Apple Brings Good Karma to Online Music

The paint was barely dry in the Moscone West building when media and VIPs descended on San Francisco's newest convention hall to watch Steve Jobs unveil Apple's much anticipated music strategy. This was the day when the half and quarter notes were to blend into sweet harmony for Mac users. And during the passage of this very entertaining hour, many of Apple's recent business maneuvers suddenly made sense.

Think about Apple's moves over the last few years: the steady evolution of iTunes, the addition of the iPod to the digital hub, the licensing of Amazon's One Click technology, the migration to AAC encoding, the melding of AirPort and Rendezvous, the tight partnership with Akamai, and, finally, initiating talks with the major record companies to bring sanity to the online music environment.

Apple has been working on the music service for a year and a half and probably has had the overall vision for even longer. As enjoyable as the parts were--such as iTunes for music management and the iPod for portable listening--I doubt that many Mac users envisioned the totality of Apple's endeavor until Monday's presentation.

A Symphony of Announcements

By now you've probably heard the chorus from the media event. Apple announced new iPods, new version of iTunes, AAC codec for iTunes and QuickTime, and a new online music service available directly through iTunes 4. Everything works right now. I just downloaded a couple songs, and I quickly decided that I'd better get back to writing this article before I spent my entire month's allowance on new Counting Crows tracks.

You may also have heard some of the downsides of the new announcements. The Apple Music Store is initially open to US customers only. You have to have a credit card with a US billing address to purchase music. Apple hopes to offer this service internationally within a couple months. We'll see how that shakes out.

If you're a Windows user, you'll have to wait even longer. Apple is estimating they will be ready to serve PC customers by the end of the year. But as Steve Jobs said during the presentation, "Innovation happens on the Mac first."

Some folks are bemoaning the selection of titles in the music store. If you listen to popular music, both modern and vintage, I think you'll find just about everything you want. But for classical and alternative listeners, I think it's going to take a while to build the inventory to a satisfactory level. My initial thought is that the music store augments your other methods of procurement; it doesn't replace other sources completely. And in that light, I think it's rather impressive at launch.

Overall, this is a strong effort. The music service is compatible with old iPods, so you don't have to upgrade your hardware. Downloading iTunes 4, QuickTime 6.2, and iPod Updater 1.3 is free. You can use your existing One Click account with Apple--all you have to do is verify your information and you're rolling. And thanks to the terrific user interface and high quality 30-second previews, shopping for music in Apple's new store is truly fun, as long as you have bandwidth. Currently there are over 200,000 titles to choose from, and that number will continue to grow. Just type in an artist's name or song title, and you're presented with a selection of tunes to preview, and if you want, purchase and enjoy instantly.

So now that you have a handle on the big picture, here are a few details to digest.

New iPods

The third generation iPods don't levitate or play MPEG movies, but they do have a number of substantial improvements for a lower price. Here are some of the highlights:

• More capacity: 10, 15, and 30 GB models to choose from. 7,500 songs can be uploaded to the 30 GB model.
• Aggressive pricing: $299, $399, and $499 US.
• Lighter: at 5.6 ounces, they weigh less than 2 CDs in their jewel cases.
• All controls are "touch" variety with no moving parts.
• Screen is improved and more readable.
• Backlit control buttons.
• Firewire is on the bottom now, and iPod sets in a dock.
• "Line out" is added to the dock
• USB 2 is added for Windows customers.
• AAC audio codec is now incorporated into iTunes, QuickTime, and the iPod.
• "On the go" playlist reorganization so you don't need to do everything in iTunes.
• Two new games: solitaire and parachute
• You can personalize the main menu.

Also, if you've been thinking about replacing your existing PDA with an iPod, Apple is dangling another tempting morsel of functionality to help you move in that direction. A new batch of iPod AppleScripts enable you to easily move text from your Mac to your iPod. Especially interesting is the Clipboard to Note and the Note From Webpage scripts.

Apple has already sold more than 700,000 iPods; these latest models, with their various enhancements, are sure to keep the momentum rolling.

iTunes 4

Related Reading Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual By David Pogue

I've felt that iTunes is Apple's most refined and evolved member of the digital hub suite of software, and this latest version raises the bar even higher. In addition to incorporating the music store right in the application, which is so intelligent, there are a few other very notable improvements.

Finally we have Rendezvous support. You can now stream your playlists over a network to other Macs and enjoy other people's music. You can also burn directly to DVD from iTunes to back up your music library. As I mentioned earlier, AAC encoding now sits beside MP3 as an option. And iTunes now displays the album artwork of the songs that you download from the music store.

This update is free to download; after a night's testing, it ran smoothly.

Online Music

I think on any other day the new iPods and iTunes would have made for a tidy announcement, but expectations had been set for something more. And that something is Apple's new music store. You can browse music titles or use the search, listen to 128 Kbps previews, and purchase with One Click ordering. But there are some additional noteworthy details too:

• Unlimited CD burns for personal use, but a "governor" will restrict you from burning a playlist more than 10 times without modifying it.
• Music can be uploaded to an unlimited number of iPods and three Macs. You can "unauthorize" one Mac and authorize a new one if you want.
• The music you download can be used in any of the iLife applications, such as iPhoto slideshows, for personal use.
• There's no subscription fee or limitations. You pay 99 cents and it's your song to enjoy.
• Music encoded in 128 Kbps AAC.
• The 30-second previews are the same quality as the downloadable song.
• Album cover art is included with the downloads.

Good Karma

Steve Jobs attacked the existing free alternatives by pointing out their lack of previews, inconsistent encoding, poor quality control, and the fact that it's stealing music. Apple, on the other hand, offers 30-second previews, cover art, powerful web serving farms, pristine encoding, and, most importantly, good karma. You are legally buying the music and are thus guaranteed certain rights for its use as part of the purchase.

Aside from the particulars of the service itself, the overall integration of hardware, software, and network is impressive. There are a lot of little things to like as you get to know these tools.

iTunes 4 is sweet. When you're in the music store, you have web-like breadcrumbs at the top of the window to help you find your way back. The Rendezvous music sharing is cool beyond description. It just works. You can share your entire library or just an album. If you want, you can add password protection so you only share with those you choose to. You can control these settings via the Sharing options pane in Preferences.

The new iPods look great, and I'm looking forward to playing with them. But I'm also happy that my existing 10 GB pod was easily brought up to speed with the 1.3 Update that makes it compatible with iTunes 4, AAC encoded files, and a host of minor improvements, including a backlight toggle switch on the main menu. And best of all, everything worked the first night, just as advertised.

Tim O'Reilly, my boss, has remarked on a number of occasions that Mac OS X is guilt-free computing for Unix geeks. They have BSD under the hood, but get to enjoy the iApps, MS Office, Photoshop, and other goodies without having to use a Windows machine.

Now Apple has extended that "guilt free" feeling to the music world. If you have decent bandwidth, you can sit in the comfort of your own home, shop for music, download as much as you can afford, and enjoy it knowing that no one is being ripped off and that you won't end up with a RIAA subpoena in your hands.

After one night of testing, I have to say that I do believe that Apple has brought good karma to online music.

Derrick Story is the author of The Photoshop CS4 Companion for Photographers, The Digital Photography Companion, and Digital Photography Hacks, and coauthor of iPhoto: The Missing Manual, with David Pogue. You can follow him on Twitter or visit www.thedigitalstory.com.

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Comments on this article

Showing messages 1 through 15 of 15.

• AAC Streaming
  2003-04-30 05:44:28  TomSawyer [View]
  
  
  Has anyone run into problems sharing their purchased AAC encoded songs? An office mate and I were playing with the new iTunes 4 features yesterday. I could connect to his library via rendezvous and listen to his MP3s but his purchased music was requesting that I authorize my computer.
  
  Unless I'm missing something this runs contrary to the demo where Steve had his son and his son's pal come on stage with their 12" PowerBooks.
• AAC Streaming - Not From "Purchased Music"
  2003-04-30 08:47:11  Derrick Story | [View]
  
  
  Mac Rumors has posted a good article about Apple's DRM model. Here's a slice from that article that addresses your question:
  
  "If you're listening to a shared library or playlist, iTunes skips any purchased music in the list (if the computer is not authorized to play the music). To listen to a purchased song in a shared library or playlist, you need to double-click the song. If your computer is not authorized to play songs purchased by the person who is sharing the song, you'll need to enter that person's Apple Account ID and password to hear the song."
  
  And there's an associated Tech Note that covers this too.

• Great but !
  2003-04-29 11:56:58  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  iTunes 4 is excellent, the ability to stream music on a local network in the house or in my school is as I was today is great. Just make sure you follow up some of the threads on the Apple discussion forum as there has been some glitches if you have not opened the proper port in your Firewall or you acces the internet via a proxy server.
  however as I live in Scotland i am disappointed not being able to purchase music from the store. Apple has alienated a lot of European users with its lack of international support. We are still waiting for a Euro version of Sherlock and iPhoto has not been fully implemented here.
  If I can buy CD's online from the States with my credit card why is there such a big problem purchasing tracks from the Music Store? ( Jim Henderson)
• Great but !
  2003-04-29 12:15:20  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  Don't assume the problem is Apple's. It may be the music company lawyers at work.
• Great but !
  2003-04-30 09:34:59  mknepher [View]
  
  
  I'm a subscriber to emusic.com, and they recently added a large library of music from one of the big 5 (forget which one), much of which was restricted to US subscribers. Part of the problem is that an artist may be distributed on one label in one country, but distributed by another label internationally. I'm sure lining up the contracts for all that is a nightmare and a half.
• Great but !
  2003-04-29 23:36:06  eableson [View]
  
  
  An interesting side note here is that I suspect the problem lies less in the legal ramifications of the music industry, but rather in the tax implications of the various European nationalities. When I signed on (from France) I was able to get the service to work fine since I still have a US address credit card from when I lived there. The interesting part is that they properly identified the _county_ I live(d) in and charged me the appropriate sale tax as if I had made this purchase in a store in that county.
  
  This is a first that I've seen in online commerce with the ability to tie into that many tax jurisdictions and work out the billing rates and remittance details. Dealing with the Euro market gets even more confusing since they have to decide whether to offer a separate store in Euros (and we won't get into the whole price disparity that comes from that or the remaining non-Euro currencies still out there) or just let people buy in US $ and work out conversion rates - but tax accountants _hate_ that.
• Great but ! "International" customers
  2003-04-29 14:03:41  Derrick Story | [View]
  
  
  
  I think Apple is going to work hard on this one. Believe me, it's not because they don't want your Euro dollars. They do. The problem is legal in nature, and we're all tired of it.
  
  The Internet has made us one community in connectivity, but not in the other areas of commerce. This isn't an easy hurdle to overcome, but it is a very worthy endeavor.

• iTunes4, music store
  2003-04-29 11:39:14  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  contrary to many, 99 cents/song is NOT cheap. norah jones' "come away with me" is $13.98 for the album, but it's selling at most stores for about 11 bucks these days. but what the music store does offer is a truly unique buying EXPERIENCE. it's willy wonka's factory (sans oompah loompahs) for the audiophile - beautiful, colorful, and even a bit dangerous (i HAD to give it a try so i downloaded a cranberries album!). i'm not sure how successful it will be in the long run, which is what industry analysts measure. i hope it will be successful, but we'll wait and see.
• iTunes4, music store
  2003-05-07 20:00:39  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  Cutting thru all this HYPE. I'm new to the on-line music thing and I hope this will be successful to. But the m4p aac is not compatable with mp3 players. I just spent $2,500 for the newest Alpine car head end with DVD/CD/MP3. I can't play music I paid for in my car player. It won't burn in mp3 format. If I burn it in data cd format, the mp3 player ignors it. I suspect this is an attempt to increase sales for iPod. What are we all going to do, sit in front of the computer or hang a iPod on the belt to enjoy this music? I think in order this service to survive, mp3 format will need to be made available for purchase.
• iTunes4, music store
  2003-04-29 12:15:51  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  99 cents is cheaper than buying a whole cd for two songs. I purchased two albums (Jane's Addiction and Jimmy Buffet) for 9.99 each and another single track that wasn't available otherwise. I'd have paid 25- 30 easy for those two and I couldn't get the single by itself if I wanted to. I'll pay a buck to own just the songs I want.
  
  
• iTunes4, music store
  2004-01-22 03:30:00  jmeyers [View]
  
  
  Not Goog so cheap
• iTunes4, music store
  2003-04-29 15:51:54  stmpjmpr [View]
  
  
  True, but Jones' album is one of the few I'd care to own all the tracks of. Now you can own half of the songs if you like, or just one.
• iTunes4, music store
  2003-04-29 13:20:59  Jason Deraleau | [View]
  
  
  99 cents is cheaper than buying a whole cd for two songs.
  
  Exactly. But a lot of people seem to be missing that. I'd rather buy the hit songs on an album and then preview the rest with the 30 second clips, grabbing what else catches my ear. On many CDs these days, that'll total about three or four worthwhile songs. $3.98 later and I have the music I want legally. Normally I'd go down to my local Circuit City (ever Tuesday) and spend $13 for the same album and hate half of it.
  
  It'll be interesting to see what happens once this service succeeds and people stop buying whole albums. I wonder if it will drastically change the music industry.
• iTunes4, music store -- Solid Numbers
  2003-04-29 14:09:06  Derrick Story | [View]
  
  
  I think one change that's going to happen is that artists and record companies are going to get solid feedback on what customers like, and don't like.
  
  This is one reason why I enjoy writing for the Web. I get solid numbers on my articles. If I were a musician, I'd want that too.
  
  I think it's great that we don't have to buy a whole album. Sometimes I want to, sometimes I don't. That's what choice is all about.

• Bravo Derrick
  2003-04-29 11:38:42  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  Nice article; good summary of points; not cheerleading (mac-press), not negative (slashdot, register), just the basics summarized nicely. The postcards are pretty neat too.