ITunes: The Assassin and Lifeline for Music

           ITunes is currently the best and worst thing the music industry has going for it right now– while it is keeping music alive, it simultaneously is slowly and painfully killing it. How is this possible? I’ll start with the bad.

            Have you noticed the number one song on iTunes at the moment? It’s Gangnam Style by PSY, the song that has become an Internet sensation as of late. While I’ll admit that it’s a pretty catchy song, has America really been dumbed down to the point that a song like this is the #1 song we’ve downloaded? In addition, people like Flo Rida (an artist who has never had a song with solid content in it… rather just a catchy beat coated with meaningless lyrics) always manage to find themselves in the top 10 for songs. Also, seeing that Carly Rae Jepsen’s new album is ranked higher than Dave Matthews Band’s new release seems like a crime to me.

The majority of Americans have terrible taste in music. Or maybe it’s something else. Maybe the problem is that iTunes strongly promotes mainstream garbage. ITunes promotes the popular songs from the radio as opposed to the ones that are given good reviews. It’s dumbing people down to the extent that they believe everything played on the radio is good music and they refuse to form their own opinions. Certainly there are great songs played on the radio, but not everything can immediately be dubbed the next hit.

On the other hand, iTunes is the only hope music has of surviving. When was the last time you went to the store solely to buy a new album that had just come out? Personally, it’s been years since I have, and I don’t plan on breaking that streak except for my very favorite musicians. Then again, why should you go out and buy the album? First of all, most albums on iTunes are only $9.99 while the physical albums in stores are more often than not a few dollars more. Second, it’ll cost even more than just the price of the album when you deduct the cost of the gas it takes to get to the store! Third, time is money, after all. Why waste your time driving to and from the store when you can simply press the “purchase” button on iTunes, then kick back and relax while your new music downloads straight to your computer?

In an age where everything is digital, it’s hard to imagine a world without something like iTunes. If iTunes didn’t exist, there would be two alternatives: either people would continue going to the store to purchase albums or they would simply search for places where they could download their tunes online (most likely in illegal fashion.) It might not be a big deal for consumers, but suppliers would not be able to get too far if everyone received their product for free.

ITunes may be pretty annoying at times, but it’s a small price to pay when the life of music is on the line.