Downhill Battle announced today Tune Recycler, wherein they plan to accept codes from Pepsi’s iTunes promotion. Downhill Battle opens their announcement saying “Pepsi is about to dump 100 million free iTunes songs into circulation.” I have to question how the songs are in circulation if you can’t resell them, but I have bigger concerns with this campaign.
The first is their assertion that Pepsi pays Apple full price for every song on the promotion. Why would Apple charge full price for free advertising? I wouldn’t be surprised if the labels cut their rates as well, but since their agreement is secretish, I doubt the public will know. If their source is rumor, well, uh, I heard a rumor that Pepsi isn’t dumb enough to pay full price to advertise Apple.
Second, why do the Downhill Battle people get to choose what music deserves to be supported? I realize that this campaign is for people who don’t use the iTunes Music Store, but why not allow people to choose which artist and song they want to support? Do the Downhill Battle people think that they have better taste in music than the people supplying their purchasing power? If they want to further their political agenda, they could limit it only to artists not belonging to the RIAA.
It’s an interesting idea, but they seem more focused on what they want to do instead of enabling people to help them out.