When a new company decides to develop an MP3 player, probably the first thing that comes to their mind is what features a consumer would look for, for example a large detailed display, easy navigation through directories, ID3 support, display that is backlit and maybe even FM radio and recording support. Well, while some of these features may look to be key sellers, apparently that is not the case as not only does the iPod Shuffle lack all these features, it is so far grabbed 58% of the market share for Flash-based players! This is up from 43% in February.
Apple still leads when it comes to hard drive based players, which has a 90% market share. When it comes to online music services, 70% of all US music download sales come from Apple's iTunes service and to date Apple has sold over 350 million tunes over it.
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NPD's stats put the Shuffle's share of the retail arena on 58 per cent, up from 43 per cent in February. Apple already commands the hard drive-based player market with a 90 per cent share. More than 70 per cent of all legal song downloads in the US are sold by Apple's iTunes Music Store, the Merrill Lynch client report notes, according to MacNN. |
Apple surely knows how to sell its MP3 players, no matter what features it has. However, if another company were to now release a flash based player that did not have a display, only had basic navigation and a volume control, I couldn't image it doing too well.
Finally, even though other music download services aim to offer better features than iTunes, such as flat rate unlimited download music subscription services and cheaper pricing, Apple's share in the music download business has not really changed that much in the past year, for example Apple still had 70% market share of legal music downloads last April.
Source: The Register - Mobile Devices
