Comments on: Music Labels Rethink iTunes, Again; Same Old Gripe of Album vs Singles

By: Lacy Kemp

Lacy Kemp — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 23:31:53 +0000

I agree with Teamost. I'm also curious as to how the artists would prefer to have their music distributed. I would think it would be cool to have it done on a case by case basis for artists. I know certain bands look at their whole albums as a story that is meant to be listened to from begeinning to end…But, what if I don't want to hear all of the parts of the story? It's really an interesting battle between what artists want, what labels want, and most importantly, what consumers are going to BUY. Because if you're not making your consumers happy they'll find a way to get it with out taking legal channels.

By: Teamost

Teamost — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 18:22:20 +0000

I wonder if the artist/musician has any say in these decisions? Probably not, but you would think the artists would perhaps like to have a say in how their music is made available — in terms of single songs or album-only.

By: Monita De Varge

Monita De Varge — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 11:58:16 +0000

This is crazy!

Labels are crazy

People should be given the opportunity for choice, so what happens if a band has a one hit wonder on an album and people only want one song, they'd be pissed that they had to download the rest as well.

I have my Album selling in iTunes & I'm happy to let people buy my songs separately. The music is sitting in one of the largest music databases in the world.

If I wanted to download only one song from an album, then it should provide the freedom for me to do so.

By: Jamie Poitra

Jamie Poitra — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:45:00 +0000

What always strikes me at these times is that I don't remember record labels freaking out like this about the big chains. When Walmart suddenly became the biggest seller of CD's they didn't suddenly freak out about it and start selling certain CD's only at other stores.

And Walmart was can't have been paying the same amount for CD stock as other stores all this time. Walmart is known for pushing it's product supliers around to the point of ridiculousness.

The real issue is that record labels don't like the freedom that a digital copy of music gives you. They repaint it a variety of ways, but it really always amounts to the same thing.

Their actions seem designed to try and show how really digital music isn't "all that" when its been repeatedly shown that it IS all that.

And yes, when I can't find a song I want on iTunes I often just don't buy it until it shows up there. I'm too busy to try and figure out where a song IS available.