iTunes Store's new pricing scheme affects the charts, that Lightspeed Champion guy expresses surprise
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted Apr 12th 2009 9:06PM
posted Apr 12th 2009 9:06PM
An interesting sidenote on the intersection of music and commerce: Billboard reported last week that the iTunes Store's new variable pricing plan has had a bit of an impact on sales rankings on individual tracks, giving $.99 songs an advantage over their $1.29 counterparts. According to the magazine, numbers for Wednesday, April 8, show that the iTunes Top 100 chart had 40 songs at the $1.29 price point, and 60 at $0.99 -- the premium songs slid an average of 5.3 places, while the $0.99 songs gained roughly 2.5 chart positions. On Thursday the trend continued, with the 53 songs priced at $0.99 rising roughly 1.66 places on the chart, while the remaining songs -- priced at $1.29 -- lost an average of two chart positions. None of which answers the most pressing question: When will Miley Cyrus's reign of terror come to an end?
it's affect goddamnit
"affects the charts"
they still haven't realised it...
Dear reader,
Engadget is conducting a meeting after 10 minutes between all of its employees to discuss this serious issue, and a mini vote will be placed for fair results (Affects vs. Effects.)
Please hold on for more updates.
What is there to discuss? It's grammatically wrong. There is no discussion to be had.
it's affects.
effect is result of something having affected something
Affect is right.
If you are talking about an aspect of something being altered, use affects.
If you are talking about an event that occurs, use effect.
Drinking affects his mood. His mood changing is an effect of drinking.
@arcticpenguins
Fail..
Just because Saad has a profile pic and a properly spelled name does not make him a Engadget blogger.
well DUH
VERY few times have I seen an actually editor post in the comments, except when responding to a comment that sheds new light on a subject.
I am not a moron
@arcticpenguins
Lmao
Second time in one thread that you took a comment to seriously.
Theres a reason I hate the English language despite it being my native tongue. Excessive convolution for the sake of it. Math FTW!
unless they're saying the new pricing scheme effected the creation of new charts to display the new data.
@ dBs
Try German. Mark Twain was right about that language.
Being greedy will make me crafty.
Your Avatar is upside down
OH MY GOD THE WORLD IS FINALLY ENDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Watch out, he has Conficker!!!
ɯıɥ ɹoɟ dn ʎɐʍ ʇɥƃıɹ ǝɥʇ s,ʇı ʞuıɥʇ ı
i can figure out the inverted avatar, but how the hell do you write upside down?
RE: TRAFFICBLOWS:
write upside down using
FlipText.net
.uʍop ǝpısdn ɹoʇıuoɯ ɹnoʎ uɹnʇ ʇsn
why the heck can't they come up with a subscription service?
oh.. a revelation that cheap stuff sells better than expensive stuff!
this is news?
ZOMG!!! Increasing price decreases demand for a product! This is revolutionary! To the presses!
Apple still has not realized this.
Really? i thought apple had a way of selling expensive stuff... well
demand: still sloping downwards.
note: revenue need not necessarily be down, so you don't know if apple is seeing more or less dollas as a result of this. If they're seeing more, that says to me that people valued the service more than .99/track...but I am in school for econ, so I'm a bit biased, maybe. :)
@ Matt
Uh... Apple has no say in the iTunes pricing of music... the variable pricing was the "genius" of the music cartels in return for DRM-free music. Please do not accuse Apple of this rediculous idea.
@Chuckles McGee
To be more accurate, increasing price decreases the amount demanded. The demand curve remains unchanged, unless the price increase has tarnished the reputation of the company to the point that if they dropped the price back to $0.99, there would be less people buying from them.
Hooray for fleeting knowledge of high school economics!
@BMW
Once upon a time, NBC-Universal tried to raise prices so Dear Leader cut them off. The Apple faithful praised Him for his actions saying that He was sticking up for the little guy, and boycots against NBC-Universal were called for. There were complaints about how Microsoft was selling out because they give $1 to NBC-Universal for each Zune sold along with claims that MS was paying off NBC-Uni to stop selling on iTMS.
When NBC was added back to iTMS Dear Leader was declared a genius, NBC was laughed at for "crawling back" because they would not survive without the power of Apple behind them.
Where is this attitude now? Why is Dear Leader not sticking up for the little guy? Where are the calls for standing up to the man (record labels)? Where are the complaints about Apple selling out? It is simply, as you said, not Apple's fault - and that is OK with the Apple faithful.
One TV company is a bit different to 4 major record labels. iTunes could survive without NBC. It couldn't without the 4 major labels. So the price gets increased. Apple has no real say in it.
@ Nohone: thanks to "Dear Leader", the "little guy" can now get DRM-free AAC's from iTS. However, that came with a price - different price tags for tracks. As an occassional only user of iTS, I think this was a good compromise. And when the greedy music cartel notices people won't buy the more expensive tracks, things will probably get back to normal.
It is news because of what it will do to the industry.
Apple has been telling them for years that 99c was the best price point, and flat pricing was best. They didn't listen, because they're under some illusion that they rock the distribution game (despite never having done it well. Ever). Now they've made their most popular products more expensive, and as a result, "most popular" has been redefined.
It's fantastic. They're getting punished. Their top songs which they spend millions promoting and sell at $1.29 are failing because of their greed. The bad news is that they won't learn. Record labels are amazingly good at stubbornly ignoring the fact that the ship is sinking.
I think Apple will just go out and make their own record label. They've lost favour with the established labels, so there's little to lose. They also have the largest music store and oodles of cash.
Is this the same for Amazon mp3 and walmart music downloads?
no, that's why i still use amazon
Amazon is also selling songs at $1.29
No difference in cost.
Top songs are $2.19 here in Australia. Thats sick. No wonder people pirate.
I remember when doing a grocery shop costed $100, fuel was 89c/L and when cd's had 20+ songs on them instead off 11. In a few years time iTunes will be added to this list, when songs were 99c...
ahmen brother!
Songs were never ¢99 in Australia. You're witty remark is foiled by my incessant nit-picking!
"You're" needs to be "your". Your (
Comment system fails again.
"You're" needs to be "your". Your (
Ooops.. my own fail actually.
"You're" needs to be "your". Your (< example) incessant nit-picking is foiled by my love for grammar. (ntrly btw)
doesnt matter, no one in australia buys music anyway.
As everyone knows, Australia is entirely peopled with criminals.
Engadget photo win
People should just subscribe to the Zune Pass and enjoy unlimited music downloads on three PCs for the price of an album per month. I know that the Zune marketplace has only half of the music library iTune's does but, the more people support Zune, the better the library becomes. This is an amazing way to stop music piracy, and I'm one of the people who converted to this paid service considering how reasonably cheap it is.
And, I say PCs because Mac users are just 6% of the world, probably 80-90% of iTunes users are PCs.
I'm with you. I haven't downloaded any music illegally in months since I signed up for the Zune Pass. It's easier to search than Usenet or P2P, I can download anything in the Zune catalog, I get to keep 10 DRM-free songs per month, and its legit. Let's see if Microsoft can pry people away from their iPod Touches with the next version of the Zune hardware and actually make some headway with the Zune Pass. About 50GB of my 80GB Zune is filled with music from my Zune Pass.It boggles the mind to think how much that would cost in a world where the only alternative, legal or not, would be 99 cents per song from iTunes.
The problem with Zune Pass is that you can only play the songs on a Zune.
And what happens if/when Microsoft closes the Zune store? You're left with zero functional music. Whoopee.
Same here man, same here. Over half of my music library was downloaded by the Zune Pass, I use my 10-songs per month to keep my best of the best music, which happens to be less than a song per monthly new album, and sometimes I end up with only 6 songs.
This is a great way to enjoy music without the need to buy it and find out how lame it is after wasting a full dollar on it! and nothing beats double clicking any song and playing it like if it was on your computer or surfing the market place through your own Zune to listen or download music on spot. Sometimes I don't even download music, just double click and listen! Lol. My experience with the Zune Pass made me appreciate new genres of music I never thought I would love. I always bought music with full caution and didn't bother "discovering" music, now it is a different world for me.
Me, my brother and a friend all share the same account and each of us pay $5 per month!! Lol, me and my brother have Zunes, and my friend uses only his PC to listen to music, and we are all enjoying the service.
Guys, try it out, they even have a 14-days test for free, if you don't like it just cancel, trust me people it is really worth every penny.
Lol, I feel like listening to the old stuff Steve Wonder has, firing up my Zune, and baam, instant music. *You are the sunshine of my life*. :D
@ Jon
That's why people should adopt Zune. Plus, if you have a Windows Mobile Phone, or just use the music for your computer or a media center extender (Xbox), then you can use your Zune Pass on those. Also, Microsoft is probably not closing the Zune Marketplace any time soon. If anything is to go it will be the Zune devices, the service is gonna stay around. And on the chance that it does close, you don't really loose anything because you never really owned any of the music. The advantage to the Zune Pass is that you get those 10 free songs a month that can even be DRM-free MP3's so if you cancel your subscription or they shut down you get to keep those free songs.
@Jon,
Well when you download the 10 free songs with your zune pass then you get to use them for anything really. CD burning and converting and what not. Although for me I keep all the songs I download off zune pass by using tunebite. Oh shoot the RIAA is at my door!
1) $0 is less than 1 album per month
2) I wouldn't have to buy a Zune
3) I wouldn't have to own a Windows machine
At this point, music leaks are done on purpose to create hype. Producers leak albums out on bittorrent along with musicians themselves who give pre-release copies to blogs and other outlets.
The RIAA will have you believe that it's piracy so that their jobs stay somewhat relevant. Really, as has been said a million times, artists make money off of merch and touring.
I'd buy a Zune if it supported Mac.
@ John
Completely right. I'm studying Music Business/Management right now and while there is absolutely no business model anymore for the music industry to thrive on, artists are making almost 90% of their revenue from both merchandise and public performance. As well, their publishing deals give them a shit-ton of cash flow, as does ASCAP and BMI.
People need to stop worrying about illegal downloading affecting the artists. First of all, the times when the artists WERE NOT IN IT FOR THE MONEY are coming back, people are writing music for the sake of having an audience to listen to it. If you notice, the only people giving a shit about their music being stolen, are the artists that are in it for the money, not the music.
Argue what you will with how the artist should be paid for his work, I totally agree, and being an artist myself, I feel that getting money for my work is essential to being able to pay bills, however, I would take an audience of 1,000 people listening to my music over selling any amount of CD's or digital singles.
Realize that record companies are sinking (already sunk), and Artists are now doing things themselves.
@Saad
You mention that you, your brother, and a friend share a Zune Pass. I can see this possibly being considered
fair use if you share a residence, if not, this is exactly the problem the music industry is combating
although it may not seem like piracy to you, it is. If artists can't trust each individual consuming their product pays
the agreed upon price, whether it's subscription or per track, then the decline of the music industry will continue.
like the popular slogan of an electronics retailer here in Brazil: "PRICE IS EVERYTHING."
i think the more pertinent question is how has the rise in price affected the total number of sales? i think the information given in the article seems rather obvious.
man, fuck itunes. who still uses that shit?
Everyone.
sadly almost everyone, zune is now officially that much better!
People that like to own their music use iTunes.
FoxKenji, you know, you can also own your music on Zune or Amazon, what's your point?
Fox meant
"people who dont want to own their stuff cuz it's under DRM"
I like to own my music (and do a lot of it) and I avoid itunes like the plague. That bloated piece of crapware won't even let me sort my music by folders - that's a a freaking OS function, it takes almost nothing to include it in your software.
If I didn't need it for ipod touch software updates I wouldn't even install it.
I stopped usin that shit when I discovered LimeWire. Just like I stopped using LimeWire when I discovered torrents lol
This is how you thank them for removing the DRM?
Make up your minds, nerds.
@kangbp.nyc
Wow, who's been hiding under a rock for the last few months. iTunes has gone DRM free when it comes to music. It was a pretty big deal.
@ Wrabbit:
"won't even let me sort my music by folders"
Looks like you've never seen iTunes' folder structure. It automatically organizes your music by folders. But then again, with iTunes there's really no reason to go looking under the hood. You can take care of all organization in a much more superior way via iTune's interface along with all the meta data info. When downloading from iTunes there's really zero need to mess with any of that anyway but it's very useful when ripping CDs or adding songs downloaded from another source. I think iTunes is the best personal music management software out there.
Is that the guy from Yo Gabba Gabba?
it'd be cool if they added:
- Edit posts
- Delete posts
- Allow bold, italics, underline tags
No its Devonte Hynes AKA Lightspeed Champion.
LOL good one! i dunt think everyone knows nor watches Yo Gabba Gabba...
I think that full scale deletion and editing isn't really the best, as you get trolls and shit. Blah blah.
Best way would be to have something like:
- Up to 1 minute after posting they're allowed to delete the post
- Up to 3 minutes to click that edit button and correct whatever
ORLY?
Not buying any $1.29 music unless something else comes with it.
$.99 was the sweet spot.
it-leaked & strikegently ftw...
You could also go the other way...
The songs that are priced higher are the ones that were already on the top of the charts, correct? The lower-priced songs were not on the charts, or were lower on the charts.
As songs get more popular, they move up the chart, and something has to be pushed out of the way. When a song reaches its peak, it must eventually move down the chart.
This could simply be the more-expensive songs (the previous chart-toppers) moving down and making room for new songs.
Do people still pay for music? Why?
I thought people stole fuel for their cars, too!
wait..people buy music?
Only stupid people (or maybe I should say ill-informed, I like stupid better) and young fools buy movies and music from iTunes Store, when they can get it cheaper from a competitor - - go figure.
Which competitor?
@Jon
TPB
I'm with Jon, what competitor sells their music for much less than iTunes? And I'm not talking the totally obscure cheap crap sites that give away 100 songs for free to get you to sign up, and then their library turns out to be all bad indie groups (I'm not saying all indie groups are bad, I'm saying the indie groups they feature are bad, btw).
Only stupid and ill-informed people believe that iTunes is selling music at higher prices than the competition. On April 8th news broke that Amazon and Walmart both followed Apple and started selling their tracks with variable pricing.
http://i.gizmodo.com/5203077/variable-song-pricing-hits-amazons-and-walmarts-digital-music-stores
Go figure.
Why is it "iTunes Store's new pricing scheme" vs the music industries new pricing scheme?
Because it's referring to the iTunes charts.
Those are the ones EFFECTED???
Good...keep doing that and the record company may reconsider their plans...
I love me some Lightspeed Champion; and I've met the guy :D
I had no idea people were so cheap. I'm not exactly rich, but I can see absolutely zero difference between $.99 and $1.29. Both are extremely tiny amounts of money. Even after 100 songs it won't add up to a significant difference.
What's the highest level of math you understand? Addition?
$1.29 - $0.99 = $0.30
limit as n approaches infinity of the price difference between n $1.29 songs and n $0.99 songs equals infinity.
obviously, chefgon never heard about volume
@zomg0t
Math is witchcraft!
After 1000 songs (the most that can be held by the lowest-capacity iPod)...
$300 gone, 16gb Touch along with it.
Dang you guys are fast =(
I guess it never occurred to me that someone who is extremely concerned about 30 cents would ever consider buying 1000 songs on iTunes. I thought I was high-balling it at 100 songs.
Leave Miley alone!
People pay for porn?
Miley Cyrus is already going out. The Jonas Brothers, much more talented, are taking her place.
I suspect that when the two younger of the Jonas Brothers finish vocal puberty, and once they leave the disney channel, they'll get better. They may not be great now, but at least they have potential (Miley Cyrus does not).
what the!!!
people still pay for music in 2009?
lets see own 17,000 songs, n paid zero for them.
insane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!