Boycott Expensive iTunes Tracks
April 7, 2009
Today is a sad day in the world of digital music. Despite how hard Steve Jobs tried, the record companies won the iTunes pricing war, as the new variable pricing announced at Macworld has finally come into effect. Essentially what this means is the music you want to buy costs 1.29, the music you might buy costs .99 and the music you probably don’t care about costs .69. Nothing can stop this apparently… not even Steve Jobs. However, I think I have a solution.
Everyone must boycott all $1.29 songs. Do whatever you have to do not to buy it from iTunes. If the .69 tracks become popular enough, eventually the record companies might see that more sales from the lower priced tracks make more money than fewer sales from the higher priced tracks, and perhaps they’ll start to change the prices of the songs. If we continue to buy 1.29 tracks, the record companies will bump more songs to that price, and perhaps someday bump them even higher. DO NOT SUPPORT THIS. Join my cause, and perhaps someday we can go back to a time when all songs were priced a consistent, beautiful, 99 cents.
great idea…or you can download for free
But…
The record companies are allowing Amazon, etc. to sell the same songs for less money (trying to derail Apple/iTunes in my opinion).
If we buy from Amazon, the record companies get money from the music AND possibly take iTunes down a few notches – then what?
People want to blame Apple, when the record companies are mostly controlling the pricing. Maybe boycotting the purchase of music anywhere would get the point across (but we know that will never happen – people don’t want to take a stand).
“If we buy from Amazon, the record companies get money from the music AND possibly take iTunes down a few notches – then what?”
Yes, you have a good point there. Continue to support Apple and iTunes, and show the labels that their underhanded tactic is not working. Once Amazon and others that are in cohorts with the labels starts losing market share, SJ will hopefully bring down the hammer and return pricing back to equal that of Amazon.
Buy nothing.
Fudge the greedy record company scumbags that fuck the artists with creative accounting.
Buy nothing, they’ll get the message.
Record company scumbags, your day is coming, you and Blockbuster are soon outta here!
Good riddance!
@ George: don’t swear!
@ everyone else: I think we can all agree buying the 1.29 tracks somewhere else or not buying them at all is better than paying the record companies for this price hike. Buy the .69 tracks aplenty though… show them what really makes money.
buying songs from amazon sadly WILL help record companies obtaining what they want: a less powerful Apple. Many Majors probably think that they don’t have enough power over the internet and iTunes (because Apple is too “arrogant” to give them evrything they want, such as percentage over every iPod sold- a deal many companies accepted- transforming the itunes homepage into a big ad that only shows what they decide to show, and many other things). So, yes, I think that labels are tryng to boycott iTunes, sadly. When they’ll finally understand how much they need iTunes, hopefully we’ll get better deals.
Oh, and don’t forget that all songs are now DRM-free and that quality has significantly increased, wich is certainly a good thing. Is it worth $0.30 more for some songs? I don’t know. I bet we’ll see.
Buy albums instead. The price of an album always brings the cost of a single song to under 0.99$
It is also both a good musical habit to judge an artist from his album and not a single song. It is also good against the music labels that just want to push a single hit (often bad music that is done fast from untalented people)
So don’t buy the marketing hit of the moment song that costs 1.29. Buy good music, buy the entire album, help the artist, help the good music.
Yes, but if you buy the whole album, that will play into the record exec’s hands too. They’ll just think that the higher per songs price is a good way to get people to buy entire albums, rather than individual songs. Best boycott solution: don’t buy any songs priced at 1.29, and don’t buy those albums either.
Come on guys this is all about nothing. Costs go up for everyone, including Apple. Thirty cents will not be a deterrent to anyone who values time, convenience and legal boundaries.
Don’t encourage illegal downloads… that is just silly.
@ CHAMPAGNEBOB
I don’t encourage illegal downloads. I encourage not buying the song period. And its not costs… Amazon is selling most of the same tracks for cheaper.
Record companies don’t control retail pricing – that’s illegal. Apple and Amazon control retail pricing from wholesales dictated from record companies.
So the comment that labels are allowing Amazon to sell cheaper is 100% absolutely false or else there would be a lawsuit…and record companies are smarter than that.
Boycott music? That seems silly, unless you’re not a music fan and don’t care if it disappears forever. Artists need to make money or else they’ll sell shoes or something else.
Who the heck is complaining about $1.29 for a song? Do you buy a daily coffee? What does it cost? How long does it last? I’m guessing $2 for your coffee, and you drink it in 15 minutes. You buy a song, listening to it 25-50 times? Songs are 3 minutes long on average? You do the math and tell me where the value is.
If boycott $1.29 music, then the price will (hopefully) go back down. That’s what happens in a free market. Supply and demand. The thing is tho, if the record companies see that we buy the $.69 music, then the $.69 will become $.99, then up to $1.29. Or worse, they’ll force apple to use Genius data to predict the kind of music we’ll want to buy, and make those songs $1.29. Then genius will know what we don’t like and make that $.69. AHH!! That’s scary right there…
Nobody said the record companies control retail prices. We said they controlled the [wholesale] prices to the retail outlets. And, yes, they do give different wholesale prices to different companies – which allows the companies they give a break to, to sell for lower retail prices.
If they sell to company A for .69, and company B for .99 (I am not claiming these are the actual prices, just for example), then Company A could sell for .99 and make a .30 profit, while company B would make nothing at that price.
So the comment about allowing Amazon to sell cheaper is NOT absolutely false, they are allowing it by selling to them at a cheaper wholesale price.
AMazon.com sucks. have you ever tried to sell music on amazon. it’s a nightmare. a complete nightmare.
Download illegally screw the music companies for charging so much money on album that sucks a fatty now they raise the price to 1.29? that makes me so frustrated. I dont download illegally but now i will cuz its just complete bull shit…
exactly, i think the companies should stop worrieng so much about illigal downloads and think of y ppl download illigally….. because they are overcharging. it should be 50 cents per song, but until then, i will continue to not buy music
I second the boycott. I am not going to buy one song for $1.29 this is rip off. The Music Industry thinks it can charge more for a popular song and tries to sell off crap for less, so far all I can see is that all new Songs that are from fairly popular Artists cost $1.29, I never really see $0.69 and then there are some $0.99. If $1.29 at least offer a B-Side the way it used to be …
We should all go to Zune. Unless the price changed, did it? I remember seeing a commercial for 15 dollars a month and unlimited downloads. Haven’t seen that in a while though. I officially hate iTunes and I wish I wasn’t typing this on an iPhone… What’s worse is that I also have a MacBook… -sigh-
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i agree totally with the records label its a shame that the hard work of an artist who would stay night in night out in a recording studio to make an album and put it out there thinking that she/he would make million with there album and to find out the hard way that people only bought the song,s they like and not the entire album.and that all that hard work and those sleepness nights where for nothing.call me old fashion but i buy all my albums from my favorite artist and i don,t mind paying 17.50 for a mariah carey album becouse i know she work really hard to whrite her one song,s and to make good music.and sometimes the song,s that you didn,t like and up beeing your favorite song,s itunes is a rip of i rather give the artist and the record label the money for their hard work then give it to the ceo of apple who didn,t do anything to deserved the moneny that should be going to the artist.all of you who are buying song,s and downloading song,s from itunes you are ruining the music industry your helping the ceo of apple to get rich on expenses of the artist you so call like.if you really like an artist then buy the whole album don,t bring them down buy buying ad itunes.pay the artist for their hard work.pay them for all those sleepness night they spend in the recording studios to bring good music for you.