Download biz has to change, or digital sales will be playing a swan song

DOWNLOAD BIZ HAS TO CHANGE, OR DIGITAL SALES WILL BE PLAYING A SWAN SONG
[SOURCE: USAToday, AUTHOR:]
[Commentary] Nearly six years after the introduction of iTunes and the iPod, online music has failed to interest the vast majority of the world's music consumers. Which is no doubt why Steve Jobs recently called for an end to copy-protection software on digital songs. Something has to change, or iTunes and its ilk will never break into the mass market. It's certainly not that people don't want to buy stuff on the Internet. Amazon.com's sales soared in 2006. Blue Nile is thriving selling diamond jewelry, and eBay sells millions of cars. Getting people to buy songs ought to be a snap. But for the majority of people, downloading songs is too hard and too frustrating. Some of that problem is the digital rights management (DRM) software that limits where and how songs can be played. It makes iTunes songs playable only on iPods, Rhapsody subscription songs playable only on certain devices, and so on. The record companies believe DRM keeps people from pirating music, which may or may not be true. But DRM definitely keeps people from buying online music. As Jobs says, if consumers could buy music from any online store and play it on any device, the entire industry would thrive. There are other reasons downloads are stalled. People who grew up with CDs — or vinyl LPs before that — like the packaging and cover art, and like to get songs deep in an album that are not hits but grow on you over time. At 99 cents a song, digital downloads don't offer enough value to give up the packaged CD niceties. Especially when pirated music is so easily available for free. If digital downloads are going to take off, they probably need to be DRM-free, simpler to buy and much cheaper. Then again, that will only happen with the record companies' blessing, and since they get 90% of their revenue from CD sales, maybe they just don't care about taking digital downloads to the mass market.
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/money/20070214/maney14.art.htm