James Delahunty
26 Nov 2004 15:25
Canada is to get its own version of Apple's hugely successful iTunes music store. Apple currently has its iTunes music store available in the U.S. and most European countries, and so far is dominating the business. Apple had planned to launch a store in Canada in November 04 and has assured Canadian audiophiles that it will make the November deadline. “It's still November; we'll launch in November,” Apple's Natalie Kerris said. Canada currently has three main download services including Napster.ca, Archambault.ca and Puretracks.com. The prices in these services are generally around $1 a track, which is the same as iTunes in Europe and the United States.
Kaan Yigit, president of Toronto technology market research firm Solutions Research Group, believes that iTunes coming into the Canadian music download market will be good for all other competitors too, as it will sharply raise the profile of paid music downloading. “If you put three grocery stores on the same corner, everyone benefits,” he said. “It's going to drive a lot of excitement around the whole space.” Alistair Mitchell, co-chief executive of Puretracks says that Puretracks has many advantages over iTunes including a database of music from Independent Canadian Artists. He also claimed that Puretracks files are compressed less than those of iTunes, so they have better fidelity.
Now the challenge that is facing Apple and its new competitors is to lure users from P2P networks to buy music legally instead of downloading it illegally. The Canadian Recording Industry has tried in the past to attempt an RIAA-like lawsuit campaign against file-sharers but a Judge ruled that there was no infringement of Canadian copyright laws. This has led to artists lobbying for stricter Copyright laws in Canada to help to deter the illegal file-sharing.
Source:
GlobeAndMail.com