I was at a complete loss for words the other day when I found out that India does not have any online music stores. Sure there are the ones like flipkart and infibeam which will ask you to buy entire albums, CDs to be more specific. But nothing in the lines of iTunes or Amazon mp3 store. Hence we are left with no other option but to physically go out and buy music CDs of entire albums even if just one track in the entire album is worth listening to.
This is quite a shame to be honest. India is regarded throughout the world as a music loving nation. To stifle the average music lover with lack of digital downloads is a sin. Fortunately for the native music industry there are places like raaga and saregama which will offers digital downloads but those online stores are strictly without anything remotely western music.
I have stopped blaming iTunes for this though, as Apple is a company which likes to believe that the world has just one country and the rest don't exist. Well that's why Apple doesn't matter to me. But I really can't understand why companies like Amazon and Google are shutting their doors to international users.
No wonder then that music piracy at least of international albums is rampant throughout the country. People willing to pay are being forced to take the illegal route as its way simpler. For heaven's sake downloading torrents is the easiest thing ever. Why would anyone stop doing that and spend money on fuel to drive to the music store? Its not that I support piracy, I totally don't. But I do understand why people would want to pirate music.
Message to the music labels? Make internationally recognisable stores available in this country. Give users the option to buy individual tracks instead of forcing them to pay big bucks for entire CDs. Make music accessible to users, the users will be accessible to you.
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