Maybe it's just me, but I genuinely doubt that Apple's service is the "future" of anything other that a boost to a slowly sinking company.
I was reading a recent article in the Wall Street Journal that discussed Apple's new music service just before it was launched. While Steve Jobs and company have done a good job getting a number of the major music labels to make their recordings available, it might be pointed out that you need a Macintosh computer to access the service.
And Macintosh is a fading computer brand. In the past decade they've slid from something like 9 or 10% of the PC market to somewhere around 3-4%. Unless they make the service available to the Wintel crowd - the service is doomed. I won't even mention Apple's sliding sales in the past two years. Just recently they cut pricing across almost all of their line, because sales were few and far between.
I also fail to see the commercial media industry fading away. How many people on this board actually listen to MP3s on a regular basis? Probably almost noone. And how many people do you know over the age of 40 who actually "rip" their music from the internet?? Again - most likely very few if any. The down load music industry is mostly driven by young people in their teens and early 20s - who will put up with second rate sound quality. Many are too damn cheap to actually buy anything - hardly an audience to try and sell a "legitimate" music service to. Anyone other than Apple's marketing dept. that thinks this service will be the "future" of music should see me about a bridge I would like to sell.
I was reading a recent article in the Wall Street Journal that discussed Apple's new music service just before it was launched. While Steve Jobs and company have done a good job getting a number of the major music labels to make their recordings available, it might be pointed out that you need a Macintosh computer to access the service.
And Macintosh is a fading computer brand. In the past decade they've slid from something like 9 or 10% of the PC market to somewhere around 3-4%. Unless they make the service available to the Wintel crowd - the service is doomed. I won't even mention Apple's sliding sales in the past two years. Just recently they cut pricing across almost all of their line, because sales were few and far between.
I also fail to see the commercial media industry fading away. How many people on this board actually listen to MP3s on a regular basis? Probably almost noone. And how many people do you know over the age of 40 who actually "rip" their music from the internet?? Again - most likely very few if any. The down load music industry is mostly driven by young people in their teens and early 20s - who will put up with second rate sound quality. Many are too damn cheap to actually buy anything - hardly an audience to try and sell a "legitimate" music service to. Anyone other than Apple's marketing dept. that thinks this service will be the "future" of music should see me about a bridge I would like to sell.