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Media (Apple) Media Music Businesses Apple

Canadian iTunes Music Store Opens 479

Posted by CowboyNeal from the moxy-fruvous-and-rush dept.
Trillan writes "After appearing on December 1st, iTunes music store Canada is now officially open. Price is only $0.99 CDN (about $0.83 US) per song, so it's less expensive than the US store. This is probably fair since our CDs are usually cheaper here, too, at least on the west coast."
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Canadian iTunes Music Store Opens More

Canadian iTunes Music Store Opens

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  • Possible? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by CompSurfer ( 759218 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:07PM (#10981805)
    Is it possible for Americans (USA) to buy songs from Canada's iTunes?

    • Re:Possible? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by double-oh three ( 688874 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:08PM (#10981818)
      The better question is; Where's a list of Candian proxy servers and where can I get the Canadian version?

      • Re:Possible? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by prof_peabody ( 741865 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:33PM (#10982036)
        Anyone can surf the Canadian store. You need a credit card with a Canadian address in order to purchase from the Canadian shop. I have been purchasing tracks from the US store here in Canada for the past year with my US based credit card. There are all sorts of loopholes like this in online shopping.

      • Re:Possible? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by BondGamer ( 724662 )
        Step 1: Buy $10 plot of Land in Canada and stick mailbox on it. Step 2: Apply for credit card. Step 3: Save money in canadaian iTunes store!

        • why bother... (Score:4, Informative)

          by WebCowboy ( 196209 ) on Friday December 03, 2004 @12:30AM (#10983218)
          ...with step one? Just get a PO Box from Canada Post. You don't need your own plot of land, a little box in Macs next to the frosty machine will do just fine.

          Besides, you couldn't by $10 of land anywhere in Canada (even in Winnipeg). Even $10 US--especially since at the rate the US dollar is tanking it'll be at par with the Canadian dollar in a year and with the peso by the end of the decade if the trend were to continue that long.

          BTW...this is how Canadians get HBO--they get a PO box in Montana and order DirecTV. Can't see why the same strategy in reverse wouldn't work for USians lookin' for cheap iTunes.

    • Re:Possible? (Score:5, Funny)

      by glomph ( 2644 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:10PM (#10981835) Homepage Journal
      Sure, it's possible for Americans to buy from the Canadian Itunes store! But as Pres.Bush will remind you, we can't be sure those bits will be safe! What's really IN those files?

      • Re:Possible? (Score:2, Offtopic)

        by bigberk ( 547360 )
        Real Canadian drugs you can trust... you think everyone up here is dropping dead from bad pharms? Fake Canadian pharmacies you should avoid, like these asshole spammers [diwefbsdf.info] (please slashdot the site into the ground, spam/scam running out of China)

    • Re:Possible? (Score:5, Informative)

      by The Hobo ( 783784 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:12PM (#10981868)
      From TFA:

      "The iTunes Music Store in Canada works with the Canadian dollar, and purchase and download of songs requires a valid credit card with a billing address in Canada."


      Which is fine for me, but not for Americans..

      • Business opportunity (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Atario ( 673917 )
        1. Be a Canadian.
        2. Have a credit card.
        3. Set up website (totally automated, eh) offering to buy people iTunes songs at cost plus 5%.
        4. Advertise service in USA
        5. Profit!

        Of course I'm probably missing some DRM reason why this won't work. Not that I care.

      • Re:Possible? (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Pfft.. forget what the article says.

        Let's use our American mentalitly and just say we can use it. If they don't let us use it we'll just call them a bunch of flammatory names, say stuff like "WHATEVER, AMERICA JR!" and "OUR ARMY COULD KICK YOUR ARMY'S ASS!" (all in a really loud voice, of course).

        Yup.. the good ol' American way. ;)

    • Re:Possible? (Score:5, Informative)

      by PktLoss ( 647983 ) * on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:43PM (#10982111) Homepage Journal
      I'm a Canadian, and up untill today I have been buying songs from iTunes USA with my US credit card, so I can only assume that the reverse is also possible. Should the slide of the US greenback continue (the canadian dollar is already at a 10+ year high against the USD) and CDN$ > USD$ I will just switch back.

      If only I could return all my music bought under the US account for a refund and re-purchase at the lower currency price.

      Getting a Canadian CC isn't as easy as it was to get an American one. In the US your (my?) bank card also functions as a debit card from visa/mastercard. So merely having a bank card generally means you can buy stuff online because it functions as a visa/mastercard. Not so in Canada. Your bank card is not affiliated with a credit card company, instead it is part of the Interac network, which allows you to make purchases with it everywhere that accepts Interac (which is everywhere (except Tim Hortons)). So you would need to procure a Canadian billing address, a Canadian bank account, then a Canadian credit card.

      good luck :)

  • Price per album? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by CRC'99 ( 96526 )
    Wonder if these will still be $10+.....

  • Only album for sale at the moment... (Score:5, Funny)

    by TheLoneIguana ( 126589 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:08PM (#10981813)
    "The Best of Bob and Doug Mackenzie."

    Take off!

  • About time (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Fenis-Wolf ( 239374 ) <`su.hcet2a' `ta' `eddubj'> on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:08PM (#10981820) Homepage
    About time. I don't see why it took this long. Was there some massive tech barriers, that restrained the opening, or was it Canadas version of the RIAA?

  • Dont expect the store to be up for long (Score:3, Interesting)

    by infonick ( 679715 ) * on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:10PM (#10981831) Homepage
    Under the Canadian Copywrite Law, "personal copying" is permitted. This means I can download all the music I could ever want. The only drawback is a small tax on every cd purchased. thats ok though, i dont buy cd's often.
    • i think canadian iTMS will do quite well, actually... iTMS has been successful because it's relatively cheap, allows a lot of individual tracks to be purchased (instead of an album), easy to use, easy to find the songs you want quickly and you are guaranteed a certain download quality. i think the "fear" of being sued because you use downloading (which hasn't happened anyway... only lawsuits have been for uploaders) is not the only reason iTMS has been successful.
      • But why the hell would you be affriad of being sued if two seperate rullings have indicated its perfectly legal because of the coppyright levy?
        The only case in which I see iTunes being able to be able to use the not get sued philosphy is with audio books (which are illegal) .
        For iTunes to be successfull in Canada it will have to emphasice that artists are getting a fair share , since otherwise people will just continue to legally download music without paying for it.
    • Under the Canadian Copywrite Law, "personal copying" is permitted. This means I can download all the music I could ever want.

      Yep, well said.

      That story is trying to invoke fear that the influence of copy control in America is bleeding across the US border, and tries to legitimate corrupt American lawmakers by claiming a 'better' alternative to sharing music online. Any country that willingingly makes information a permanent form of property has no concept of the word freedom.

      Thankfully there are nation

    • Re:Dont expect the store to be up for long (Score:5, Insightful)

      by That's Unpossible! ( 722232 ) * on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:26PM (#10981989)
      "Don't expect the store to be up for long."

      Yes, I will chalk that bit of insight up there with the infamous, "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."

      If you think the fact that iTunes is one of the few "legal" places to download music is the reason for its success in the United States, you might be right. Fortunately for them, it isn't.

      Some things to ponder...

      Via your Canadian "free" channels, how hard is it to find a COMPLETE album, with all of the correct song and album information, converted consistently well to digital file format, complete with album cover art embedded? Because on iTunes it is easy-as-fucking-pie.*

      There is something to be said for being able to fire up iTunes, type in "Old Hundredth," sample the recordings available, find one I like, and buy it AND have it on my hard drive in a matter of 60 seconds.

      * Not to be confused with pie-fucking.
    • Yeah, I know it's legal. I choke a little every time I see the phrase "illegal copying" with respect to Canadian music. It ain't illegal (yet, at least) no matter how many times the labels repeat the phrase. But I think the store will prosper anyway, as very often I'd much rather spend $0.99 on a song than fight with the various measures the labels have used to sabotage the P2P system.

  • Aussie ITMS (Score:4, Interesting)

    by z3021017 ( 806883 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:12PM (#10981863)
    Please Apple. Please.

    Australia/NZ now are the last English-speaking countries not to get iTunes so I hope we get it soon (as in the next 6 months).

    • Re:Aussie ITMS (Score:5, Funny)

      by nxtr ( 813179 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:20PM (#10981929)
      there's a new zealand now?

    • Re:Aussie ITMS (Score:3, Insightful)

      by jxyama ( 821091 )
      why does english-speaking matter?

      potential marketsize-wise, it's a no brainer where the next iTMS has to be: japan.

      • Re:Aussie ITMS (Score:3, Interesting)

        by notthepainter ( 759494 )
        Perhaps it is a translation issue? Australia would be much easier to "port" than Japan. Think of all the text on the iTMS, the Tom Waits biography is 3 screen tall, somebody has to go and translate all that.

        The original poster's point was that for the AUS/NZ market, they don't have to translate it.

        On the other hand, is the Canadian iTMS available in French?

    • Considering the U2 branded iPod, I expect to see Ireland come online first.

    • Re:Aussie ITMS (Score:4, Informative)

      by michaeldot ( 751590 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @10:00PM (#10982216)

      I heard a rumour that Telstra / NineMSN had put up serious obstacles to preventing this from happening, but I've not be able to see it confirmed either way.

      Anything reported in the press is insubstantial: David Frith on recent iTunes releases [news.com.au]

      Australia's record industry also has a powerful lobby. They almost managed to kill parallel imports, and seem to be able to recruit high profile personalities (eg, Molly Meldrum) to spout the party line.

      I'd be interested to know what is really going on. But it's no use expecting to see any journalists dig up the facts, given publications like the Sydney Morning Herald's long-term hostility to the iPod.

      (How's this: when publishing a definitive review of MP3 players about a year ago, they omitted all reference to *the* MP3 player! They have to pay lip service to it now it's such a big hit, but most reviews damn it with faint praise. I think Creative must pay them more for their advertising.)

    • South Africa and Liberia have iTMS?

  • Canadian Credit Card Required. (Score:4, Funny)

    by amigoro ( 761348 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:14PM (#10981879) Homepage Journal
    The iTunes Music Store in Canada works with the Canadian dollar, and purchase and download of songs requires a valid credit card with a billing address in Canada.

    Any Canadian out there who wants to be my best friend?


    Moderate this comment
    Negative: Offtopic [mithuro.com] Flamebait [mithuro.com] Troll [mithuro.com] Redundant [mithuro.com]
    Positive: Insightful [mithuro.com] Interesting [mithuro.com] Informative [mithuro.com] Funny [mithuro.com]

  • Fantastic! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Drakonian ( 518722 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:14PM (#10981883) Homepage
    I've been waiting for this for ages. It's at the right price point too. Many CDs are $12.99 CDN here, meaning they were going to have to beat that to get my business. They appear to be $9.99.

    Now I can buy some Wilco albums for only $9.99 when they are often $20 or $25 CDN in stores.

  • Take my country, please (Score:5, Funny)

    by OldManAndTheC++ ( 723450 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:16PM (#10981897)
    Cheaper CDs, cheaper pharmaceuticals, affordable health care ... sounds like paradise! Would you Canadians just invade us, please?

  • Don't forget tax (Score:5, Informative)

    by DJStealth ( 103231 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:18PM (#10981914)
    Keep in mind that the taxes in Canada are higher on average. In Ontario, we pay a total of 15% tax.

    Also, keep in mind, if a can of coke goes for $1 US, the same can will sell in Canada for $1 CAD.

    • Re:Don't forget tax (Score:3, Informative)

      by Rosyna ( 80334 )
      You pay $1 for a can of coke? Sheesh. Here in the US we pay 35 cents to 65 cents with 60 cents being the norm for an individual 12 ounce can of coke out of a machine.

      • The difference is that our Coke machines have those temperature-dependent pricing processors. Since it never gets above 65 degrees American here, the machine charges the lowest possible price.

  • NAFTA and Free Trade (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cheshiremackat ( 618044 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:24PM (#10981959)
    I find it interesting that Canadians right now enjoy more 'freedom' wrt music sharing/copying etc. We are allowed to 'share' our music with friends in exchange for a small tax on CDRs and MP3 players.

    Also, our AACs from Apple are cheaper ($0.84 today).

    The most interesting part? IP is not part of NAFTA, if it was, you could buy music in Canada and re-import it to the US. (Actually if IP was part of NAFTA, Apple CANADA could sue the RIAA to force lower prices as the present situation is anti-competitive) {interesting asside, Apple CANADA would have to do it, Apple USA would have no standing, goofy NAFTA dispute resolution}.

    INSTEAD, what I think will happen is that the US will force Canada to sign the WIPO and the world gets DMCA like treatment, as opposed to making the US laws more sane.

    So, for all those who asked, no you will not be able to re-import the music back into the US... even if you could get Apple to sell it to you at the lower price you would have to declare the purchase and remit duty on the purchase. Ever buy one of the "imported' CDs from the record store... part of the reason they cost more is excise duty.

    Bah, somewhat useless however, with the USD sucking lately, we could be back to 1.05Canadian soon, and we would want to buy your cheap music.... better get that trade deficit fixed soon!

  • Store performance? (Score:3, Informative)

    by psyconaut ( 228947 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:24PM (#10981968)
    The performance of the store doesn't seem terribly awe inspiring right now. Knowing that Apple don't tend to launch small, I can only presume that this means lots of happy Canadians browsing and buying.

    -psy

  • No local stuff from Quebec? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by NeedleSurfer ( 768029 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:25PM (#10981972)
    In other country Apple had problem getting indies onboard, one would have thought they would be prepared this time. This ain't gonna work if they have no music from here to sell us, The rest of Canada might appreciate but the national fiber is too strong here for a majority of people to adhere to a service that doesn't sell them their own music...

  • That's relative (Score:2, Insightful)

    by johnny_sas ( 785125 )
    "so it's less expensive than the US store"

    That's irrelevant; as someone here once said, $1 is still a $1 here, no matter what it's worth anywhere else.

    • Are you really saying there's no difference between a Canadian dollar, a US dollar, a Euro and a Philippine Peso?

      If there's no difference, I've got some Philippine pesos. I'm willing to trade them on par for US dollars. What do you think?

      So which would you rather have: 10 million US dollars or 10 million Canadian dollars?

  • What a deal! (Score:5, Funny)

    by bigberk ( 547360 ) <bigberk@users.pc9.org> on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:33PM (#10982033)
    Sweet, what a deal for Americans! [yahoo.com] Only $0.83 a download, no wait, $0.85, oop, make that $0.92, don't worry guys it'll stop any day now, shit! $1.05 ...

    • Re:What a deal! (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      haha you're making fun of our weakening currency, i get it. we don't need canadian business though, you need ours
    • That's sooo cold. But remember once we were far above them, though of course we will be again.

      Hehehehehe ban our beef, we'll stop shipping you grain, eat your funny green money we'll see who starves first.

      The above was not meant to be a reasoned analysis of the stability of our two currencies, just a hope that the Chinese will decide to lock their currency against the CDN $ rather than the american one. Also I'd like to have a really nice vid card cost less chocolate bars here.

  • I live in the United States of Canada [mithuro.com]. Do I qaulify?

  • itunes is great and all but... (Score:4, Informative)

    by seven of five ( 578993 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:40PM (#10982088)
    as an indie musician with stuff on iTunes, they don't have it together internally. I've had sales from 6 months ago that I haven't been paid for yet.

    it's great that they're opening these new outlets and all but they're lacking in some basics.

  • screenshot available here (Score:5, Funny)

    by jeffehobbs ( 419930 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @09:45PM (#10982119) Homepage

    Can you spot the subtle differences [mac.com]?

    ~jeff
  • I'm not trying to troll here but I'm not overly interested in rebooting just to go browse and see what they have. Is it possible to at least browse the store under linux or is it mac or windows only?
  • It looks like not all of the music that's in the US store is available in the Canadian one at the moment. :( And I was looking forward to picking up some Lemon Jelly...
  • Here's how a Canadian could arbitrage this. Offer to buy songs for any Americans. They send you $x where 0.83 x 0.99 via PayPal. You then create a bogus Apple ID (email address), buy the song they want, email it to them eith the password to the Apple ID. They change the Apple ID password and the song is all theirs. Actually this could be simplified by purchasing "gift certificates" perhaps? I'm sure there's multiple holes in this, but seems like there's potential!
  • "...it's less expensive than the US store. This is probably fair since our CDs are usually cheaper here, too, at least on the west coast."

    Gol' darned Canadian socialized music industry!

  • New store, same problems (Score:5, Insightful)

    by H_Fisher ( 808597 ) <[h_v_fisher] [at] [yahoo.com]> on Thursday December 02, 2004 @10:55PM (#10982635)

    And just like the US store, I'm sure it'll feature:

    A lot of pop artists;

    A good selection of works by earlier groups in various genres;

    Not a whole lot of imports; and

    A lot of partial albums for major singers, because some corporate asshat out there thinks that's good marketing.

    I used to download lots of music from Napster in college. Burned it CD, played the hell out of it. But I didn't keep most of those mp3s, and today with a steady job and a little different viewpoint, I'm willing to pay money for good copies and to support artists I like. So I checked out iTunes and loved it. I've spent about $80 there in the first month.

    But when I run across artists like Enigma (whose albums have been chopped to hell) and Genesis (none of the most notable songs from the Peter Gabriel era are available), what do I do? I load up my p2p and start searching.

    I don't blame iTunes. I commend them for doing the best they can to bring fire to the music industry cavemen. I admire what they're doing, but if the music makers want me as a consumer, they're going to have to deal with me on my level.

  • iRATE Radio - Free and Legal Music (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MichaelCrawford ( 610140 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @11:59PM (#10983042) Homepage Journal
    Would you like to get new music to listen to without enriching the RIAA record labels? Would you like to support up-and-coming artists who can't get a recording contract or airplay?

    Many unsigned and independent artists provide free downloads of their music as a way to promote themselves. Of course the hard part for you is to find this music at all, let alone find the music that you're going to like without actually downloading and listening to it all.

    iRATE Radio [sourceforge.net] solves this problem for you. It is a collaborative filtering MP3 downloader and player. It is Free Software, licensed under the GNU GPL.

    iRATE's central server has a database of about 50,000 MP3 tracks available from a number of music hosting services such as the Internet Underground Music Archives [iuma.com]. The iRATE client fetches a few URLs from the server, downloads the tracks, and then plays them for you.

    As you listen to each track, you rate it according to your preferences. The client then uploads your ratings to the server, which then correlates them with ratings submitted by other users. Future track recommendations will be based on these correllations. Basically what that means is that if you and I like the same music, then iRATE will download for you all the same music that I rated highly.

    iRATE Radio is very close to its 0.4 release, which offers many improvements over the current 0.3 release. We can use your help in testing the upcoming release. If you want to help, please download one of the unstable builds [sourceforge.net]. Subscribe to the mailing list and submit bug reports via the sourceforge bug report form.

    There is a new distribution page at www.irateradio.com [irateradio.com] that is aimed at the non-technical user. Downloading from there gets you the 0.3 release right now, but soon the 0.4 release will be available there.

    iRATE Radio is written in Java and welcomes contributions from new developers.

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