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Gateway to Ship PCs with Pre-Installed DRM Music Files
Captain Chad writes "News.com has an article about Gateway's decision to bundle Pressplay's music service with its PCs. Of interest is the fact that 2000 popular songs will come pre-installed, helping reduce download time for those of us with modems." I wonder how much Pressplay is paying for this privilege. All sorts of interesting legal wrinkles here: you're buying a computer which contains data that you cannot legally access.
Gateway spins Pressplay service on PCs
By Reuters
December 5, 2002, 10:11 PM PT
Computer maker Gateway on Friday announced a deal with online music provider Pressplay to load its PCs with 2,000 songs from music stars such as Eminem, Bruce Springsteen, the Dixie Chicks and Frank Sinatra.
The deal with Pressplay, a joint venture between Vivendi Universal and Sony, capped a turbulent week for Gateway, which saw its stock fall 17 percent Thursday after the troubled PC maker warned that fourth-quarter revenue might not measure up to expectations.
The news came after three consecutive quarters of losses at the Poway, Calif.-based computer maker, which has suffered from weak demand and stiff competition from rivals such as Dell Computer.
Under the Pressplay deal, Gateway consumers can access the Pressplay service and features in several ways, including a 90-day free subscription to the service that contains 2,000 songs preloaded and available for streaming and downloading.
By loading it on a computer, consumers, especially those using dial-up connections, will save weeks of downloading time, said Michael Bebel, chief executive officer of Pressplay.
Other Pressplay plan options will also be available, some to be sold separately in hard-drive packages.
Gateway signed another deal with Pressplay rival Listen.com's Rhapsody a few weeks ago, marking the first distribution pact between a computer maker and one of a current crop of subscription services, trying to lure customers away from unauthorized song-swap services that have emerged in the wake of now-idled Napster.
Under that deal, buyers of Gateway desktop PCs will get a coupon for one free month of Rhapsody and a demonstration of the service on the PCs.
"The Pressplay deal is significantly different because we're pioneering a way to deliver digital music on the hard drive," said Brad Shaw, a senior vice president for Gateway.
Shaw said the deal would have no impact on the company's fourth-quarter forecast announced earlier this week.
After the free trials, consumers can get the Pressplay service, which provides more than 200,000 songs and additional features, with pricing options starting from $9.95 a month.
"We're now making it possible for people without a broadband Internet connection to get in on the fun of digital music by delivering it to them in a whole new way," said Ted Waitt, Gateway chairman and chief executive in a statement, adding those with broadband will enjoy it even more.
Gateway earlier this year sparked the ire of the music industry by running TV ads that showed Waitt and a cow--the company's mascot--singing along to a homemade CD, directing viewers to a Web site that encouraged them to "protect their digital music rights."
The ad was construed by the recording industry as an invitation to music fans to join in the fight against Hollywood as technology and media companies locked horns over digital copies of entertainment.
Entertainment companies, burned by piracy and file-sharing services like Napster, have been seeking more control over digital copies of movies, music and TV shows, while tech companies are putting out even more products that encourage customers to "rip" and "burn" entertainment software.
Gateway executives this week said they have always supported legal copying.
Waitt said the Pressplay deal was a great example of the technology and recording industries working together to drive innovation and serve demand for legitimate digital music.
Gateway plans to promote with television, Web, catalog and e-mail marketing.
The poster says that the computer contains data which you cannot legally access. I would actually interpret that you can access it, you just cannot legally try to go around the protection mechanism that pressplay has put on it.
I am quite sure that there will, eventually be a very easy workaround for this. Don't companies realize that no matter what they do, somebody will crack it?
I wonder if and when music will actually get to this point where everyone buys music online? Personally I like to own the CD to have the original CD art...
So long as I can still delete the damn things.
Since they gave you the content, when you break the DRM for the purpose of listening to it, you're not breaking it for the purpose of copying it (necessarily). They gave you the copy on purpose...so it'd seem that tools designed to give you access to content that was given to you by the copyright owners might not be covered by the same DMCA.
" including a 90-day free subscription to the service that contains 2,000 songs preloaded and available for streaming and downloading."
editor should have read the article.
also, my cable box comes with the ability to recieve all of the channels too, whats the legal implication there?
my car comes with the ability to do 150mph, but the chips lets me go to 120... whats the legal wrinkle there?
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
"After the free trials, consumers can get the Pressplay service, which provides more than 200,000 songs and additional features, with pricing options starting from $9.95 a month. "
So basically, it's a big ad? Nothing new here.. And we all know that the files will be cracked extremely quickly (of course, some geek will have to fess up and admit to buying one of these!). No matter, they'll all be songs I wouldn't want anyway - the "pop"ular stuff that the radio plays day in and day out, no doubt.
In general, it's a good idea, but if you think about it: 5 megs on average per file (guess) x 2000 = 10,000 megs... That's a LOT of wasted space for something you're not supposed to be using until you pay for! So, yeah, I'm paying extra to waste space. Nice.
....As if the free AOL icons on the screen weren't enough... now is the paperclip going to pop up and say "You haven't been force fed pop music lately. Would you like me to play something by Brittney Spears?"
Music = marketing and product all in one. The more you listen to music the more you either like it or hate it. If you like it you'll buy more, if you hate it you'll suffer through it or turn it off.
Now the music companies are going to put their marketing materials (free?? music) on the computers to further entrench themselves.
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
"Entertainment companies, burned by piracy and file-sharing services like Napster, have been seeking more control over digital copies of movies, music and TV shows, while tech companies are putting out even more products that encourage customers to "rip" and "burn" entertainment software."
On the one hand, we got tech companies saying burn your music. Enjoy it, play it, sleep with it, whatever. On the other hand, we got the RIAA saying: HEY! Wait! You can't do that. You need to pay me for that.
In the middle is the customer going you know what? Screw you both. Make music. If I like it, I'll buy it. (--In most cases) Hey, PC makers, you make pcs. Don't worry about what I do with it, it ain't your concern.
Sent from your iPad.
then you get 2000 songs with your gateway. Lets see ... average 15 songs a cd .... 2000 / 15 = 133 ... times $17.00 for the average CD ... $2267.00 free !!! ... and it's not your fault you did BUY the computer and that just came with your computer. Same thing goes for when you buy a box from an auction, to find it's full of gold, to the victor go the spoils.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
I just bought this damn computer and I have no more disk space!! Oh yeah, i have 2000 songs on here that I can't listen to...
you're buying a computer which contains data that you cannot legally access
So ? If I recall correctly, mainframes in the old days used to ship with HARDWARE that you couldn't access legally. The machine came preshipped with X amount of RAM, which was enabled by simply flipping a switch after you payed for it. Noone ever complained, even though RAM prices those days were somewhere in the region of what we pay now for an average house.
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
I liked Gateway until they ditched AMD. Now with DRM included they should replace the Cow with Milquetoast as a logo.
Help fight continental drift.
No, not necessarily. You would have to comply with the full terms of the license agreement, whatever they may be. For example, the agreement may require you to remove the files after xx days or after x uses or pay a additonal fees. I believe the article mentions a 90-day trial to access the 2,000 songs.
Gateway computer, preloaded with songs: $999
Connection to the Internet: $19.95/mo.
Knowing it's only going to take a couple minutes to crack 20,000 songs wide open: Priceless
slashdot!=valid HTML
So what? My computer already has tons of data I can't access without illegally reverse-engineering files. My server at work is chock full of e-mail that I can't access without (probably) violating my cow orkers' rights. One might argue that the layout of my CPU is data stored inside my computer, but I sure can't have access to that.
License more than 200 songs from mainstream and niche artists, encode them to 160Kbps MP3s, and bundle them on new i-Systems.
No DRM. No free trial. Just free music.
Mix. Burn. Repeat.
2000 "popular" DRMed songs you can listen to for 90 days, or about 300 encompassing all genres of music that you can listen to forever? Hmm.
I would have to venture that the idea here is to get new computer buyers (who we can therefore assume do not have an encompasing understanding of DRM, the legalities of file-sharing, etc...) latched into this turn-key system. I'm sure that whatever tool they're using to front-end this initiative has DRM dripping off the edges and will allow you to rip your own music to their proprietary (read:can't take it no-where else and don't even think about trying to share it P2P) format and get the user's locked in. Someone has taken a hint from M$ and is looking to get the 'Embrace and Extend' initiative rolling in the music world.
Now you may call me cynical, but I highly doubt that this tool will play nicely with standard P2P tools. Would you put it past someone like PressPlay to have any mp3's touched by the system either re-encoded in a DRM-friendly format with minimal warning to the user (click here to import all you files into the PressPlay AudioVault of Doom...)
or some obnoxious and legaly-questionable click-wrap aggreement that consists of 15 pages of legal bum-fodder that allows them to show up at your house in the middle of the night, rape your dog, kick your grandmother down the stairs and flag all the audio files on your machine with a unique fingerprint that gets matched with your machine ID and therefore your RW identity... hmm, Little Timmy has been uploading his Smurfs Christmas Album to Sweet Suzie. RIAA, sic'em!)
{/sarcasm}
Anyhow, I cannot fault Gateway for trying to provide their customers a value-added item like this (like smallpox to the Native-Americans...) I see this as becoming a troubling trend as more companies with DRM products start co-branding with big names in the PC field and set this plague loose on the face of the planet.
In the meantime, I'll stick with my ogg-vorbis/mp3 server running linux.
"If I wanted your input on my pet project, I'd stick my hand up your ass and use you like a sock-puppet." - Muse
You caputer the digital out of your sound card
Make that "analog out". Windows ME and Windows XP operating systems have a Secure Audio Path that disables digital outputs and unsigned drivers when playing restrictions-managed audio files.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Personally, I don't like alot of the mainstream music that is out today. So if I buy a *cough* gateway *cough* why would I want these music files? The top 2000 hits....Ummmmm I would rather not have that on my computer.
Can I rather have the top 2000 punches?
Is there a list of the songs that come with it? Is it grouped by genre? There's alot of different tastes out there and I can easily see several people buying this FOR the music (non-tech ppl of course), just to find out that it doesn't have single song they like. 2,000 songs @ ~4 megs a piece = 8,000MB, or 8Gigs sacraficed to an unusuable data format. 8gigs over a modem certianly isn't a laughable amount over a short time span, but how many 56K 80+GB warez sites have you seen? I can't justify the loss of space/Saved bandwidth ratio especially when I won't want most of the music...
I think it would have been a better decision to slap 8Gigs of DRM'd Porn on the drive..
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. It's just that yours is stupid.
It comes preloaded with the Eminem and Dixie Chicks?
c:\
c:\deltree \mypreloadedmusic-DRM
Are you sure you want to delete the directory \mypreloadedmusic-DRM and all subdirectories? [Y/N]
Youbetcherass
172 File(s) deleted.
c:\
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
I believe it is you who are mistaken about a great many things. DRM means that you have to comply with whatever terms the copyright owner wants to put on you in order to access the material. Simply buying the computer may not be the only term, and it most likely will mean that you can only access the material a certain number of times, or for a certain period of time without coughing up more cash.
my cable box comes with the ability to recieve all of the channels too, whats the legal implication there?
Its illegal to decrypt them without permission. Doesn't mean that the law is right. I personally agree that the law makes sense, but people are free to disagree with me and try to convinve their elected representatives to change this law.
But this is just because of percieved cost to them. It costs them money to send me signals. In the case of data that's already on my hard disk, it doesn't cost any more to supply decrypted data than it does to supply encrypted data, yet they want to charge me the full cost of the media just to decrypt it for me.
... to the Microsoft Tax when we buy a machine loaded with cruft we have no intention of using?
Trouble making decisions? Just flip for it.
Thank god I'm a vegetarian then! :)
A slip of the foot you may soon recover, but a slip of the tongue you may never get over. -Benjamin Franklin
I would hook the boot HD up to a different computer, extract all the songs onto it and format the drive on the gateway afterwords. Never once did you boot thier install of the OS that has the license agreement. And since they "gave" you the songs on your computer you're free to do what you want with them. I.E. remove DRM and enjoy in OGG format.
Is there an option available to pre-load my machine with porn instead?
--It's Pimptastic!--
"All sorts of interesting legal wrinkles here: you're buying a computer which contains data that you cannot legally access. "
So what? I bought a name brand PC a few weeks ago that came with Quicken Deluxe on it, to be used only if I have bought the reg key.
The real issue here is that this won't work: within two weeks of these bad boys hitting the street, there will be dozens of postings on how to circumvent Pressplay's reg/purchase code strategy and gain access to all of the music, just as I can go to any one of dozens of sites for hacks into getting my unregistered copy of Quicken to work. I wouldn't do this, of course: no no, not me....
There's a metaphor here from Apocalypse Now: the Bridge at Do Long. Every day the Americans would rebuild the bridge, and every night the Vietnamese would blow it up. Each new tack by the RIAA and its DMCA cronies to secure rights in this fashion will be defeated, sometimes within minutes of hitting the street.
This points to the need for them to dynamite their business model and think up something new: how many people actually pay for content? (And porn doesn't count. Besides, porn is largely stolen anyway!) The answer is none, zero, nada. AOL-TimeWarner's about to find this out the hard way. Gateway and Pressplay are making it easier than some to circumvent by the fact that the files are on your machine, and you can ostensibly do what you want to with them without them knowing. But even if you had to download them, you'll still be able to hack them.
"Don't matter how New Age you get, old age is gonna kick your ass." - Utah Phillips
Remember how Gateway ran that commercial that "respected your rights to download music" (or somesuch). I took that commercial to be a slap to the face of the RIAA - now they're the RIAA's lapdog? Or have I completely misread this?
Schnapple
With my new dual USB iBook, on the default install, there's something like 600 megs of MP3's by various big name artists (can't remember them all, since I reloaded with my new 10.2 cd I forgot to back them up), spoken word stuff from Henry Rollins I remember, perhaps someone else can fill /. in on what's all on there. Pretty neat I think.
Yep, they're 100% unencrypted, copy them anywhere MP3 files. They're installed when you do a full system restore. No DRM here. Not needed or wanted.
Gateway's insight is this: "Hard disks are getting big, and we are shipping computers with a bunch of unused disk space. Why not fill that space with advertisements (or anything else that a third party will pay us to put there)?"
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
In my first 4 years of buying CDs I accumulated about 500 total. In the last 4 years I have bought maybe 5 total, as gifts for others. So considering that 500 CDs @ $18.00 each = $9000.00. If there are more like me, I would say we are definitely not adding to the bottom line of the record industry.
Now, as for DVDs, I know the MPAA is evil... but I feel like there is $8.99 - $17.99+taxes worth of entertainment on a DVD. I look at a DVD and see the 2 hour product of at least 100 actors and production crew, whereas for about the same price I *might* get an hour of product from really 4-10 people, tops, on a CD.
Plus all new music is crap, anyways. Everyone should have taken a long break after Social Distortion's "Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell".
(only half-joking)
Gateway computers come with a recovery CD, don't they? (at least my friend's did). So what happens if something goes wrong and you lose your hard drive - since you paid to listen to those songs (through advertising, upped computer price, or through the 'free' trial), do you get them back? Do you have to redownload the 2000 songs you have 90 days free access to? I doubt they have a couple of DVDs of music in the box, ready to be reinstalled for you...
I can see some poor suck^M^M^M^Muser calling the tech support people crying for her Britney! *ack, the horror*
The end of DRM will the following: Microsoft, working in concert with the Big 5 record labels, will begin to deliver content in the form of stainless steel balls. Sort of like BBs, but bigger. They will insist that these steel balls are, in fact, music. "Believe us," they'll say, "we thought long and hard about this one." The steel balls will, however, confuse consumers. "I don't know," they'll say, "I can't hear anything." But the labels will insist that the steel balls work fine. "They're music," Hilary Rosen will say, "but they're copy protected." "It's foolproof," Jack Valenti will say, and then -- a few months later -- introduce his own version of the steel music balls: plastic video pyramids. Each pyramid will be about three inches high, black plastic, and weigh about three ounces. "Microsoft helped us with the protection algorithm," he'll announce. "In fact, they're so secure not even Microsoft's new operating system can play the video. But trust us, these videos look great." Confused consumers will be seen walking around with steel balls and plastic pyramids. "I don't know," they'll say, "I haven't seen anything yet, but I look forward to it." Another music lover will admit to liking the way the steel balls feel. "They're so smooth and lovely. Perfect." "The Register" will point out that the balls are not, in fact, perfectly spherical. "There are tiny, minute imprecise abrasions. But to the naked eye they'll look pretty nice." Posters on Slashdot.com will claim that they've not yet cracked their steel balls and enabled the music. "It's in there," a Slashdot poster named Borg2Soon will say, "I've set up a Linux box to play the steel balls." The plastic pyramids are a bit more diffucult since they take up more space and aren't as portable as the steel balls. "You can't carry as many pyramids around at one time," John C. Dvorak will say. The Screensavers Patrick Norton will be dubious. "Well, I'm not sure why they made the music into steel balls. I liked the normal files." The screensavers Yoshi will design a case-mod in which users can place up to one thousand balls and fifteen pyramids. "It's a wicked mod," Yoshi will say. Thousands will build the mod. Millions will praise the balls. "But not the pyramids. I don't like the pyramids." John C. Dvorak will wonder why they just couldn't have made the pyramids plastic balls instead of plastic pyramids. "Come on, Microsoft," Dvorak will chide, "not everyone has room for all these pyramids." Microsoft's stock will skyrocket. Amazon will merge with Starbucks. They'll rename the new store 'Pequod.' The White Whale will be spotted. "Balls!" Ahab will shout.
All sorts of interesting legal wrinkles here: you're buying a computer which contains data that you cannot legally access.
I don't see much of a difference between this and software demos that are made up of the full version and only need a registration key to be unlocked.
Disney Interactive about 4-7 years ago used to include entire programs with its computers but would disable them until you paid an online payment to them.
This is way back though. I just remember trying to figure out how to get through the disabling so I could play... Never figured it out. (I was really young then.) All I knew is that if you signed up with them (it would dial a long distance number and give your info to them), the programs would become active.
Perhaps now with the internet, more people will go out of their way to break the DRM, but I am willing to say most will either pay to listen to them, or just continue downloading like they always have using morpheus or something similar.
~ kjrose
Did YOU read the article?
Under the Pressplay deal, Gateway consumers can access the Pressplay service and features in several ways, including a 90-day free subscription to the service that contains 2,000 songs preloaded and available for streaming and downloading.
and
After the free trials, consumers can get the Pressplay service, which provides more than 200,000 songs and additional features, with pricing options starting from $9.95 a month.
So basically, Gateway is allowing Vivendi to put music on the drives, and Vivendi allows users to play it for 90 days. After that time, I'm sure the assumption is that some of the users will like this way of downloading music (knowing that it's correct, that it's virus free, and that somehow the artists are probably benefiting from it) and will continue to use the service.
Yes, the users can access the data. No, they don't have to pay for the first three months.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
I'd love to see the first lawsuit after these watermarked mp3s get cracked and make it onto a p2p network.
"Dude, you're going to Jail!"
*ducks*
Money I owe, money-iy-ay
I didn't quite grasp it in the article, but I would assume that this data is somehow encoded/protected so that it is only accessible with the key or subscription (post-trial)?
I remember when ID software shipped extra games on their Quake, etc CD's. You could call in and get a decoding key to install the games.
After a while, somebody cracked the CD and you could get the games with a keygen... somehow I think encoding data on a machine is just asking for trouble.
Your interpretation is wrong.
.
Under the Pressplay deal, Gateway consumers can access the Pressplay service and features in several ways, including a 90-day free subscription to the service that contains 2,000 songs preloaded and available for streaming and downloading.
You get 90 days free when you purchase the system, and in those 90 days you'll be able to access any song PressPlay offers (access = listen to, not burn). The 2,000 on the drive are there to save you time.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
Pressplay sells two plans:
$9.95 / month for unlimited streaming + downloading into press play format
$17.95 / month for unlimited streaming + 10 conversions to portable formats
they also offer the $17.95 / month plan as $14.95 / month if you pay for the entire year in advance.
The non portable format is tranferable to one other system. Further tracks can be organized in play lists and sets....
My guess is that they are trying to sell people on the $9.95 / month to have a large music library on their computer. I'd further guess that pressplay also is coming out with some sort of portable player for their format.
So a gateway customer paying $9.95 / month has:
1) a very large music library on their system
2) The ability to add to it freely as new music comes out
3) The ability to take this music and move it to their portable player
I can see this doing quite well. 200k songs ~ 18k albums ~ 500 shelves ~ 100 sq foot CD collection ~ 1/2 a small record store excluding duplicates ~ a small record store including duplicates.
That's a lot of music for a home user at a price which is not unreasonable. I can see music fans which aren't that computer savvy going for this. The main thing that needs to happen is for gateway/pressplay to offer a way to get the music into a car for people not to realize this is not as good a deal as it looks like.
...where id software decided to package all of their old games encrypted on the CD with the ability to 'unlock' them with a credit card.
Then some unscrupulous scoundrels broke the encryption, and turned a $9 game preview into Best of ID Software Platinum "Game of the Year" Edition.
blah blah client side security blah blah tooth fairy...
Also, i wonder if, when they tell you the size of the HD, do they chop off the space they've filled up with 2000 unwanted songs? Do they make it obvious that you could save a few gigs by deleting them? Probably not.
vk.
I cannot fault Gateway for trying to provide their customers a value-added item like this (like smallpox to the Native-Americans...)
At least the Natives got blankets out of the deal.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
Gateway says here:
.mp3's. We don't feel that you have any rights for files whose names end in any other set of three letters."
"As a leading proponent of inexpensive and easy-to-use downloadable music, Gateway believes consumers should have lawful rights to encode, copy, collect, purchase and listen to their personal music collections in the MP3 format. We fully support an MP3 user's right to:
'Rip' and encode their own CD music collections into digital music files for their own personal use and enjoyment.
Make as many copies of their digital music files as they would like for their own personal use. This freely allows consumers to copy their MP3s on any number of their own computers in various locations, as well as on to their portable MP3 hardware players.
'Burn' their music files onto compact discs for their own personal use."
Yeah yeah yeah, now that I see Gateway's ACTIONS I can go back and re-read those words with the right slant. "Of course, we never expected you to think that the files you purchased as part of your Gateway Computer are YOUR files." Or perhaps, "Well, we only meant that for
My mother taught me that the essence of a lie was not whether or not the statement was technically true, but whether the speaker intended for the listener to misunderstand them. I'm afraid Gateway's fine talk about consumers' rights is just such a statement.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Glaxo, Inc, announced today it will soon begin shipping sealed bags of M&Ms with its blood sugar testing kits...
This is my post. There are many others like it. If you don't like what you read here, go try one of the others.
Ah, right you are. Anyway, $800 is still hundreds of dollars more than an equivalent PC (after all, the CRT iMac's hardware is getting pretty vintage).
My mistake, but my point still remains. The music isn't free -- you *do* pay for it.