Art Machine
Just another former infatuation junkie

Note: The following entry is graphic-intensive. Exercise caution.

In a move that shocked exactly no-one after the massive build in rumors, Apple announced today that it was opening its own online music store. And with it comes a snazzy new edition of iTunes.

Naturally, being both a Mac geek of the umpteenth power and a music geek of the umpteen-minus-oneth power (look! I made a new word!), I had to try it out. And I figured you might like to go along for the ride.

Let’s define the space, first. This is my computer. CD’s, papers, and pumpkin seeds make up the clutter scattered all around.

This is me in all my unkempt glory, about to embark on a voyage into the wild, wooly world of Apple’s online music store. Still relatively sane, if a bit unshaven.

About three years ago, Charles – a good friend and former roommate of mine – started his frequent comments on how fast I drink diet cola. An unhealthy addiction, to be sure. Since he first made these comment, I’ve started to think of things in terms of Pepsi’s. This movie is three Pepsi’s long. Etc. My mind just turns to Pepsi and I think of it a lot. You know the drill.

But I digress. The question is: can I pay for and download a track before I drink an entire bottle of Pepsi?

At this point, the Pepsi is still closed.

I’ve already downloaded the new iTunes and the new Quicktime from Apple’s website, so that’s taken care of. That was less than ten minutes out of my life, and I’m eager to get going.

Every time Apple updates iTunes, they use a new color note. This is so when you go down to your dock to open the program, you know for sure that you’ve got the new button. The last note they used for iTunes 3 was purple. Purple’s okay. But the new note is green. Green’s my favorite color.

Ooo, green…

Click on the pretty green note, and iTunes opens up.

At this point, I open the Pepsi.

So far, things look pretty normal. Still the same brushed-aluminum look. The search option up in the corner is still there, along with the multi-colored eye that says “Browse.” My library is currently empty because I’m trying to archive my eMusic downloads on CD-ROM (a dangerous and time-consuming task, I assure you). Yup, everything’s normal. Except for…

This new button. This is over in the menu with all of my playlists. Wow, did Apple know what they were doing, or what? Their store is right there under your own library, just crying out to be clicked. Don’t have something in your library yet? That come-hither look tells you that you can have it right away – for a price. Plus, it’s green. Ooo, green. I like green. Clicky-clicky.

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There’s the storefront in all its glory. A storefront that screams We have major artists! in big, bold letters. Maybe even in that San Francisco font that Apple used to include with its system way back in the old days (1984). Just looking at this screen, I see Sheryl Crow, Beck, Bob Dylan, Eminem, The Who… they’ve got a good selection, I must admit.

And the storefront is not too shabby, itself. Beyond the flashy names all over the place, there’s an elegance to the design. A pop-up menu lets you jump to genre listings. You can power search, browse, and send requests. It tells you the top album and song downloads. Very cool. And, of course, there’s a link where you can buy an iPod. This is on my wishlist, if any wealthy potential benefactors are out there reading.

The third thing I notice is that my library search option has turned into “Search Music Store.” All right, I’m game. I’m a sucker for Kurt Weill (German composer of “September Song” and The Threepenny Opera, among others), so let’s search for “Weill.” Just type it in and hit “return”.

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Great googly-moogly! They have a lot of Kurt Weill’s stuff here by a lot of different artists. And the search was pretty quick. Of course, I’m on a high-speed connection. But it returned versions of Weill songs recorded by John Coltrane, Rosemary Clooney, Elvis Presley, Liberace, Louis Armstrong…

At this point, the Pepsi is this far gone:

All right. So they’ve got variety and a fairly easy system to use. So, let’s pick a track and give it a real test. Whom shall we download?

At this point, I start playing with those little windows of “Just Added”, “Up & Coming”, and the like that are on the main genre pages. And I discover that clicking the word “More” brings all of the entries up on a page by themselves. That arrow on the left side of the display window, however, causes the four albums currently displayed to roll off the screen and the next four to scroll on. Snazzy design is always an Apple strongpoint.

So, let’s see. I already have The Donnas’ Spend the Night and David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Both very good albums, yes, but I’m not willing to spend the money on music I already have.

Finally, I decide to go with Tom Petty. I don’t have his latest album, and his single “The Last DJ” has been banned by some radio stations – not for questionable content, but because it’s pretty critical of commercial radio. Or so I’ve heard. I double-click the title track and listen to the free thirty-second sample. Yup. Sounds good. Time to take the plunge and click the “Buy Song” button.

A single song off the iTunes Music Store is going to run you $0.99. Almost all of the albums are $9.99 if you buy them all at once, unless they’re under ten tracks long. Then the price gets adjusted down. And if you get to over twenty tracks, the price is going to go up. But in general, you get a discount when you decide to buy the whole album. But $9.99 is a pretty steep price to pay just to try out the service. Heck, I didn’t even pay eMusic that when I started – I got free downloads. So, for the sake of science – one track at $0.99.

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There’s the sign-up screen. Create an account, and you can enable one-click shopping. Just click what you want to buy, and there it goes.

Those of you who haven’t heard about the limits on these files, here’s a quick run-down.

• You can only play these songs on up to three Macs
• You can burn as many CD’s as you want to
• You can put them on as many iPods as you want to

As far as “Burn as many CD’s”, the agreement points out to you that you can only burn an unaltered playlist a maximum of 10 times. But you can burn your library as many times as you want, and you don’t have to worry about paying for the song each time.

By now, the Pepsi is this far gone:

A few quick seconds later, and I’m ready to buy. Of course, Apple now has me on file – but they had that already.

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A very cool thing is that it asks you if you actually want to buy the track/album you just requested. This is more helpful than you might imagine. It ensures that you won’t get charged out the yin-yang because of an accidental click.

Now, I’ve got a completely new playlist over there in my listings. iTunes tells me that the playlist is just like any other playlist that I might make, but tracks downloaded from the store will be instantly added to the list. Also, the new playlist is green. Pretty green. Wants it. Wants it, my preciousss….

Sorry. Bad Smeagle.

Aside from the fact that I am now a dollar poorer than I was a few minutes ago, the whole process was completely painless. Friendly, even. But the friendliest process in the world doesn’t mean Jack if it’s a substandard product. So now it’s time for the acid test. Time to plug in the headphones and give the song a listen.

Even with iTunes’ built-in EQ turned off, the sound is incredibly rich. Clear stereo. And the track is pretty good, itself – but that’s to be expected.

So far, we’re doing pretty good. Apple has my money, I’ve got my song, and all is right with the world. And the pepsi is down to about a third of the bottle left.

Now, let’s put it on a CD.

Lanford Wilson wrote a play called Burn This, but I don’t think he had CD’s in mind when he did. Anyway, that’s what I called the playlist I was going to burn from. From here, it’s just a matter of clicking the “Burn Disc” button in the corner.

There’s the disc. All set to be put anywhere I want the music. Isn’t technology grand? And I still have Pepsi left.

So, that’s how easy the service is to use. How does it stack up?

I’ll admit, eMusic’s monthly subscription service has spoiled me a bit. There’s just something about paying one flat fee and getting all the music you can carry that calls out to the voracious non-conformist in me. It takes a lot to make me want to pay by the track or by the album for music that I’m going to download.

Of course, Apple manages to provide a lot. They’ve got selection, ease of use, and a pretty fair price plan. $9.99 for a downloaded album isn’t a bad price to pay, and the music is still mine. While I may not download as much as I would like to (I can’t afford to download as much as I would like to), I’ll definitely be keeping up with the new music store.

What’s most important about the store, however, is not the pricing or the selection. It’s what Apple has gotten the music industry to do.

The music industry has said time and again that they didn’t want people to be able to download music. The statement from the RIAA was that downloadable music would never be a reality until it had effective copy protection, couldn’t be burnt to CD, and couldn’t be put on portable players. In other words, the music industry was only willing to sell you the music when they didn’t actually have to sell you anything.

Apple’s system has gotten the record industry to agree to a distribution model in which the consumer retains ownership of the product they’ve bought. You can burn it and put it on portable players. Of course, it still has copy protection. But as far as protection goes, it’s very non-intrusive.

So, I have to give Apple’s new service four stars. While it’s currently too rich for my unemployed blood, it ranks just slightly ahead of eMusic in my estimation by virtue of the titles offered. eMusic has the advantage on price, but Apple takes ease-of-use, convenience, and popular selection hands-down.

Now, here’s the downside for PC users. Just like the iPod at its roll-out, the new Apple Music Store is currently Macintosh only. It’s built into iTunes, which is a Mac-only piece of software. As much as I would love to take this time to tell you that it’s time to invest in a Mac, however, Apple is currently working on a version for the PC. It’s not clear yet whether it will be just a version of the store or if PC users will finally get a version of iTunes to call their own. Whatever it is, however, Apple once again proves that it is the greatest innovator currently working in the computer field.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 28th, 2003 at 8:40 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.