A Little Hypocrisy?

I purchase CD's directly from a distributer. My cost: $5 to $6 per disc. It's not the record companies marking up the disc it's the retail outlet. Circuit City sells CD's for $9.99 and they are making a 100% profit. So, when you go into a store to buy a CD for $19.99 take my advice and lube up in the parking lot because your about to get f______d.

P.S. royalties for artist range between 2-15% of the price the distributor pays. About 0.10 to $0.90.

I buy expensive equipment and cables. I don't like paying $15 for CD that's poorly mastered. I don't mind paying $25 for the same XRCD. If the recording industry could consistently give me good quality at $18 to $20 I would be happy. (I'd be happier still if I could buy really great vinyl at that price)

I would also hazard to note that a place like A'gon is the essence of a competitive market--people pay what they think its worth, or they don't buy it, and if someone values it more, it gets sold to someone else. Contrast that with the retail CD market which has now been judged to be the subject of, effectively, price fixing. I think I'd like a CD market where I was in control of deciding what software was worth how much.

B'sides, getting back to the original quote, I complain about high equipment costs *and* high CD costs all the time. Maybe I just like to complain...

When I read the starting post, I had the same thought as Rdr4b. People complain about audio prices all the time. As always it is funny to watch some of you look at a forest with a microscope, and call yourselves biologists. When you buy a CD, you are not really buying the plastic and aluminum, and Circuit City and Best Buy, I guarantee, are not making money on CDs. From the distributor, a CD costs a store around $9, new releases around $11, but it varies quite a bit. That $16 retail CD has to pay a lot of people. Its the same thing as books.

The items offered on Audiogon tend to represent the higher end of what's available in music reproduction equipment. As such the record exec is making an argument that the better quality, presumably hi-rez, CDs should cost $15/each. That price seems reasonable to me.