snapshot 12/27/07

Apple and Fox planning movie rental deal: reports
Apple Inc and News Corp.'s Twentieth Century Fox are set to announce a deal that will allow consumers to rent movies through Apple's digital iTunes Store, media reports said on Thursday. The agreement will allow rentals of Fox's latest DVD releases by downloading a copy from the online iTunes store for a limited time, the Financial Times said, quoting a source. The Wall Street Journal also reported the deal in its online edition.


Amazon adds Warner Music tunes to download service
Online retailer Amazon.com Inc has signed on Warner Music Group to its music download service, which aims to compete with Apple Inc's industry-dominating iTunes online store. Warner Music songs are available on the Amazon MP3 service, which lets users purchase the tunes and download them to many digital music players, including Apple's iPod, the companies said on Thursday. They will also offer exclusive tracks and special album bundles.


Amazon Now Selling MP3s from Warner; 2.9 Million DRM-Free Tracks Now Available
Customers can now choose from more than 2.9 million MP3 songs on Amazon MP3, including music from Warner Music's renowned catalog of artists


2007 in review: The year in music
Given that the word “iPod” has become synonymous with “portable music player,” it’s easy to overlook other Apple-related music matters in 2007. Yet the year brought significant changes to the musical landscape in regard to online music distribution and digital rights management. And in most cases, Apple was at the heart of them. iPod developments—and there were a few this year—will get their moment in the spotlight later in the week; today, we’ll focus on other matters musical, including the death of DRM, the emergence of an iTunes rival, and the ability to buy digital tracks without having to set down your Starbucks frappuccino.


Psst! DVDs Are Starting To Die Too...
For years, we've been pointing out that disc-based media was on the way out, but for the industries (mainly music and movies) that make money from selling those discs, the allure of the cash cow was too strong. They've done little to plan for a future without disc-based media -- which is why you see the recording industry in such a freakout these days. In the meantime, the DVD world wasn't much better off. DVDs could have been saved if they'd agreed to a new format early on, stuck to it, and worked on continually adding new and interesting features that made the DVDs, worthwhile -- but instead they've been stuck in a pointless standards battle where no one will win. Thanks to that, it appears that DVDs are starting to follow CDs on their inevitable sales decline. While there may be whining and complaining about how this damages the movie industry, that's not the case at all. The demand for movies is still quite high -- and if the movie industry ever figures out how to stop treating its customers like criminals, perhaps it will come up with business models that work.


The Death of High Fidelity
Over the past decade and a half, a revolution in recording technology has changed the way albums are produced, mixed and mastered — almost always for the worse. "They make it loud to get [listeners'] attention," Bendeth says. Engineers do that by applying dynamic range compression, which reduces the difference between the loudest and softest sounds in a song. Like many of his peers, Bendeth believes that relying too much on this effect can obscure sonic detail, rob music of its emotional power and leave listeners with what engineers call ear fatigue. "I think most everything is mastered a little too loud," Bendeth says. "The industry decided that it's a volume contest."