Why is iTunes pricing so much more than Amazon

iTunes is too expensive but in my opinion, for the folowing reasons.

Real Steel on DVD on Amazon.com is 16.49$ but in iTunes its 24.99$ for purchase. I wonder what price walking in Walmart would be?

Even disregarding the price of iTunes "competitors" how can they justify 25$ for literally nothing? I'm not buying a physical CD or DVD, there's no case, no printed paper, no packaging, no shipping to a mailbox, no transporting to a store there's nothing. In this case someone from Touchstone Pictures sat in a chair and sent iTunes ones nad zeros and then apple sits in a chair and send me ones and zeros for that price? And they wonder why some people pirate movies? They wonder why I dont have a single movie on my iPad3? I checked the price for movies for the first time just now and was shocked. Unbeleavable!

I'm certain their sales would skyrocket and my collection would be full of iTunes movies if the prices were lower. In my opinion they're missing a gold mine, 25$ is out of this world.

Was curious about this too and ended up here.

Examples of prices over here in the UK include,

Desperate Housewives Season 8- iTunes price £34.99, Amazon price £23.19,

Mad Men Season 4- iTunes price £20.99, Amazon price £10.99

Batman: The Animated Series (Volume One)- iTunes price £17.99, Amazon price £5.63

Sadly, everyone posting here is correct. Apple have no need to change their prices as they will always make a comfortable amount from iTunes sales, regardless of price.

Remember, if every person with more money than sense throws fistfulls of money at iTunes for their music, tv shows and movies, then Apple will continue to make a profit out of it.

And as someone above pointed out, it isn't as if they have cost of warehouse storage, delivery, packaging etc etc. I would hate it if it wasn't so **** smart.

I just bought two albums off of Amazon for $10. the exact same albums would have costed $20 on iTunes. There is a definite price difference. My research has revealed that the music sources themselves charge Amazon and iTunes different prices. I do not notice any difference in quality in playback on my devices. Good question. Thanks for asking.

i also wish that itunes was cheaper. i like usin lg itunes to buy music, but when i spend my momney on a song i fe l ripped off and i feel like im wasting my money when i can go download the exact same song off legal sounds for 9 cents. oh, but wait! apple songs come in a different format, and has an un noticable improvement in sound quality. totally worth the extra 1.20.

now im not aaying they should lower thier prices to 9 cents a song. but aomthing more reasonable! like 75 cents. more people would buy the music therefore increasing the money they earn. even if they dont make money, they atill have like 80 billion dollars in the bank. they should sell it so they just barely make a profit on each song. it will add up over time.

Don't like it, don't buy on iTunes.

crist_or_trent wrote:

i also wish that itunes was cheaper. i like usin lg itunes to buy music, but when i spend my momney on a song i fe l ripped off and i feel like im wasting my money when i can go download the exact same song off legal sounds for 9 cents.

Note that "Legal sounds" are not really legal.

Not a single penny in royalties has gone to any artist or label. They do not abide by international or Russian copyright laws.

and you give your CC info to them? That is funny...

Since the cult of Apple don't really want to acknowledge the problem, let's offer some real examples and see how far they'll justify this blatant rip off.

A subscription service like Netflix charges you $8 a month to watch all you want. This is what I use mostly. However, the problem is, Netflix instant is not very up to date. For that, I go to Apple.

I recently watched four seasons of Breaking Bad for that $8-a-month price. The fifth season is out but Netflix don't have it yet. I went to iTunes and bought the season for $42.99. That's about 500% of what I paid to watch four seasons, just to get one season.

The Walking Dead is coming out soon. $42.99 for a season pass. Big Bang Theory – $42.99. How I Met Your Mother – $42.99.

Since I'm not a milionaire, I decided to wait until these shows are available on Netflix or Hulu.

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I would like to write few arguments. I am not claiming that those are 100% valid. Feel free to correct me, but that's what I have understood so far.

Firstly , from what I read so far, amazon and apple have different pricing policy. Apple lets the publishers define their own price and apple gets 30% of the sale, while amazon buys the content and resale it. That's what happened with the books. They buy for 14 and sell for 9,99.

Apples shop is totally different on every country. Therefore I will pay another price in USA and other price in Italy. Apple has to get into an agreement on every country and publishers have to make content available in every country. On the other hand, amazon shop is selling from UK or USA or wherever it has e-shop.

Also you have to keep in mind that, these huge companies, Sony, apple, amazon and other involved in this business may have side profits such as fighting apple, in order to sell for example more playstation 3.

Another claim should be that the movie distributors on each country, wouldn't like to kill their physical copies revenues at video clubs, hurting an entire industry.

If you could rent any 1080p movie from apple store to your Apple TV for 2 euro, while here in Greece renting the same physical blu-ray copy cost 2,4€ for a day, video clubs would face an enormous rival. Keep in mind that I must own a blu-ray player too which cost 100€. My personal opinion is that with such pricing policy they protect the physical shops they work with and in the long term they protect themselves.

On the other hand, with amazon and their business model, they may surpass this obstacle leading to lower prices.

Do you mean compared to other sites. Or are you like me and think paying $39.99 for a TV season (24 for example) when there is no overhead eg retail outlet, store employees, physical media is a little ridiculous? And to top it off its DRM encrypted so you can't use your purchased content on other programs like XBMC.

I would like to purchase movies and TV shows but the fact that they are encrypted and cost as much as retail is a huge deterrent. I'm have trouble finding out even how to remove the DRM.

Not paying and defeating the DRM is theft - aka - stealing.

MJ

Fine you know what the Apple terms are go someplace else.

You missed the point of my comment. I said I would like to purchase iTunes content but remove the drm so that it can be used in XBMC. All I was doing was pointing out that most pricing structures are based on the previously mentioned overhead and since there is none for digital content other than licensing the price should be lower than the retail counterparts.

CharlieM78 wrote:

You missed the point of my comment. I said I would like to purchase iTunes content but remove the drm

Note that this is not an Apple issue. It is the television/motion picture industry and the DMCA, which makes it illegal to remove DRM (and most countries have something similar to DMCA for copyright removal).

Well I believe that is incorrect. Apples DRM limits you to only using certain apple products. Drm is meant to prevent piracy not line apples pockets. I should be able to play purchased content on any device I choose be it android blackberry apple or whatever program I choose be it win media player QuickTime or XBMC. And apples also does have a say in the pricing since they make a huge profit hence the mark up.

You missed the point of HIS and most comments. With the lack of overhead eg retail outlet, store employees, physical media ... the prices of iTunes seem very bloated.

...and thus, I don't buy from them.