Will Apple bring us iPhone radio?
One of the latest Apple rumors is that the company is planning to bring FM radio with live pause and iTunes tagging, such as they recently introduced on the iPod Nano, to the iPhone and iPod Touch.
The Nano with FM radio features was introduced at Apple’s music event in September, with significant fanfare. There would seem to be no obvious reason not to bring the same features to the iPhone and Touch, at least those with the hardware necessary to support it, which would be the iPhone 3G and 3GS and the second- and third-generation iPod Touch.
Those models of the iPhone and Touch already have an FM radio receiver built into their chipset, so Apple can simply turn them on via an app on both mobile devices. That app will be a bit of a different experience than using the pause and tag features on the Nano. That’s because the iPhone and Touch are actual gateways into the iTunes store, whereas the Nano is not. That means that with an FM radio app on an iPhone or Touch, you can hear a song and instantly access iTunes to purchase and download the song. And, of course, as noted in a MacNewsWorld story, instant gratification is just what customers have become accustomed to.
If iPhone and Touch users are given an avenue for instant gratification for their musical whims, that means that the iTunes store (and Apple) are likely to sell more songs, and thus to make more money. So Apple is working out the details of the app that will allow you to tag a song that you hear on the Apple FM channel and then be transported to the iTunes store so that you can buy it now. Right now.
It seems that everyone could see this as a win situation. Consumers can identify more music that they enjoy more quickly and get it faster. Apple can sell more songs and make more money. The only fly in the ointment is the likelihood of getting a song that you will really enjoy long term on the spur of the moment. It may be a bit like the checkout lane at the grocery store. You have just been careful to select a cart full of healthy food, and suddenly you are confronted with 80 brands of candy bar. So you buy six. That, too, is instant gratification, though you may wind up hating yourself in the morning.
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