Believe it or not, music executives do not have the consumers best intrest at heart.
I have been an iTunes user for 3 years now. For me, when it comes to listening to and purchasing legal music downloads nothing is easier and more flexible than iTunes. For .99 cents a song I’ve become my own DJ. I can buy only the songs I want and I can purchase most albums for $9.99. Apple also offers iTunes Originals, your favorite songs and the stories behind them from influential artists such as Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morrisette for under ten bucks. Steve Jobs, Apple’s top dog, has been adament about the .99 cent song price since iTunes inception. The music buisness embraced Apple and easily agreed to the price structure. They were despearte to break the illegal download buisness. iTunes, within a matter of days, rocked the world and turned millions of people into legal downloaders. iTunes effectively saved the music industry which, at the time, was beginning to see the first major losses of the download era. iTunes allowed the record companies to legally get downloadable music into the hands of consumers and still retain control. That is when the dollar signs began flashing. When iTunes became the phenomenom that it is, music execes suddenly turned on this new technology. Record execs began to push jobs to raise the .99 cent cost. They began to whine and complain. They again started crying that downloadable music was hurting their buisness. Jobs called the greedy. So do I.
Today I got a little hint at their greediness. A Reuters article shed some light on just how greedy record execs truly are. Warner Music’s Edgar Bronfman might be wishing he could retract a statement he made last week at an investor confrence. I’ve bolded his touchy comment below.
Record executives, however, are seeking some flexibility in prices, including the ability to charge more for some songs and less for others, the way they do in the traditional retail world.
“There’s no content in the world that has doesn’t have some price flexibility,” said Warner Music Group Corp. chief executive Edgar Bronfman at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia investor conference here. “Not all songs are created equal. Not all albums are created equal.
“That’s not to say we want to raise prices across the board or that we don’t believe in a 99-cent price point for most music,” he said. “But there are some songs for which consumers would be willing to pay more. And some we’d be willing to sell for less.”
Think about that for a second. What he is effectively communicating is that he believes that he can suck more money out of consumers for hot, popular music. He is saying that he can manipulate you, the consumer, into paying whatever he wants you to pay for your favorite artists. In theory, an artist could be an .88 cent artist one week and a $1.50 artist the next. I am begining to see what the real problem is in the music buisness. Leadership. Small-minded, money grubbing leaders.
Sony Music wants to thank you for legally purchasing their music by adding an enjoyment tax. Here’s to you, music execs! Way to ruin the party!
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