Digital Trends

At long last, Apple Computer has launched the Japanese version of the iTunes Music Store. But will Japanese music-lovers be willing to pay more than $0.99 a song?

More than two years after introducing its digital music download service in the United States, Apple Computer has launched a Japanese version of the iTunes Music Store. Apple worked with more than a dozen Japanese companies (alongside international distributors) to provide music for the store from both international acts and Japanese artists, and the new service launches with more than 1 million songs available for purchase. But unlike the U.S. version of the store, where tracks are consistently priced at $0.99, songs in the Japanese version of the store are priced at •150, with roughly ten percent of the available tracks commanding a higher •200 price tag—those prices are roughly US$1.35 to US$1.80.

Sony's competing Mora online music service charges ¥210 per song. Japan is considered the world's second-largest music market, after the United States, when measured in terms of album sales.

Apple has never made much money from its various iTunes Music Stores; rather, the profitable part of Apple's music business rests on the sales of the ever-more-ubiquitous iPod family of portable music players, which account for roughly three quarters of the market for portable music players in the United States. However, in Japan, the iPod is merely the market leader, accounting for roughly 36 percent of the market, while rival Sony has managed to secure over a quarter of the market with a popular flash-based music player. Apple hopes the introduction of a Japanese version of the iTunes Music Store will spur sales of iPods, particularly the inexpensive flash-based iPod shuffle.