My Advice to Apple: iTunes Plus
Apple needs to seriously negotiate a way to get most, if not all, of the iTunes Store tracks available as “Plus” (DRM-free) tracks. I don’t understand why Amazon has a deal with all of the record labels to provide high bit-rate, DRM-free music tracks across the board, and Apple does not. I just recently read that Napster has now followed in their footsteps. What is the deal with iTunes? Today, there are still a relatively sparse selection of iTunes Plus tracks. I’m certain that this has to do with some contracting with the record labels, but they need to wiggle their way out of that — if that’s the case.
I love iTunes, and I frequently buy the iTunes cards at places like Target, so I load up on downloads. Despite having credits from those gift cards, I’ve bought my last two albums from Amazon. You browse the music just like any other Amazon product, and use a batch downloader that they provide to get your music (For Mac and Windows). After that, the 256k MP3 files are yours to do as you please. Sweet indeed.
Until Apple offers the same, I’m afraid I’m going to have to continue buying music from Amazon. It’s a shame on Apple’s part, considering iTunes is such a big player. If others feel the same way that I do, they are going to be in trouble some day if they don’t turn this around.
