2005-11-17

iTMS Already Has Variable Pricing

So everyone is talking about how Mr. Jobs might raise iTMS prices.

The thing is, they already have variable pricing. Not every song costs 99 cents, and I'm not talking about the different prices between the countries. Let's look at a few examples:

PQM - The K Song 4 tracks = $9.99
Eddie Amador - Psycho X Girlfriend 4 tracks = $9.99

You will surely notice that two of the four songs in each bundle is over 10 minutes, which seems to be the magic cutoff to only being available if you purchase the whole album. Still, that's $2.50 per track. Are these considered albums, requiring the $9.99 price?

But it goes the other way too.
London Elektricity - Pull the Plug 7 tracks = $5.99
Here, we also have two tracks over 10 minutes, but the prices is less than 99 cents a track when spread across the whole album.

Clever - Breakbeat Science Exercise 5 15 for $8.

Even better, here is 13! tracks for $4.49.
Energy 52 - Cafe del Mar: The Best of the Remixes The funniest thing is that if you buy the tracks individually, it will cost $11.00 and you only get 11 of them! Now that's variable pricing.

It is true that I have not yet found a single track that costs more than 99 cents, but I swear I saw some a while back, so I'll keep looking. The best I can do is 2 tracks for $9.99. However, I'm guessing this too is a glitch in the way the music is priced. Since both of the tracks are over 10 minutes, all of the tracks are available "album only" and albums are $9.99. Could that be it?
BC - Switch It

Damn you iTMS. I added 4 songs to my cart just browsing around looking for variable priced music! No, none of them were the higher priced ones, but that's not to say that I will quit buying if they raise prices. I'd really love it if they raised some and lowered others, but I doubt there will be any lowering. If they raise too high, I'll probably send more of my money to Beatport, but I would miss the ease of use of iTMS, that's for sure.

1 comment:

Jason said...

I didn't think single songs were ever different than $0.99, good to know.

I really like uniform prices so that I can just keep clicking the purchase button without thinking about it. However, it would be great to see them buck the Best Buy trend. Instead of making music cheap at first, and then jacking up the price after a week, why not make people pay for the new hotness, and pay less when the want the old and busted?