Universal Music 'Free Music' Plan to Take on iTunes

[shikimo]

...I do think it is interesting that France, which is battling Apple over the length of the unlock DOES charge a royalty on blank media (CDs, DVDs) to "recoup" lost income due to pirated downloads. Seems like they are talking out of both sides of their mouths.

Any chance you could slip us a reference for this practice? It is certainly believable, but it's not marked as such in the stores here--or with online dealers--and I can't find any evidence of it in the media. It's TOTALLY possible they slipped a little charge in without telling us--French consumers are not the most well-informed bunch on the planet--and if so I'd love to learn more about it. Particularly, I'd like to know who's getting the money and how it's getting to them when I buy blank media at a giant grocery store.

 

[Drumjim85]

In between their first single and their first album, Radiohead played a rock pub here in sydney that just up the road from my house. I know a couple of people there who still talk about that night. I still here random people on the bus talk about that night.

I understand that night was booked on reputation of the band playing live in england, and while the record companies where in early stages of signing.

Their music isn't commercial by any means so getting radio airplay or print ad's or any of the trick of those multi-million marketing isn't going to push them much.

But I'd put money on idea that anyone in sydney who own more than two album having a small degree of seperation to some at that gig.

The distribution that a big company offers has done them many a favor.

But these days you don't need the record companies distribution.
Or you do, but at least understand what it is they offer.

Ok, thats just radiohead, a very different genre and very brilliant guys. But i still doubt half of the people in the US would know of them if it weren't for Creep... I mean, they were on SouthPark for crying out loud...

But also, the people were talking about more than just Radiohead.... NIN and Prince are both very mainstream...

 

[mr.666]

bwahahahah. very funny. "nurturing the likes of Microsoft's Zune media player" OMG the greed of these idoits. they are doomed. and subscrip's are doing SO well these days right? people when given the choice will want to own rather than rent.

it's like telling the driver that the quickest way to get there is to make a right, but their stubborn a$$ makes three lefts cuz they gotta be correct.

cant stand rediohead but... BRILLIANT on thir part. and i do hope more artist follow on their own sites.

 

[studiomusic]

Any chance you could slip us a reference for this practice? It is certainly believable, but it's not marked as such in the stores here--or with online dealers--and I can't find any evidence of it in the media. It's TOTALLY possible they slipped a little charge in without telling us--French consumers are not the most well-informed bunch on the planet--and if so I'd love to learn more about it. Particularly, I'd like to know who's getting the money and how it's getting to them when I buy blank media at a giant grocery store.

Yep, France taxes blank cds, blank dvds, external hard drives... anything they can (although you can buy an external case and an internal hard drive and put the two together sans tax).
I used to live close to Belgium in France, we would go there for gas (I brought over a 5.0 Mustang GT Convertible!) and cdrs. MUCH cheaper!

 

[djlu]

I guess I don't understand the business model for this at all.

Let's say I'm Microsoft selling a zune at if I'm lucky $199 with a 30% margin. I make $60. I pay this new service $5 a month, and all the music is free to my end users. After a year I used up all my profit margin and am making nothing. Anyone using my device for over a year is now causing me losses.

Why would I ever want to do this?

 

[Peace]

Still sounds like illegal anti-competitive price fixing to me.

 

[Jefe]

I wouldn't be so sure.If most of the music content leaves iTunes for other pastures people will start buying a product that can use the other service.That's what this conspiracy hopes.

Makes me wonder if the FCC or some other Fed watch-group will start looking into this could-be-illegal practice.

The iPod existed and flourished long before the iTMS. People aren't going to bail on the iPod just because they can't get music for it on iTunes. Assuming Apple continues to innovate.

 

[megfilmworks]

Any chance you could slip us a reference for this practice? It is certainly believable, but it's not marked as such in the stores here--or with online dealers--and I can't find any evidence of it in the media. It's TOTALLY possible they slipped a little charge in without telling us--French consumers are not the most well-informed bunch on the planet--and if so I'd love to learn more about it. Particularly, I'd like to know who's getting the money and how it's getting to them when I buy blank media at a giant grocery store.

Here is a link to an article announcing it in 2001.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1120199.stm
It's a personal copy tax.
I believe there is an online exemption for sellers outside of France.
Here, I found a link to the exemption:
http://subscript.bna.com/SAMPLES/ec...6f6116f9051d5c1a852572ad007ebaa4?OpenDocument

 

[shikimo]

Here is a link to an article announcing it in 2001.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1120199.stm
It's a personal copy tax.
I believe there is an online exemption for sellers outside of France.
Here, I found a link to the exemption:
http://subscript.bna.com/SAMPLES/ec...6f6116f9051d5c1a852572ad007ebaa4?OpenDocument

Right on...thanks for the links. It's great, because I've been going around asking French people about it for two days and each of them looked at me like I had grown a second head. Not one person had heard of this, including a friend who works for a store that sells storage devices. Makes me wonder what other taxes are built into some of the rather inexplicable prices around here.

EDIT: Looks like Germany is in on the game too...

 

[elbruelsio]

MY cell provider had better not even think about charging me a fee for a service I don't ever plan on using.

Strongly seconded! My cellular bill is already too high as far as I'm concerned. The scary thing would be if this subscription service actually caught on. When that happens I'm sure the next thing they would want to do is to have a tiered service. Alternative Package $5.99/month. Alternative / Classic Rock / Pop Package $14.99/month. Etc, etc. This business model works for Netflix, not for the music industry.