Print - Apple Faces Biggest iTunes Challenge Yet

After dominating the online music service business for over two years, Apple's seminal iTunes Music Store service is about to face it's biggest challenge yet. Unexpectedly, that challenge is not coming from Microsoft or its partners, but rather from the music industry that provided Apple with the contracts it needed to offer digital music to consumers. Apparently, the music industry is tired of Apple's pricing schemes and they'd like to see consumers pay more for newer songs, and less for older songs. Apple is resisting, for now. But the outcome of this battle will likely determine how quickly digital music sales grow in the near future.

To date, Apple's success with iTunes seems astonishing: As of early this month, consumers have purchased over 500 million tracks from the service, and the recent launch of iTunes in Japan saw customers there purchase over 1 million tracks in just four days. The company commands 75 percent of digital music sales, and, thanks to its successful iPod franchise (21 million units sold so far), it owns 80 percent of the MP3 player market as well.

Impressed? As it turns out, those figures are just a drop in the bucket compared to audio CD sales and, interestingly, portable CD player sales, respectively. Total audio CD sales in 2004 were over 3.5 billion units (for comparison, most CDs include 5 to 10 tracks). And total portable audio CD player sales last year alone were approximately 19 million units, and they're expected to hit almost 18 million units sold in 2005.

Put simply, music is big business. And with Apple creating a digital audio monoculture, the music industry is getting ready to fight back. Curiously, their plans are more in line with consumer needs that are Apple's. The music industry would like to see Apple make two changes. First, they would like individual song pricing to be variable. New songs, they say, could cost as much as $1.49, while old songs could cost much less than the 99 cents that Apple is currently charging for all songs, regardless of demand. Apple thinks consistent pricing is more important, despite the fact that music has always been sold at a variable per-track rate, based on demand.

Second, the music industry would like Apple to either embrace Microsoft's rival Windows Media Audio (WMA) format--which is used by all non-Apple online music services and MP3 players--or open up its own proprietary format--Protected AAC--to the competition. The music industry feels that the current bifurcation between WMA and Protected AAC in the market creates confusion for consumers and is, thus, slowing the adoption rate of digital music. This is the sort of confusion that slowed the adoption of personal video recorders in the early 1980's and recordable DVD devices over the past several years.

They actually have a point. But critics argue that the music industry shouldn't be messing with the sole successful digital music business model. And, after all, Apple is the company that jumpstarted online music sales. When CEO Steve Jobs first approached these companies two years ago, none of them had a digital music strategy at all, beyond trying to sue file sharing networks into oblivion.

Part of the issue is jealousy. Because Apple makes little or no money on music sold from the iTunes Music Store--70 cents of each sale goes to the record companies, while the rest is split between the artists and various marketing and licensing costs--the company is focused on using the service to bolster sales of iPods, each of which is sold at quite a premium. Record companies don't see a cent from the sale of iPods, which some find untenable.

Later this year, the recording industry has to renew its contracts with Apple. If they decide to boycott iTunes--an unlikely event, given its popularity--Apple will essentially have to close up shop because the company are its primary source of content. But Steve Jobs is known for his tough bargaining tactics, as ex-HP CEO Carly Fiorina is painfully aware. This time, my money is on Jobs and Apple to carry the day.

Meanwhile, Microsoft's challenge to iTunes and the iPod remains as ineffectual as ever. One of the key players in the MP3 space, Rio, recently announced that it was exiting the market completely, after losing tens of millions of dollars a year on the venture despite decent unit sales. Online music services such as Napster continue to languish with few subscribers, and the recent launch of Yahoo! Music Unlimited--which provides high-quality WMA-based songs for a surprisingly low cost--hasn't gotten much press. Microsoft continues to make promises about future services and devices, but thus far Apple simply dominates the market it jumpstarted. It's unlikely that will change any time soon.

"...while I don't totally believe that Apple has what it takes to unseat Microsoft, God would I love to see that happen." --Paul Thurrott Let the games begin!

Nothing can stop the ITMS and iPod phenomenon that is sweeping the country, not any greedy record industry fat cats and definitely not silly Napster, Yahoo Music, Real or Creative! As for Micro$oft, they are irrelevant in the online digital music business. Don't worry about Apple, the Record companies are just incensed because Apple is making billions off the iPod and they aren't getting a penny of it! They'll cave soon, if it weren't for Apple, nobody would be buying music online!

"The iTunes Music Store...is now officially toast" -Paul Thurrot, on the debut of BuyMusic.com

i can't help but laugh at the people who think music sales are relvant to the computing industry. why are we even talking about this and then not about movie sales, or ebook sales, or any other product then. bottom line is the winners will always be the big record companies and i really don't care who feeds them the pie. apple, microsoft, CDs, DVDs etc.

People seem to be missing this lovely story: http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/#082905pub Looks to me like the subscription services could be dead before they even get to renegotiate any deals. "Music subscription services and publishers are officially stalled in their royalty negotiations, despite the fact that several companies have been in the market for years. While music services and record labels have ironed out a royalty agreement for master recordings, discussions with publishers over underlying compositions have failed to produce anything substantive. Now, those talks appear to be completely stuck, with groups like the National Music Publishers' Association (NMPA) and the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) announcing a stalemate. The publishing consortium is reportedly demanding more than a 16 percent share of overall music subscription revenues, far greater than the 6.9 percent offered by DiMA, which represents the interests of various subscription companies. For new entrants like Yahoo Music Unlimited and existing players like Rhapsody from RealNetworks, the stalemate creates an uncertain financial terrain. While publishers are not threatening to take legal action against the various subscription stores, each service could face a massive retroactive payment if and when a compromise is reached. Publishers and music subscription services have been unable to reach an agreement for about four years. Still, the highly public airing indicates a growing dissatisfaction among publishers with the lack of progress. Going forward, publishers are likely to rattle the cage a bit more if things remain stagnant, with threats of lawsuits and hard deadlines potentially forcing an agreement in the future. For now, publishers seem to be playing it soft, issuing a warning shot to gain some leverage in the negotiation."

"The music industry would like to see Apple make two changes. First, they would like individual song pricing to be variable. New songs, they say, could cost as much as $1.49,...Second, the music industry would like Apple to either embrace Microsoft's rival Windows Media Audio (WMA) format. The music industry feels that the current bifurcation between WMA and Protected AAC in the market creates confusion for consumers and is, thus, slowing the adoption rate of digital music. This is the sort of confusion that slowed the adoption of personal video recorders in the early 1980's and recordable DVD devices over the past several years ." Paul makes it sound like the music industry is trying to be more "consumer-friendly" than Apple by allowing "flexible" pricing schemes while Apple is being the bad guy. Now given the history of the major music industry companies, does anyone believe that they are on the side of the consumer on this issue? In actuallity, "flexible" pricing is a euphemism for higher prices for popular tracks. On the other hand, Apple, and certain music industry supporters of Apple's strategy, believe that the online music industry is too new to be pushing up prices too aggressively. As for the claim that the industry wants Apple to accept the WMA format because of concerns about "confusion for consumers" or "slowing the adoption rate for digital music", that's total BS. Apple's iPod line has a dominant market share (+75%?) while WMA is struggling to gain acceptance. There is no "confusion" among consumers about whether AAC or WMA is the dominant standard. And the claim that a struggle between AAC and WMA is "slowing the adoption rate for digital music" is ridiculous. WMA is slowing down Apple's music effort as much as a fly hitting a speeding Mack truck.

I would love it if Apple would open up their own music label and offer more percentage to musicians... we'll see how many artist jump ship LOL

The article about this stated that two of the major labels were considering the variable pricing model, while the other two were not. It stated that music executives doubted they would convince Jobs and be able to threaten removing their songs to get him to change the pricing structure. Remember that Apple this time around has a lot more clout. This is just the music industry freaking out over the fact that Apple is slowly making them irrelevant. Why sign up for a record label when you could just sign up with a distribution service like CD Baby (as My Chemical Romance does) which will send your music to iTunes and other stores? As for the invented "confusion" over music formats, there isn't any. iTunes and AAC are the de facto standard. All the whining about incompatible formats and "confusion" comes from the competitors who are mad that consumers are choosing Apple over them. They are the ones using an esoteric format that few use (WMA). No consumers are confused by anything. They want iPods and iTunes.

I will never buy music online. If I want music, go buy a CD. Much less something with DRM like apple or WMA.

"I will never buy music online. If I want music, go buy a CD. Much less something with DRM like apple or WMA." I was the same way two months ago, but three things changed my mind: 1.) Most of the major artists have their music encoded from the original 24-bit masters, not CDs. There's this clarity and "shimmer" that's not there on the CD version. It gives a lot of headroom to the music. I was listening to Type O Negative all weekend bought from the music store, and it's incredible. Definitely check out any Nine Inch Nails as well, especially The Downward Spiral Deluxe Edition (assuming you're into those kinds of music). 2.) Apple's DRM is so open, it's hard to run into any limitations (if you want to burn more than three CDs, just recreate the playlist again...it's really easy stuff). 3.) The whole thing is just a really nice experience. You don't have to go out to the local CD store. All the music you could want is right there in the iTunes window with full-quality 30 second previews of every song. I only got started because I bought a $15 music card at Wal-mart just to check it out, thinking it would be a one-time thing. I've bought 1.5GB of music from iTunes since then with no sign of stopping.

""The iTunes Music Store...is now officially toast" -Paul Thurrot, on the debut of BuyMusic.com" That's nothing...on InternetNexus, he said podcasting was a fad nobody would care about in a month. Then iTunes 4.9 came out. :)

"I would love it if Apple would open up their own music label and offer more percentage to musicians... we'll see how many artist jump ship LOL " They can't, at least use the name @pple because there is already an Apple record label.

>They can't, at least use the name @pple because there is already an Apple record label. But they sure can under the name iTunes Music Studio/store (iTMS) make you wonder if a spinoff is in the works. The Labels are making a deadly move. The Labels may think they are messing with Apple. Truth be known to the Labels they are messing with the customers. We (the customer) have selected Apple's DRM as in is a fair to both you and us. We have selected Apples model as it is simple, 1 type players both platforms work seemlessly, and tunes for .99.

"he said podcasting was a fad nobody would care about in a month. Then iTunes 4.9 came out. :)" And people still don't care. Outside of the tech universe and obsessive iPod fanatics, podcasting is a weak medium, and will be for quite some time. I use the average person in the street metaphor as an example here. If you asked the average person in the street how many podcasts that they have listened too, what do you honestly think that you would hear? I don't think the average person knows or cares about podcasting. Look, most average people barely even know what Tivo does, and they have been around for years. The truth is that podcasing is not relevant right now. Only time will tell. And no doubt the record labels are freaking out. But haven't they been freaking out for years now? Or was the whole RIAA thing just acting normal? To their benefit, CD sales really are still brisk. The average car has a CD player or changer, and does not support MP3 or any other format. CD walkman style devices still sell like hotcakes (and why not, when you can get one for less than $30).

"And people still don't care. Outside of the tech universe and obsessive iPod fanatics, podcasting is a weak medium, and will be for quite some time." You're right. CBS, ABC, CNN, Ebert and Roeper, Rush Limbaugh, and many other high-profile entities have nothing to do with podcasting. LOL. "I use the average person in the street metaphor as an example here. If you asked the average person in the street how many podcasts that they have listened too, what do you honestly think that you would hear?" Most people on the street don't even know what version of Windows they're running despite it showing on the screen during every bootup. I don't think anybody's saying podcasting is gripping the culture, but it is booming and growing and represents the next generation of radio. "The truth is that podcasing is not relevant right now. Only time will tell." BS. Podcasting is incredibly relevant. "And no doubt the record labels are freaking out. But haven't they been freaking out for years now? Or was the whole RIAA thing just acting normal? To their benefit, CD sales really are still brisk. The average car has a CD player or changer, and does not support MP3 or any other format." But that's changing. Cars are even shipping with iPod docks. "CD walkman style devices still sell like hotcakes (and why not, when you can get one for less than $30)." CDs are dead. People want to carry 5,000 songs around with them with no skipping and built-in cover art. Coming soon--videos.

It's time to start boycotting the labels whom won't stick with the .99c single and "fairplay". Stupid move Sony/BMI.

"That's nothing...on InternetNexus, he said podcasting was a fad nobody would care about in a month. Then iTunes 4.9 came out. :)" What does the release of iTunes 4.9 have to do with whether or not podcasting is a fad? Personally, I don't think it's a fad. Internet radio has been around forever, and it ain't going nowhere. Remember, podcasting doesn't require an iPod, or even a portable music player (regardless of what Apple and it's minions want you to think). From Wikipedia: The term podcasting can be misleading since neither podcasting nor listening to podcasts requires an iPod or any portable music player. For that reason, various writers have suggested reinterpreting the letters POD to create "backronyms" such as "Personal On-Demand."

Yeah, lets boycott everyone that refuses to use Apple's DRM. That makes sense... DRM = Evil DRM + Microsoft = Evil DRM + Real = Evil DRM + Yahoo! = Evil DRM + Apple = I LOVE DRM YOU SHOULD ALL USE APPLE DRM YAY GO APPLE!!111 You forgot Sony's DRM, and the OMA DRM and all the others DRM's. All are evil, but so are some people. To play fair one must get the best deal out of the DRM's. So far fairplay seems to be the choice. Anyhow, if you don't like DRM don't buy drm content. DM and all have sold very well on iTunes, I think Sony's DRM is just increasing iTMS sales.

That wasn't meant to be all-inclusive. "To play fair one must get the best deal out of the DRM's. So far fairplay seems to be the choice." Ah, so choose what seems to be a "lesser of evils"? Go from the ALL DRM IS EVIL, AND WE SHOULD BOYCOTT mindset to the... since Apple's doing it it must be okay minday? Or am I misreading/misinterpreting something?

>>From Wikipedia: The term podcasting can be misleading since neither podcasting nor listening to podcasts requires an iPod or any portable music player. For that reason, various writers have suggested reinterpreting the letters POD to create "backronyms" such as "Personal On-Demand." Wow! Now Wikipedia wants to re-write history! Paul, from your censorship, Wikipedia's re-write of history to the music labels price increase. (Paul's remark,its not an increase if the lower some prices). Come on boy get off your *** and stop calling yourself a journalist. Go out and be one.

Or am I misreading/misinterpreting something? Yes, you are misinterpreting something. With fairplay you can remove the DRM. You might not like having to buy with DRM, but those whom hold the rights have the same right to be paid. Since the DRM allows you away to strip it your rights to fair use have not been trounced on. Sure it a pain. But with a virtual c.d. thanks M$ it very easy. Want better anything? You can get it. But it seems you don't.

"2.) Apple's DRM is so open, it's hard to run into any limitations (if you want to burn more than three CDs, just recreate the playlist again...it's really easy stuff)." Are you recommending that people bypass the DRM? You know here in the states, that's illegal. If you're going to go to the trouble to buy music from iTMS, only to bypass the DRM, why don't you just download it illegally to begin with? Just because it's "open", doesn't mean it's not a pain-in-the-*** either. Its nice how they use their advantage to lock people out. Reminds me of Microso.. Oh wait, no it doesn't! Apple would never do anything evil!

"Wow! Now Wikipedia wants to re-write history!" Wikipedia isn't trying to re-write history. They're ackowledging that some people would prefer to call it something other than "podcasting" or change the meaning of the "POD" in it. Perhaps you should actually read the entire description of "podcasting" at Wikipedia. Here's a link:

>>"2.) Apple's DRM is so open, it's hard to run into any limitations (if you want to burn more than three CDs, just recreate the playlist again...it's really easy stuff)." If you want to burn more than 3 CD's you don't need to change your play list in iTunes. I thinks thats a Windows or Napster limit. Poor agreement. They did not proctect the consumer. >>Are you recommending that people bypass the DRM? You know here in the states, that's illegal. If you're going to go to the trouble to buy music from iTMS, only to bypass the DRM, why don't you just download it illegally to begin with? Because its not illegal! Falls under fair use. Come on get in the game. By, By Sony and BMI. The artist and the consumers no longer need the labels or RIAA. The games over and Apple moved us to the finish line. No more Limo's for the fat cats as the food is cut off. Arist are about to recive their fair share. Thanks to Apple.

"Yes, you are misinterpreting something. With fairplay you can remove the DRM." What the heck does that have to do with what I said. I didn't say you couldn't remove the DRM. My thoughts were that the Apple cheerleaders are now "okay" with DRM, since Apple's behind the wheel.

>>Are you recommending that people bypass the DRM? You know here in the states, that's illegal. If you're going to go to the trouble to buy music from iTMS, only to bypass the DRM, why don't you just download it illegally to begin with? Well you were wrong. We are not cheerleaders Apples or any ones else. We like our music and will pay fair for it. We don't like the greed that the music companies are trying to put on us. Fair use and Fair play are our best bet. Let it be known we will not put up with kicking us (the consumer) around. A fight with iTunes is an attack on music consumers.

Wikipedia isn't trying to re-write history. They're ackowledging that some people would prefer to call it something other than "podcasting" Okay, and to some people Paul is not a "Journalist" don't see that in Wikipedia, do you? LOL. Censorship is censorship, re-writing history is re-writting history and a price hike by the labels is a price hike. No matter how you see it. Wikipedia or Paul will tell you how they would like you to see it. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, or wants more than .99c for a singe, it may be "Al Gore and the uncounted votes" but it most likely a duck.

"If you really owned the songs you could sell them to someone else or do with them as you like. With iTunes DRM you have a limited use license, that Apple could modify at any time. Sorry to have to give you the facts." "why not buy music from web sites that skip the RIAA and give a fair share to artists." Apple FairPlay != Fair To Consumers (note that != means not). Thanks Google.

>What's fair use? Whatever Apple says it is... sounds fair enough, eh? No that would be "fairplay" Apple's DRM. Fair Use is defined in U.S. Law. Thanks for playing. Go back to the RIAA or whatever label you came from. The consumer has spoken.

>"If you really owned the songs you could sell them to someone else or do with them as you like. With iTunes DRM you have a limited use license, that Apple could modify at any time. Sorry to have to give you the facts." ******* in my pants, laughing at you. If anybody really owned land... Sure I own the Brooklyn bridge. Let's get this clear. No one owns anything. Whiteman. Your payment is the right to hear and enjoy limited use of the tune you pick. The terms are covered when you bought the tune.

"What does the release of iTunes 4.9 have to do with whether or not podcasting is a fad?" Because iTunes 4.9 introduced built-in podcasting features, dummy. "Remember, podcasting doesn't require an iPod, or even a portable music player (regardless of what Apple and it's minions want you to think)." Nobody "wants" you to think anything. But with iPods being over 80% of the market, podcasting is a simple and fun term for it. Way better than Microsoft's "blogcasting" (snicker). "From Wikipedia: The term podcasting can be misleading since neither podcasting nor listening to podcasts requires an iPod or any portable music player. For that reason, various writers have suggested reinterpreting the letters POD to create "backronyms" such as "Personal On-Demand."" I can't think of anything more stupid than the above paragraph. ROFL.

""If you really owned the songs you could sell them to someone else or do with them as you like. With iTunes DRM you have a limited use license, that Apple could modify at any time. Sorry to have to give you the facts." "why not buy music from web sites that skip the RIAA and give a fair share to artists." Apple FairPlay != Fair To Consumers (note that != means not). Thanks Google." Uh, you can't make copies of a normal audio CD and sell that either, dummy. I love Micro$oft trolls, so angry that their crappy, esoteric "WMA" format is a **** in the wind now.

"i can't help but laugh at the people who think music sales are relvant to the computing industry. why are we even talking about this and then not about movie sales, or ebook sales, or any other product then." It's not about music sales, it's about the control of online digital media. Apple is using iTunes to sell iPods, Macs, and spread their digital technologies. Digital media is the future, and Apple is leading the way, and Microsoft knows the repercussions.

"Let's get this clear. No one owns anything." That's right hippie. I recommend you go to your local car dealership and "steal" a car, and then try that BS on the cops. "limited use" Limited use is not fair use. I think the nice people on MacObserver said it correctly like this: FairPlay is basically shareware for music. Fair use is only possible with non-commercial parters. "Uh, you can't make copies of a normal audio CD and sell that either, dummy." In certian circumstances you can actually (e.g. if you're the author, if the author says you can, that sorta thing). Thanks mr. generalization :P. "I can't think of anything more stupid than the above paragraph. ROFL." I understand why people don't want podcasting (gasp! something that can be done without an iPod!) to be iPod centric. I actually prefer blogcasting over podcasting, because blogcasting doesn't contain an advertisement for a product you don't even need to perform the action.

Outside of the tech universe and obsessive iPod fanatics, podcasting is a weak medium --- What garbage.. there are over 20 million iPod users.. which means these people use itunes all the time, which means they have access to all these podcasts... I for one have about 8 or 9 subscriptions running...all because of iTunes

"The consumer has spoken." The consumer hasn't spoke. The consumer doesn't care that much. People want their music, and Apple provides it to them (with DRM). Apple tries to bundle QuickTime /w iTMS. iTMS has a clean layout, and it's semi-inexpensive. I'll give Apple that much. iTMS isn't the piece of crap that RealPlayer is.

"I love Micro$oft trolls, so angry that their crappy, esoteric "WMA" format is a **** in the wind now." I hope you're not referring to me, considering i've never been much of a supporter of WMA. I prefer MP3s, since they're DRM free (I would go for ogg-vorbis, but it's not catching on). That, and they're popular.

>>"The consumer has spoken." >The consumer hasn't spoke. The consumer doesn't care that much. People want their music, and Apple provides it to them (with DRM). Apple tries to bundle QuickTime /w iTMS. iTMS has a clean layout, and it's semi-inexpensive. I'll give Apple that much. iTMS isn't the piece of crap that RealPlayer is. If the consumer cares that much or not, the consumer has spoken. Quicktime or no Quicktime, Gates new why he had to "Knife the baby". But that did not happen and the game is over. Now comes the big question. How much longer do we want the "fat cats" (labels) in charge? Lets face facts: the labels are no longer needed. We the consumer are in charge. We thank Apple for putting this power back in our hands. It still come down to: "Its all about the music". Thank you Mr. jobs. For those about to rock we salute you! In other words the middle men are no longer needed. Its becoming very easy for a band to go to the consumer. The best part is a big fat check for the band from iTMS signed by s. jobs. You still don't get it? Do you? WMA's and the rest of the DRM's are way to tight. The sub services (Napster, Real, Music Match, and others) owe a lot of money to the rights holders (a.k.a. the bands and some others) it time for them to pay up or get out of the game. Did you every wonder way Apple did not license their DRM? Could it be that they are under contract by a label or two not to do so? As or your shot at Realplayer, anyone in the IT field will tell you RM has the largest and best ***** collection around. Real still hold an Ace against Microsoft. Can you say anti-trust, no settlement? I thought you could.

"Many outlets have mistakenly reported that the recording industry wants to raise the price of tracks at iTunes. This is incorrect. They want variable pricing. Some songs--especially "golden oldies" would cost much less than 99 cents. Meanwhile, in-demand new tracks might cost as much as $1.49. Paul, Paul, Paul! A 1.49 is 50% more than .99c. How is this incorrect? Please! Your no longer on holiday. Most of us could care less if your a "fat cat" or not. Much less, where you plan on going on holiday next. I and the rest of us readers wish you and your family the best of times on holiday. That said Paul, we would like to hear from the other side. Truly, we want you to dig around. In this case we would ask you to call a few bands , pick up the phone and call a few rights holders, don't shoot from the hip or a press release. A statement from /. or a press release with your opinion does not make you a "journalist". Come on Paul we all know you are better than this! Show us you a "journalist".

I'm so happy that jobs and apple finally found something they're good at. All those years of trying to beat Microsoft with Mac's and OSX and now they made it! They should just leave the computer business and become the sole distributor of online music. Then all the poor mac-users will get the benefits of windows (vista) and the mountain of software available for it. They will be shocked by the amount of available software after all these years of only being able to use Photoshop and those little apple applications (you know, all this "ixxxxx"-Stuff).

>Then all the poor mac-users will get the benefits of windows (vista) and the mountain of software available for it. ROTFLMAO. You must mean the sea of Ad-ware/spy-ware and virus when using a Windows OS. Today is tuesday and we all in "windows land" knows what that means. LOL. Have fun installing your mountain of updates (a.k.a Microsofts patch tuesday).

Yeah, right! We'll see what happens wenn osX (or Linux for that matter) is used by more than 500 People worldwide! We'll talk when the user base of your little os has reached 10.000.000! But I'm pretty sure we'll never get this far! And it doesn't matter anyway because i'm sure that osx will never need any security patches or updates. It's just perfect the way it is. You know the reason why there is so many spy- and adware and viruses and other **** for windows? Because it's used by a relevant number of people. Sure you won't write a virus for some obscure os that runs only on beautifully (granted) designed machines from some online music distributor! Why would you? To scare 500 People? It's far easier to scare 250 million dumb windows users who are unable to install a firewall and an av solution.

>You know the reason why there is so many spy- and adware and viruses and other **** for windows? Because it's used by a relevant number of people. Yeah thats it. Keep up the good work Sherlock!

Paul, am agreed with others that this was a poor effort, mostly from lacking much new info on a topic so hot, yet badly reported on. An honest question; Could (technically politically & economically) any kind of coop OS be co-created by an @pple$oft... or $$$$$oft-end@pple? hmmmm... "Agave-XP" (XP=10%) Not enough kick? Ok, "Cyclops"? iFor.1 would TREASURE the day the armys of lite and dawk united. Or would "Cyclops" turn into an all seeing eye breathed in flame that only wide-hearted folk (Linux?) save us from?

As an independent musician that sells my songs on iTunes (thanks to CD Baby being a iTunes client for musicians). I & other musicians get paid for each download 70 cents (less the CD Baby 7 cents fee) on each iTunes 99 cent download. This is fair to musicians & to the buyers that don't want to pay $16 for a CD with only 1 or 2 songs. Although it may not be unlimited downloads like others have, at least the artist gets 70 cents per download. I don't believe that Napster is actually paying musicians 70 cents for each download of the supposed unlimited downloads for a monthly fee. Unlimited plans I think are hurtful to the musicians/songwriters & they are skirting around by not paying them by claiming the client doesn't own them but merely renting them while they are monthly subscribers. Support iTunes! They are actually honestly paying those who own the rights of the songs whether it be an independent artist or a record company.

"Paul, am agreed with others that this was a poor effort, mostly from lacking much new info on a topic so hot, yet badly reported on. " Like all of his other articles lately. Come on Paul. Start thinking and researching what you are writing about rather than just the mindless gibberish you have been submitting lately.

"What garbage.. there are over 20 million iPod users" And how many are actually podcasting? The thing to remember is that podcasting is still growing at this point, but you Apple people think that this is some how changing the world. I use RSS every day, and it has improved my ability to get information, but no where do I actually think that it is changing the world. No one really knows what RSS or podcasting is. Leave it at that. "Now comes the big question. How much longer do we want the "fat cats" (labels) in charge? Lets face facts: the labels are no longer needed. We the consumer are in charge. We thank Apple for putting this power back in our hands. It still come down to: "Its all about the music". Thank you Mr. jobs. For those about to rock we salute you!" Have you fallen off your rocker? I hope you were being sarcastic. While I don't like the record companies that much either, they are still very relevant. Do you really think you are in charge somehow? Seriously. The big music labels run the show, and the RIAA helps them out with their dominance. While we can hope that this power will be lessened, I won't hold my breath.

EVERYBODY LISTEN UP. I am sick of this "competing format" nonsense. Buy a song on iTunes, burn it to a CD, then rip it to the computer as an MP3. It works just as well with WMA. Buy a song from Napster, Walmart.com, Rhapsody, whatever...burn 15-20 tracks to CD, then rip them as MP3s. And guess what, everyone likes MP3s, cause you can put them on Rios, on iPods, or any MP3 player(duh). Thank you for reading.

">You know the reason why there is so many spy- and adware and viruses and other **** for windows? Because it's used by a relevant number of people. Yeah thats it. Keep up the good work Sherlock!" Thats the truth. What is the real difference between the security vulnerabilities listed in the most recent update bundle for OS X, which allows remote access and privilege escalation, and the updates to Windows, which allows remote access and privilege escalation? Nothing really, so it must be the relevance of the OS in the marketplace. Do you waste your time and hope it gets to infect 3% of the computer users, or do you do something that can potentially infect 90% of the market?

"I would love it if Apple would open up their own music label and offer more percentage to musicians... we'll see how many artist jump ship LOL " This is a great idea ... no, really .. a great idea !! Apple has the cash and resorces to make this work. Hope your reading this Steve!

Lawsuit... lawsuit...lawsuit... ??? Can`t understand this response? Artists contracts are renewed about every 5 years, depending on the type of contract they are in. Once a contract has expired a artist has can change music label. Don`t see any lawsuits here????

"For that reason, various writers have suggested reinterpreting the letters POD to create "backronyms" such as "Personal On-Demand." Yeah, Scoble must be writing for wikipedia now.

I knew Apple was infringing on Creative's Patents. I hope they get their *** sued off so bad they never recover. Then all these stupid freakos will need to find something else to do besides come here and bug me. And really, shame on you for buying an Ipod, it's stolen technology from Creative. This is why I own a creative device.

I think a lot of people are forgetting that Apple is in huge trouble with lawsuit from Apple Music (as in the Beatles music company) as they promised to never enter the music business. Don't think there will be much left of Apple or Jobs after that case given that iVirus is all that is keeping them afloat now.

"There is no 'confusion' among consumers about whether AAC or WMA is the dominant standard. And the claim that a struggle between AAC and WMA is 'slowing the adoption rate for digital music' is ridiculous. WMA is slowing down Apple's music effort as much as a fly hitting a speeding Mack truck." Yes, there is confusion. Only Apple uses AAC and the rest uses WMA. Most MP3 player support WMA. But not iPod. Apple has actively crippled iPods (the hardware supports WMA) to stop fair competition. Apple is forcing you to use THEIR MP3-player and THEIR online store. It's ok with me, because there are alternatives. But if it was Microsoft doing this you would all be calling them names.

Don't think there will be much left of Apple or Jobs after that case given that iVirus is all that is keeping them afloat now. -- BWAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

Apple will never offer WMA support on the iPod. Doing so would create a support nightmare. iPod/iTunes/iTMS works so well because it comes from the same company. And you're an idiot if you don't realize this. Consumers don't want another expensive piece of tech that promises a lot and then fails to work. They already have Windows for that.

I personally believe the pricing of downloadable music to be expensive. If I can buy the CD for £9 (UK) with 14 tracks, why pay 79p per track or £8 for the whole album? It doesn't make sense. Download music should be far cheaper, there is no middle man required to make CDs, plastic casing etc. Whilst the pricing is at it is, illegal downloads will continue to rise despite how good, bad or indifferent iTunes or other music stores are.

"No consumers are confused by anything. They want iPods and iTunes." How arrogant! I do a computer call in show at WGN Radio in Chicago every Wednesday night along with the hosts and two other techies. Based on the calls and email we get, there IS confusion among the novice, non-techie consumer about what to buy their kids and grand kids and why. And, there are more of them then there are of us. So, let's not forget that we up-to-the-minute tech types are not the only ones with money to spend. Also, iTunes may have 75% of the market (in the USA). But, remember, only 15% of the population owns a portable music player. That's 75% of 15%. There is still a whole lot of market out there to be sold to. As for me? I use Creative products because I want to buy music from more than just Apple. Apple makes some great products, however, consumers deserve the freedom to shop, which Apple does not give them. Mike D. WGN Radio - Website Wednesday Night.