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Not sure - I don't save anything for offline use as I either use it on my Mac when connected or my phone when not (then it comes in through 3G and the buffering is really intelligent so it goes out and gets a lot at one time...just in case you're driving, say, and you hit a coverage blackspot).
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I'm on Apple Music - I just put an option to download main playlists automatically, and all of those songs are in offline zone over there.

This would be disastrous for me, and clearly plenty of others out there, who quite rightly see the option of purchasing music legally as a legitimate expectation, at least in the digital world if not the physical. It's not necessarily that one must be anti-streaming; personally I've not seen the need to gravitate towards it, but may do so in years to come. It's just that most of us surely would not wish to be forced to do it because the purchase option had been withdrawn wholesale. I'd also guess most consumers would prefer to have the option of either, and if we prefer buy-to-own - and there's several sound reasons why we would - then there'll be sufficient custom for downloads (and in the albums sector it seems, even CDs) to maintain these as viable formats. I could understand why they might terminate download sales sites if the market became so depleted that it wasn't worth the money invested to run them; I had to reluctantly concede to that when labels had effectively withdrawn CD singles en masse by 2010. But I never thought I'd be expecting a similar predicament with downloads come 2020!

 

For my part, I don't really care if Apple iTunes shuts eventually, as I have never used their services, and so as long as other sites continue with the paid-for download option, I shall use them. That said, we can all recognise the massive impact it would have on the overall sales of downloads, given that iTunes continue to be the market leader, and the reality is that if Apple close off their download store, many people who've used it faithfully for many years will probably rather move to streaming via Apple than move to downloading from say Amazon. It will not help the format survive longer-term; quite the reverse.

 

There's little doubt now that long before we reach the 2020s, audio streaming will dominate the music landscape almost entirely (at least in respect of individual tracks), and that in turn, download sales will decline as customers yield to the growing trend and start renting their music as a habit. But that should not mean that the download format must be hastily and wilfully killed off before it is due. However 'niche' it becomes by the close of the 2010s, it should still be a viable, available option. I would still be surprised if in four years it was in quite the dire position CD singles were in six years ago. I'm confident there'll be a hardcore and significant segment of the music-consuming market who will always want to buy-to-own, and so will render it worthwhile for at least some sites to continue with the MP3 for many years to come.

 

Remember - we all thought CDs would kill vinyl; we all thought downloads would kill CDs; now we're assuming streaming will kill downloads. In the first two cases, history has shown that whilst one format may rapidly dominate the market and drastically-reduce fortunes of its once-all-conquering predecessor, it never quite finishes the job and kills it! The older formats, and indeed the more traditional habits of consuming music (i.e. buying rather than renting), may end up as niches, but tick over at the bottom of the scale, and in some instances actually hold their own, or even start to regain traction. CD albums have not yet depleted to the lowly levels predicted a few years ago. Vinyl, though consigned to a very low market share overall, has begun to show a marked resurgence in custom in the last three years. Hell, even CASSETTE - the format everyone confidently dismissed as dead by the mid-2000s, is now being talked about as having a mini-revival among some more hipsterish local markets! In fact, when one considers it objectively, in the pop/rock era (so since 1950), the only once-dominant format that has ever truly died a commerical death was the 78RPM shellac disc, which was eventually eaten whole by its 45RPM vinyl counterpart come the early 1960s! But even THAT took almost a decade to transpire from its original inception.

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