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Wal-Mart Music Download Service Launches
nns6561 writes "Wal-Mart launched their music download service today. They are providing wma files for 88 cents. I was able to download and play the test file with MPlayer and Linux. Finally, a music service for us geeks." While it may be only another online music seller, I'd hazard a guess that Wal-Mart has the name recognition to be the most prevalent music download service, especially among the tech-unsavvy.
They seem to be a bit less restrictive than Napster2.
From their usage agreement:
You may download music to a single computer. You may then transfer music files and backup license files to up to two (2) additional personal computers. You may play music an unlimited number of times on up to three (3) personal computers. You shall be entitled to 1) burn Products solely for personal, non-commercial use up to ten (10) times and 2) export Products solely to a portable device capable of playing Windows Media (TM) Audio ("WMA") files such as a WMA-compliant MP3 player an unlimited number of times. WALMART.COM is a reseller to you and does not accept orders from music dealers, exporters, wholesalers, any businesses of any kind or other customers who intend to resell.
Emphasis mine.Still, I won't pay for any music until I can burn it to CD in MP3 or Ogg format. My car has an MP3 player and changing CDs every hour or so has become as objectionable to me as following the speed limit.
As for the submitter's claim that wal-mart might be able to make this the "most prevalent online music service," whatever happened to the ISP that wal-mart tried to float? I rest my case.
How many roads must a man walk down? 42.
I question the validity of this. I am not familiar with WalMart.com's sales but I bet they are dwarfed by Amazon's sales. (WalMart, in general, however I am sure dwarfs that.)
While cheap, it will take more than a few cents savings to convince people to use Walmart's service as opposed to using itunes. Hey, better yet, why not download for free? Seriously though, unlike their globally dominating bricks and mortar brand, I don't see this taking off as well. But maybe I'm wrong; perhaps WalMart's music service will take off. Hey while we are at it, maybe while people are at the site they will buy a bunch of Lindows PCs too. :)
Plus with the selection available at WalMart (or lack therof) I hazard a guess that WalMart will not be the most prevelant music download service...
*
troll blacklist. Please mo
The test file said "Thanks for shopping at Wal-mart!
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
Here's what you need to play a song: A Windows PC. See all system requirements. Windows Media Player 9. Get it now for free. Approximately 10 MB of disk space on your PC. A connection to the Internet the first time you play a song. If you currently have a Windows Media Player installed on your computer, you may be prompted to update certain components of the player before you can play the song. Click here for information about installing, configuring, and troubleshooting your Windows Media Player.
Who do they think we are? This is /. by God. We shall never be held by the "requirements" of simpletons!
Game Overdrive - Gaming News
I will gladly save 11 cents to switch!
Or not..
Napster is fulfilling my dreams of musical intimacy. I don't care for DRM, but that is a reality that shall be eternally attached to digital music sales.
Clif
clifgriffin > blog
With Wal Mart entering the fray with music downloading, pretty soon we will have mp3 networks pumping our inboxes with free music if we sign up for these really good offers. It's official. Our economy has now vaporized into the electronic economy; expect a downturn on physical object sales and an upturn on non-tangible sales. Services will replace ownership and the middle class will vanish, and the poor will not own anything while the rich will own everything. All because Wal Mart decided to compete in online mp3 sales. It's the beginning of a standardized, McDonald's style cookie-cutter industry in an intangible form. Without the costs associated with shipping and manufacture, industry can charge more and reap more profit. Soon we will be required to do much more intangible stuff than we do, and there will be industry waiting to take our money to help us (give them money for no reason other than to give them money).
This is nothing new really, and as Marshal Berman said, All that is Solid, Melts into Air. ( BooK: Amazon )
I'd never buy anything from wal-mart just because they have been a major promoter of censorship in music (and films). I suspect their online music store is the same.
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Somehow I doubt Wal-Mart has "geeks" in mind as the target audience. It does not help the geek community to patronize an online music store that provides WMA files. When those WMA's start including Palladium-enriched goodness, you won't be able to play them on Linux anymore. And maybe by then, Wal-Mart and Microsoft will have put iTunes and the more legit shops out of business.
Think about the big picture. Demand MP3 and OGG files. This cannot be understated.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
88 cents every son every day! you have to pay 88 cents a day?
wma files for 88 cents. I was able to download and play the test file with MPlayer and Linux. Finally, a music service for us geeks.
.vma files to /dev/audio and decoding the audio by ear. I mean, how geekier can you get?
Yes, huzzah and hurrah with highly polished brass knobs on. Everybody knows the vma format is the sound format of choice for true geeks. Geeks even make a point of cat-ing their
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I actually think I like the website driven manner which they have set up things.
It doesn't feel like I'm making a commitment, it is simply a place where I can buy digital music...like Amazon.
I will add it to the list of places I search when I'm in need of a song. 88 cents doesn't really catch my eye. I'm curious to how they can survive at so low of rate, unless they cut a better deal with the recording industry (which is possible given all the freaking CDs they sell nationwide, everyday). Does make one wonder...if Apple is barely paying the bills at 99 cents, how can Walmart do better at 11 cents less?
I await financial reports and news. They are getting in late, but...hey...it isn't like Walmart doesn't own us.
Clif
clifgriffin > blog
I always wondered what WMA stood for.
they analyze their first day traffic and see Slashdot as their number one referrer, Linux i386/i686 as their number one OS, and Mozilla/Gecko as the number one browser.
So, does this mean that their music folders are going to be a complete mess like the aisles I wander down in Wal-Mart when I visit?
Will I have barefoot pregnant mothers with no front teeth jostling me so they can download "Shania Twain's Greatest Hits" first in the queue, before me?
Will my internet connection be trampled over, causing me to pass out, as a mob of people try to download the new cut price 77c song?
Boy oh boy, I can hardly wait!
It'll be about the only thing for sale at Walmart with a price that doesn't end with .99.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Well, it passed my test: I tried U2 (a must for any online service that I use :) ) and every major studio track appeared. What I cannot figure out, though, is how WalMart can turn a profit while Apple cannot. Is it volume? Do they have an even more special deal??
1) Apple doesn't kow tow to M$ by using wma. They use their own format, with decent DRM policies. That's more than enough for me to keep using them.
2) They bundle their store with free burning/ripping/playlist software and seamlessly integrate it. The only thing Wal*Mart is good at integrating is their supply chain.
3) Apple is a company that gives me a warm fuzzy feeling when I buy their products. Did Wal*Mart create the first music store? No. Did Napster develop a really great MP3 player? No. Apple innovates, and that's why I like them.
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
So in the interests of full disclosure the price should really be marked as "88 cents...AND YOUR IMMORTAL SOUL!"
I bet that would've messed up the formatting on their website or something though. Oh well.
They are screwing all the grocery store businesses in the southwest by forcing their competitors to stop paying their workers health insurance just to say competitive. They are the cheapest because they buy alot of customers fire all of them and ship the labor oversea;s. The made in the USA banner in all their stores are such crap!
They have the GDP of most countries and according to Business week magazine is projected to be the seller of 50% of all household goods by 2008!
Walmart also forces vendors to outsource labor to 3rd world countries because they only stock products that are the cheapest. If not then you go out of business since Walmart will own 50% of all your customers by 2008!
All the products are cheap crap over there and the walmart down the street from where I live recently, because they put in camera's in the breakrooms, bathrooms, and hired a gumshoe to determine if the employees were forming a union. Only a few were but they fired all 120 workers in the store just to be safe and replaced them will mexicans willing to work for minimum wage.
The controversy is endless and this corporation makes Microsoft and the RIAA look friendly.
Just a little warning and you all may want to do some research before buying any laptop or music service from them.
http://saveie6.com/
128 bit encrypted WMA which they claim is "CD Quality." You can't send them as gifts (which sounds like a cool idea now that they mention it). The says
All rights in the Products are owned by WALMART.COM or its licensors and you have only a limited, nontransferable, nonexclusive, revocable, nonsublicensable right to use the Products for personal use in accordance with the terms of this Agreement.
According to this:s ervlet/ TourServlet?pageIndex=1
e rvlet/ TourServlet?pageIndex=0
http://musicdownloads.walmart.com/catalog/
Macs are out!
Yet this page has a screenshot from a mac!
http://musicdownloads.walmart.com/catalog/s
You do not need to burn to CD and rerecord to remove copyprotection, just open the file up in a sound editor and save as whatever you like.
Their FAQ says:
That would seem to imply that your tunes are limited to one PC only - unless they're referring to casual sharing.I wonder how much attention they're paying to what they are throwing online. Here's a sound effects CD for 88 cents per effect. Bizarre.
No, it is a mac. MacOS 9.
Despite the poster's enthusiasm, it is worth noting that the test file is NOT DRM-wrapped (encrypted), which is why it works on mplayer / Linux. The downloaded songs surely would require licensing.
(Score:-1, Wrong)
According to their license and usage, one can download the music to 1 computer and back up music to up to two additional computers, make 10 burns to a CD and make unlimited transfers to a portable device. That's if you use WMP 9 on a PC. I was able to download the sample song, play it *and* transcode to mp3 with VLC (too lazy to cmd-line it with other tools) on OS X with no troubles. I tried the same with a song I paid for and got nothing. VLC choked on it, MPlayer gave me no sound and WMP for OS X tried to send Safari to a web site (no doubt for the DRM part).
/. effect (it was alot faster earlier today).
I'm looking forward to seeing a thorough comparison of the quality of Wal-Mart's encoded WMA (I couldn't readily find the encoding details) and Apple's iTunes AAC. I doubt that Wal-Mart is the store of choice for audiophiles, so I'm suspecting Apple's downloads are of better quality.
iTunes wins hands down on interface, usability and reliability. I can't see Wal-Mart's web-only interface winning them any converts. And, as I was checking back just a couple seconds ago, it appeared to be just starting to feel some pain from the
The potential "problem" is price. 88 cents is hard to beat, especially when folks are downloading Britney Spears latest pop hits (again, not the audiophile audience). I suspect Wal-Mart *is* making money, if only because they are leveraging their position as the number one retailer. "Want us to carry alot of copies your new album in our store? Then, you'll let us put your song on our online service and let us make money there too!"
Right now, as a Mac user, I just blew 88 cents on a song I'll never be able to hear. They lost a *potential* customer by locking my platform out. That may be their biggest downfall.
Mind the gap...
Did you actually try that, Captain?
If you had, you'd have noticed that it cannot be done. Sound Forge, Goldwave, Super Cyber Sound Editor for Soccer Moms With 2.4 Kids all can't. They can't unencrypt it or use your license.
Clif
clifgriffin > blog
Wal-mart: We plan on selling music online, we plan on giving you 40c per download
Record label: NO! We want 75c per song
Wal-mart: fine we will stop selling your music in our stores
record label: err.. damn.. fine 40c it is then
thats how wal-mart works
I downloaded the test file, fired up MPlayer OSX, and the song played just fine.
Not that I'd be buying my music from WalMart, of course. I do have standards.
Off topic, but I couldn't resist. Wal-Mart is soon to enter the retail wine (fermented grapes) business, according to a press release some months ago, and have actually contacted a number of the major players in California bulk wine to brand their own name. At our wine shop, we received an email from another shop suggesting the Top 12 possible names: ...
12. Chateau Traileur Parc
11. White Trashfindel
10. Big Red Gulp
9. Grape Expectations
8. Domaine Walmart "Merde du Pays"
7. NASCARbernet
6. Chef Boyardeaux
5. Peanut Noir
4. Chateau des Moines
3. I Can't Believe It's Not Vinegar!
2. World Championship Riesling
And the number 1 name for Walmart Wine
1. Nasti Spumante
Note however that the importing process takes significantly longer than usual, I don't know if this is due to the AAC format or the protection. And my only experience working with the files is on the mac, perhaps it's different in windows.
To the extent that you can really prove anything, the proof is there that the image is that of a Macintosh computer running MAc OS 8 or 9, surfing the WalMat on-line music store (menu shadowing, color scheme, font, cursor shape, browser form button style,menu location, etc) . The other option is that someone is running a GNOME or KDE theme that accurately emulates even the tinyest detail of the Mac interface.
It's quite likely that the marketing department uses Macs and hasn't upgraded to OS X (probably because they are waiting for a particular app to be updated, or WalMart's IT budget is too thin. Since you CAN successfully surf/browse the site with a Mac, there's every possibility that the screen shots are from a Mac and that due to the all to common "marketing doesn't talk to operations" issue, marketing used the systems they had at hand instead of ones that are actually compatible with the service.
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
Nothing at all. However, note that WMA -> CD -> Ogg/MP3/etc. will result in a much more lossy file that will sound worse due to the different codecs cutting out different parts of the sound. In fact, even WMA -> CD -> WMA would sound worse.
Want Slashdot headlines on your site? Try SlashHead
I researched this Spring '03, so all facts are current as of Fall '02 - Spring '03:
Top 5 Reasons Not To Shop At Wal-Mart
1. American Wal-Mart Employees Are Exploited.
2. Wal-Mart's Low Prices Are The Result Of Human Misery.
3. Wal-Mart Forces Its Unethical Practices On Its 65,000 Suppliers.
4. Wal-Mart Destroys Local Communities.
5. Wal-Mart Is Not Accountable.
1. AMERICAN WAL-MART EMPLOYEES ARE EXPLOITED:
* "Full-Time" (actually 28 hours/week) employees only gross $11,000 a year,
on average.
* Health benefits are available only after two years, but premiums are so
high only 38% of employees can afford it.
* Even discussing working conditions or unionization will result in
retaliation and firing.
* There is "a harsh, anti-woman culture in which complaints go unanswered
and the women who make them are targeted for retaliation." (Quote taken
from a national class-action suit against Wal-Mart.)
2. WAL-MART'S LOW PRICES ARE THE RESULT OF HUMAN MISERY:
* 13-16 hour days molding, assembling, and painting toys, 7 days a week; 20
hour days in the peak season.
* Workers are paid 13 cents/hour wages in China: the minimum wage is
31 cents.
* There is no health or safety enforcement: constant headaches and nausea
from chemical fumes, indoor temperatures above 100 degrees F, rampant
repetitive stress disorder, no protective clothing available.
* Most employees are young women or teenage girls.
3. WAL-MART FORCES ITS UNETHICAL PRACTICES ON ITS 65,000 SUPPLIERS:
* Suppliers have to open their accounting books to Wal-Mart executives so
they can cut "unnecessary expenses" like unionized workers, health
benefits, and American-made products.
* Suppliers are forced to move facilities to China and other low production
cost nations to meet Wal-Mart's demands.
* Competitors are also forced to abandon customer service while slashing
employee wages and moving production to foreign sweat shops to remain
competitive.
4. WAL-MART DESTROYS LOCAL COMMUNITIES:
* Wal-Mart stores average 200,000 feet in size: more than 4 football fields
and destroying any sense of community or character where they are located.
* By pricing items below cost they crush local retailers. Once they hold a
monopoly in the market they raise prices.
* Three good jobs are destroyed for every two Wal-Mart jobs created.
* Instead of business profits being reinvested in the community they are
shipped to Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas.
5. WAL-MART IS NOT ACCOUNTABLE:
* The media won't report negatively about Wal-Mart because Wal-Mart would
pull its huge advertising budget.
* The 535 members of Congress have no power compared to Wal-Mart's
global reach: Wal-Mart does not have to answer to American voters, just
it's stockholders who are seeking unethical profit.
* Wal-Mart is radically remaking our labor standards and local economies
by stifling debate, suppressing knowledge, and not asking our consent.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
Really? You must mean the ones that can't read, because 90% of the stuff that they take home says 'Made in China' right on the bottom/label/box/manual/agency label/warranty card/rebate.
:)
They've also heard that's where the jobs are going too
Seems it was Wal-Mart that promised America it would promote madeinUSA....but gosh, where is that APEX TV made...ummm...not in USA? How patriotic.
Top 5 Reasons Not To Shop At Wal-Mart
1. American Wal-Mart Employees Are Exploited.
2. Wal-Mart's Low Prices Are The Result Of Human Misery.
3. Wal-Mart Forces Its Unethical Practices On Its 65,000 Suppliers.
4. Wal-Mart Destroys Local Communities.
5. Wal-Mart Is Not Accountable.
1. AMERICAN WAL-MART EMPLOYEES ARE EXPLOITED:
* "Full-Time" (actually 28 hours/week) employees only gross $11,000 a year,
on average.
* Health benefits are available only after two years, but premiums are so
high only 38% of employees can afford it.
* Even discussing working conditions or unionization will result in
retaliation and firing.
* There is "a harsh, anti-woman culture in which complaints go unanswered
and the women who make them are targeted for retaliation." (Quote taken
from a national class-action suit against Wal-Mart.)
2. WAL-MART'S LOW PRICES ARE THE RESULT OF HUMAN MISERY:
* 13-16 hour days molding, assembling, and painting toys, 7 days a week; 20
hour days in the peak season.
* Workers are paid 13 cents/hour wages in China: the minimum wage is
31 cents.
* There is no health or safety enforcement: constant headaches and nausea
from chemical fumes, indoor temperatures above 100 degrees F, rampant
repetitive stress disorder, no protective clothing available.
* Most employees are young women or teenage girls.
3. WAL-MART FORCES ITS UNETHICAL PRACTICES ON ITS 65,000 SUPPLIERS:
* Suppliers have to open their accounting books to Wal-Mart executives so
they can cut "unnecessary expenses" like unionized workers, health
benefits, and American-made products.
* Suppliers are forced to move facilities to China and other low production
cost nations to meet Wal-Mart's demands.
* Competitors are also forced to abandon customer service while slashing
employee wages and moving production to foreign sweat shops to remain
competitive.
4. WAL-MART DESTROYS LOCAL COMMUNITIES:
* Wal-Mart stores average 200,000 feet in size: more than 4 football fields
and destroying any sense of community or character where they are located.
* By pricing items below cost they crush local retailers. Once they hold a
monopoly in the market they raise prices.
* Three good jobs are destroyed for every two Wal-Mart jobs created.
* Instead of business profits being reinvested in the community they are
shipped to Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas.
5. WAL-MART IS NOT ACCOUNTABLE:
* The media won't report negatively about Wal-Mart because Wal-Mart would
pull its huge advertising budget.
* The 535 members of Congress have no power compared to Wal-Mart's
global reach: Wal-Mart does not have to answer to American voters, just
it's stockholders who are seeking unethical profit.
* Wal-Mart is radically remaking our labor standards and local economies
by stifling debate, suppressing knowledge, and not asking our consent.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
using pop music prisoners.
photosMy Photostream
I was able to change the .wma test file to .ogg using CDex. I had to download a DLL for it to be able to read the WMA file, but I just google'd for it and it came up lickety split. So basically:
1) Install CDex
2) Download WalMart WMA Song
3) Attempt to convert file, download whatever DLL it tells you too, then try again.
4) Congratulations, you have a OGG/MP3/whatever format you want.
I did notice their song collection is pretty sparse. For example look at keb' mo and I see two songs listed for download and the rest marked "not available". Also cant buy any of his complete CDs either just individual songs
many of the songs are edited for content as well. iTunes does this too but offers the originals as well. Also Walmart acknowledges they pull songs they just dont like regardless of specificly "dirty" lyrics (ask sheryl crow).
Is this good or bad for apple. I'd say good. First was wolworth used to say he liked it when the competion moved next door cause it tended to grow the market. At the same time, it completely guts the profit for all the marketers on the windows side of the house. They will be in ruinous competition. Walmart in their usual strategy just drills out the center. That is, they sell all the millions of brittant and justin albums and leave the onesy-twosey sales of nine-inch nails to Napster. Napster eats it on overhead mamanging diversity and wallmart rakes it in. Meanwhile at the other end of the spectrum for people who want a good music store experience there is Apple gobbling up the quality market. Since apple now leads with 80% of online sales people will/should see the light and realize its the better choice for diversity.
Meanwhile MS sits back, takes no risks at all but just lets others front its stores and push WMA. If it succeeds they'll swoop in and seize the market by changing WMA somehow and jacking up the royalties.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
(random groups selected from the family music library...)
....
:)
Dio:
ITMS - three full release albums from Dio (including an album from '96 that I'd never heard about) - no hits from his stints in Deep Purple or Black Sabbath, oddly enough, or any Dio albums as old as what I own
WMMS - a "Very Best of Dio" album, and two compilation albums with a track from Dio
Iron Maiden:
ITMS - twenty-four albums (including several duplicated "special edition" albums - assuming to be edited)
WMMS - also twenty-four albums, but you can see "remastered" and "limited edition remastered" for most of the album names, so the total number of availble albums is lower than at ITMS
Manowar:
ITMS - three albums
WMMS - Amazingly enough, one album: "Fighting The World". which is also on ITMS
Duran Duran:
ITMS - eight full albums, one partial album
ITMS also has the only album relased by Arcadia, which was several of the D^2 boys post-band split
WMMS - five albums, as well as several compilation album hits
WMMS also carries the Arcadia album
Kate Bush:
ITMS - four albums, plus one hit on a compilation
WMMS - four albums, plus hits on three compilations / soundtracks - wow, Kate Bush is in GTA: Vice City? Who knew?
ABBA (hey, they're the wife's LPs, not mine!):
ITMS - fourteen albums
WMMS - twenty(!) albums - though the same caveat about "remastered" applies, there were a few albums that ITMS didn't have listed
And, just for testing's sake (and since I'm on a roll), a few things not in the house:
Slayer:
ITMS - eight albums, and one hit from a NASCAR album(?)
WMMS - two compilation hits - the NASCAR one, and a soundtrack from WCW
Spike Jones:
ITMS - three full albums, and three compilation hits
WMMS - one album, and three compilation hits
Wu-Tang Clan:
ITMS - three full and apparently one partial album, three hits for compliations and soundtracks; slightly less than half of the ITMS tracks were labeled "explicit"
WMMS - three albums and one compilation hit, all labeled "edited", none "explicit"
John Denver:
ITMS - fifteen full albums, three partial
WMMS - umm, a lot - they listed 485 tracks, spread out over 10 screens; I couldn't find an easy way to list all the albums, or even all the tracks on one screen, like you can do with ITMS, so I stopped comparing sites at this point
So, WMMS beats out ITMS for performers like ABBA and John Denver, while ITMS excels at... most other stuff. Feel free to continue to compare / contrast... I'm going to bed
Come to the University of Mars! Classes starting soon!
Being the only geek here with 88 cents I went for it. Downloading was very easy. No clunky software was eneded, just download it directly from walmart after paying. Way better than any other solution (IMHO).
The results are mplayer not being able to play it. Oh well.
dan@stryker:~/Desktop$ mplayer Crash
MPlayer 1.0pre2-3.3.2 (C) 2000-2003 MPlayer Team
Playing Crash
ASF file format detected.
= ASF Stream group = START =
object size = 32
stream count=[0x1][1]
stream id=[0x1][1]
max bitrate=[0x1f67f][128639]
= ASF Stream group = END =
Clip info:
name: Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm
author: Crash Test Dummies
copyright: (P)&(C) 1999 Arista Label. All Rights Reserved.
=
Opening audio decoder: [ffmpeg] FFmpeg/libavcodec audio decoders
AUDIO: 44100 Hz, 2 ch, 16 bit (0x10), ratio: 16002->176400 (128.0 kbit)
Selected audio codec: [ffwmav2] afm:ffmpeg (DivX audio v2 (ffmpeg))
=
Checking audio filter chain for 44100Hz/2ch/16bit -> 44100Hz/2ch/16bit...
AF_pre: af format: 2 bps, 2 ch, 44100 hz, little endian signed int
AF_pre: 44100Hz 2ch Signed 16-bit (Little-Endian)
SDL: Samplerate: 44100Hz Channels: Stereo Format Signed 16-bit (Little-Endian)
AO: [sdl] 44100Hz 2ch Signed 16-bit (Little-Endian) (2 bps)
Building audio filter chain for 44100Hz/2ch/16bit -> 44100Hz/2ch/16bit...
Video: no video
Starting playback...
A: 0.0 0.0% 0%
Exiting... (End of file)
Edited for junk filter
"Full-Time" (actually 28 hours/week) employees only gross $11,000 a year, on average.
Assuming they work 52 weeks a year, that comes out to about $7.55/hour, which is well above minimum wage, for menial labor. Working at wal-mart isn't exactly skillful work.
People aren't forced to work at wal-mart, there are alternatives. Wal-mart is one of the nation's largest employers, if not THE largest. If something is going on there that's illegal, there are plenty of people watching.
It's called capitalism people. Wal-mart offers cheap things, and gets cheap labor. So what if it uses factories in china. The chinese people are employed by them, so it helps them out.
The media won't report negatively about Wal-Mart because Wal-Mart would pull its huge advertising budget.
Utter bullshit. Walmart was all over the media for using illegal immigrant workers. Illegal immigrants shouldn't be in our country in the first place, so anyone who hires them should be punished. That goes for meat-packing plants as well.
The parent thread is an anti-capitalist troll. Its so easy to pick on the big bad walmarts of the world.
[sarcasm]Yep, they're successful, but they must have gotten that way by cheating someone out of something.[/sarcasm]
...here, though only as complete albums (and mostly censored ones at that). Still missing a few big-name artists (for example, the Red Hot Chili Peppers), but it'll be interesting to see how the iTunes holdouts fair here.
All things being equal (source quality, etc.), which they probably aren't, AAC should beat out WMA handily at bitrates like what the iTMS and Wal-Mart are using. The only chance WMA would have of approaching AAC in quality at that bitrate would have been if Wal-Mart had used WMA Pro, but because of the lack of hardware player support for WMA Pro, that probably won't happen soon.
I haven't seen tests directly comparing AAC to WMA (non-Pro), but Roberto Amorim's testing at 128kbps with AAC and WMA Pro and ff123's testing of a different AAC codec against WMA non-Pro probably say enough.
Also, Apple has actually spoken about the quality of the sources that they encode from (the original masters rather than CDs themselves), and Wal-Mart hasn't.
I do hope that whoever elects to actually directly compare the quality of Wal-Mart's music to Apple's doesn't just look at frequency analysis to do it. Apple's AAC lowpasses at 16 KHz, but to use this as some sort of indication of quality is ludicrous.
Wal-Mart makes labels censor their artists works in able to be sold at wal-mart. This is wrong. If you believe in free speech and free expression please don't give a dime to wal-mart.
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
Record label: "The volume is GREAT, but how about we jack up the prices now? I don't want to have to downsize mansions again and give up the crack habit."
Walmart: "I'm sorry, but we need to offer our customers a better value every year. If you can't do it for 38 cents, we can find someone who will."
Record label: "And I thought I was evil."
--
Power to the Peaceful
If you hired her, she would not be your SLAVE, she would be your EMPLOYEE, and would therefore be free to quit. If you hired someone to kidnap her and bring her to you, then that's kidnapping, not capitalism.
Captitalism has its flaws definitely, but if you want to talk about FORCING people to do things, then you're talking about Socialism.
"We obviously need a new moderation category: (-1, Woo-fucking-hoo)" --Mr. AC
Isn't it better to give a person a choice between the absolute shit life of complete poverty and the nearly absolute shit life of menial pay for hard work?
No because that's contrary to liberalism. If you are liberal you can't accept that because your justification can be used for anything. If anything, you can even justify slavery by your reasoning.
Of course, to a capitalist, slavery is perfectly ok. In fact, capitalists were the ones who were against the abolishment of slavery.
Like all capitalists, you obviously has no idea of the notion of exploitation. And how about cases where the government initiates mass propaganda and disinformation and brainwashes people to accept something? You will have no concept of right or wrong. To you, only one thing matters: money.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
Hey, thanks for making all sorts of assumptions about my line of reasoning and motivations - love when that happens.
Actually, freedom matters a whole lot more to me than money. I'd like to see people have the options to take whatever jobs best suit their abilities and opporunities. In some cases that's well-paid executive. In some cases that's poorly paid gas station attendant. In some cases thats well-paid high-profile prostitute. In other's, it's a poorly paid street hooker.
I don't want to take any choices away from people on either side of the contract. So long as both the employer and the employee enter into their arrangement knowingly and honestly, who the hell are you or i or anyone else to tell them what they can or can't do. All employed work is subjugation of one sort or another - its up to the employee to decide whether its worth the payment in return.
And no, capatalists don't think slavery is ok - not unless they can't distinguish between humans and properties. A capatalist can't buy and sell that which isn't considered to be property. While the US has its own deplorable history with failing to make that distinction, it's a point we moved past long ago. Slavery can exist under any economic system - but not under any just system.
As far as cases wgere government initiates mass propoganda and disinformation - well that's a bad thing regardless of the economic system. Historically we've seen it happen in communist, capatalist, socialist and all sorts of other societies. IF the governmetn engages in behavoir like that, the government is going to introduce corruption into the system - regardless of what type of system it is.
It's not explotation if someone chooses, with all the information presented in front of him/her, to enter into the situation without coersion.
Sure they've been found guilty of all kinds of violations and fined several times but no fine, no sanction (to date) has been severe enough to make them notice, let alone think twice. The fact is that Walmart is well on it's way to becoming the poster child for the crusade against monocultures. Microsoft has nothing on Walmart.
"Sanity is not statistical", George Orwell, "1984"
um...
2 yes...
3 yes...
4 yes..
5 * actually between illeagal aliens cleaning the freaken floors and 4 count them 4 women bitching about being screwed over from working there...the only media coverage I hear about wal-mart is considerably more than any other retailer and it's all bad
* Congress having no power over Wal-Mart? Are you sure? You're reading that wrong anyway...it's Congress that doesn't care to have power over Wal-mart because they are paid to not care.
* not sure about that last bit
1 You really screwed up on #1...
** "Full-Time" (actually 28 hours/week) employees only gross $11,000 a year,
on average.
* Actually at the Wal-Mart I work at everyone gets full 40 hours a week. The only time they cut back are the months Jan-March the slowest months of the year. There are a lot of older people working at wally world that have been with the company a while. 10 years ~= 15/h stocking shelves. Not that I plan on being here more than a few more months though
** Health benefits are available only after two years, but premiums are so high only 38% of employees can afford it.
* Where the hell are you getting your info from? NO! From the day you start you can get a third party health insurance. After 6 months you are qualified for health insurance...38%? Did you pull that out of your ass? It costs me 35 bucks a pay check and 3 bucks for dental...who can't afford that?
** Even discussing working conditions or unionization will result in retaliation and firing.
* I can tell you've never worked there before. No actually working conditions are talked about all the time. In fact me along with 14 other people at the Wal-Mart I'm working at all got $1 raises because we used something called the open door policy stating that other places would be paying us the same amount...it took a while but we got the raise. We talk about unions all the time...but most people agree that paying money for some union is a joke at the rate we get paid. Who will pay the bills if we HAVE to go on strike? And who needs more money taken out of their small pay check for it?
** There is "a harsh, anti-woman culture in which complaints go unanswered and the women who make them are targeted for retaliation." (Quote taken from a national class-action suit against Wal-Mart.)
* I have 2 store managers that are women and about 7 other women above me in the chain of command. Your quote is from 4 women out of how many that work at Wal-Mart? How many of the Waltons (you know the owners of Wal-Mart...there are 5 of them) are women? `
Yes Wal-Mart damages the local community and exploits labor in third world countries. However, I really doubt half the stuff you hear in the NEWS/MEDIA is in any way acurate about the realities of working there. It's a sucky job...yes. It pays crap yes. And I'm sure it will not be here more than another decade given how many people like you seam to hate it with such a passion. But despite everything that is bad about it...nah you know what there's nothing I can say good about the place...I just wanted to correct the mis-stated facts you made.
Take it from someone that works there...Wal-Mart is EVIL!!!! But it's no different from the thousands of other retailers...Cosco? K-Mart? and the job is a McJob...but what do you expect? We have to work somewhere. I suppose if places like Wal-Mart where outlawed (which they would have to be in order to prevent another one from doing the same thing) the only places left would be small mall stores...I doubt they would pay much better...it would still be another McJob.
Oh...by the way. I'm one of those CS majors from college that was a Junior before he had to take a job at Wal-Mart stocking shelves because everyone hiring required 5+ years experience.
WalMart may just have to find a way to support DRM'd WMA on Linux, or just ditch WMA all together, if their own music store wont work on their own cheap Linux PCs.
Imagine bing a WalMart customer, buying a WalMart Licoris PC- and not being able to buy music from WalMart's own online music store.
Here is another reason they are not accountable: They are by leaps and bounds the richest family in the US. Look at Forbes Top 10 Richest People list for 2003. Notice any similarities in the names?
TOP TEN
1. Bill Gates
2. Warren Buffett
3. Paul Allen
4. Helen Walton
5. S. Robson Walton
6. John Walton
7. Jim Walton
8. Alice Walton
9. Larry Ellison
10. Michael Dell
If you watch that train-wreck of a show "The Simple Life", Paris Hilton had no idea what Wal-Mart was. I found that quite interesting, because any one of the Walton family members could buy her family out with the cash in their pockets. Wal-Mart is even less accountable than Microsoft, which is pretty sickening.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Apple doesn't kow tow to M$ by using wma. They use their own format, with decent DRM policies.
An additional point that is often lost on slashdot discussions is the fact that Apple's "AAC" format isn't just something they made up, nor is it something that Apple "controls." It's the audio component for the mpeg 4 standard which was created by several biggies in the industry.
Contrast this with Microsoft's "WMA" format. Who made it up? Microsoft. Who can change it any time they wish? Microsoft. Who can determine which players, companies, computers, people can play the files? Microsoft.
Do you trust Microsoft not to abuse that position? I thought not.
You like your Macintosh better than me, don't you Dave? Dave? Can you hear me Dave?
If you stay long enough you're left with back problems, wrist problems, and bone spurs for your trouble.
And how is this is any different from working at any grocery store, Target, Sears, gas station, or toll both, ticket counter, convienence store etc?
Does Walmart buy special non ergonomic keyboards for the registers (moot point anyway as everything is scanned), and special granite floor pads to stand on that cause these problems?
What do other retailers in the US pay for wages and is it really any different then Walmart? Walmart is big so it is easy to get some statistics but if you add up 10 or 15 other mid sized retailers you will find the same wages, the same working conditions, but yet, they are somehow not "evil".
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
OK, here's a search on some representative samples of my current collection.
Desmond Dekker & The Israelites:
ITMS - 42 Songs: 1 full album (best of) and 3 compilations
WMMS - 3 songs: 2 compilations
Link Wray & The Wraymen:
ITMS - 1 song: 1 compilation
WMMS - nada
Sebedoh:
ITMS - nada
WMMS - nada
Trailer Bride:
ITMS - 26 songs: 2 albums
WMMS - nada
Yoko Kanno & The Seatbelts:
ITMS - nada
WMMS - nada
Modest Mussorgsky:
ITMS - many: 5 full versions of Pictures At An Exhibition, 2 versions of Night On Bald Mountain and 4 other pieces
WMMS - 1 movement from Pictures At An Exhibition
Pleasantly surprised that ITMS has Trailer Bride at all. Stunned that WMMS has only one piece - and a single movement not the whole thing - from Mussorgsky.
Insanity is the last line of defence for the master diplomat. But you have to lay the groundwork early.
It is unfortunate and my heart bleeds for them
n capitalism you apparently espouse (along with most Republicans I know) is the reason we make so little progress toward attainable ends like eradicating world hunger, fighting AIDS in Africa, ensuring gender and racial equality, ending extreme poverty, and maybe even paying people a little more than so-called minimum wage.
What exactly does it bleed? It would seem from the rest of your post that you are a hardline, anything-not-illegal-goes cheap-labor Republican hell-bent on defending the rights of us priveledged folks to cash in on the misery and lack of rights of others in the world. Does the fact that people can't fucking eat on those wages while continuing to live indoors have no effect on you?
We could go further and point out how the unquestioning, God-gave-me-the-fucking-right-because-I'm-America
And just for the record, I have a friend who has worked at WalMart for 10 years, and is just now working up the guts to leave. He's a manager there, and they pay him less than $28,000/yr, and take $230 from each of his checks for health insurance. They also actively promote the idea that there are no other solid jobs out there, and that if you leave WalMart, you'll just have to come back because you'll be laid off within a year anyway. So fuck the apolegetics for WalMart. This is one of the hardest-working guys I know, and because he doesn't bitch and whine, throw tantrums and threaten to quit, he has associates working under him who make more.
The point of all this is that it does make a difference whether we pay attention to human misery! Other people in the world deserve fair pay for their work, just as much as you do, and our consumerist culture has grown the idea that what happens on the other side of the world doesn't matter, as long as I can get my new toaster for $10 less than that guy down the street is selling them. My wife and I seek out and buy fair-trade goods, because even if we pay a couple dollars more for them, we're supporting the producer, and that makes a difference on a worldwide scale. Get your head out of your wallet and try to think about how your actions effect other people on the planet.
So I return to my opening question? What exactly does your heart bleed? Likely not something I want anywhere near me...
To reign is to serve.
Interestingly enough, there is no Classical music at all! Even something as common as Beethoven.
I'll stick with iTunes for myriad reasons, but here are the biggest ones:
1. WalMart has excluded me based on my status as a Mac user. For some reason, they saw fit not to include me and my ilk in their business plan.
2. There is no classical music, which is 90% of what I buy. Here even iTunes isn't so great, as what I'm interested in is new music by living composers, and the selection there is limited.
3. WalMart is an evil, unscrupled company.
Reading this, WalMart? You could turn me into a customer, but I imagine it's not likely to happen.
To reign is to serve.
BEWARE.
Wal-Mart charges sales tax in their music store. At my local sales tax rate of 8.25%, that brings the price of a track to 95 cents, not 88. iTMS does not charge sales tax so the total charge is 99 cents.
Well, I'm a fool ... I bought a song to "test" the poster's theory. No go. MPlayer reads the header and gacks immediately. However, it does work in Windows Media Player running in Win98SE under Win4Lin not that that's much consolation.
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato
Sounds like a lot of the reasons not to shop at Wal-Mart are reasons you shouldn't shop anywhere at all.
You can always smell a "something for nothing" democrat.
...sub-poverty level wages. If you stay long enough you're left with back problems, wrist problems, and bone spurs for your trouble.
Life isn't all ergonomic keyboards and naptimes on company time. Your entire argument is based on emotion and conjecture. Walmart has done nothing illegal, and for you to bash them as if they're just some evil corporation is ridiculous.
sub-poverty level to me, and I may be wrong about this, means below poverty level. Being paid about two times minimum wage wouldn't be below poverty level. I would think below minimum wage would be sub-poverty level.
not the way the world works. These people are living on such a thin margin of financial saftey that a missed paycheck, an injury, their car breaking down, can make the difference and put them on the street.
Actually, that's exactly how the world works. Here's the secret. If you have some ambition for a better job, go out and start looking while you hold your current job. You may be miserable for a little while, but if you line it up right, you can quit your current job and move on to you new happy job.
It's only censorship when it becomes *illegal* to read/view certain content.
:)
Merely deciding not to carry certain content in your store is hardly censorship, any more than a church deciding they don't want porn mags brought into Sunday school. Market pressure exists from many sources, not just from Walmart's decision not to carry unedited versions. That decision comes from their desire to appeal to the broadest common denominator, and they've decided that's the same audience as bland broadcast-network TV. (Because broadcast-network TV doesn't carry the Ozzy Show, is that censorship??)
Similarly, I don't want rap music brought into my house. That doesn't make it censorship. You can play the nasty stuff in your own home all you like.
Yes, Walmart exerts a market pressure toward bland sameness. But if that's where the money is, that's how it will be. If those who don't like it can't exert sufficiently large economic pressure to the contrary, other choices may disappear from the free market. Many folk enjoy a horse-and-buggy ride too, but that doesn't make it economically viable for a large corporation to offer Sunday buggy rides.
Your recourse is to buy from alternative retailers, same as it would be if you wanted any other retail item that's not profitable in a large-scale market. If the alternative retailers can't make a buck and go out of business, that's market pressure, not censorship.
Yeah, the net *effect* on what's available in the open market CAN be the same, but as wise folk around here often say, don't confuse causation with correlation.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
The argument is that what WalMart is doing is immoral - not necessarily illegal.
as to minimum wage, depending on where one lives, especially on the local rent levels, a minimum wage does not guarentee a decent living standard. In Toronto, for example, about 1/3 of the people using food banks are actually employed, presumably at or above minimum wage.
"Actually, that's exactly how the world works"
yes, it is. the question is, do we accept this as an appropriate thing, or do we do something to change it. you seem happy enough to accept that there are poor people - i am not.
"Here's the secret. If you have some ambition for a better job, go out and start looking while you hold your current job"
you are assuming that there are other or better jobs out there. one of the complaints against WalMart is that it is (nearly) the sole employer in many communities. the unemployment rate in all industrialized countries is above zero. perhaps you are trained enough to find an alternate job easily - many people are not.