Unlimited iTunes?

From Ars Technica, rumor has it that Apple may soon be letting consumers download unlimited songs from iTunes with the purchase of an iPod or iPhone:

A report by the Financial Times (registration required) cites unnamed executives who say that Apple is in talks with record labels to offer access to the entire iTunes music library for a lump sum price. The fee would be added as a premium option on an iPod or iPhone, or it could come as a monthly charge. It would allow downloading of any song at any time so long as the purchaser still owns the device, and the songs would be yours to keep….

Since the average iPod owner buys about 20 tracks from the iTunes, Apple wants to make the premium about $20, arguing that it should cover the average consumer’s downloads. Then the owner can make unlimited music downloads from the iTunes Store for the life of the device. Once downloaded, the tracks are yours to keep, even if you get rid of the original iPod or iPhone. And since iPod and phone owners tend to replace devices fairly regularly, the record labels would be getting the fee whether or not the consumer makes any further downloads.

Oh my gosh. I really, really, really hope Apple does this. Music heaven, here I come. (I don’t buy a ton of music, but it’s enough that it would make a huge difference.) (Whoa. Maybe I do buy more music than I thought — I have 889 songs purchased from iTunes. It’s not an exact $1-1 correspondence, mind you, since some albums sell for $9 or $10 and come with 20-25 songs. But that’s still a big chunk of money. Good grief. I had no idea…)

Anyway, unlimited would be nice. I’ve been wanting to expand my musical horizons. :)

It seems like I’ve been hearing this rumor for years now.

Now, it’s clear from the numbers that iTunes is just a loss leader to sell iPods, since most people who buy a $300 iPod don’t purchase 300 songs (at least, not before the next generation iPod comes out and they invest another $300). But having sold billions of songs, the only way Apple would ever do this is if it would boost iPod sales to the point of eclipsing the amount of money they make on iTunes. Otherwise it wouldn’t make sense to bundle it with the iPod, especially. Previous incarnations of this rumor have been about a paid subscription service (buffet style), ala the new Napster, among others.

I still think it’s unlikely, because Apple’s whole process of continually releasing new models seems already very good at driving ever more purchases of iPods (and it enables Apple to bypass Grimm’s law and keep charging the same prices for iPods over the years, by discontinuing models as fast as they make new ones).

Apple has already sold iPods of varying capacities approaching (or perhaps already surpassing–I’m not up on the latest numbers) the 100 million unit mark. If we take the price range of those, between $79 and $399, and guess an average of 200 dollars spent per iPod, that’s equal to 20,000,000,000 iPod songs, which is several times more than the number of iTunes songs ever sold, and yet doesn’t seem like such a great difference that they would want to cut something the revenue from iTunes individual song purchases. If anything, I’d say buffet subscription is more likely, and that rumor’s already been shot down by Apple numerous times.

Just my thoughts (as a non-Apple user)…

I agree with rikker. This rumour just hangs around on street corners, flagging down passing cop cars to whisper what it heard from “a reliable source involved in the negotiations”, then takes the tip money and spends it on drink and coke. I’ll believe this one when it’s on the Apple.com page.

Another reason this isn’t happening:

Apple led the no-DRM movement. Subscription service requires DRM to make sure your music goes away after you stop subscribing. There’s no way to offer a subscription music service without DRM.

Apple doing subscription now would be them saying ‘just kidding about that no-DRM stuff’…

Not happening.

This is basically just reiterating what rikker has said about the no-DRM movement but the basic idea that Apple is too strict with their music purchases as it is would prevent something of this nature ever happening. Only if there are numerous other successful companies who end up doing the same thing BEFORE Apple will this be a likelihood. And even then…I won’t be holding my breath.

Apple is kind of known for surprises, so I wouldn’t put it past them to do something like this. (And it wouldn’t be subscription-based. That much is already clear.) Just wait and see. :) And there are companies doing this already (like Nokia).