1. Can I sell them to someone else? What happens if my hard drive dies, can I just download them all over again? Is the quality as good as a CD?
If the answer to the above questions are all "no", we don't really need to go further. But hey, I'll humour you.
2. I buy 90% of my CDs online. half.com is just as easy as anything else online.
3. When lossless, uncrippled downloads are offered, I'll consider changing my point of view.
4. Personally, I see nothing wrong with someone downloading an album off of bittorrent or anywhere else, provided they delete it if they don't like it and buy it if they keep it. That's a moral call, though, and I know the law says differently in many countries.
5. I can still buy CD singles at a much cheaper price. I typically pay anywhere from 1.00 to 6.00 per album. Add a few bucks for shipping and it's still just as cheap... with all of these benefits:
1) No DRM
2) I can sell, lend, do whatever I want with it. I own it.
3) Rip into any quality and format I require.
6. There are even more independents NOT on iTunes.
7. Glad we can finally agree.
8. The point is that you do not need iTunes... and iTunes can in fact be quite restrictive if you wanted to own an MP3 player with better sound quality than an iPod, for example.
9. You might be right.
10. The sony rootkit didn't hurt my mac much at all... how about yours? Again, if they get rid of the DRM and meet my other requirements I'll happily change my "tune", so to speak.