Increasing streaming revenue is eating into download sales. So how long before Apple turns off the tap?

Will streaming eventually kill off downloads for good? Will downloading go the way of cassette tapes in the next five years? This is the future music industry blogger Mark Mulligan has predicted in his article After the Download: When Apple Turns off the iTunes Store.

Apple’s music streaming service, Apple Music, which launched in June 2015, reached 13 million paying subscribers just shy of its first birthday. According to Mulligan, 27% of these subscribers have said that they have stopped buying downloads. With download sales declining steadily, Mulligan suggests that Apple will turn off the iTunes store in 2020, when revenue from streaming is predicted to reach the 2012 iTunes download revenue peak.

Since Apple is the dominant player in the music downloads business, Mulligan warns that this will have flow on effects for the rest of the industry. “Smaller labels, publishers, artists and songwriters all better have a Plan B in place before this transpires,” he concludes. “The download was a fantastic transition product to give the music industry its first steps into the digital era. But as we transition from transactional models to consumption based ones, its role diminishes every passing year. It has served the market well, but the end is now in sight.”

This prediction has interesting ramifications for classical music enthusiasts, for whom iTunes is only one of several platforms (and not necessarily the best one) from which to source music. Amazon, of course, is the other big player, but music downloads aren’t available for Australian users. UK website Presto Classical is another player, and it is geared specifically toward a market of classical music listeners. Trawling through platforms like iTunes and Spotify, it quickly becomes obvious how unsuitable the current set-up is for classical music listeners, who may want to identify tracks by work, composer, ensemble, conductor or label rather than simply artist and song ­– not to mention those who want to read well-researched and written liner notes. Classical music enthusiasts, perhaps more than other groups of listeners, are often collectors as well as consumers, and for those listeners the download model may remain more attractive than streaming. A number of platforms also combine subscription and download based services. Spotify, for instance, has a Listen Offline function, which begins to cross this divide in music, and Amazon’s eBooks are available by both subscription and download. 

Since Mulligan’s article was published, rumours have been swirling about plans to kill off iTunes downloads in the next two years, but an Apple representative has since denied this report to news website Mashable.

Other analysists are convinced that downloads will eventually end, or at least diminish significantly, but they envisage a longer timeline. “Transitions like this take years and years,” comments Dawson from Jackdaw Research in an article published by Computer World, “there will come a point where Apple will turn off the lights because no one is in the store, but it will be a very slow transition.”

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