I’ve said for a long time that it doesn’t seem that music industry executives actually listen to music and that they want to charge consumers for every device that they use to listen to their music. Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr. is now saying that music should cost different prices depending on what is being used to play the music.

Mr. Bronfman said the music industry should not have to use its content to promote the sale of digital music devices for Apple or anyone else, and not truly share in the profits.

“We are selling our songs through iPod, but we don’t have a share of iPod’s revenue,” he said. “We want to share in those revenue streams. We have to get out of the mindset that our content has promotional value only.”

So, for “the music industry”, music is merely a promotional item that sells cassette players, CD players, iPods, and other music devices. And so they want to “share in the profits” generated by those devices. Imagine:

“We are selling our songs through Pioneer CD Players, but we don’t have a share of Pioneer’s revenue. We want to share in those revenue streams. We have to get out of the mindset that our content has promotional value only.”

They have no idea that people who actually listen to music buy more music when it is easy for them to listen to it. That’s the whole secret to the success of the iTunes Music Store, in which the music industry does share profits. Music isn’t merely a promotional item for selling an iPod; an iPod--or any other music device--is a way of listening to enjoyable music. But someone who doesn’t listen to music wouldn’t understand that.