Your argument only works in the context of someone like Rhapsody, who is a pretty bare-bones wrapper on top of content.
But consider services like last.fm, Netflix, or Pandora - where there is a significant value-add on top of merely distributing content. They are providing consumers a valuable service but yet also cannot afford the steep cut that Apple is now demanding.
The "they're distributors and deserve to get cut out" argument is a fallacy, because some distributors actually do provide consumer value - and they're all getting taken to the cleaners with Apple's new move.
Besides, a diverse crop of distributors competing with each other is a far better situation to be in than exchanging all of that for a monolithic monopoly of another distributor. Make no mistake, this isn't some populist uprising where the producers make their work available to the consumer and bypass the middleman - the middleman still exists, it's now Apple, and now Apple has all the cards.
But consider services like last.fm, Netflix, or Pandora - where there is a significant value-add on top of merely distributing content. They are providing consumers a valuable service but yet also cannot afford the steep cut that Apple is now demanding.
The "they're distributors and deserve to get cut out" argument is a fallacy, because some distributors actually do provide consumer value - and they're all getting taken to the cleaners with Apple's new move.
Besides, a diverse crop of distributors competing with each other is a far better situation to be in than exchanging all of that for a monolithic monopoly of another distributor. Make no mistake, this isn't some populist uprising where the producers make their work available to the consumer and bypass the middleman - the middleman still exists, it's now Apple, and now Apple has all the cards.