Comments on: iTunes variable pricing goes live

By: Lauren

Lauren — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 00:50:09 +0000

haha the only 69cent kanye song WOULD be a religious song. the media’s freakin facist

By: Lauren

Lauren — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 00:47:56 +0000

okay i looked up the artist “A” just for kicks and ONE of their albums is 69 cents but that’s the only 69cent songs i’ve seen…EVER

By: russd

russd — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 19:33:08 +0000

Avast matey! Let fly the Jolly Roger! There be pirating to do…..

By: Jim Philips

Jim Philips — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:06:48 +0000

I don’t blame Apple for the price increases. Those were pushed on them by the recording companies. I do blame them for holding on to DRM for longer than necessary. That was a blatant attempt to lock people into their devices. It made it nearly impossible for me to play their music files on my Linux box or on a non-Apple PMP. For that reason, I dropped iTunes as soon as I could get a decent selection from Amazon.

By: Bob

Bob — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:58:08 +0000

It’s been announced and reported several times since January, so I’m surprised this author didn’t know. The pricing isn’t based on the “popularity” of the song at all, at least not how popular the song is on iTunes. It’s based entirely on the wholesale price of the track the music company charges Apple.

If the label charges a lower price, it’s less expensive on iTunes. If the label charges more, it’s more expensive on iTunes. Simple as that.

By: Benji

Benji — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 04:25:26 +0000

APPLE SUCKS!!! well just their prices… i am gonna stop buying music until they lower them. apple is gonna lose in the end… plus with all the FREE downloading apps why dont just start steeling it…

By: John Appleseed

John Appleseed — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 02:49:53 +0000

The day I tried to live by Soundgarden is $.69.

Thats the only one i found though…

By: Econokid

Econokid — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 01:11:27 +0000

Anyone else notice that the top songs no longer have the ringtone icon on them. A few do but none of the 1.29 ones do. The 69 cent songs don’t either. I also looked under the top ringtones and none of them are 1.29. Is it possible that one part of the deal was a restructuring of ringtones or that maybe an aggreement on ringtones wasn’t made before today and apple had to pull them. Just wanted to see if anyone else thought this odd.

By: Ahoy

Ahoy — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 00:35:44 +0000

I want to know who these people are that actually buy music? Christ I haven’t bought a cd or paid for music since the mid 90’s. Presently have around 3tb of storage and pretty much as releases are pre’d I have them. Its not even difficult to find anything you want be it torrent / ftp / mirc / usenet. Spend your money on a usenet account and you’ll thank yourself.

I support artists by attending concerts. This whole thing would be profitable again if they offered content / exclusives outside of the music. I’d pay a couple bucks for good quality album covers.

Every artist knows the power of social media now as well viral marketing to their fans. Selling of music is dead outside of the noobs who enjoy iTunes as it’s click to buy and click to sync.

By: mike!

mike! — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 22:51:00 +0000

Ripping cds ftw!

By: Mike

Mike — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 22:48:10 +0000

Outstanding. The record labels have no damn idea what the consumer wants. They’re so out of touch with reality it’s pathetic. Thanks for making my choice concerning pirating that much easier Mr. Music Label Exec. I hope you choke on your $5k champagne assholes

Posted from BGR Mobile (iPhone).

By: Ed Anger

Ed Anger — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 22:22:21 +0000

Zach Epstein and basically just about all of you above, you are idiots. Who do you think is behind the change in the pricing? Apple? NO. It’s the content owners, namely the cartel we call the RECORD COMPANIES. They must be laughing at all of you for blaming Apple and giving them a pass. If you recall, the record companies were playing hardball with Apple, threatening to pull out from the iTunes Store. Apple fought this, but realized that the record companies do have this one upper hand.

So instead of blaming Apple, who had fought to keep prices down for years, vent your spleens at the fat comb-overs who run the record companies. And please, get your facts straight. You guys are such tards…

By: peterrabbit

peterrabbit — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 22:20:18 +0000

@Ilias. The point I was trying to make is I-Tunes-Apple is being greedy and is certainly not deserving of my business while Amazon and others are not as yet. IMHO Apple products are overrated and over priced anyway. I can’t draw you a better picture than that.

By: CAA

CAA — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 21:21:02 +0000

There’s a Kanye West song off the College Dropout album for 69cents.

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?i=5925910&id=5926607&s=143441

By: TRV$

TRV$ — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:07:12 +0000

I’ve never had any issues with Amazon.

By: Martin

Martin — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 19:51:20 +0000

I completely agree with Sarah.

Why the F*#! is “More Than A Feeling” 1.29??? That song is over 30 years old!!

And so is Baba O’Reily by The Who

F U Record Labels

By: jonnybruha

jonnybruha — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 19:46:51 +0000

…”you’re”

Troll, maybe. I used to come to BGR to get a bit of attitude with the daily news in the wake of Ring Nokia going under (IntoMobile is terrible). Now, it seems that everyone at BGR is scouring MacRumors and Apple.com for any changes whatsoever. That’s not news. It’s filler.

By: juice_22

juice_22 — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 18:40:55 +0000

What Crap. All the more reason piracy will get worse. I’m ditching iTunes and going to Amazon or anywhere else that hasn’t given in to the greedy RIAA b*stards. They have songs that have been out for over 6 years priced at $1.29. How They are picking and choosing any songs that have done decent and try to gauge us for the money. Where is the justification for charging a premium. Other songs are available that are just as good as the “Premium” songs, there is no better quality. We aren’t getting any more for our money.

By: sarah

sarah — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 17:23:56 +0000

@jonnybruha
Sigh, your obviously a troll and thus everything is going to ignore you.

Anyways, I thought the $1.29 was gonna be for new songs and albums. If there basing it on popularity then this is just bs.

By: Econokid

Econokid — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:58:52 +0000

An increase in demand leads to higher prices. Since the supply isn’t changing and is constant it not increasing, the prices can be placed higher. If the supply was increasing and the demand was as well the shifts would offset themselves and the price would remain the same. The demand is the only effect on the price of these goods. The supply does not have any effect on this price increase.

By: jonnybruha

jonnybruha — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:42:39 +0000

Jesus Christ, you guys really do write changelogs for Apple’s website? Did you sign a deal with them or something?

How many of your readers buy music in the first place?

By: Evan

Evan — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:34:48 +0000

I can already smell Piracy becoming exponentially worse

By: Justin

Justin — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:34:08 +0000

Why are you looking at Britney Spears anyways?:)

By: Ilias

Ilias — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:20:02 +0000

I found one: this apparently popular jazz tune by Count Basie is 69c despite the fact the remaining tracks in the album are 99c

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?i=119267&id=119303&s=143441

@peterrabbit: You sound like an irrational shopper.

@ken: it’s probably personal choice but I always found MP3s sound shallow. I prefer the sound of 256kbit AAC (iTunes) to 256kbit MP3 (Amazon)

By: jorGeorge

jorGeorge — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:00:31 +0000

“The super cool loaners among you who are into niche genres..”

Loners*

By: chilipadi

chilipadi — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 15:58:22 +0000

Almost seems like a method to force supply-demand into raising prices… (bearing in mind that “supply” is virtually infinite)

greedy b*stards

By: MadMike

MadMike — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 15:21:14 +0000

I don’t buy music. I have Sirius/XM in my cars and internet radio for everything else.

By: Matt S

Matt S — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 15:11:31 +0000

If you open Itunes Store… then click Music under Itunes Store… when the next page loads there are 3 ads at the top, one of mine showed $0.69 cent songs… if not there press music again to refresh ads and it should show an ad for “Great song at a great price”

By: peterrabbit

peterrabbit — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:44:17 +0000

I would pay $1.29 to Amazon before I would pay I-Tunes $.69. IMO Apple is greedy and arrogant.

By: ahow628

ahow628 — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:37:59 +0000

Amazon is the best. Haven’t used iTunes in well over a year.