Holy fuck, the labels are SCREWED!

Did you watch the Macworld presentation?  It’s not easy, there are too many hits.  I couldn’t even get the video to go until now, at almost midnight.  The music business used to understand this paradigm.  One of UNDERPLAYING THE MARKET!  Instead of the baby band playing arenas the very first year after their video went nuclear on MTV, in the old days bands still played theatres, even though they’d sold tonnage.  Creating DEMAND!  You felt privileged to BE THERE!  As opposed to going to the arena and seeing thousands of empty seats, even though twice the capacity of the theatre might be in attendance.  Yes, it would be better if technology eliminated the glitches, but the tech companies have got this down, the video game companies have got this down, create less than the market demands and you have a FRENZY!

And that’s what happened in iPod world.  Word was that Apple couldn’t make enough.  This fucked up non-consumer electronics company underestimated demand again and couldn’t fill orders and thus you should sell the stock, before it goes down.  Oh, at first they expected 12 million iPods to be sold, but the Cupertino pompous braggarts certainly couldn’t deliver more than 10.  And not everybody wanted one anyway, what with the Nano scratch fiasco and the battery life controversy.  The tide was finally turning.  Microsoft and Plays For Sure were going to make inroads.

But, as the Who sang in "Naked Eye", IT DON’T REALLY HAPPEN THAT WAY AT ALL!

Apple sold 14 million iPods in the fourth quarter.  Rather than worry about whether you got a device, you should worry whether you bought stock.  Because as soon as Steve Jobs trumpeted this number this morning the stock jumped 5%, just like that.

But that’s not the complete story.  Apple sold 32 million iPods THIS YEAR!  Well, LAST year, 2005.  Hell, the company hasn’t even sold HALF of that in ALL the previous years combined!  This is beyond mania, this is REVOLUTION!

Those same Wall Streeters are passing reports about the sales EXPLOSION at the iTunes Music Store after Christmas.  Using this as evidence the music business has turned a corner.  NOTHING could be further from the truth.  Shit, you get an iPod, you buy a few tracks at the iTMS.  Maybe you even got a gift certificate.  But that only loads a TINY FRACTION of the music the device holds.  How are you going to FILL IT?

Well, first you’re going to rip your CDs.

Then you’re going to rip your friends’ CDs.  Or maybe just hook up their hard drives to YOUR computer and transfer the songs at less than a second a track.  OR, maybe you’ll download that free software all over the Web and just transfer the songs DIRECTLY FROM YOUR FRIEND’S iPOD TO YOUR COMPUTER!

Are you getting this?  We’re approaching critical mass.  Soon, the only reason to have a CD will be to RIP IT!  The major labels might be holding on to the old format, but the PUBLIC is abandoning it in DROVES!  Hell, why don’t you ask how many of those people who got iPods for Christmas got CDs too.  Not quite ZILCH, but CLOSE!

Are you scratching your head yet?

The wave is coming in.  It’s gaining momentum.  It’s gonna hit the shore.  People will only want files.  And they’ll gravitate to the CHEAPEST place to get those files.  And, it won’t be at the iTMS, it will be via the means delineated above or P2P.  God, the device holds thousands of tracks, are you gonna pay THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS TO FILL IT?

Get this straight.  People only have a limited amount of disposable income.  They’re not going to spend a much higher percentage of their cash for music today than they did yesteryear.  But now, instead of twenty albums being a decent collection, the equivalent of 100 ALBUMS is a SMALL collection.

The device, the iPod, has changed the paradigm.  Along with large hard drives, broadband and P2P.  While the major labels are working under the old rules, expecting digital tracks to REPLACE physical business, the consumer now wants EVERY record in the store, not just one or TWO!  And, unless you satiate this demand, you’re leaving money on the table.  LOTS of money.

If the business doesn’t figure out soon how to deliver what the customer wants, a vast quantity of unprotected tracks for a low price, labels are going to be LEFT OUT OF THE EQUATION!  Make no mistake, it’s the LABELS that are devaluing music, not the CONSUMER!

You’ve got to get EVERYBODY to be a music customer.  Sell EVERYBODY a plethora of tracks.  And keep creating great new stuff, so they’ll remain hooked.  Hell, keep on marketing CATALOG so they’ll remain hooked.  God, monetize EVERYTHING that gets this music into people’s hands.  P2P.  At the ISP level.  Or issue trading licenses.  Just start CHARGING!

But what about RENTAL?

Well, rather than tell you why this won’t work conceptually, why it’s a sideshow, I’ve got to quote another Macworld statistic.  40% of all cars sold in the U.S. in 2006 will be iPod-ready.  Now, not all will come with the hardware INSTALLED, but you can go to your dealer and buy the kit and VOILA, fuck terrestrial radio, stop carrying around a bunch of CDs!

This is the XM model.  Make it easy.  Tie in with the automobile manufacturers.  Steve Jobs went to school on Hugh Panero’s efforts, and got greater penetration sooner than HE did.

And, in case you never noticed, the iPod has got a PROPRIETARY CONNECTOR!  In OTHER words, if you buy a competitive product, and you want to use it to listen in your car, you’re shit out of luck.  Well, not totally.  You can employ one of those FM transmitters, that work SO well!  Or, you can go to crutchfield.com, or some giant box retailer and have some ignorant salesman sell you a connector that might not work whereas you can buy the iPod and you have a seamless solution, just like with iTunes!

Speaking of iTunes…  What the FUCK is up with the new version?  The one distributed today.  That displays the iTunes Music Store AT ALL TIMES!  I’M computer-savvy.  I figured out how to turn it off (there’s a button in the lower right-hand corner of the iTunes window), but MOST people are going to be confronted with this constant sales pitch ALL THE TIME!  That’s HEINOUS!  That’s not the Apple way.  MAYBE this allows you to look at what you own and compare it with what you might want.  But not really, this is MICROSOFT-territory.  Taking advantage of desktop space to insure dominance.  Apple, update and remove this default IMMEDIATELY!  You’re just going to piss consumers OFF!

And the FM transmitter.  Yeah, that’s what I want with my iPod, FM.  Isn’t that why I bought the iPod to BEGIN WITH?  To get RID of FM?

Apple couldn’t use satellite, because mobile satellite functions too poorly for the Apple brand name.

But, the product is so expensive, almost fifty bucks for a RADIO, that at least Wall Street will be happy (and, how the radio comes up on the screen is cool…)

So, where’s the Mac Mini movie store?  Where’s the new iPod shuffle?

Well, Steve Jobs has learned to keep the public jumping.  As if a hit act only gave a week’s notice and surprised us with a whole new album.  Expect more.  Not too far away from now.  Just like we got multiple announcements in the fall.  He’s got us hooked, we all want to see the Steve show, he hasn’t let us down yet.