iPod flourishing, gaining market share

MacNN ^ | 04/25/2006

[Panerai]

PiperJaffray senior analyst Gene Munster today maintained an "outperform" rating on Apple shares with a price target of $99, following an examination of data from his Amazon Top Seller list ratings. Apple's iPod is flourishing on the lists for portable MP3 players and all electronics, holding all 10 spots in the top 10. The analyst believes that Apple's iPod is still gaining market share, noting the device's recent rise to 77.9 percent in March, up from 76.8 percent in February. "We believe the increase is noteworthy given that the last time we recorded 10 iPods in the Top 10 occurred on September 9th, 2005, prior to the holiday shopping season," Munster noted. The number of Macs in the Top 10 and Top 20 decreased to eight and nine, from nine and 11, respectively. "The eight in the Top 10 remains at the upper end of all observations since we began tracking the Top Sellers," Munster wrote.

"For a point of reference, there were five Macs in the Top 10 one year ago. We believe that increase is primarily due to the recent launch of the new Intel=based iMac and MacBook Pros."

Munster also noted the steadily increasing internet traffic to Apple's website, indicating a growing interest in the company and its products.

"Apple.com has had a significant increase in 'reach' over the past quarter, which we believe is mainly the result of Apple's new product launches at Macworld on January 10th," Munster told clients in a his research report. "Apple's three-month average traffic rank of 45 on April 20th is the best value that we have observed for apple.com since we've tracked the Alexa data."

Alexa.com is a Web-based information provider that tracks statistics for nearly every main domain name in existence, and is particularly useful for identifying which websites are important to surfers. The "reach" rating signifies the number of users of a site, and Alexa.com expresses this statistic as the number of users per million.

"Apple's 3-month average reach of 13,255,000 on April 20th is the second best value that has been observed (high was on 13,300,000 on March 1st)," the analyst added. "While we realize Web 'traffic rankings' and 'reach' are not perfect measures of actual sales, we believe they are a decent indicator of overall mindshare."

PiperJaffray believes Apple will have shipped more than 85 million iPods by the end of 2006, providing Apple with a greater scope of awareness for various products, or a "halo effect." The company announced in its March quarter conference call that it had shipped 50 million iPods through the end of March 2005.

[Echo Talon]

the encryption that requires the use of iTunes is not for the purpose of a monopoly (at least not for Apple), it is part of the agreement with the record labels to cover the digital rights management.... Apple has to make a reasonable effort to protect the music from unauthorized copying/distribution.

So, any MP3 player can download and use iTunes songs?

[coconutt2000]

Out and about making intellectually vacuous and dishonest arguments and trolling in the Mac threads again?

You need a life that doesn't involve being a prick.

[TheBattman]

Not sure. I don't own an iPod (so far haven't had a need).

Each online music store uses it's own variety of encryption/protection. Some are compatible outside of the proprietary software, some are not.

The music purchased through iTunes is downloaded to your computer. Apple's version is AAC encoded. This is a variety of mp4...... so if your player (non-iPod) can read it...

[Echo Talon]

You need a life that doesn't involve being a prick.

awww poor baby. I like the insults BTW.

[gondramB]

Very interesting... thanks for that - cant wait to check my Windows version of Itunes.

[coconutt2000]

I don't care if you like them or not. You're an ass. You're about as useful as a liberal.

[antiRepublicrat]

I have been disappointed in their video offerings.

You haven't seen the French maids yet. ;^)

[antiRepublicrat]

So, any MP3 player can download and use iTunes songs?

So, can any car use all Lexus parts?

[ThinkDifferent]

I know you can redigitize Itunes into MP3 but all the methods I am aware of involve breaking the ITunes agreement and thus the law.

AFAIK there's no problem with burning a CD and re-ripping to MP3.

[gondramB]

"AFAIK there's no problem with burning a CD and re-ripping to MP3."

I guess you are not actually breaking the encryption. it does seem odd that Apple would require DRM and then make it so easy to get around it.

[Spktyr]

It's the labels/record companies requiring DRM. Apple provides the least draconian system that will satisfy the idiots there, which (while they don't come right out and say it) is stupidly easy to circumvent.

Don't like DRM? Get rid of the RIAA.