I can't say I'm surprised - I'm pretty sure quite a few places did the same with Amy Winehouse's albums. They are suddenly very much in demand, and the price increases to reflect that.

It's more surprising that they have apologized for it, and I hope they'll refund people that they charged the higher price.

www.memoriaconsultancy.com

sony=phoney=pony.
That's it, I'm not going to buy any more floppy drives, ever, that'll teach 'em

What do you expect from an industry that's being stolen from? Desperate times call for desperate measures.

I don't get why they're apologising for standard industry behaviour. Sure it's slimy, but it's the business they're in.

I'm totally amazed that they reversed the price hikes.

No suprises here.

Sony statement " We are real sorry that we got caught".

Does anyone believe this was an accident and that they didn't intend to profit from her death the way all greedy entrepreneurs do in this country? After the nine eleven people sold twin towers memorabilia without conscience to anyone they could at ridiculous rates without ever mentioning the fact that they were acting like ghouls and opportunistically taking advantage of a grief stricken and morbidly curious society. Every artist who dies has their work become more expensive because you can no longer get their creations so when they die it becomes a limited edition. The music business is not any different. The ungraceful thing that seems to insulting the public's collective intelligence is for them to act like they didn't mean to make a huge profit from her death.
The insult is for them to say, "We didn't mean to!"
To which we should all reply with a resounding, "Really, when did you stop wanting to profiteer from someone else's work?"
Her fans deserve credit for having more brains than that.

apple/itunes: you are pathetic.

The work of most artists becomes more expensive after their death and the record company, in the words of the late great Frank Zappa, are only in it for the money! No great surprise really.

They should donate those "mistakes" to Music Cares or some kind of charity that helps musicians and artists with drug and alcohol problems.

Right and I accidentally went to sleep last night.

Like gasoline prices going up in anticipation of demand. Doesn't cost any more to produce or distribute, so what the hell? Gouge, baby, gouge! It's the Free Market! Viva Romney!

Corporate hotshots are no different than politicians... creeping over the line of acceptable behaviour for gain, and "apologizing" after the fact ONLY if they get caught... usually blaming someone else for the transgression.
One major difference, though... for the time being, anyway... corporate executives aren't able to write laws for the populace to obey, and for themselves to be immune from. The symbionic relationship this creates is rather heart-warming, isn't it?

"Mistakenly"?
Shameless - and not at all unexpected