[elCapiton]

The logical conclusion is they are all idiots. How can they sue that woman and get ~$220,000 USD for sharing 24 songs and then claim the want to make it basically free. Now this is only one label compared the the RIAA group of labels but they are all the same.

[fribhey]

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So, in other words, the labels want more money and aren't happy being locked into the iTMS pricing scheme.

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yes they are not happy and yes they want more money.... but i see this as loss in power. if the labels lose their distribution power, which esentially record labels are just distributors, then bands will see no reason to even use them. record labels used to be the source and now they are quickly becoming the middle man. they are doing less and want more money. the first big band to release on their own terms was radiohead, then trent reznor (nine inch nails) announced he is no longer associated with a label, then oasis and jamiroquia announced they were going to follow radiohead's path... and then yesterday madonna announced she was signing a deal with a promotion company (not a record label) to distribute and promote her next 3 albums. all of those bands/artists made their announcements in the last 2 weeks, the tide is turning against the traditional record label system and the labels are losing power quickly.
it's funny that universal is scrambling to try and form their own digital distribution system now. they have had many opportunities in the last 8+ years to do something and they refused to and now it's bitting them in the ass.

[fribhey]

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The logical conclusion is they are all idiots. How can they sue that woman and get ~$220,000 USD for sharing 24 songs and then claim the want to make it basically free. Now this is only one label compared the the RIAA group of labels but they are all the same.

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blame the uninformed jury for that fiasco. the RIAA didn't ask for any amount of money, it was the jury that decided that each song that the woman shared was valued at over $9,000 which came out to a total of just under $220,000.

[leicaman]

Jean-Bernard Lvy's use of the word obscene drips with hypocrisy. The way they treat artists makes Apple look like a charity.
Just watch as NiN and Madonna and Radiohead leave the labels behind in a mass exodus away from their virtual slavery for artists.
Apple may have to change the iTMS business model to accommodate how artists will want to sell their music, but they have a much better chance at doing it with the labels being the real devil in this industry. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

[Jamus]

The music execs are getting desperate to get the oh-so-wonderful subscription model pushed into consumers heads. Blah!

[Wings]

If I read the article correctly, "free music" means free to the consumer (right), not that they plan to give anything away for nothing. They actually expect to collect $5 PER MONTH from the MP3 player manufacturers, can you believe that? $60 bucks a year! So who is going to pay that, Apple? Sony? Samsung? Not on your life. What they're trying to do is to force the subscription model down everyone's throats, and they expect you and I to pay it if we're to keep listening to their "free music".
These guys are really, really out of touch with reality.

[Immeral]

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Apple may have to change the iTMS business model to accommodate how artists will want to sell their music, but they have a much better chance at doing it with the labels being the real devil in this industry. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

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There is a great company that is trying to work this angle for independent artists called CD Baby (cdbaby.net). They take a much smaller cut (9%), no soul selling contracts and they can post your music to iTunes for a small fee ($35).

[piccologato]

What you are missing is the music companies want more money--for themselves, not the actual music creators.
Apple has created a simple system. Universal wants to obfuscate it up so you think you are getting something free but are actually paying more. Its a time honored system.
Lets hope people are smart enough to stay away.

[rgonzalez]

typical greed dumb-aes...let them go, they'll come up with one of those "beautiful" websites that are ussually un-usable with a whole bunch of music and exhorbitant prices that eople will prefer to "find" for free on the internet...sme-old-sotry again...we all go back to the old days of Music-file-sharing...remeber how it was before iTunes...!
Ridiculous...

[randombob]

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If the new service were to offer DRM-free songs it would make it easier for it to target a wide range of music players.

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Like what? The iPod, the iPod ... and, um, the iPod? Doesn't Apple own more than seventy percent of the player market? Seven out of ten players isn't enough, though. These companies want to sell to all ten.

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Meanwhile Sony said recently that it would abandon its proprietary ATRAC copy-protection technology, and add Microsofts Windows Media technology to its music players instead.

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And Sony is doing the opposite. They are abandoning iPods altogether and going with the DRM scheme that works only on the few players that use Windows DRM. Good plan.

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... which aims to counter what the music industry sees as Apples overly stringent restrictions on the way they can market their music.

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Read: We want to charge more for the songs you actually want to hear, and we won't give one extra penny to the artist.
Why isn't Apple courting the artists to sell directly through iTunes? Here's the pitch: "We'll market your music on the iTS and take 29 cents for each track. You'll keep the rest." The artists would be making TONS of money compared to whatever contract they currently have with the major labels.

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Agreed. That's exactly what I was thinking, "why doesn't Apple just become the new-for-the-21st-century Music Label?"
They're primed, they have the placement & capability to market the artists in the next-gen formats (online sales, mp4, etc). They have proven themselves well, they could probably do something like that and be viable. Lots of other music stores (you know, the ones that claim to be "free," because they don't have music anyone is interested in) do similar; they offer a whole bunch of free tracks from unknown artists that are trying to get discovered. Apple could adopt that philosphy and expand iTunes' role.
They'd just have to find a way to promise marketing & discovery to the artists. Established names don't need marketing, they just need to be available to purchase. The hardest part of being the new record label industry would be trying to convince new talent that you'll find them a market (and then succeed in that endeavor).

[luckylindy]

Hasn't it been widely reported that Apple makes pennies on the sale of each song, and that the reason they do is because they make it up on the sale of iPods (hence the 'closed system' complaints)? Seems to me that the flexible pricing these guys seek is to rip more bucks from consumers on the newer stuff, and entice anything they can on the older stuff. OK, so they are trying to create a new online biz model...yet let's look at the brick and mortar stores..new CD: 15.99...5 year-old CD: 15.99...really old CD...9.99 (sometimes). Gee, consumers are REALLY going to warm to this new approach.

[tmedia1]

As long as it's DRM-free, I'm all for it. I've started buying my music from Amazon since its DRM free. I've vowed to stop buying DRM music because I should be able to play my music on any device I choose and anywhere I want, I should also be able to freely share my music within the confines of my home and family. Apple DRM doesn't allow me to do this. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif

[Grapho]

What really cracks me up about all this is that it almost seems like everybody wants Apple to fail.
First it was widely stipulated that the iPod was grossly over priced.
Once that was debunked we got the theory that cell phones would eventually and definitely kill the iPod. Well, now we know that is not going to happen.
We also get continuos announcements about iPod killers and now iPhone killers too. The sad part is that the only thing they end up killing is people expectations. The new Zune for example. It can sync though a WiFi network only if it is plugged to a power source. So you do wireless with a wire. Now that is innovation!
Music labels are going to die. They are no longer needed for recording, they are no longer needed for distribution or production, and they are marginally needed for promotion purposes. They will probably sill have clout for all the older material that they have under contract. But that will also eventually fissile as demand for this older music also shrivels. If this dose not connote desperation from Universal, I don't know what does.

[lwdesign]

Universal is upset that Apple is making an "exhorbitant" 29 cents on each song sold on iTunes. Let's see, how much does Universal make per song when they have to package CDs and distribute them to record stores whose sales are diminishing (I've heard) each month. Apple is probably making the labels more money than ever, with the most popular music player by far, yet Universal is off on a crusade to sell songs to the less than 30 percent of the market who don't own iPods, and specifically NOT to iPod owners by incorporating Windows Media technology. How does this make any sense?
Why not keep the iPod market in place, make lots of money from it, AND create OTHER distribution services for the smaller market of non-iPod owners? Wouldn't that make the labels even more money? Why bite the hand of the company that's selling billions of their songs to iPod owners who make up the vast majority of the market?
By doing this, they're actually telling iPod owners that they all have to buy another music player! What arrogance! Consumers vote wth their wallets, and the votes overwhelmingly favor the iPod and the iTunes store, so why buck the system when the labels could simply sit back and rake in the profits? The situation seems to be about control. Universal seems terrified of not being in control rather than profiting off of the new wave of iTunes distribution.
I believe an earlier poster was correct. I think that more and more artists will start dealing directly with Apple and fire their labels, choosing PR companies to do their promotion instead. The day of the big labels may be numbered, and this probably is scaring the wadooky out of them, hence the rise of desparate and senseless acts.