Music Download Inconsistency Syndrome (MDIS), and "The Cure"
What's a consumer to do? Here's the scenario, I wanted to buy and download the new album by The Cure. So I started to dig around the top music download stores, and my impulse to buy was drowned out by my aggravation with the Music Industry.
In my quest to figure out which site had the album for the best price, I began to wonder - why should the price vary at all? Shouldn't I just be able to go to my preferred store, buy the album download, and know I didn't get ripped off? There aren't any costs associated with shipping and shelving physical products here.
No you can't, and this appears to have something to do with ill-conceived price manipulation on the part of the music industry to 'level the playing field' for other music download retailers. But it's really just leveling my willingness to commit to a purchase. Here's are the confusing price variations I found when looking for that new album:
For this particular album, it looks like Amazon is the way to go - but that isn't the case for every album. And what if I only want a few tracks? Anyway, it seems disingenuous that Apple supposedly had to threaten to close down the iTunes store to keep the per-track price of music downloads from going up - only to then see Walmart launch weeks later with tracks for as little as $0.74+. And now that other stores offer DRM-free MP3s, why isn't all new music on iTunes offered in a $0.99/track iTunes Plus format? Anyway, sorry for the particularly geeky rant - but come on, you aren't going to win the war on illegal downloads with these kinds of consumer unfriendly strategies.
*not an "iTunes Plus" offering
**Amazon tags it's MP3s with a unique ID code in the metadata, Walmart - unknown
***iTunes Protected AAC is 128kpbs, MP3s can be VBR but approx. twice the bit rate of protected AAC
In my quest to figure out which site had the album for the best price, I began to wonder - why should the price vary at all? Shouldn't I just be able to go to my preferred store, buy the album download, and know I didn't get ripped off? There aren't any costs associated with shipping and shelving physical products here.
No you can't, and this appears to have something to do with ill-conceived price manipulation on the part of the music industry to 'level the playing field' for other music download retailers. But it's really just leveling my willingness to commit to a purchase. Here's are the confusing price variations I found when looking for that new album:
| Album in question: The Cure, 4:13 Dream | |||
| iTunes | Amazon.com | Walmart.com | |
| Cost for album | $9.99 | $8.99 | $9.22 |
| Cost per track | $0.99 | $0.99 | $0.94 |
| Format | AAC | MP3 | MP3 |
| DRM? | Yes | No** | No** |
| Quality*** | Medium | High | High |
| Album savings | $2.88 | $3.88 | $3.00 |
For this particular album, it looks like Amazon is the way to go - but that isn't the case for every album. And what if I only want a few tracks? Anyway, it seems disingenuous that Apple supposedly had to threaten to close down the iTunes store to keep the per-track price of music downloads from going up - only to then see Walmart launch weeks later with tracks for as little as $0.74+. And now that other stores offer DRM-free MP3s, why isn't all new music on iTunes offered in a $0.99/track iTunes Plus format? Anyway, sorry for the particularly geeky rant - but come on, you aren't going to win the war on illegal downloads with these kinds of consumer unfriendly strategies.
*not an "iTunes Plus" offering
**Amazon tags it's MP3s with a unique ID code in the metadata, Walmart - unknown
***iTunes Protected AAC is 128kpbs, MP3s can be VBR but approx. twice the bit rate of protected AAC
posted by James Young at
7:47 AM
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