Steve Wildstrom gets it wrong - unusually - on the iPod vs WMA
Steve Wildstrom over at BusinessWeek is generally reliable as hell; I find I’m always agreeing with what he says, and wishing I’d said it. Of course what he writes comes from an American perspective - they still don’t get mobile phones or Bluetooth, for example - but his hit rate is excellent.
Which is why I’m a little surprised by his latest column, The Music Mess: Advantage, Microsoft. He goes over the arguments we’ve heard before: that if you buy something from an online music store that’s not the iTunes Music Store, it won’t play on the iPod. And vice-versa.
Now, before I saw his piece I’d written my column for Wednesday’s paper on where I think the iPod is going. But just to deal with this argument: Yes, Apple has chosen an isolationist course. It supports only FairPlay in its products, and it has been unwilling to license other companies either to build FairPlay-enabled players or to sell FairPlay-protected songs.
One key difference: Apple really owns this market at the moment, and there’s little sign of others getting into it. For each song sold on other music stores, more than two are sold on iTunes. (It’s a 3:7 ratio.) For each non-iPod sold with a hard drive, nine iPods are rung up.
So saying that “Apple has chosen an isolationist course” is like saying Microsoft has chosen an isolationist course with Windows, because you can’t run .exes on Linux or OSX. It’s true, but lacks context.
Even so, Steve W is right on one point: Windows Media will get a growing share of the market. But he’s missing what the followup: Apple can issue a firmware update. Bang! Every iPod in the world will be capable of playing songs from any other music store - as well as those from iTunes. Still sounds like an edge to me.
- These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
- Walt Mossberg's nano is scratched. Steve ain't gonna like that. (7 October 2005; score: 42.75%)
- Fiorina's curse lives on after HP kills Apple deal to resell iPod (1 August 2005; score: 42.75%)
- Two links just to prove that technology isn't good or bad... (11 July 2005; score: 42.53%)
![[Valid RSS]](wp-includes/images/valid-rss.png "Validate my RSS feed"){kind=small}
November 11th, 2004 at 12:22 pm
I’m with you here.
I think the thing that some people seem to be missing is that the ipod is the only player the masses want right now. So why open the door for other music services? It wouldn’t make good business sense.
A friend of mine said to me recently that when he sees somebody with anything not an ipod he looks at them with pity.
yea.
November 11th, 2004 at 11:48 pm
I agree with all the comments made about the BW guy but to him I need to say this.
I don’t think many of the so called pundits bashing Apple just don’t get it (question do people at Business Week actually listen to music?). Apple is the business of selling hardware (iPod) and to do that they set up the iTunes music store to compliment the iPod it worked probably more than Apple initially anticipated. At the moment they have a clear lead and I don’t see any of the current mp3 players even coming close to it even with MS backing. The iPod also has the COOL factor (worth millions $/£ in free advertising) and that is something other companies would sell their employees children for. The truth of the matter is MS has never been cool and it’s leader has never been cool it has never ever made a cool product and probably never will. So what if Apple don’t open up iTunes, people can still buy off other sites (convert wma to aac to mp3) but why bother when iTunes does it so well. What the pundits want Apple to let others manuafcture the iPod, I don’t think so unless they are of the size of HP ( that was a good move). Would MS let another company sell MS Office, so I don’t think so. Finally the iPod id a leisure cosumer appliance not a operating system, which Apple also sells to Windows users (another smart move). These pundits can’t see the wood for the trees, they just can’t, how much do they get paid.
Final note my nephew bought a chaep flash mp3 player, I told him he’d wasted his money but he wouldn’t listen, after a week though he took it back to the store. Now he wants an iPod mini (smart move).
November 11th, 2004 at 11:56 pm
That BW guy has really gort my goat as he said this
“None of these players is as easy to use as an iPod, these Web sites aren’t as easy to use as the iTunes online store, and no rival can match Apple’s brilliant marketing. But the gap is narrowing. Virgin Electronics, for one, is part of an empire with proven marketing ability, especially in selling.”
Obviously he’s not been on the receiving end of Virgin’s pitiful attempt at running a train network, I have, which is one good reason not to buy anything with the virgin monika stuck on it.
November 12th, 2004 at 12:41 pm
glad - yes, in the US, Virgin still has a good reputation for getting things done; in the UK it has besmirched its reputation forever with the trains thing. Anyone use its mobile network? Is the service any good?
November 17th, 2004 at 6:56 pm
Hm. I argue (internally) with Wildstrom fairly frequently.
I also don’t own an iPod and I don’t want pity: I *like* my Archos Jukebox multimedia.
wg
November 17th, 2004 at 7:36 pm
When you argue (internally) with Wildstrom on things that subsequently happen (eg format wars, new hardware etc), who turns out to be right? Just interested…