Perhaps they get the most because they take most of the risk?
jeff
But that is the point behind my argument, they - the music industry RIAA are NOT taking the biggest risk. No "perhaps" to it.
The creators should be getting the biggest piece of the pie - musicians first and writers second. In this case music distribution is far less costly in today's world than it used to be. "Promotion" in the old model was expensive but not today.
The problem with Apple is that they are judged and attacked on their size, not their model. It is their business model (and their software) that is successful. It has taken about 5 years for the RIAA and music industry to learn that tied up subscription models for music is not what consumers want.
Subscriptions models lock people into contracts that is money in the RIAA and Music industries pocket for a long term. The problem of subscriptions is that people want to listen to over and over and therefore benefit from "owning" it rather than renting it like a movie. A movie is something most people watch two or three times.
Amazon and the Zune (by MS's description) are direct answers to a successful business model, not Apple per se. RIAA and the big 4? of music have pushed and pushed "subscription" but it never worked. Apple's success (besides its software) is due to the business model. That business model is aimed at what will consumers will embrace and tolerate with prices in lieu of "free" internet downloads. The model is the .99 barrier. (I personally don't know what is wrong with $1.00, as I never have understood that psychology although I was taught it in college.)
Apple has been battling the big 4 and RIAA for the past 4 years on raising the prices and has been fighting the PR image that the RIAA and the big 4 have been putting out that Apple is the bad guy. Apple fought DRM and went public on it, the industry hated this. Apple still was bound by RIAA and big 4 legal contracts to include the DRM on their (Apple) sales. Then the music industry big 4, mainly Universal, started offering the DRM Free on Amazon and with Zune to break Apple's hold. Once broken, then they can kill the business model that keeps the prices at 99 cent mark. These guys are betting that they can keep people from going back to torrent bit like or the old napster model which will benefit NO ARTIST, musician or writer. The REAL culprit is the RIAA and Music giants, mainly Universal. Decrease their profits, not the real distributor.
Complain about Apple's model and label them as the bad greedy guys while giving the majority of the dollar to a group that does the least work of all.
. . . Lets see, Apple gets your blame as being greedy and you don't complain about Universal, Sony, EMI and (one other) and the RIAA for getting 40 cents out of the dollar. The writer writes, the musicians sing, Apple and Amazon distributes - BUT the big 4 + RIAA get the fat check. You complain about Apple, but not the fat cat middelman that does the least and gets the most - in this situation. I don't understand your logic. The big 4 and the RIAA are depending on this attitude to focus away from the real money eater.
$.99 is a major part of the business model. Take that away, go with $ 1.09, $1.19 and the old Napster model re-surfaces and the writers and musicians suffer.