Why can't I download the albums I want from iTunes just because I'm in America?

January 30, 2005 5:07 AM

LegalMusicDownloadFilter: Why can't I download the albums I want from iTunes just because I'm in America? [MI]

Yesterday I discovered that a british band I love has made virtually all of their albums available for download via iTunes, including a couple of earlier ones that I do not have. The reason I do not have them is because they are not available in the U.S., and paying for them as imports makes them more expensive than I want to pay. But paying for them as a digital download and then burning my own CDs would be completely reasonable. Unfortunately, when I follow the links on the band's website to download the album, iTunes comes back and says that they are not available for sale in the United States. Why should iTunes care what country I am in? Do I just need to download some UK version of the software, or change a setting somewhere? I'm trying to be legal here and actually pay for the music rather than stealing it. You'd think they would want that.

posted by Lokheed to computers & internet (14 comments total)

Even back when the iTunes Music Store was US-only, you had to have a credit card with a US address in order to use it. To actuallly buy things from the UK store, you'd need to have a UK billing address.

It's because the licensing deals with the record companies are worked out separately for each region, and so there is a different catalogue available in each country. I guess it's pretty much the same reason as why you can't get a US-local edition of the actual CD.
posted by chrismear at 5:19 AM on January 30, 2005

Rights are negotiated on a country by country basis. If a band doesn't have representation in a country, then their items cannot be sold there (easily). iTunes doesn't do imports.

We get exactly the same the other way round. There are many American releases I cannot buy, because I'm in the UK. One solution is to copy. If these people aren't going to bother serving my market, I won't bother buying their stuff until they do. I am not ashamed to admit this, and do not consider it unethical if I am given no options.

Another solution, usually if they're a smaller artist, is to buy their CD on CDBaby or from their own digital download systems.. but very few artists use these systems. If they do, however, I will use them and make sure they get the $$.
posted by wackybrit at 5:21 AM on January 30, 2005

Which band is it that you like? Just curious..
posted by ascullion at 5:36 AM on January 30, 2005

Which band is it that you like? Just curious..

What, you think I'll just open myself up for that kind of ridicule?

Seriously, I fugured it was something like that. It just seems silly, especially since I can go to the british Amazon site to buy music and have it shipped here with no problem at all. If the hard goods can be made available for direct import, I just don't see why the soft goods can't be. Ah, well.
posted by Lokheed at 5:46 AM on January 30, 2005

You could try All Of MP3 - not exactly "legal", but way cheap and no restrictions.
posted by eatcherry at 7:00 AM on January 30, 2005

I second All of MP3. It's dirt cheap. You're paying rubles to the pound, as it were, and it's entirely legal within the setting of Russian law. As for the legality of foreigners using the service...it's not specifically illegal, but it's not sanctioned either.
posted by hobbes103 at 7:22 AM on January 30, 2005

Just wanted to point out that UK iTunes is £0.79 per song, or about $1.50. $15 an album too. So even if you could buy from them, it wouldn't be quite as cheap as US iTunes. Is buying direct from the Amazon UK store really that much more expensive than that?
posted by smackfu at 8:16 AM on January 30, 2005

Does iTunes allow customers to resell songs with other customers? Seems like wackybrit and Lokheed could have the start of something big if they were each to buy what the other person wanted and then swap the two albums.
posted by Mitheral at 8:58 AM on January 30, 2005

Actually, AllofMP3 is not entirely legal within the setting of Russian law. They do not have the permission of the sound recording owners and are facing various legal investigations. What's more, even the one licence they do have (from ROMS) is currently being called in to question. They have no right to distribute music to foreigners, either. Still - it's a fantastic service, dirt cheap, no digital rights management and very reliable!

It has been shown previously that an iTunes track can be resold - it does involve sharing your iTunes password, however, which may not be something someone wants to do.

As for the licensing issue, unfortunately music licensing is still carried out territory by territory, as if the internet was not an international medium. The only service I know of that does license on a global basis is EMusic.com.

What complicates things is that there are two main rights in an album - the composition right and the recording right - and it's not unheard of for these to be owned by different companies in different territories. Plus, songs can be written by multiple people, who themselves are represented by different publishers. So it only takes for one of these interests to disapprove of digital distribution in a particular territory (or more likely, not have got round to it yet) for the album not to appear in your local iTunes store. Finally, iTunes themselves have a backlog - so it's quite possible the tracks will eventually make it up onto the store.
posted by skylar at 9:29 AM on January 30, 2005

Is buying direct from the Amazon UK store really that much more expensive than that?

For an average CD from amazon.co.uk, once you add on the air mail shipping and do the currency translation, the cost winds up being roughly $25. I could also pick up an import copy of the CD at my local Virgin Megastore for about $30. So yeah, even at $15 it's a good deal.

I checked out the Russian website (where it looks like I can get the same album for about $2), and if nothing else I finally got to listen to the album - which was nice. I hesitate to actually buy from them, though, since clearly none of the money would ever make it back to the band.

Having listened to several of the tracks, I'll probably wind up paying the ~$25 to buy the CD. I'd rather pay the money and support the band.
posted by Lokheed at 10:13 AM on January 30, 2005

I've found that buying iTunes gift vouchers works quite well.

Find someone you trust in the UK, PayPal them some money and get them to purchase a Gift Voucher for you. It's worked for my friend here in Australia.
posted by cheaily at 10:22 AM on January 30, 2005

I checked out the Russian website (where it looks like I can get the same album for about $2),
......
Having listened to several of the tracks, I'll probably wind up paying the ~$25 to buy the CD. I'd rather pay the money and support the band.

Lokheed, what about using the Russian service and sending a check to the band for the difference (or see if you can buy a shirt or some other piece of memorabilia from their website)? It will almost certainly be more than they would see from iTunes or a CD sale. (Although the questions of legality would still persist.)
posted by MikeKD at 5:15 PM on January 30, 2005

AllofMP3.com is great! If you want to buy tracks anonymously I suggest you get your hands on a Visa Gift Card (buy it with cash, of course). It's working perfectly for me.
posted by exhilaration at 6:09 PM on January 30, 2005

I still want to know who the band are! I won't laugh, I promise. Anyone who has ever received one of my swap disks will testify that I'm in no position to laugh. My username comes from a bloody Genesis song for God's sake...
posted by salmacis at 5:44 AM on January 31, 2005