iTunes Sales 'Collapsing'

Alien54 writes to tell us The Register is reporting that based on reported revenues this year iTunes sales are plummetting. From the article: "Secretive Apple doesn't break out revenues from iTunes, but Forrester conducted an analysis of credit card transactions over a 27-month period. And this year's numbers aren't good. While the iTunes service saw healthy growth for much of the period, since January the monthly revenue has fallen by 65 per cent, with the average transaction size falling 17 per cent. The previous spring's rebound wasn't repeated this year."

Re:Why buy the cow?

[Dan East]

Beef.

Dan East

Credit Cards?

[tinrobot]

I buy my iTunes by trading shells and trinkets.

Re:DRM and the improved iPod alternatives

[cei]

there's a lot to choose from these days

indeed -- iPod, iPod Nano, iPod Shuffle...

iTunes is dying.

[CCFreak2K]

It is official; Netcraft now confirms: iTunes is dying

One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered iTunes community when IDC confirmed that iTunes market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all listeners. Coming close on the heels of a recent The Register survey which plainly states that iTunes has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. iTunes is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent The Register comprehensive networking test.

You don't need to be a Steve Jobs to predict iTunes future. The hand writing is on the wall: iTunes faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for iTunes because iTunes is dying. Things are looking very bad for iTunes. As many of us are already aware, iTunes continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

The iTunes Store is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core customers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time iTunes Store customers Bob and Jill only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: iTunes Store is dying.

...

All major surveys show that iTunes has steadily declined in market share. iTunes is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If iTunes is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dabblers. iTunes continues to decay. Nothing short of a cockeyed miracle could save iTunes from its fate at this point in time. For all practical purposes, iTunes is dead. Fact: iTunes is dying

Shamelessly plagarized by me.

Here's your explination:

[Anonymous Coward]

People are lazy. People are stupid. People do stupid and lazy things.

That about covers it.

Re:Must just be the majors. The indies are thrivin

[Unipuma]

Stop thinking that small decline in numbers means THE INDUSTRY IS DEAAAAAAD. It's ridiculous.

Because we all know only Netcraft can confirm that something is dying. ;)

Orlowski...

[Anonymous Coward]

Some of us wanted to be astronauts, some of us wanted to be firemen or doctors or schoolteachers. Orlowski, now... there's a guy who wants to be John C. Dvorak when he grows up.

We all need our goals.

I guess.

Re:I use a gift card

[laffer1]

Well then its not a good way to track sales. Apple offers gift cards as well as paypal in the US at least. I often by my relatives iTunes gift cards for birthdays and sometimes christmas gifts. My mom gets at least $45 in gift cards a year for instance. Also, gift cards are available at local retailers like Target, etc. That wouldn't be tracked in the Apple store (online) sales either. (regardless of payment method)

I can think of one reason the conclusion maybe true though. Since Apple started selling tv shows and movies, I've bought very little music from them. Most of my iTunes budget goes into shows now. I've bought every episode of Monk, and various other things. I've got about 30GB of content that was purchased through ITMS between two computers. This does not include my wife's collection.

Another poster was also right. I have purchased most of the older tracks that I'm going to buy. At this point, I buy tracks from a few new albums if I actually like the song.

Finally, I use iTunes on Mac OS and Windows XP nearly everyday. I often stream from my iBook to my windows machine to use my nicer speakers. It does seem a little buggy and I can't stand the hidden equalizer. I've noticed that it acts up when downloading from Apple if my network connection is maxed out. I've also noticed that it locks up frequently on my Mom's PC last time I was there. She's on a dialup and even trying to get album artwork will cause a freeze. After 20 minutes I just killed it since there was no activity on the dial-up. Apple needs to fix iTunes quickly. There's room for improvement in usability too. My mother is having trouble using 7.0 and she jumped from 4 to 7. I get calls every few days because she had it crash or can't figure out how to do something.

As for iPod sales, I know 4 people getting shuffles and one getting a 30GB iPod.

Re:Is the story full of it?

[stewbacca]

BTW, the name of Microsoft's new player is "Zune".

BTW, "Zube" means penis in Arabic, so I think it is a funny typo.

If you buy a PlaysForSure device, however, then there's at least some chance that the player you like better next year will also be a PFS device.

You have fun with your PlaysForSure (ObsoleteForSure, more like it). Do you seriously think that there will be a single PFS device for sale in two years? I'm pretty optimistic that iTunes+iPod will still be a viable option in two-years time, however.

Re:Must just be the majors. The indies are thrivin

[cmdrbuzz]

CDs have been around since *1982*. That is 26 years.....

Umm isn't that 24 years, cause I cause born in 1982, and last time I checked I was 24. I feel old enough without having more years thrown at me!

Re:Must just be the majors. The indies are thrivin

[Mr. Underbridge]

I swear, once I find those CDs, I'm going to go through our entire collection and rip every one of them using some lossless codec and store them on a hard drive. Every time I purchase a song that employs digital restrictions management I get burned by it. Apple can take their iTMS and serve the sheeple.

!Viva la revolucion!

Re:Must just be the majors. The indies are thrivin

[soft_guy]

No, you just THINK those records don't have "weak tracks" because you have such horrible taste in music.

Re:Improve your product Apple... duh

[KKlaus]

And if I drink all the time I guess I don't care if my girlfriend looks like a moose. But seriously just like eventually I'll find myself sober, you'll run into a situation where you can notice quality, and then you'll realize you got screwed.