> And really his strength and the reason why he was instrumental to iTunes lay in his ability to negotiate and drive deals with all of the music industry player

> And really his strength and the reason why he was instrumental to iTunes lay in his ability to negotiate and drive deals with all of the music industry players. He had negotiated some great deals back in the day, but the music world changed and he wasn't making progress at negotiating (partly due to his past success, labels didn't want Apple to continue to have so much power). Cue not being able to make a deal is why Apple bought Beats for $3B and gained access to its streaming deal. Tough spot to be in and I think it would have happened the same way regardless of who was negotiating (scrappy iPod era Apple and current iPhone behemoth Apple are radically different negotiating partners).