Apple Negotiating Unlimited Usage of Music Downloads
Apple Inc. (AAPL) is in talks with record companies to give iTunes customers easier access to music they've purchased across multiple devices, said three people with knowledge of the plans. — Apple is negotiating …
Context & Ripple Effects
This negotiation is the next step in a licensing arc Apple has been running with the major labels since late 2008, when sources first reported talks to strip DRM from iTunes songs, followed by the expansion of DRM-free tracks and tiered pricing in early 2009. Those deals freed individual files; this round, reported as unconfirmed talks with three people familiar with the plans, goes further — Apple wants terms that treat a purchase as usable across every device a customer owns rather than tied to where the copy lives.
First-order effects
- If signed, iTunes customers gain access to purchased music across multiple devices without re-buying or manually syncing files, changing what an iTunes purchase legally entitles them to.
- Record companies would need to grant a new usage license covering cloud-style, multi-device playback of sold downloads — a category that does not exist in the current per-file sale model.
Second-order effects
- Labels would effectively be setting the template price and scope for 'purchased music in the cloud,' which any other retailer selling downloads would then have to match in its own licensing talks.
- Apple's leverage comes from being the largest download storefront; whatever terms it extracts become the reference point labels use against smaller music services negotiating the same rights.
Third-order effects
- The move points toward music retail structured around licensed access rather than file ownership, with Apple's relationship to labels shifting from one-time wholesale transactions to ongoing negotiated usage rights.
- If the pattern holds, the labels' licensing framework — built around selling copies — gets rebuilt around authorizing access, a structural change whose final shape depends on terms still under negotiation.
The trend: Digital music is moving from DRM-laden files through DRM-free downloads toward cloud-based licensed access, with each step renegotiated directly between Apple and the major labels.