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The Insanely Great Songs Apple Won't Let You Hear
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu Jan 25, 2007 09:25 AM
from the let's-hear-it-for-blumchen dept.
from the let's-hear-it-for-blumchen dept.
FunkeyMonk writes "Slate.com has an article by Paul Collins explaining that the iTunes music store has thousands of tracks that you can't buy in the U.S. From the article: 'The iTunes Music Store has a secret hiding in plain sight: Log out of your home account in the page's upper-right corner, switch the country setting at the bottom of the page to Japan, and you're dropped down a rabbit hole into a wonderland of great Japanese bands that you've never even heard of. And they're nowhere to be found on iTunes U.S.' The article goes on to mention a few workarounds if you want to purchase foreign tunes. But this brings up a good point — why shouldn't iTunes be the great mythical omniscient music repository where all the world's music is available instantly? Is this simply a marketing decision?"
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Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Informative)
What makes it even more retarded is that the remix / version you want is always on the other label which you're not allowed to buy.
Most of the other stores are smarter, unfortunately, and you just can't go and change your location. So, you get to have fun finding a proxy that truly is in the territory from where you want to pretend to be.
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Interesting)
Doesn't really bother me much, but makes me curious about their business sense.
As an aside, Apple/iTunes/publishers also do the same thing with video content that's available to US customers only, and not to people from other geographic regions. The reason? Who knows, but I do know that it's costing them money from people like me that would prefer to purchase it easily rather than using alternatives...
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Interesting)
All the marketing, none of the support, and no overhead.
But if the pirates actually create a following, you can then offer media via existing channels, and make a buck.
Doesn't really bother me much, but makes me curious about their business sense.
Don't market in a place where a market does not exist. Wait for a market to apear, then take advantage of it. Nothing could be more brilliant.
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Interesting)
True, of course, but iTMS really highlights the problem. Back when the way of selling music was to press it to a record (or other physical medium) and sell it in a shop, it made sense to have different distribution deals for different countries. Company A might have access to retail channels in the USA, while company B might have access to retail channels in the UK. Giving either a worldwide licensing deal would be a problem, since neither would be able to exploit it. Giving both a worldwide deal might cause them to step on each other's toes in some areas, which would be bad for business.
Amazon started to change the rules. They had almost the same store in a large number of countries. You could even get them to ship products to you from their stores in another country using the same account. They were not bound by the distribution contracts, since they were buying from the authorised distributor and selling them elsewhere.
The movie industry tried to 'fix' this, rather than embracing it, by introducing region codes. Now, the DVD you bought from the USA wouldn't play on your player (although most stand-alone DVD players sold in the UK are now region-free, laptop drives are often not, which is irritating).
A bigger problem than music and film, however, is TV shows. These are typically broadcast in one country up to a year before they are syndicated elsewhere. There is no option to buy them legally through any channel[1], but you can download them from the Internet within a few hours of their original release. The movie industry woke up to this and started launching things at the same time worldwide, but the music and TV industries are still stuck in the regional distribution model.
iTMS simply serves to highlight the fact that entire industries are clinging to an obsolete business model. Now that worldwide distribution is a reality, they are still trying to enforce regional supply chains.
[1] This, to my mind, means that they should not be protected by copyright. If you intentionally exclude a region, then it is not in the best interests of that region to grant you a monopoly on distribution.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
While I agree with most of what you said, this is obviously wrong. US movies still mostly take a few months to get to the UK, and any UK movies often take more than 6 months to get here. Sure a few very big movies have world wide releases, but then that was happening 10 years ago.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Speaking for all Americans, I apologize.
Re:so you're a fan of emminent domain? (Score:4, Interesting)
If you think about copyright as being executed for the benefit of the culture, then artistic works don't really EVER intrisically belong to the creator (or copyright owner) - they belong to the culture that created them. Extending this idea, if a copyright owner decides to actually distribute their work, they're giving the people their due payment in exchange for the monopoly on distribution. It doesn't seem to make sense to then turn around and say "Well, I'll go ahead and repay YOU people, but NOT you guys over there!" because aren't we all supposed to uphold the same copyright?
Doesn't it then seem backwards for a region to uphold a copyright... on a product from which they receive no benefit? From that line of reasoning it seems that the only time a copyright owner should be able to do this is if they do not distribute the item to anyone.. anywhere.
This isn't a simple question. But it's definitely an interesting one.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Copyright is more than just a monopoly on distribution: it also protects unpublished works.
Yes, I consider this a flaw. Trade secrets should cover unpublished works. If you don't publish something, then you can enforce your control via contract law on the few people you show it to (e.g. publishers). Copyright is a social contract between society and the creator; society agrees to enforce a temporary monopoly on distribution for the creator in exchange for the work eventually entering the public domain. If a work is not published, then it can never enter the public domain, so copyright can no
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Or to take the petty theft out of the equation, if you throw away an early draft of a manuscript you're working on, am I allowed to publish it?
Current US Copyright law says "no," and as a musician, I think that's reasonable.
An example more pertinent to my own life is that my band will be working on another album soon, but we've got some new songs already. If someone bootlegged
Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No, we all went out and bought DVD players with publicly-available "no region" hacks and an in-built capability to skip the bits that the DVD makers try and force us to watch ("Millions of people who wouldn't think of driving a combine-harvester through a puppy-farm, setting fire to a children's hospital after welding all the doors shut, or launching an ICBM at Finland commit the immeasu
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
that's not what's going on. what happens is that whoever has rights to the music can sell rights to distribute the music to different distributors. you don't need to buy rights to hear music in different regions, but distributors have to sign contracts so that they are the official distributor of a specified region. this helps a label gain distribution because a large distributor will be more likely to pick up a label if they know that they will be the exclusive distributor for that label in the region they
Re:Licensing, licensing, licensing (Score:4, Interesting)
What they need is a separate "local top rated" in addition to the "[absolute] top rated."
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Nothing new... (Score:5, Insightful)
British had "With the Beatles" while an album with slightly different tracks called "Meet the Beatles" came out in the US.
The British version of "Are You Experienced?" by Hendrix had additional songs, such as "Red House" which the record company felt would go over better in Britain than the US, even though it was a straight blues track and blues was born in the US. *shrugs*
So while in the age of the internet, this seems silly, it's nothing new.
Re:Nothing new... (Score:4, Interesting)
Singles were a marketed item until the advent of the CD. Now that we have digital formats, the record labels simply don't want to sell singles at all. They even fought Apple, the leader in MP3 player sales, to "let" them sell MP3 singles, and then would only let them do it at a high price with DRM. Buying a Beatles single is still either impossible or very limited.
An interesting piece of trivia here. Albums, with respect to music, mean a collection (like a photo album). Back "in the day" an album was a few 78 RPM discs bundled together. It wasn't until the advent of the 12" LP (long play) 33.3 RPM discs that an album was able to fit on one consumer playable media. That is why albums, records, vinyl, etc are synonymous.
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Re:Nothing new... (Score:5, Insightful)
Three generations are gathered together at a reunion. The youngest is preparing dinner, a fine potroast. She takes the roast, dutifully cuts off each end of the roast as taught years ago by her mom, and puts it in the pan. She asks her mother "Mom, I never really understood that part, why do we always cut off the ends of the roast? It's perfectly good meat we're just throwing away."
And the mother responds, "I don't know really, I always do it because that's the way Grandma taught *me*". So they decide to go out into the living room, and ask Grandma. And she replies... "I used to cut the ends off so the damn roast so it would fit inside the pan, you idiots".
It is still the same old behaviour, but the physical constraints that legitimized that behaviour are now gone, and the behaviour should change accordingly.
I see this all the time in various ways. Online stores, software, you name it, various industries or designs clinging to behaviours that used to have physical limitations still doing things the same old way, even though they no longer have to.
My wife and I just raise our eyebrows and whisper "potroast" to each other.
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Devil's in the Contracts (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Can I get the "domestic" price by switching to the iTunes Japan site?
Are the bits cheaper that way?
Well, of course not, since everything costs the same on iTunes. But I bet the labels would prefer it this way. This may be why those "import" tunes are just unavailable on the US store instead.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It actually is often cheaper to order the CD from the local amazon (e.g., amazon.jp) and have it ship them to you.
Re:Devil's in the Contracts (Score:4, Funny)
OR, think of the outrage from the industry if a Japanese track made #1 on the US charts.
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Re:Japanese track made #1 on the US charts (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.maddmansrealm.com/sukiyaki/ [maddmansrealm.com]
"His biggest hit, Ue o Muite Aruko (I Look Up When I Walk; "Sukiyaki" in the West), was released in Japan in 1961. After its release in the U.S. in 1963, the song's earnestness and melodic beauty proved irresistible despite its incomprehensible lyrics. Against all odds, on June 15, 1963, the song ousted Leslie Gore's "It's My Party" to become the No. 1 popular song in the U.S."
Japan has lots of great music. While I was there I bought a few albums. Some I could not even tell you who the artist is or the name of the album because there is not any english printing on it. The record stores would frequently play albums and display the album playing. This is how I found and bought some great music.
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Re:MP3 is in the link (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe iTunes doesn't sell them is they sometimes are posted for free after the copyright expired unlike in the US where the extension act will make it sure I will expire first.
Isn't it the record labels doing it? (Score:3, Insightful)
I seem to have seen a post about that at some point on Apple's discussions boards.
From that, iTunes works with the whoever hold the distributions rights in that country. If those bands don't have a U.S. distributor.
One band I like "Growing Old Disgracefully" recently made the jump from the U.K., to the U.S. iTunes store by working with CD Baby.
Re:Isn't it the record labels doing it? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Music marketing doesn't understand ubiquity (Score:2)
Unfortunately, but hardly marketing (Score:3, Informative)
Selling all music globally is something no one's ready for legally, and probably won't be for years, given the glacial rate at which the *AA's seem to be evolving to embrace new technologies and opportunities.
Holmwood.
It's probably a legal decision. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sadly, while the Internet is world-wide and country borders are merely speedbumps, the legal world hasn't figured that one out yet...
So their deals with Japanese record houses probably only allow Apple to sell their music in Japan.
Seems short-sighted to me. If you're making a deal with the guys who sell 80% of the online music sold, why not let them sell to as many people as possible instead of holding back rights? You get a cut on each...
For an iTunes J-Pop/J-Rock fix (Score:5, Informative)
JList/JBox [jbox.com] has been selling Japanese iTunes [jbox.com] cards for some time, and frequently advertise them in their ads in magazines like NewType USA. Right next to the hentai/bishoujo games and Domo-kun plushies.
Uh, it's the Record Companies (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Um, look at the headline...
It's about copyright ending at the border (Score:5, Informative)
It *should* be a simple, global, find-it-and-buy-it repository. Unfortunately, the way that copyright has been worked, the right to sell a particular work (music, movie, tv show) only extends to a country's borders. If you want to sell that work in another nation, you have to somehow acquire the rights to sell there as well.
This used to be a real problem trying to buy import albums and CDs. If a particular overseas-only album had a local rights-owner who didn't have the title in print, that rights-owner could prevent you from importing the CD for purchase. (Naturally, they could also prevent you from importing if they *did* have it in print, but generally then you wouldn't want the import in the first place.) This didn't always happen in practice, but it did make things more difficult at times.
Today, they try to restrict trans-national media purchases via things like region coding.
Honestly, I think this is another of the ridiculously outdated aspects of copyright law that really needs to change. In my mind, if I purchase a legally-produced copy of a CD or DVD (or iTunes download), then somehow, somewhere, somewhen the artist was compensated for that purchase. Maybe not directly, and maybe not for that exact purchase, but at some point the artist's rights to sell the track were transfered to someone else who got money from me. It shouldn't matter if I'm buying a German pressed CD while visiting in Japan and holding a US passport. As long as the German CD was produced with the approval (or delegated approval) of the original artist/rights-holders, then it should be treated as legitimate and proper.
Of course, if you've got a situation where some country is permitting the sale of tracks for which the original artists have *not* delegated their rights to whomever made the [cd, dvd, file], then that shouldn't be permitted. Certainly, this isn't what's happening in Japan, but it is sort of what happened with AllOfMP3 (or so I understand -- I haven't followed that too closely).
I believe this is also why it's taken so long for new iTunes stores to open in new countries. It's not just a matter of arranging the financial-side of things for handling payments, currency conversions, etc., or even of getting servers and such set up for faster local access, but I bet a whole lot of it is securing the appropriate approvals from whomever "owns" the publishing rights for each track in that country.
No, it's a label decision. (Score:4, Insightful)
how is this limiting choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
A more accurate presentation might be that DRM and restrictive licensing is limiting the choice of music, which does have an element of truth, and Apple does bear some responsibility. But even this is far from unclear. If we are talking about music downloads, the only thing effecting music choice is the artist, not Apple. Apple certainly effects exposure, but not choice, except in the sense that one cannot choose what one does not know.
But certainly anyone can go onto a P2P network an download music, and it will play on the iPod and work in iTunes. Any artist can go to Youtube and upload a video. If a song is insanely great, it will generate insanely great buzz, and people will hear it.
I also wonder about the definition of insanely great music, and people expecting have such music handed to them on a gold platter. We are so used to having sanitized music spoon fed to us. The ability to download music is just going to exacerbate this problem, and lead to the increasingly sanitized of music. A better article would be how increased music delivery in destroying insanely great local music, and replacing it with moderately interesting sanitized corporate music.
Another legal way to buy Japanese music (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/ [cdjapan.co.jp]
I have no financial interest in this company. I am merely an occasional customer. Of course, if you are under, say, 25 years old, the idea of actually buying a CD will be anathema to you as you'll have to wait for it to arrive by mail and you'd rather slit your emo wrists than do anything that doesn't lead to instant gratification. And if you want to just buy individual tracks, this isn't the answer you were looking for either. However, if you are over 30 years old and not afflicted with ADD, this might be an option for you should want to purchase that CD that is only available in Japan. Sometimes Japanese CDs come with bonus tracks not released in other markets (usually this means the US), so hardcore fans of various Western singers/groups might be interested in Japanese CDs for that reason too.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And if you're over, say, 30 years old, the idea of downloading music seems like scary voodoo as music is supposed to be a plastic disc instead of data, and you'd rather yell at kids to get off your lawn than do anything to save natural resources.
Jesus, keep this shit on Digg (Score:4, Insightful)
Do the math... (Score:5, Funny)
On the UK iTunes store it is $15.75 (i.e. £7.99)
On the Canadian store, $8.47
New Zealand, $12.61
etc. etc. etc.
On the Japanese store, by the way, they don't sell it at all. Guess they saw the video for "Hit me Baby" and figured "Like the schoolgirl outfit, but needs more tentacles. Or cowbell."
Beyond Music (Score:4, Interesting)
In the book business it has become near impossible to convince publishers to translate non-English authors, making access to some of the planet's finest writers nearly impossible.
Geist magazine [geist.com] out of Vancouver has had a couple of good articles looking at this phenomenon, one by Stephen Henighan [geist.com] in Issue 61, and by acclaimed writer Alberto Manguel in Issue 62.
Henigan's article opens:
Manguel's article this month puts the blame squarely on the publishing houses who are increasingly market driven to publish lowest common denominator works, rather than building a catalog that stands on literary merit.
North America lives in a cultural bubble defined by a narrow range of English language music, writing, and film. It would be a great exercise to see how iTunes handles music from Latino and Mexican artists, or in Canada from Quebec musicians.
I'll wager that both of those groups are also underrepresented despite the considerable popularity of their work.
Some songs are only on iTunes - and then removed (Score:4, Interesting)
For over 2 years I had exactly 4 songs in my iTunes shopping cart... songs that I really liked, but I couldn't bring myself to hand over my credit card for the DRM inhibited music. I usually buy CDs.
So, for Christmas I received a couple of iTunes gift cards. I figured, what the heck... I'll buy the songs now and attempt to find something to strip the DRM.
And then the catch hit me. The songs, while still in my shopping cart and still had playable samples were "no longer for sale in the iTunes US store". The songs and the albumn that they made up were no longer listed in the store by any means of searching.
Here's the real kicker that pissed me off. These songs were only ever sold through the iTunes store. No physical store sales, no other online music stores, and I was never able to find them on any p2p services.
Hopefully I'll now be able to purchase them. This is another perfect example of why DRM is a bad bad thing. If the company holding the keys to the DRM infected information decides to revoke them, the content can be completely lost to society.
Two Quick Points (Score:5, Insightful)
First, this isn't "Apple" not letting you hear these things. It's the record companies and their licensing agreements. If you go into a record store in the US, do you see all these great Japanese artists? Hell no. Why? Isn't it just as easy to ship them over as it is to ship over US artists? It's not Apple limiting these things, it's the damned recording companies.
It's the same reason that TV shows on iTunes US aren't available on iTunes UK and vice versa. There are ancient licensing agreements (well, ancient in terms of the internet) between the media companies that Apple has to respect if you want any content on iTunes at all. Apple could have gone the eMusic route and filled the iTunes store with independent artists, but who would start doing that?
Finally, Apple's not preventing you from hearing these songs on your computer or your iPod. You're free to buy them on CDs and rip them into your computer. And you can even rip them in MP3 format with no DRM! Amazing!
It's natural for people to beat up on Apple because that's who's dealing with them when they don't get what they want. But that's just human nature. I used to work as a bus boy in a restuarant. I've seen people scream at waiters for the cooks screwing up their order. I've seen people yell at cashiers for something they bought there not working correctly. Most people are stupid. It's up to those of us who aren't to
That's the one thing that really annoys me (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No it isn't. Complex webs of contracts have been set up. You might imagine the studio has complete control over its tracks but it doesn't. A simple example: They may have signed various types of contract with a variety of distributors all over the world. If studio X has given distributor Y exclusive rights to song Z in country W for a certain time then X might not be able to sell the song on iTunes because Apple then becomes a competing distributor to Y breaking the exclusivity contract. Sure, X