Now That's Good News

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Now That's Good News

EMI announced this moring that they are going to start selling higher quality unprotected files in iTunes and also through their other online retail partners. iTunes will feature the EMI catalog in 256 kpbs unprotected AAC format. That's fine with me. If I have to convert to mp3 to run on certain devices, I can do that. And I like getting higher quality for iTunes listening. These files will cost $1.29 per song and you can pay $0.30 per song to convert your existing fairplay EMI songs to this new format.

EMI also announced that they will offer their retail partners the opportunity to sell their music unprotected in AAC, MP3, or WMA formats presumably at this higher bitrate.

I am happy to pay more to get music in the format I want it in. The extra $0.30 seems to be a fair price to pay for the flexibility I've long wanted to put my music wherever I want to put it.

My big question is why Apple doesn't offer this new format (256 kbps AAC unprotected) for all the music that is currently available in unprotected mp3 on eMusic and elsewhere? That would have the unfortunate effect of putting a huge dent in eMusic's business.

But I won't buy music online in a protected format. I don't have to put up with that when I buy CDs and I refuse to put up with it online. iTunes is missing a big opportunity by keeping all its indie music in DRM format when they don't have to.

Comments (10) | Posted April 2, 2007 in Venture Capital and Technology

Comments

Apple is more monopolistic and closed than Microsoft ever was.

Just not as big, therefore not as "bad".

Posted by: Andy Swan | Apr 2, 2007 9:47:29 AM

I think EMI has the "persuasion power" (read volume or whatever) to force Apple to sell non-DRM AAC files. If Apple starts selling all files without DRM on iTune, people will start buying files without having bought an iPod! For the moment, people are buying iPod, install iTunes software and are then inclined to buy from iTunes store: all the money goes to Apple :-)

Posted by: Jean-Etienne Poirrier | Apr 2, 2007 11:01:55 AM

Steve Jobs isn't ideologically apposed to DRM. See my post on the announcement.

Posted by: steve | Apr 2, 2007 11:27:25 AM

I think the hurdles for the rest of music available in unprotected mp3 are more logistical than anything else. It's going to take until May to release EMI's catalog in unprotected AAC. If the rest of Apple's unprotected music is not available then, I suspect it will only be a matter of time.

Posted by: apseek | Apr 2, 2007 2:10:50 PM

$1.29 is still way too much to pay for a song... I now have access to so much more music than I used to... so, for me, supply is way up... and I have so much less time to listen to it, b/c I have so many more forms of entertainment, lower demand... As an econ minor, I'm pretty sure I know what that's supposed to mean. Instead the price of music hasn't moved in years.

Posted by: Charlie | Apr 2, 2007 2:16:50 PM

I have just read a rumor that eMusic is about to announce that they are being sold - most likely to Amazon. It will be interesting to see what changes occur with them if this deal is completed.

Posted by: Dominic | Apr 2, 2007 3:23:48 PM

Steve did say that he expects 50% of the music in the iTunes store to be DRM free by the end of the year, I could well imagine that one large step towards that would be extending this deal to the independent labels.

Shannon

Posted by: Shannon Clark | Apr 2, 2007 3:29:45 PM

Dominic - I sure hope that rumor is wrong. I'm a huge fan of eMusic, both for its price and the fact that it's DRM-free, and I don't trust Amazon (or any larger company) to keep either of these intact.

Posted by: Steve | Apr 2, 2007 4:12:45 PM

Looks like my comment above was lucky in its timing, and Apple getting "big enough" to be "bad":

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8O8O8MO0&show_article=1

Posted by: Andy Swan | Apr 2, 2007 6:49:48 PM

This is the next nail in the coffin of Microsoft's closed, proprietary WMA audio format. WMA is dead. Thank GOD.

Posted by: madgunde | Apr 3, 2007 3:00:13 PM

A VC

Musings of a VC in NYC