When we heard about this new service called Album-only for the first time, we thought that it was a back to past. Since iTunes Music Store has been available, we use to buy music track by track. So we have the opportunity to buy only the tracks we like.

Why now, some tracks are only available with the entire album on ITMS ? John Glaser, journalist at the New York Times, takes absolutely offence because he can not buy only one track of a movie soundtrack. At first sight, this seems to be a disagreeable constraint.

Closely it is not so stupid. Imagine that you release your album with 15 tracks. You have your own label. The entire album and each track of it are available through ITMS. Apple pays royalties to you for any downloaded track.

Now, a third party, another label, would like to release a compilation with your track. He asks you to deal a licence with him and he agrees to pay royalties (% of his net receipts) to you. If you give him the opportunity to sell track by track his compilation it could reduce the sales of the track of your own album in a large proportion. It should be more favourable for you if you deal a non-exclusive licence without being allowed to sell track by track the compilation but only the entire album. If the fan would like to buy the track only, he will buy it from your album and not from the compilation. The royalties paid by ITMS will be higher for you as you needn’t to share it with the third party label.

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