Why Spotify Will Kill iTunes

I think his argument is pretty weak. Sure, for tech-savvy people that buy a lot of music, going with the flat pricing of Spotify makes sense, as does the convenience of not having to manage and sync your music files between devices.<p>However, a very large number of people spend less than $10/month on music, or don't have the desire to completely switch over to a new music service. There's also the hesitation to spend the effort switching to the new service that will disappear once you stop paying them whatever they demand. Netflix has recently demonstrated that the pricing for media streaming has the ability to change rapidly and sharply, leaving you no recourse other than to either pay or lose access to the music and your playlists.

No Beatles.<p>No Bob Dylan.<p>No Pink Floyd.<p>I'm certainly enjoying Spotify, but it has some big gaps that need to be closed.

The article seemed a bit tedious and overwrought. All that aside, for me it raised the question, "how do the musicians get paid?"<p>As a musician, this is a matter of great interest. The answer: "Spotify shares it 50/50" according to the first article I found that answered the question.<p>Last time I checked, Apple was paying 70%; however, if you're not on a major label, you'll likely get to iTunes through a third party such as CDbaby; they pay 91% of that 70%. Even so, 63.7% is better than 50%.<p>Addendum: as the article I mentioned describes, it may actually be worse than that, because payments aren't on a track basis, but rather more like the airplay payments that BMI and ASCAP pay (in which you only get paid if you have lot of spins).<p><a href="http://gramtone.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/spotify-a-loss-for-musicians/" rel="nofollow">http://gramtone.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/spotify-a-loss-for-...</a>

If that is the case why hasn't rhapsody which has been around for a long period of time already killed iTunes?

Sort of off-topic, but does anyone know why the hype around Spotify is so great?<p>A few years ago, I started using Napster's streaming service. Then moved to Rhapsody for a slightly better interface/collection and mobile offline caching. Then to MOG, and eventually Rdio.<p>Now Spotify comes out, and while I also moved to it, about 30 of my coworkers/friends are now on it using it as their first streaming service.<p>Maybe the invite-only access and alleged legal troubles helped in their favor? I don't get it.

Hogwash. iTunes isn't just a place to listen to music. It's a place to buy it, retrieve it, find it, and more. It has better selection and is backed by a bigger company, with more weight to throw around when record companies try to get pushy.

iTunes is used, overwhelmingly, to deliver music <i>to mobile devices</i>. And streaming is facing a number of serious barriers for that kind of mobile use: battery drain, network coverage, bandwidth caps and the high price of data plans (with sufficient caps).<p>So, almost regardless of individual quality, streaming services are not replacing iTunes any time soon. Almost certainly not in the US and likely not anywhere else.<p>They definitely have a market, particularly in competing with terrestrial and satellite radio. But streaming is simply not a good fit to do what iTunes is used to do.

I don't know if I believe that Spotify will really be able to kill iTunes, but perhaps it will force iTunes to lower their prices or to offer streaming subscriptions?

Apple can enter the streaming music market whenever they want to; that's why they bought Lala.

iTunes isn't going anywhere because it's tied to iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, iPad, Mac and it's where you buy Music, Videos, Books, Apps, Audiobooks, Podcasts, and um....yeah.<p>Also, I love music and Spotify is pretty great, but so was Mog, Pandora, Napster, Zune, and many other music services, but none of them have dented iTunes, if anything quite the opposite.<p>Spotify is great relatively cheap way to sample lots of music you may or may not like, but if I want to keep a song or album, I'm going to buy it on iTunes or Amazon MP3 so I have a backup copy of that music "forever".<p>Spotify is likely a bigger competitor to Pandora and traditional radio than it is to buying music in general. People like owning things more than they like renting things.<p>Hoarding is human nature.