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Music Media Media (Apple) Entertainment

Bands Bypass iTunes With iPhone Apps 155

iminplaya writes to tell us that the band "The Presidents of the United States of America" (yes, the peaches guys), are trying to expand their engagement with fans by selling their music via Apple's App store, something others have experimented with but never dealt with on this level. "The app, called 'The Presidents' Music — PUSA,' sells for $2.99 on the App Store (iTunes link) offers users access to four full albums, including the band's early 'lost' recordings. This includes the previously-unavailable FroggyStyle — 'unless you have one of the 500 cassettes the band sold in 1994, you've never heard this before,' reads the app description. The app also features a number of extras and exclusives that the band says are updated regularly, and fans can read the band's blog directly from the app on their iPhones or iPod touches. The music, however, is not actually contained within the application itself; instead, it is streamed to the app from a server, requiring the user to be connected to a network of some kind (iPhone users on the cell or WiFi network, iPod touch users on WiFi) in order to access the media."
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Bands Bypass iTunes With iPhone Apps

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  • my app (Score:5, Funny)

    by profaneone ( 316036 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:26PM (#26935725)

    Please buy my app (profanespeak) to read my comments on this article.

  • Until now I had completely forgotten about those guys and that stupid song.

    *sigh*

    • Kitty at my foot and I wanna touch it!
      Kitty at my foot and I wanna touch it!
      Kitty at my foot and I wanna touch it!
      Meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow.

      Whatever, they are way better than most of the crap out now.
    • And I have absolutely no idea who they even are! I guess this means I'm just too old.... or too young....

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        And I have absolutely no idea who they even are! I guess this means I'm just too old.... or too young....

        No no, PUSA were very much a "blink and you'll miss 'em" band. Some trajectories are brief.
  • More bands should be offering their music for free on the Internet itself. Look at how well Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead (for starters) have done with their Internet releases.
    • Re:Why stop there? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:37PM (#26935857)
      More bands should be offering their music for free on the Internet itself. Look at how well Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead (for starters) have done with their Internet releases.

      Yeah! All you need to do to make it big on the internet is to already be a multi-platinum selling band before the internet came along. Simple!
    • I agree, but ... You know that you have to buy it, right?

    • by eccenthink ( 1312043 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @06:08PM (#26936231)
      [Chorus:]
      Movin' to bittorrent, gonna steal a lot of songs
      Movin' to bittorrent, Gonna steal me a lot of songs
      Movin' to bittorrent, gonna steal a lot of songs
      Movin' to bittorrent, gonna steal a lot of songs
      (Wow)

      Songs come from a torrent,
      they were put there by a pirate
      In a country overseas
      If I had my little way,
      I'd steal songs every day
      So many songs to be played

      [Chorus]

      Take a little app where the tunes all exist
      Heard a rotten song and was pissed
      And dreamed about you, RIAA,
      I used my encryption down inside
      Make a little room my songs to hide
      Pirate's bounty in my PC or Laptop or a Phone

      Millions of songs, songs for me
      Millions of songs, songs for free
      Millions of songs, songs for me
      Millions of songs, songs for free
      Millions of songs, songs for me
      Millions of songs, songs for free
      Millions of songs, songs for me
      Millions of songs, songs for free
      • Amusing, but you destroyed the meter of the song. "Peaches" is two syllables while "songs" is one. The way the song is sung ("pee chez") you don't have enough syllables to fill the notes. Try using "MP3s" instead. It should fit into the meter a bit better.

        "Moving to the bittorrent, gonna steal me a lot of em-p'threes"

        See how much better that sounds?

        (Yes, that was a totally pedantic and geeky thing to worry about. I make no apologies. :-P)

        • by Bronster ( 13157 )

          Yeah, I filked that song with "pizzas" long time ago.

          "Pizzas come in a van, they were put there by a man, at Mondo's Pizzaland, downtowwwwn"

          Sang it at the start of the pizza sculling competition at college (woot, I was the returning champion, after all)

    • I love PUSA. Love them. I have their Mount Rushmore concert taped from MTV on VHS, complete with the Mount Rushmore Hug Of The Day, and I still have dreams set to "Mach 5". However, I do not, and WILL not, own an iPhone, so I guess I don't get access to this sort of thing. This is a confusing message I'm being sent. Only people with iPhones can get this music, and people with iPhones have enough money to throw around to not need this.
      • You could get an iPod touch.

        • The music (according to the summary even!) is streamed from a server. So unless you're on a wireless network, you wont be able to listen to it on a touch.

          Think of it as mandatory activation for the music.

          Pretty much DRM then?

          • I realize that, but most people are often in a location with a WiFi network. (I have seen a decent number of people in other iPhone or other PDA/netbook threads say that they don't need cell access, just WiFi.. e.g. a few people who want a Skype only "cell phone" for use over WiFi.)

            It could be used to listen to music at work or home, for instance.

      • by fermion ( 181285 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @08:42PM (#26937549) Homepage Journal
        How do you figure. Is their music so lame that it cannot be downloaded for free P2P clients or bittorrent? Are their CDs not for sale at resale shops for a few dollars? Can you not borrow a CD from a friend and rip it. IS the music available nowhere as a free stream that can be heard over the generic smart phone?

        This is just another way to deliver music, and not an exceptional method at that. Complaining, as you do, would be like complaining about them putting music on iTunes. Only those rich enough to own a music player can have access to this sort of thing. Even now music players are not cheap. A few years ago when iTunes opened, it was only the rich who have the option of choice, while the rest had to live with a CD player.

        Get real. There is little value in this. Only those who like the band well enough to toss them another few dollars are going to this. Everyone else will just rip and load like we always have done. With no significant new stuff in three years, they had to do something to revitalize the catalog, and box sets are not what they used to be.

      • No, people with iPhones do not get exclusive access. There is in fact a cheaper device you haven't heard of: The iPod touch :)

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by jlarocco ( 851450 )

      Actually, Radiohead didn't do so well with their internet release. They actually stopped doing it [inrainbows.com] and now only sell it on iTunes and CD.

      If a huge band like Radiohead couldn't make it work with tons of media coverage and massive internet buzz, most smaller bands don't stand a chance.

      • by geekoid ( 135745 )

        define "well"?

        If memory serves, the people complaining about it not working were people in the industry basically saying: Look x % didn't buy, or spent less then what it's "worth".
        However the band made a lot of money. It was the middle men that lost out.

        It has been planned as a limited time distribution before releasing the album through traditional means.
        So yeah, it worked.

    • More bands should be offering their music for free on the Internet itself. Look at how well Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead (for starters) have done with their Internet releases.

      But why stop there? March right into your boss's office right now and demand to work for free. /sarc

      You do realize that things like food, clothing and shelter do actually cost money right?

      If you don't think that you should work for free, then why do you think other people should?

  • Presidents (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Chabo ( 880571 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:33PM (#26935795) Homepage Journal

    Personally, I know them better for their song "Lump" (which Weird Al parodied as "Gump") better than I know them for "Peaches".

    • Same; Lump got a ton more radioplay than Peaches where I grew up. Also always liked Dunebuggy, although besides those three I can't say I recall any other songs...

    • by 2short ( 466733 )
      I always liked "Peaches", but mostly because I already liked the John Prine song ("Spanish Pipedream") that I assume partly inspired it. Do any actual fans of theirs know if they've drawn that connection explicitly?

      I never remember them on the radio, but I bought their album in a pre-iTunes whim/quest to own all recorded covers of "Kick Out the Jams". (Theirs is amongst the best, maybe because it's amongst the least faithful.)
  • Sounds fair (Score:5, Insightful)

    by oahazmatt ( 868057 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:33PM (#26935797) Journal
    If the content is streaming, I don't see Apple having a problem with this. After all, I can stream numerous radio stations already through iTunes or through an iPhone app. I don't think Apple will be concerned unless the app allows you to save the music. Besides, there's probably some agreement the developers have to agree to that states no app will directly compete with iTunes.
    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      I don't think Apple will be concerned unless the app allows you to save the music.

      Personally I don't think it is any of their business. Linux Torvalds doesn't seem to care what I do with his kernel.

    • Is there some reason why anyone should be concerned with what Apple's position is here? If you bought the iPhone, you should own it and it should play whatever you want it to play at any time. It's sad that anyone would raise Apple's perceived position on this as an issue, as if they rightly should be allowed to stop any activity you undertake with your iPhone.

      • by 2short ( 466733 )
        One should be concerned with what Apple's position is here if one bought an iPhone, because regardless of your opinion on whether it is right or wrong, Apple certainly does stop some activities people undertake with their phones.
    • by v1 ( 525388 )

      Besides, there's probably some agreement the developers have to agree to that states no app will directly compete with iTunes.

      I don't know if they sign anything that says they won't, but THAT is the #1 reason for apps to be rejected by Apple submitted for sale on the ITMS. Even apps that remotely sort of kind of might be seen to compete with iTunes or Mail tend to get slapped with the generic "competes with another apple product" veto and are not placed for sale on the ITMS.

      I wonder if this app will be the

  • Band 2.0 (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Clever7Devil ( 985356 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:34PM (#26935813)
    If looked at purely as a method of accessing the artists' work it seems ineffectual. However, as a total package this is a genius appeal to the "always on" "web 2.0" environment of today's Internet. For 2.99, a price I think many will pay, users recieve a portal on their mobile device into the world of their favorite artists. Bios, extra content, tour dates, blogs, and ALL their music in one place. Sounds like something a fan would gladly pay 2.99 to have access to.
    • by vux984 ( 928602 )

      Bios, extra content, tour dates, blogs, and ALL their music in one place. Sounds like something a fan would gladly pay 2.99 to have access to.

      Yeah, ONE place. Their ipod/phone app. What if they want to listen to it on their computer? or put it on their kids mp3 device?

      What happens when you buy a new phone, and it isn't an iphone?

      Hell, you can't even to mix the tracks into a playlist with music by other artists on your iphone.

      As for bios, tour dates, blogs... those better be on the regular web. That leaves '

      • by malkir ( 1031750 )
        What happens? You're out a whopping $3.
        I would pay $3 for hours of my favorite band and deal with some inconveniences. Better than spending $12 on 1 album and not being able to do anything with my music because of DRM.
        • by vux984 ( 928602 )

          What happens? You're out a whopping $3.

          But what if the next band charges $12? or $20? or $40?

          I would pay $3 for hours of my favorite band and deal with some inconveniences.

          Not being able to mix it into a playlist with other artists is a pretty serious inconvenience at any price. Hell, even at 'free' I'd find it more annoying than it was worth. Nevermind not being able to move it to any other device.

          Better than spending $12 on 1 album and not being able to do anything with my music because of DRM.

          iTunes musi

          • But what if [CITATION NEEDED]

            Then dont buy. Or pirate. Just quit'cher bitchin.

            Fact: This band charges 3$ for 4 cd access until they quit. Theres a nice piratebay link in a recent post that aims at 7 cds. Hell, if you like the group, you will buy the 3$ to get the unheard tracks. Its just 3$.

            Fiction: What if! If! Iff!!!!

            • by geekoid ( 135745 )

              Just quit'cher bitchin.

              You first.

            • by vux984 ( 928602 )

              Hell, if you like the group, you will buy the 3$ to get the unheard tracks. Its just 3$.

              As a glorfied system to pay to sample music, or show fan support for your favorite band -- it works at that level.

              But what if I actually like the tracks? I have to re-stream them everytime I want to listen to them? And I can't put them in a playlist? And I have to load a different app each with its own UI to listen to different artists? Nobody is going to put up with that.

              Like I said, if they want little iphone fan club

          • I concur. And it's even worse than you describe. As I understand it, not all iTunes is DRM-free. Some tracks that Apple distributes still have DRM and there are plenty of other reasons to reject doing business with Apple including:

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        Yeah, but Itunes per song is 1$ average.

        They offer 4 cd's of content. Average of 10 songs per cd = 40 songs.

        40$ with mp3's or 3$ with protections. That's not that bad of a deal, considering they make a "portal" of dates and other things.

        Course, there is Piratebay if you want permanent copies [thepiratebay.org] of these songs. But this 3$ deal isnt that bad.

      • Re:Band 2.0 (Score:5, Funny)

        by dave562 ( 969951 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @06:01PM (#26936165) Journal

        What do you expect for $3 measely dollars? Maybe the band should come to your house with signed copies of all the music you have access to and load it onto your computer, your kid's computers, and maybe even take your wife out for coffee? I mean damn... You did give them three whole dollars!

        If you want to listen to the music on the computer, pay for it from the iTunes store. If you want it in portable format, pay for the CD. Or hell, don't pay for anything and just steal it like everyone else does.

        I think I need to take a step away from /. because if I see one more person write a post about, "I expect the world for less than a Chinese sweatshop worker gets paid in a day.", I'm going to freak the fuck out.

        • Ive got the piratebay link on my post, just above yours. Its not that hard. Nor is 3$ for 4 cd's of music from 1 group.

          I hate DRM and dislike copyright, but these prices are finally getting fair. If they were for a computer (eg: not tied to an os or drm setup) Id consider buying 4 cds for 3$. Hell, I blow that on a coffee drink that disappears in 5 minutes.

        • I think I need to take a step away from /. because if I see one more person write a post about, "I expect the world for less than a Chinese sweatshop worker gets paid in a day.", I'm going to freak the fuck out.

          Jsut don't do to a Chinese sweatshop. Cause you know, they'd want the world for less then what they get paid also.

        • by vux984 ( 928602 )

          What do you expect for $3 measely dollars?

          What do I get for 3 measily dollars?

          I can already sample the song for free at any of a dozen online music stores to decide if I like it, and if I walk into a CD shop they'll put the CD on for me so I can listen to a full song or 3 for free. I can already read their bios and tour dates on the web for free... so what do I get exactly?

          I can samples the whole songs without visiting a real store?
          That about it, I can't bloody well do anything else with them.

          Actually the

          • Re:Band 2.0 (Score:5, Insightful)

            by dave562 ( 969951 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @06:35PM (#26936531) Journal

            What if the app is just the first, beta release of a product that for all we know, three years from now could be bought by a major independent label, and used as a portal to hundreds of bands? You're one of those glass half empty types aren't you?

            If a band that I liked wanted to charge me $3 to listen to any of the music that they've put out, I'd do it. That is a whole lot cheaper than buying a bunch of CDs or individual tracks.

            These apps and similar things aren't meant to be everything for everyone. This one obviously isn't even aimed at you. You want more than they are willing to provide for $3. Okay. And?

            On the other hand it seems perfectly targetted at the "What do I want to spend my allowance on?" demographic. It's like Ringtone 2.0. The band of the month gets to make $3 from a bunch of junior high school kids with rich parents who can afford to buy them iPhones.

            • I still cannot mix it into my playlist on my itunes.
              This is going back to the subscription service that Walmart had that collapsed several months ago.
              For a service like this to endure it has to do the following thing:
              1. Sell a product, not a service agreement.
              2. This product has to be complete self contained item, not subject to someone elses server getting shut down because the server is needed to operate whenever I want to listen to the music (ie a service agreement).
              • by dave562 ( 969951 )

                It goes back to the original point. How much do you really expect for a one time fee of $3? Who said anything about enduring? Ten years ago, the band would have just released a four track CD with their previously unreleased music on it for $3. Today you get access to their unreleased tracks, you get access to the rest of their tracks, and you get some sort of portal with information about tour dates and other band specific stuff (I haven't read the article, I'm just going on the comments that other peop

        • What happens when the content provider realizes that bandwidth costs money and that the measly $3 is not going to cover the bandwidth charges because someone wants to listen to the same album ten times a day?

          I happen to think that this business model is very broken and a money loser. Websites sell advertising to pay for bandwidth. These guys are trying to sell an unlimited amount of bandwidth usage for a fixed price. This is going to collapse within the next 6-60 months leaving a whole lot of people who bo

          • What happens when the content provider realizes that bandwidth costs money

            Please mod the parent as funny!!!!! Bandwidth doesn't cost a single penny! For instance things like a additional SMS on a network do not cost ANYTHING to the provider, the fact that there are users willing to pay 20cents to use the service is totally unrelated to the cost structure of the company...

            It is the structure and the electricity that cost money, but a single byte does not have marginal value at all.

            What we need is informed costumers and honest sellers.... (As you see you can get a hosting+unlimited

            • Hard wired bandwidth costs money. Every time someone downloads something some server somewhere has to spool up and start pushing bytes down a tube.

              If you want to have the semantics argument: the electricity needed to run the servers costs money.

              • EXACTLY!!!! the electricity needed to run the servers costs money!!! So, once the server is running a additional served byte costs nothing since there are no additional costs. So why do they sell it at a price? And most important why are you willing to you buy it at a price (that is obviously a unfair price) instead of paying a fixed monthly/yearly?

                • The heavier the load on a server the more it costs the server to operate.

                  Also each router between the server and the target will eventually want a cut so they can support their servers and routers.

                  I in no way expressed or implied that I was in favor of a fixed price or subscription price for this on going service. I did state I think that this business model will collapse within the next couple of years because the server has to be kept operating while their is no new revenue coming in.

            • Mod parent fucking idiotic.

              Bandwidth costs money. And quite a lot too (well, the cost of setting up the pipes costs a lot - past there the bandwidth isn't too expensive provided you use a lot of it).

              Internap and GlobalCrossing aren't going to give you a GigE link to the internet for free. And once you've got that, they aren't going to let your traffic traverse their link for free.

              Also, "unlimited bandwidth" doesn't exist. You're right on one thing - we need more honest sellers. If we had those, "unlimit

        • by rexguo ( 555504 )
          To those who think everything on the web should be free, I say this to you: How would you like if I (and millions of other netizens) expect you to do your day job for free because your boss decided to give away your flagship product for free. --- This fundamental lack of appreciation of economics by the general public is one of the reasons why the U.S. is fast losing its competitive edge to the rest of the world. But if you insist, be my guest, because I don't contribute to your economy and really enjoy
      • What if they want to listen to it on their computer?

        What if I want to listen an FM station on my AM radio? This is just starting. Let's give it a bit of time to see what happens. The big news here is seeing the artists free themselves of the RIAA ball and chain. I'm not going to sweat the small stuff yet.

      • Yeah, ONE place. Their ipod/phone app. What if they want to listen to it on their computer? or put it on their kids mp3 device?

        Then they do without. The pain and horror.

        Try a dose of perspective, it's liberating.

    • Definitely not a bad deal, but I do not listen to only one artists music on my mobile device. I want to be able to create playlists from individual tracks. This would not seem to allow that.
  • After reading the article, I gotta say I hope bands don't start doing this for the following reasons

    1)Relies on access to the Internet. So...you can't access it when you're not connected? Running the radio in the iPod touch or iPhone drastically reduces battery life. No thanks.

    2)Relies on 3rd party website outside iTunes. Relying on iTunes as the 'gatekeeper' to all your DRMed files is bad enough (thankfully, that's going away though). A separate entity is on even thinner ground...if their website chan

  • If the artists really want to sell their album for $2.99, wouldn't iTunes let them? This probably has more to do with artists' publicity than their music - it's like a ticker for the band, with the streamed music an added functionality.

    It is a neat idea though - particularly if the music is not network linked, it's just like selling your own CDs in the market. The Tap Tap Revenge app already does this - you can download tracks through the app and the tracks reside on the phone. You can listen to them anyti

    • No, iTunes wouldn't. Apple has a very rigid cost structure. They claim they had to give ground when they moved to DRM free, so now there are three price points, but none of those points is $2.99.

  • From the article:

    More importantly, Dederer sees the value of bringing distribution control back to the bands themselves. "If all the rights to the masters and the publishing are containedâ"if the artist has control of them or the label has control of them, they can sell music in this entirely new format," said Dederer, "The first one we're doing is for my band, The Presidents... you can sort of pump anything in there that you want, at random. Maybe we'll put my bandmate Chris Ballow's answering machine

  • Not a great idea. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WiiVault ( 1039946 ) on Friday February 20, 2009 @05:45PM (#26935943)
    One of the reasons people buy iPhones is for integration both on the phone and desktop. You know, all your music in one place. This will also have limited use for Touch users who wan't to listen to music without be near wifi. I for one do not want 100 apps from various artists scattered across my phone.
    • by anethema ( 99553 )

      So install categories and keep them all in a folder.

      That aside I agree this is generally a stupid idea.

      Having to open an app so I can listen to one band, no adding them to playlists, nothing, just seems stupid.

  • They are charging $2.99 to access a streaming radio station. Two catches. You can only listen to it from your iPod, and the station only plays songs from one band.
  • 'unless you have one of the 500 cassettes the band sold in 1994, you've never heard this before'

    That's quite a claim, unless they're claiming to have invented an unbreakable ARM scheme for cassette tapes in 1994 ;)

  • Okay, so the band is bypassing iTunes to release music. Yet strangely, Apple didn't think this app "competed" with any existing Apple-branded software.

    Only enforce rules when it suits you, eh?

  • The shortcomings of their approach are well described above, and not worth discussing. Meanwhile, a more entertaining error has landed on U2 [arstechnica.com].
    • by geekoid ( 135745 )

      Awesome.

      That article is like it was written in 1998.
      Millions buy their albums, even though they are all available for free, easily.

  • They turn on the Band Bypass Filter!

    • by anothy ( 83176 )
      oh, bloody hell, where're my mod points when i need 'em? best /. comment in a month.
  • Firstly, it just bypasses iTunes in loading new music onto your phone - there seems be a not-inconspicuous "BUY NOW" button, which I would guess would take you to the iTunes Store so you can... purchase the song!

    I've seen similar apps on the store, GameRock being the one I use. It seemed appealing enough - access to all the music game's library of music (Guitar Hero (1..n), Rock Band 1/2, etc), but honestly, it sucks.

    Firstly, you can listen to the setlists contained in each game, yes, but they're shuffled. You can only go next track and pause (and the pause only works for a little while - pause too long and you'll lose the song). Oh yeah, there's a nice big BUY NOW button so you can purchase the track. You can browse the setlist, but that's only if you want to buy a different track than the one currently playing. It's slow switching tracks (several seconds to pull new track information, then several more seconds to start playing), ugh. And the quality's fairly crappy too - like 128kbps (or lower) MP3.

    It's a great way to sample an artist's other works, I'll admit, but it certainly doesn't beat actually having the song loaded on your iPod. The random shuffle, the slow next track make it useful as say, a radio that plays one artist only (or in my case, music from one game), but not much more.

    The BUY NOW would explain why Apple freely approves these kinds of programs - more iTunes store revenue.

    • like 128kbps (or lower) MP3.

      Right, because on the iPhone, with its ultra high end audio front end, you can tell the difference between 128K and 192K mp3.

      Most of the music you are getting from those games has already been warped and flattened to 'sound good' to the general public when played from a CD anyway so stop pretending you can tell the difference.

      A real audiophile has no problem calling bullshit on the 'omg its so low quality!@$!' crowd. The general public doesn't care, and those of us who know sou

      • Eh, isn't the point of the iphone that its mp3 player quality is on par with the ipod itself? I've never used one for music playback, but ASSUMING (and i may be wrong) that its headphone out is of the same quality as an ipod, then with not-terribly-expensive headphones it shouldn't be hard to tell the difference between 128kbps and 192kbps.

        A commonly stated fallacy, even among relatively well informed audio gurus, is that limitations in one part of a signal chain can obscure limitations in other parts of th

  • unless you have one of the 500 cassettes the band sold in 1994, you've never heard this before

    Three words: tape dubbing, torrents.

    • by anothy ( 83176 )
      no, no, no... they were way ahead of their time. those were 500 heavily DRM'd cassettes. if you tried dubbing it, you just got 19200 baud screeches.
      • by daybot ( 911557 ) *

        if you tried dubbing it, you just got 19200 baud screeches.

        I did think it was poor, even by POTUS standards...

  • This is VERY impractical.

    Since Apple doesn't allow iPhone developers to design apps that run in the background, its a huge effin' stretch to say Apps are any competition for iTunes... As soon as you lock the phone, it will quit playing. There's no option to turn the screen off unless it is locked, so the amount of battery usage is tremendous, lest we ignore all the random things it might be doing in your pocket. I'm also pretty sure it won't play music through iPod/iPhone compatible hardware either... Apps
  • Band Cuts Apple in for 30% Share of Sales

  • by BitZtream ( 692029 ) on Saturday February 21, 2009 @01:33AM (#26938919)

    So if you think Apple is going to lose money from this, you're an idiot.

    This is an app from a band that if they were lucky as a pig in shit, people bought two of their songs from iTunes. In reality, most people bought one.

    Thats what hurts the record companies. People aren't buying a CD of 6-15 songs for $10-20 anymore, they go buy the one song they hear on the radio for a dollar and thats it. The record companies loose out on truck loads of money because users no longer have to by the crap they don't want to get the tiny portion they do want.

    So all this is, is a way to get $3 from people wanting to buy that one-hit wonder instead of a dollar.

    Apple won't care, its great for them, instead of buying that one song for $0.99 where Apple ends up giving a good portion of that away to the labels, and other costs of serving the music. Now they sell one app, which is certainly smaller than a song since it streams the audio from else where, and now they've made $0.90. Thats almost as much as the entire sale of the single song. And they don't even send you the audio! They only have to send you the tiny app.

    The record label is happy because they just made twice as much off that one hit wonder, so they have to give out some streams of the audio, big deal, copies of bits are free, and bandwidth is practically free so its not a big deal to them.

    What happens next? Why, Ads of course! They stream the audio to you, why not inject a little advertising, its for YOUR benifit, they can tell you about all the other great bands that you can buy as iTunes apps.

    Now, congratulations, you have just paid $3 to get the same thing I currently get on the radio. No, I take that back, radio is far more reliable than AT&T 3G service so you've got a bad radio that has an selection thats extremely limited (even compared to most radio stations) playlist, and likely advertising in the near future.

    So I restate, if you think Apple will be upset about this, you're an idiot. Everybody involved will make more money (except for the parents of the kids buying this sort of crap) from this. Its just another attempt to hold on to the old business model. What scares me is that from reading the slashdot entries to this point, hardly anyone has realized this. Sheep.

    • Maybe that's what other people do, but I buy albums. Lots of albums. From iTunes and eMusic. I make a big playlist and play it all day - I don't have time to stuff around with individual songs, but then again I'm not 13.

      Anyway, isn't this just the same as Ye Olde Days of Vinyl? We had albums, we had singles. How is this different?

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