Apple, NBC iTunes rift
p2pnet news | Movies | Music:- According to MarketWatch, Apple’s iTunes is the “by far the biggest seller of digital music, TV shows and movies online”.
If you’re talking about the miniscule corporate download market, that may be true, but Apple’s sales don’t even amount to a hill of beans when one’s talking the Net in general where the independent sites and free P2P networks continue to reign supreme.
Be that as it may, to the mainstream media, iTunes is the only game in town and, “Last month, Universal Music – the world’s largest record label – refused to renew its agreement with iTunes to make its catalogue available over the store, choosing instead to make songs available on a case-by-case basis,” says the story, going on:
“On Friday, Apple said it will not offer shows from NBC for the upcoming television season on iTunes. It also plans to eventually drop all NBC shows from the service due to disagreements on charges for the programming.”
What’s the problem?
Greed. As usual.
“According to a statement from the company, NBC refused to renew its agreement with iTunes after Apple balked at paying fees that it said would more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode,” says MarketWatch.
NBC’s demands would have raised the price of NBC shows to $5 an episode from the current $12 price tag, says Apple, according to the story.
The same kind of problem exists within the music industry, but Apple isn’t complaining.
Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG whole-sale ‘product’ at anything between 60 to 80 cents per digital track, p2pnet was told some time back, and Apple charges a minimum of $1 for tracks polluted by DRM and up to $1.30 for ‘clean’ tracks.
With those rates in the background, iTunes wasn’t a genuine service: it was a loss leader for Apple’s iPods and if the company is now making money on downloads, it can’t be much relatively speaking, and it’s probably a fairly new event.
Meanwhile, “We never asked to double the wholesale price for our TV shows,” the story has Cory Shields, executive vice president of communications for NBC Universal, stating, going on, “In fact, our negotiations were centered on our request for flexibility in wholesale pricing, including the ability to package shows together in ways that could make our content even more attractive for consumers.
“It is clear that Apple’s retail pricing strategy for its iTunes service is designed to drive sales of Apple devices, at the expense of those who create the content that make these devices worth buying.”
Apple, “argues it needs to set prices low enough to encourage consumers to buy music and videos rather than obtain them illegitimately from file-trading sites, and that variable pricing would only confuse customers,” says the Mercury News, adding:
“Next week, Apple has a press event planned at which it is expected to announce a revamp of its lineup of iPod music players. Among the expected updates is a video-playing iPod with a screen comparable to that on the iPhone.
“But even as the company has moved to expand its video offerings, the video library in its iTunes store has remained relatively modest. The loss of NBC’s television shows would mark a big hole in iTunes’ catalog.
“If consumers don’t have readily available video for their iPods, iPhones and Apple TV’s, Apple could have a harder time selling those products, analysts say.”
And while the company’s continue to hack at each other over pricing instead of trying to find creative ways to offer their product, DRM-free, at reasonable prices to the millions upon millions of people who’d eagerly snapped them up, the ‘illegal’ downloading continues.
“NBC Universal also asked Apple to take concrete steps to prevent piracy, the spokesman stated, since it is estimated that the typical iPod contains a significant amount of illegally downloaded material’,” says MarketWatch.
Also See:
MarketWatch – Apple to stop selling NBC shows through iTunes, August 31, 2007
Mercury News – ITunes viewers, please stand by, September 1, 2007
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September 3rd, 2007 at 1:08 pm
“NBC’s demands would have raised the price of NBC shows to $5 an episode from the current $12 price tag, says Apple, according to the story.”
That should be “…from the current $2 price tag…”, shouldn’t it?
September 4th, 2007 at 8:32 am
You may want to edit this sentence: NBC’s demands would have raised the price of NBC shows to $5 an episode from the current $12 price tag…
Its kind of sad that these ‘media companies’ dont get media as well as Apple does. Time will tell …
What’s sadder is that they seem to know that all iPods are good for is to play pirated media. I guess my 500+ store bought CDs are all ‘pirate’. Maybe we should boycot these buffoons?