Saturday, March 28, 2009

MAYBE NOT A GREAT IDEA = ITUNES VARIANT PRICING

One of the great things about iTunes is that you can buy pretty much any song (usually ones less than ten minutes) for 99 cents.  Almost all albums (single albums) are $9.99.  That seems to be working, people generally seem to be willing to spend a dollar a song and ten bucks an album, and the majority of people don't want to spend more than that. And, generally, they don't have to. Although it is still illegal, downloading songs from filesharing sites is still rampant. So the fact that iTunes is about to start charging $1.29 for "hot" songs just seems like a bad idea. 

A while ago, Kid Rock said something that I agreed with.  He doesn't think that every song should be the same price, and that's why he doesn't allow his songs to be sold a la carte on iTunes.  He said that his friend who just started a band and has a new song isn't worth as much as "Born To Run." I agree in theory, but the reality is, people are just going to start illegally downloading songs if iTunes starts charging more than a buck. Yes, it's still illegal, but still, I think by now the music industry should have learned not to try and force their will on the public, it worked for decades and it doesn't really work anymore. 

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