It was only a few years of pointless arguing later that the spoiled brat fight between Apple and the music labels finally ended with agreement on a scheme that would deliver DRM-free music to all of us via iTunes. So byebye, CD’s. It’s been real.
I still remember the very first CD I bought, the excitement of scraping away futilely at the shrink-wrap [what's this shiny stuff? blimey it's hard to get off] from Killing Joke’s Millenium EP and then playing it about 5 zillion times.
not again
Of course, with this advance of technology the art of the mixtape was lost forever and the romantic side of me will always feel slightly melancholy about that. I somehow miss the extra work which went into those. It’s the x-factor, the love, the thought, the care that evolves what is otherwise just a collection of songs into an insight into someone’s soul. They always sounded like shit but that wasn’t the point, was it?
Most people these days don’t know what the fuck a quality mix is, let alone the requisite late nights that should be spent planning the perfect solution. the ideal song selection and the right mood transition for the right person. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read High Fidelity by Nick Hornby immediately. I’ll even let you off lightly by allowing you to watch the unexpectedly good film instead if you want.
Kim and I must have burned an entire field of beehives in candles with the late nights we spent meticulously recording songs for each other when the Atlantic separated us and we’d not see each other for half a year at a time. This along with a forest of handwritten letters, another lost art but that’s one Kim’s probably thankful for as my writing may quite possibly be the worst scrawl that ever did infect this planet. That was back in 1990, fast forward to 2009. First off, damn that was 19 years ago and I feel .. damn. That’s a long time. Wow. ..
Damn it.
[musical interlude]
Fast forward to 2009 and I think its safe to say that the CD just died. DRM and Quality/Bitrate were the last two barriers to breakout sales for Apple/iTunes and now they have been removed I don’t see why anyone would buy a CD. For the price of a few CD’s you can get an iPod classic which stores more music than you can shake a stick at. In addition, I bet only highly trained professionals could tell the difference between a 256 bitrate AAC file and a CD. I know I can’t.
Of course, the gamble / strategy part in all of this is that a good chunk of people are going to buy the higher quality music which takes up more hard disk space. Hence people are going to need, rather than want, the latest iPhone and iPod touch models that go beyond 32GB when they come out. Admittedly this won’t be everyone, but I don’t think anyone would argue that it will be more than would otherwise. Brilliant, really.
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Apple(R) today announced several changes to the iTunes(R) Store (http://www.itunes.com). Beginning today, all four major music labels — Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, Warner Music Group and EMI, along with thousands of independent labels, are now offering their music in iTunes Plus, Apple’s DRM-free format with higher-quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings. iTunes customers can also choose to download their favorite songs from the world’s largest music catalog directly onto their iPhone(TM) 3G over their 3G network just as they do with Wi-Fi today, for the same price as downloading to their computer. And beginning in April, based on what the music labels charge Apple, songs on iTunes will be available at one of three price points: 69 cents, 99 cents and $1.29, with most albums still priced at $9.99.
