Real's Reality

prostoalex writes "While Real Networks claims its market share and low profit numbers are the result of Microsoft's anti-competitive behavior, there are some alternative views. News.com has an article on Real's reality, which reveals many interesting practices that Real resorted to. "Although RealNetworks had already licensed Microsoft's formats for use in its media player, it didn't have Windows Media licenses for its server technology. Undeterred, the company found a way to essentially replicate the Windows Media code, trumpeting its new software as the Internet's first "universal" streaming system", says News.com." Read on for more.

"There's also an interesting conversation going on at Jogin.com, which started with this post from the author, basically a rant, describing how inconvenient and even hostile Real Player is. It would be like any other rant, except an employee of Real Networks replied with some insights into the company's wrongdoings and somewhat explained Real's undeterred hostility towards those who downloaded the free version of its player. Furthermore, a consultant, who used to work at Real Networks, replied, sharing some questionable practices Real engaged in, such as hiding a variety of "add-ons" at the bottom of the page, hoping that the user would not scroll down to un-check the selections, and then charging his credit card for add-ons when he signed up for paid version on Real One."

Comments

Bloated

[mod_critical]

I know why I don't use Real player anymore...

Real Player used to be a simple piece of audio (then later video) playing software. Now its becomeiwng one of those applications that wants to dominate your system and do everything from playing media to making eggs. RealMessage Center? A constantly running tray icon? Asking me every 2 seconds if I _really_ want it to not be the default player for everything...

RealNetworks might not be having troubles if they were able to produce significantly more advanced codecs and didn't resort to bloat. No innovation, no company, regardless of whether your player can polish my shoes or not.

Re:Bloated

[porp]

Real hates MS so they chose to port to Linux. Their Linux ports were even worse than their windows counterparts. Hell, they're worse than any media player listed on sourceforge right now. Screw them being a major company to port a binary junk software to Linux. They were just being greedy not generous. And to say they could gain market share with their playback software is insane--someone has to encode it to that format to begin with. And I know when I see a file to streamed in Real Audio format, I know not to click there because it opens Real's software. Good riddance to them. They sucked in 1996, and they suck now.

porp

Real's problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that Real Player is a big bloated piece of crap. No one uses it if they have a choice. Microsoft's destroyed a lot of competitors, but in this case, they didn't have to. Real did it themselves.

I remember using Real Player back in like 1996. It was incredible stuff, and it just worked. But then they fell into the trap a lot of other software companies do. They tried to make their software do EVERYTHING, and instead of one doing a couple things well, it did everything poorly.

Re:Real's problem

[sinucus]

I whole heartedly agree with you. Real has only themselves to blame for their crappy software. The fact of the matter is it's a peice of shit. WMP 6 was awesome. It did one thing, played movies. Plain and simple and it did it well. Real decided it needed to do 400 things and on top of it run 3 different .exe's to do it. Real player itself, the tray notification shit and the Real auto updater. I don't need that many freaking exe's running. Just give a button to click that says "Update me". Nor do I need ANOTHER taskbar program launcher that "speeds up" applications. I don't mind waiting 10 seconds for the HDD to rev up and find my program. Instead I wait 30 seconds for it to page all my taskbar launcher programs to disk so that it can load the damn program. Nice going Real.

Another "Blame Microsoft" Business Model

[Naked Chef]

Similar to the RIAA blaming Napster for their poor sales, Real just assumes their business is going doen the toilet because of something MS did (they must have done SOMETHING evil, right?). I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that their product is just bloated spyware, or poor corporate leadership, or the "bunker mentality" at Real that the article mentions...

The best realplayer was... *drumroll*

[oldosadmin]

Realplayer G2 w/RealJukebox.

Great design. I loved it... then it started happening *cue sad music*... The upgrades... they said "RealONE" was the thing... but all it did was take away my ability to listen to crap online for free.

Free Carolina Hurricanes webcast? Gone. $29.95 a month.

Free Carolina Panthers webcast? Gone. Buy NFL Field Pass.

Free racing webcasts? Gone.

Now, I don't mind ads. Heck, I run a website, I live on ads [cheap plug]go to oldos.org and clickyclicky on my google text ads [/cheap plug]. I wouldn't mind listening to ads during the game, watching cheap flash ads before listening, or anything like this. How come TV can survive without needed subscriptions (skin-e-max and h-blow excluded), but internet webcasts can't?

Encoder

[mcbridematt]

Wouldn't one reason for Real losing out is that Micro$oft's Media Encoder is free as in beer and Real's or Apples, for that matter, aren't? (well, they weren't last time I checked)

How do you "accidently" buy RealOne?

[erick99]

First: I don't like Real.com's product at all. I have had nightmarish experiences with it and would never, ever considering using it.

But, how are people accidently buying the premium version? How do you accidentally type in your credit card information? I don't know about the rest of the world, but when I type in my credit card info I am *not* surprised when I get billed.

Happy Trails!

Erick

Re:How do you "accidently" buy RealOne?

[Galvatron]

I think the idea is they knew they were buying the premium version, but they didn't realize they were getting extra addons (for extra cost).

Real's website, program and license feels dirty.

[BrookHarty]

Real could of owned the world, but heres my run down of why Real hurt themselves, they harrased the customer.

1. Takes 10 minutes of hunting around the website for the free version. Even when you click on the "Free" version, it prompts you to buy it.
2. When loading the program, it asks you to register, then prompts you to buy it, and then loads an html webpage.

Back in the day, .ra format was the only format out, they owned the streaming market. Microsoft did what it always does, release the player in the OS, give away the tools, (which are very easy to use, and plain menus), and made good market decisions.

Now Microsoft is using the mpeg4 format, and seems to be taking over HDTV format on Dvd's. They win, everything. They will be the OS and multimedia format of the future.

While I agree Microsoft did use its power to assist in taking over, Real networks interaction with customers was on the level of spammers, horrible salesmen from hell. Customers had a bad experiences and walked away.

Re:WinAmp

[Killswitch1968]

Winamp still plays audio files just as good as it normally did. I actually like the video player, my only problem is it doesn't play certain files. Even if you hate it you have the choice not to install video support and get the original player.

The only Real software I have use for...

[WoodstockJeff]

... is the uninstall program. My Dell laptop came with it installed, but it was gone shortly after I saw the icon come up on the first boot. I can't stand nag-ware, and even the paid-for versions of RealPlayer nag you incessantly about upgrading to the version-of-the-week. What has this to do with Real Network's market share? Hopefully, a LOT!

Respect *just* for porting to Linux? Why?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

As bloated and useless as it is, you have to respect Real for being one of the first major companies to release their software for Linux.

Why? I mean really, why? "Ooooooo, it works on Linix. Ahhhhhhhh..." Sorry, but Real is a real piece of shit, and they will have to do a lot more than port it to Linux to win "real" respect.

Re:Respect *just* for porting to Linux? Why?

[Rew190]

Thank you for posting that. Some of this Linux fandom is terrible. Who cares if Real developed for Linux if it's bad software in the first place? What kind of merit does that give Real?

Unintrusive?

[Chuck Chunder]

I find the "Upgrade to pro?" each time it starts highly annoying.

Re:What do...

[c4Ff3In3 4ddiC]

This thing installed data in unused portions of the boot sector.

That sounds like TurboTax.

OT: Non-Multi-User Design Rant

[red floyd]

This is halfway on topic, talking about crappy software. I hate it when software is not multi-user aware:

Broderbund and Maxis are infamous for this. Both "Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing 15" and "The Sims" require you to run as Administrator.

There is absolutely NO FUCKING REASON why any app -- except for certain system utilities (and games and typing tutors aren't those) -- should require Admin. It's fucking lazy sloppy programming.