iTunes online music delivery

By now, everyone knows what iTunes is even if they haven’t used it personally.  Apple, with their iTunes software, was one of the first to allow customers to buy either single songs or entire albums online and receive their music instantly.  All this occurred during the transition from hard copy music to digital.  Digital offered convenience to customers since it was more compact and allowed the listener to carry more songs with them wherever they went.  Eventually, iTunes expanded to include videos as well as Podcasts, which can all be obtained from the iTunes platform.

The iTunes platform is very lean since there are only a few steps and the customer is not paying for any steps they don’t value.  All the media is stored on Apple’s servers and can be retrieved by the customer through the iTunes software platform.  All that is required is distribution from the server to the customer in one single step.  Each iTunes account is unique and has its own credits and debits as well as a history of what was purchased that can be re-download.  This simple system is always on so customers can always access this service, which is another benefit of the entire supply chain being electronic.

Technology has helped make the music industry more lean by offering an easier, more convenient way to distribute music.  Can technology improve the system even more or does the current state represent the peak efficiency of digital media delivery?