[signs]

just heard on the radio the music industry is pushing to put downloads up from around £0.80 to £1.50

they say they need the money to keep paying the artists
i believe they have realised this is the way the market is going and as usual they want to milk it
IMO the price should come down, it's a question of bulk a record company only needs to host one mp3 file on their site and 10-10,000 people can download it, so cutting the cost of distribution.

[gosties]

Got to agree about this with you about the record companies. Their only interest in increasing the cost of of downloads is to increase profit margins. If this increase went ahead I very much doubt that this would be passed on to the artist.

[overkill]

Originally Posted by gosties

Got to agree about this with you about the record companies. Their only interest in increasing the cost of of downloads is to increase profit margins. If this increase went ahead I very much doubt that this would be passed on to the artist.

The music producers don't change. They've always been greedy, and people should have learnt from the crass overpricing of CD, that it was only a matter of time before they started ripping people off with 'legal downloads'.

£1.50 for an MP3! They have got to be kidding! An average CD costs around a £10, yet to download the twelve tracks on a normal album you are paying £18!

[EricHitchmo]

I dont see the point of paying for downloads. Albums are available for less than £5 if you wait/shop around. Downloads can be wiped off etc if a computer dies. Plus cds sound better.

[KoThreads]

Originally Posted by overkill

The music producers don't change. They've always been greedy, and people should have learnt from the crass overpricing of CD, that it was only a matter of time before they started ripping people off with 'legal downloads'.

£1.50 for an MP3! They have got to be kidding! An average CD costs around a £10, yet to download the twelve tracks on a normal album you are paying £18!

Exactly. But even this last week i've spoken to people who have downloaded whole allbums for more than the CD price online, it's madness.

But if they do increase them then what's to stop the industry pushing CD prices higher and forcing on-line companies to do the same.

Home taping killed music.............NO
Home copying killed music...........NO
Downloading killed music.............NO

Above three actually helped them................YES
Greedy record companies are killing music......NEVER.

[UKflames]

Raising prices further will only push more people to our well known Russian friends and their nice cheap site.

[pmc]

Interesting article on this subject here

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/02...ve_gordon_drm/

I for one don't buy legal downloads because of DRM. Take away DRM and bring the price down to reflect the saving made in distribution costs and legal downloads could finally work. Or are the record companies just too greedy and stupid to realise that.

[RMCF]

Originally Posted by EricHitchmo

I dont see the point of paying for downloads. Albums are available for less than £5 if you wait/shop around. Downloads can be wiped off etc if a computer dies. Plus cds sound better.

Agree 100%

[RMCF]

The music world is full of greed.

Just take a walk around your local HMV or Virgin megastore and you'll see 10 year old single CDs at £16.99 or more. Shocking.

I always thought that downloads were overpriced at 99p, since the companies do not have to physically produce a CD, box, cover etc. If they push them up then more and more people will just use P2P sites.

[Kieron]

Aren't iTunes songs 99 cents on the American site - 50p??

Putting the price up will just increase piracy.

[the_pauley]

This is madness. They expect us to pay more for an inferior sounding product with no packaging? Anyone forking out for this like the people mentioned above deserve to be ripped off.

Doesn't come as too much of a surprise. The record industry in the UK have always been rip-off merchants. Thank gawd for online (international) shopping.

[Knyght_byte]

i think they should charge 30p for a MP3 quality download, 60p for a CD quality download and 95p for a 96/24 quality download........that would be fair and give people the choice of what they download......most would still got for the mp3 as they cant tell the difference due to owning an ipod and a dixons bought micro hifi, and its cheaper......but at least that means those of us who have quality hifi systems can get something in a decent quality to listen to as well....

if the world turns to low bitrate mp3 solely, then sadly i wont be buying much music in future :/

[RMCF]

Originally Posted by Knyght_byte

i think they should charge 30p for a MP3 quality download, 60p for a CD quality download and 95p for a 96/24 quality download........that would be fair and give people the choice of what they download......most would still got for the mp3 as they cant tell the difference due to owning an ipod and a dixons bought micro hifi, and its cheaper......but at least that means those of us who have quality hifi systems can get something in a decent quality to listen to as well....

if the world turns to low bitrate mp3 solely, then sadly i wont be buying much music in future :/

Its heading that way. The masses will accept it so it will happen. After all they accepted low bitrate SD satellite, and will probably accept low bitrate HD satellite and yet still think it is 'amazing' because they are told it is.

[Sonic67]

Something that has always got me about all this. Go into your local music shop or Play etc. My guess is the chart stuff might be around £10 for a CD.

Now how about the older stuff. Probably priced at anything from £3 upwards. Now look at itunes etc. Every track is priced the same. Why? A Prodigy track from the eighties has re-cooped its money by now for the studio costs etc.

I haven’t ever bought a download track. This will either push people back onto CDs or piracy.

[RMCF]

Originally Posted by Sonic67

Something that has always got me about all this. Go into your local music shop or Play etc. My guess is the chart stuff might be around £10 for a CD.

Now how about the older stuff. Probably priced at anything from £3 upwards. Now look at itunes etc. Every track is priced the same. Why? A Prodigy track from the eighties has re-cooped its money by now for the studio costs etc.

I haven’t ever bought a download track. This will either push people back onto CDs or piracy.

There are exceptions to your point.

If I want to buy, say for example, George Michaels Greatest Hits in my local Virgin/HMV is will be around £8.99. Now if I want to buy George Michael 'Faith' is is around £15.99. Why?? As you say, this album has paid for itself many times over, so it should be around £2.99, especially as people who don't already own it or aren't particularly fans of GM will generally just buy the Greatest Hits CD if they are buying anything from him.

[signs]

Originally Posted by Knyght_byte

i think they should charge 30p for a MP3 quality download, 60p for a CD quality download and 95p for a 96/24 quality download........that would be fair and give people the choice of what they download......most would still got for the mp3 as they cant tell the difference due to owning an ipod and a dixons bought micro hifi, and its cheaper......but at least that means those of us who have quality hifi systems can get something in a decent quality to listen to as well....

if the world turns to low bitrate mp3 solely, then sadly i wont be buying much music in future :/

i see what your saying....but do you watch all your TV in hi-def , i doubt it, at work i mostly listening to MP3. At home vinyl (my last turn table cost £lots) so i can see what your saying, but for every day listening MP3 is fine

[richardr]

The record companies would like to price tracks at different rates, but at the moment Apple insist on the one price.

Part of the reason the record companies would like to break Apple's near monopoly, but don't know how to at the moment.

[cabstar]

Originally Posted by richardr

The record companies would like to price tracks at different rates, but at the moment Apple insist on the one price.

Part of the reason the record companies would like to break Apple's near monopoly, but don't know how to at the moment.

Hmm yes the good old record company, quiete stupid really aren't they, they get that embroiled in DRM & copyright issues that not one of the large labels has realised they could host these mp3s on their own servers & sell them direct to the customer, ignore apple all together......

As for the cost of tracks being expensive, the whole mp3 download business has been built on the basis that it costs approx 55p to process a credit card transaction, hence the 99p download cost.

The same thing is now happening on you tube, since you tube announced they are going to pay uploaders for showing videos, the music industry suddenly goes into meltdown & starts removing copyrighted videos from you tube yet offers no alternative, it wouldn't be so bad if they where to upload them to youtube themselves but no thats to simple isn't it, better to go down the actively pursuing pirateers etc rather than actually embracing modern technology.

Gary

[Knyght_byte]

Originally Posted by signs

i see what your saying....but do you watch all your TV in hi-def , i doubt it, at work i mostly listening to MP3. At home vinyl (my last turn table cost £lots) so i can see what your saying, but for every day listening MP3 is fine

i use mp3's on the move on my PDA/phone/thing.....otherwise i dont bother to listen to music unless its on CD/DVD-A/SACD/vinyl......oh wait, i listen to radio1 when i have a bath..lol

oh, watching, i tend to mostly watch DVD's, only a few TV shows i watch such as quiz panel shows (HIGNFY type stuff) and WWE......a lot of other stuff i tend to wait for on DVD box set nowadays so its a nice quality....

but if its tiered pricing based on quality of the recording, then i can download what i want, cheesy bop-a-long pop for my PDA to keep me moving in mp3 format, CD quality for stuff i probably wont listen to a lot but now and again, and for stuff i love i can grab it in high bitrate.......