The Album Cabal aka Cocktail

[Jeff Campbell]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.tuaw.com/2009/07/27/itunes-store-to-add-enhanced-liner-notes-extra-media-to-album-p/' target='_blank'>http://www.tuaw.com/2009/07/27/itun...dia-to-album-p/</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Digital music purchases have been dominating the market for some time now as physical CD purchases continue to fall. For Apple, a significant lead over the rest of the music proprietor world is not enough: according to the Financial Times, the company is now working together with the four largest record labels in the business to add new features to accompany digital music purchases through its iTunes Store in hopes of stimulating full album purchases."</em></p><p><em><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/at/auto/1248742021.usr105634.jpg" /></em></p><p>This little project is code-named "Cocktail" and has Apple working with&nbsp;EMI, Sony Music, Universal Music Group, and Warner Music. What they plan on doing is making the album buying experience more advantageous to the consumer, and in return getting more revenue since the profit margin for album sales is higher. What you will get are things such as lyrics, liner notes and interactive booklets. Some of the things (lyrics specifically) bring back memories of what I got &nbsp;when I used to buy albums (the vinyl kind for those of you not old enough to remember). I understand the profit motive, but it isn't enough of an advantage to get me to buy album versus a few songs that I want. How about you, will any of this sway your purchasing decision?&nbsp;</p>

[Dyvim]

It's an interesting idea and kudos to the record industry for trying, but I'm not sure if this will affect any of my buying decisions. If I only like a couple tracks on the album, I'll still just purchase the singles. If it's an album I really like, I'll most likely buy the CD. I think this would only sway me if I was on the fence about whether to buy the whole album or not, but then only if they don't try to increase the price even further (otherwise, I'd still just get the album from Amazon instead of iTunes).

You know what's gotten me to purchase several digital albums recently? Amazon's monthly 50 albums for $5 special. I check it every month and often end up picking up 1 or 2 (and sometimes more). $5 is low enough that I'm willing to take the risk on a new artist or pick up an old catalog album that I like but not enough to pay full price for (the kind of album I'd pick up used in a record store if I saw it but wouldn't buy new). But of course the music industry probably doesn't want to think about lowering their prices!

[Jason Dunn]

You know what's gotten me to purchase several digital albums recently? Amazon's monthly 50 albums for $5 special.

Same here! And frequently they have even cheaper albums - I picked up a Sugarland album for only $2.99 this AM...

[Macguy59]

Same here! And frequently they have even cheaper albums - I picked up a Sugarland album for only $2.99 this AM...

Sugarland ? Sugarland ? Really ? Gahhhhhh :p