Virgin Accuses Apple of Abusing Monopoly

worm eater writes "The Register reports that VirginMega (Virgin Group's online music venture in France) is asking the French antitrust authorities to force Apple to license the FairPlay DRM. If France agrees with Virgin, will this be a blessing in disguise for Apple, making their DRM format the defacto standard, or will it be the downfall of the mighty iTunes Music Store?"

Comments

This Raises An Excellent Question

[ackthpt]

If France agrees with Virgin, will this be a blessing in disguise for Apple, making their DRM format the defacto standard, or will it be the downfall of the mighty iTunes Music Store?"

This raises and excellent question: Is Apple a:

A) Technology (I.P.) Company
or

B) Hardware Company
or

C) Service Company

Apple started as A & B and has dabbled in C, but IMS is solidy B & C. With their deals with Motorola (iPod tech in phones) and HP (own brand of iPod) they further A & C. If FairPlay becomes the defacto standard this places them squarely in the A camp again, which actually benefits Motorola and HP, among others who make hardware for them. Will Apple ever allow the Mac line to be made outside the company again, as it was in the Jean Louis Gassée days?

While it all looks rosy for Apple, I can plainly see now how both Sony and Microsoft want to plough into this market, so they can get it all wrong, make people mad (ATRAC3? I thought it said 8 Track!) (my mPod has been 0wn3d!) and lose lots of money.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

duh! let the slashdot crowd decide whenever the question you raise is excellent or not.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

In this case, Apple is C). And, it's very very hard to say they have a 'monopoly' position, especially coming from a RECORD LABEL.

If said RECORD LABEL wants the monopoly to end, they should maybe consider the (literally) hundreds of companies willing to get into the online music distribution business. After all, a RECORD LABEL would have the power to license songs to any other business they choose.

This is absurd. If Apple has a monopoly, it's because the RECORD LABELS gave it to them. This is called playing both sides against the middle.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

it's heartening (confusing?) to see a first post that has nothing about 'FRIST P0ST!!' or greased Yoda dolls...

Back to the topic..

As far as I see, Apple is "D: All of the above". What can make the company money will be what the company is about...

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[proj_2501]

VirginMega is a store, not a record label. Virgin Records isn't actually owned by the Virgin Group. It was sold off to EMI in 92, and V2 Records is now their record label, started in 96 after Branson's non-compete clause expired.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[FatRatBastard]

And, it's very very hard to say they have a 'monopoly' position, especially coming from RECORD LABEL.

VirginMega isn't a record lable. You're confusing Virgin Records, which was sold to EMI a long time ago, with the rest of the Virgin Group.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[jwcorder]

And if MS has a monopoly it's because PC MAKERS gave it to them. Look at what Gates did in the 80s with Windows and what Apple is doing with IMS now. Hmmm...food for thought...

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[mblase]

Will Apple ever allow the Mac line to be made outside the company again, as it was in the Jean Louis Gassée days?

When Apple licensed clones of their computers, it was intended to broaden the MacOS userbase. What happened instead was the MacOS userbase remained the same size, and Apple lost money to the clonemakers. Thus they soon rescinded the licenses and went back to doing what they always did.

Doubtless this is part of the reason Apple's reluctant to license FairPlay. As long as they control both it and the iPod hardware, they can keep the iPod/iTunes experience Insanely Great(TM) and make more money to boot. But until the iPod and iTMS actually reach monopoly levels of domination, licensing FairPlay would just decrease the quality of that experience without increasing Apple's marketshare.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[harlows_monkeys]

When Apple licensed clones of their computers, it was intended to broaden the MacOS userbase. What happened instead was the MacOS userbase remained the same size, and Apple lost money to the clonemakers

Indeed, and the reason for this is that the cloners were very limited in what they were allowed to do. They weren't allowed to design their own motherboards, for example, but rather had to buy them from Apple. The rest of their design had to be approved by Apple.

So it is not surprising they failed to grow the Mac userbase, since Apple would only let them produce machines that were essentially exactly the same as Apple's Macs. One of the cloners (Power Computing, I believe) showed off at trade shows a couple prototypes, including a cool laptop back when Apple didn't have any cool PPC laptops, that would have taken the Mac to new markets, and begged Apple to allow them to sell them, but Apple said no.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Will Apple ever allow the Mac line to be made outside the company again, as it was in the Jean Louis Gassée days?

Surely you jest! When Gassée was at Apple, he was vehemently and single-mindedly opposed to licensing the Mac OS: "Gassée's face reddened and his eyes bulged. He was upset and could contain himself no more. In his thick French accent, he began yelling and screaming that licensing could not be done...."

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[macdaddy]

Will Apple ever allow the Mac line to be made outside the company again, as it was in the Jean Louis Gassée days?

No, they never will. At least they won't if they value their company, their products, their income, and the people who support all that. The Apple clone market was a resounding fuckup. That idiot CEO should be flogged for what he did. He caused an absolute nightmare for support. People didn't call Epson or Umax for tech support. Oh no. They saw the Apple logo and called Apple for support. The Umax and Epson clones were the worst of the lot. At an Apple Service Center I worked at we had racks of dead Epson and Umax clones. They couldn't be fixed. The companies refused to honor the warranties. They were POSs. DayStar and Power Computing did a pretty damned good job of making clones (especially the SMP DayStar boxes) but that still didn't fix the support issue. The Radius machines were also junk. The clone "experiment" was far and away a horrible fuckup that we all should hope never happens again.

And it wasn't Jean that licensed the OS and CHRP platform to the cloners. It was Spindler.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Hatta]

Apple started as A & B and has dabbled in C, but IMS is solidy B & C.

Dunno, FairPlay seems more like S&M to me.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Quikah]

Apple has a monopoly on DRM'd music files compatible with the ipod. You can only play music bought from itunes on the ipod (not considering the Real case since that is still somewhat up in the air). Basically Virgin wants to be able to sell DRM'd music files which can be played on the ipod. They cannot do this because Apple refuses to license fairplay.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Bun]

You can only play music bought from itunes on the ipod...

I think you meant to say that the iPod can only play DRM'd music in Apple's format, which means it can only come from iTunes.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

licensing FairPlay would just decrease the quality of that experience without increasing Apple's marketshare.

Umh, no kidding; it wouldn't grow APPLE's market share, but it could potentially grow market share of the technology Apple controls (increasing license revenue), and it might also increase Apple's absolute unit shipment counts, even if the slice shrank or remained about the same.

But your firm belief in Apple's godlike ability to always do the best thing on earth is silly. With Mac clones cloners would have improved upon Apple's designs (see the other post for details); either by making them less expensive or having more features; or sometimes both. That's competition there that speaks. Similarly, there's a good chance that hey, maybe the price/quality ratio would IMPROVE if FairPlay was licensed. Grow out of your fanboy world.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Bones3D_mac]

Actually, the major problem was that the clone makers (particularly PowerComputing) were starting to produce better hardware at lower prices than Apple could offer. Everyone jumped ship from Apple to PowerComputing due to the lower prices and higher-quality hardware.

To this day, I still regard the Power Tower Pro as the best Mac ever produced.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[allgood2]

When Apple licensed clones of their computers, it was intended to broaden the MacOS userbase. What happened instead was the MacOS userbase remained the same size, and Apple lost money to the clonemakers. Thus they soon rescinded the licenses and went back to doing what they always did.

I don't disagree with this statement. But I've started to feel that Apple IS missing an opportunity here. I see the question as two-fold: "Will licensing Fairplay lessen Apple's current dominance in the Music market? and Will licensing Fairplay seal AAC and Fairplay as the format and DRM standards for the current music wars?

I don't believe that licensing Fairplay would lessen Apple's current dominance that much. The Mac OS license issue was a different ballgame. It seemed everyone but the high paid business people all agreed that it would sucker punch Apple sales. More importantly, it sucker punched hardware sales which are Apple's bread and butter. Unless you own the market or are a smalltime vendor there just is much money to be made in OS sales.

But for iTMS the hardware is the iPod, and licensing Fairplay will ensure the iPods dominance as a MP3 player for years. I see this as a good thing. People will still use iTunes and iTMS because of the ease of use and tight integration with the iPod. Those who won't probably aren't using iTMS currently, but also DON'T have an iPod. If they purchased an iPod, the likelihood is that they would eventually start purchasing from iTMS. It means Apple has to keep on its toes about the music store features, functions, and all around user experience, but the iPod would dominate for at least another 2-5yrs.

While this first issue is VERY IMPORTANT. I think the second question is JUST AS, if not MORE SO important for Apple, especially at this juncture.

Will licensing Fairplay seal AAC and Fairplay as the format and DRM standards for the current music wars?

Licensing Fairplay before Microsoft hits the music scene would be good for Apple, because currently a lot of people are looking for Microsoft and businesses using Microsoft technologies to save them from Apple. Who knows what the likelihood of success of a Microsoft music store would be? I don't. But I can say, that even if it failed completely (less likely), it still gives Microsoft the ability to promote Windows Media DRM as the de-facto delivery standard, which does nothing but contribute to the future decline of iPod sales.

Imagine if RealNetworks, Napster, and OD2 started offering iPod compatible offerings. That would push iPod sales. But also satisfy a number of people's needs for compatibility. Many of those people who want Apple to support WMV would just shut-up, because they don't care about wmv, they care about playing their music on their mp3 player. (It wouldn't satisfy the .oog user, but...)

I think the time is coming for Apple to license Fairplay. I don't want .wmv to the DRM standard, and it has the potential.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Donny Smith]

Power Computing started kicking Apple's ass - if you wanted a good and cheap Mac you'd get one from Power Computing. Then Apple cancelled their licence.

This is kind of opposite to what happened to SPARC/Sun clone manufacturers - they were allowed to prosper.

It'd be interesting to know why in the case of the latter it worked out... Anyone?

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[hawaiian717]

Motorola had another advantage over Apple -- a 5 year warranty. Motorola was about to ship the StarMax 6000 line when their licence was pulled. It would have been the first G3 Mac; Apple didn't announce the Power Mac G3 until four months after Motorola's announcement.

My parents still use their StarMax 3000/160MT, and it's an interesting beast. The Tanzania motherboard was initially used only in the clones, but Apple eventually used it in the Power Mac 4400. It was designed to be used with standard PC components, and included PS2 mouse and keyboard ports in addition to ADB. The motherboard and System Enabler even supported manual eject floppy drives, though Motorola used an auto eject drive. At the time my parents bought it, the other option under consideration was the Power Mac 6360.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[bushlick_bill]

A: Apple is a niche hardware market. B: Linux has overtaken them on the desktop. C: 99 cent songs? Does anyone go to the record store anymore?

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[ErikZ]

Doesn't have a reliable supplier?

What do you care? All you need is one or two and they'll last you forever.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[gordgekko]

Thinking like that produced the always successful Apple-Motorola partnership.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[gordgekko]

Only the millions who bought a CD in a record store last week.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[DAldredge]

Then explain how come Jobs had do go before APPL investors an announce delays in the G5 iMac and shippment delays for the Dual G5 Macs due to lack of G5's.

That isn't a reliable supplier and that is something the F500 looks at.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[BasilBrush]

Who told you Linux has overtaken Macs on the desktop? It must have been someone pulling numbers from where the sun doesn't shine. If it were true, Google would be seeing more than 1% Linux hits or less than 3% Mac hits.

You are wrong on your other two points too. iPod isn't what I'd call a niche, and record stores still sell orders of magnitude more than online music sites.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[hunterx11]

If the iPod didn't play mp3s, nobody would buy it.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[ErikZ]

Great, when you become a F500 company you have a point.

But as a consumer, it's not a big deal. You have to wait an extra month or two for that Mac. What are the horrible concequences???

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[DAldredge]

Lack of support from software vendors due to low market share, higher prices for software due to less units shipped, less software to pick from due to less units shipped and higher prices for hardware.

IOW, it's not how you grow a company and apple needs to grow its market share if they wish to attrack more developers.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[ErikZ]

"Lack of support from software vendors due to low market share"

Apple already has low market share, for a while now. Not providing support for your product because of the "Low market share" of apple is just an excuse.

"higher prices for software due to less units shipped,"

Wow, can you get more generic? What software do you expect to run on these new Imacs that can't be run on the G4s or G5s?

"less software to pick from due to less units shipped and higher prices for hardware."

Look, this might fly with your econ teacher, but it doesn't for me. What do you mean "Less software"? Will Photoshop for Mac stop shipping because there was a 2 month delay on G5 chips? Will someone who was programming an app for the Mac, just throw up his hands and give up?

It's a delay on a freakin chip. It happens with non-apple chips, and we've all survived. I can see you want Apple to grow it's market share and prosper, but I think you're being over-critical.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[bushlick_bill]

Here's a link you may find enlightening... http://www.macnn.com/news/25728 As for hardware, I was referring to computer hardware (maybe the iPod qualifies as such) I tend to think of it as "Consumer Electronics". In either case, I don't think anyone would doubt that they are a relatively small player (no pun intended)

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[BasilBrush]

Your link mentions no methodology, and no figures, not even percentages. It didn't even come from an IDC report, it came from a comment made by an IDC analyst in an interview. Without further information, all you have at the moment is one person's opinion.

If that's the best you can do, I suggest that the Google figures, being actual measured statistics are more significant. Unless of course you can come up with a credible reason why more than 2/3rds of those Linux desktop users are not using the web, or at least the most popular search engine.

On the other point, why were you "referring to computer hardware" on a threat which is relevant to the iPod? Why did you exclude the iPod when the very post you replied to was talking about the iPod. Answer: You want to find some line of attack on Apple, and exclude that that you see as most sucessful. Whatever floats your boat.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Moofie]

Of the 6000+ tracks on my iPod, zero of them hae Apple's DRM wrapper.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[bushlick_bill]

Well, I'm certainly not trying to attack Apple or anybody else here. I not saying that IDC's analysis is written in stone, either. I'm simply responding to someone's "Excellent Question" which I found interesting. Namely "What kind of company is Apple?" What is their market, where are they headed, et al ? If you're going to throw Google hit stats at me and suggest that these sets of data are more significant than IDC's, you must have some vested interest in maintaining the perception that MacOS is solid at #2. It's enough to say that Linux is a solid contender as a desktop OS. As more people adopt and use it, it undercuts the status of both Windows and MacOS. If this trend continues, the question naturally arises... "Why will people continue to buy Apple hardware?" They will certainly continue to buy the iPod. I don't know the sales figures for Apple's products, but I would be surprised if the iPod didn't account for a big chunk. I like to use /. as a source for knowledge and exploration. There are plenty of flamewars and games of one-ups-manship going on elsewhere. Whatever floats your boat?

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[bushlick_bill]

It also must be taken into consideration that I'm smack in the middle of Doom 3, and therefore may have difficulty conveying my thoughts as coherently as I'd like to ;-)

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[dnahelix]

The crowd hath spoken.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[oledoody]

"You can only play music bought from itunes on the ipod" ????...are you kidding?

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[Anonymous Coward]

This dude is a known troll. do not feed him.

Re:This Raises An Excellent Question

[StarRoamer]

Absolutely! I had a StarMax 4000 that was wonderful. It wasn't the fastest processor (160Mhz, I think), but I loved Motorolla's 5-yr warranty. I had to have them out to my house twice. Once they replaced the motherboard free of charge. When I upgraded to my G4, I passed this along to my sister-in-law who wanted to learn Macintosh. I was crushed when Apple cancelled their licensing program. I would have bought another StarMax in an instant.

Am I missing something?

[r_glen]

...will this be a blessing in disguise for Apple, making their DRM format the defacto standard

How exactly would this be a blessing in disguise? Wouldn't it just open the door to more iTunes-compatible players to compete with? Or does Apple stand to make a pretty penny by licensing FairPlay to the world?

Re:Am I missing something?

[2nd Post!]

Well, it depends on where the market lies...

Is it in players?
Is it in content?
Is it in distribution?

See, with players they're already licensing the iPod to HP and Motorola.
In content they already have indies as well as major bands.
In distribution they have iTMS for Windows, Mac, and soon Motorola.

If they license Fairplay, that means other people's content is allowed on the network; it also means other people can create their own networks, and it means other people can create their own players!

However if Apple licenses FP in such a way to generate network effects... I would expect Apple to license FP for other players, and maintain control over content and distribution!

Re:Am I missing something?

[demonic-halo]

Seems like everyone keeps ranting on how "Real Networks hacking DRM" is good for apple, or how apple should open source their DRM, or how they should licence the technology to competitors.

To me it looks like they're making money, and maybe people should stop ranting about what Apple should do and look at what's working.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Xylaan]

How exactly would this be a blessing in disguise? Wouldn't it just open the door to more iTunes-compatible players to compete with? Or does Apple stand to make a pretty penny by licensing FairPlay to the world?

Well, first of all, they might be forced to license it, but not necessarily for free. That, and it'll increase their market saturation. If they can get people to pay reasonable prices for licenses AND every music player decides they need to support the format, Apple does stand to make quite a bit of money.

Re:Am I missing something?

[leoxx]

Microsoft and IBM, on the other hand, have to stop doing things against Apple that keeps them down!! Waaah waaahh.

Re:Am I missing something?

[wulfhound]

Players will be a profitless commodity within two years (as soon as 2GB flash chips are cheap and readily available, you can forget about the engineering challenges that shoehorning an HD in to a small, elegant box brings). Whether or not there is any money to be made from the other two depends on whether or not the DRM model wins out against both genuinely-free and illegaly-copied music.

Re:Am I missing something?

[proj_2501]

apple might be having some trepidation about cloning.

jobs is probably very aware that mac clones nearly killed apple. that's why he killed them when he was brought back on board.

however, with the iPod having lots more share of its market than the macintosh, i think apple has less to worry about if they can get a decent sum from fairplay.

if they can't make a lot of money by licensing fairplay, they do have a lot to lose. itms won't be selling to ipods exclusively anymore, and itms doesn't have the same high margin as the ipod.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it could be a blessing if they make them license the DRM for the stores, but not for the players. Then the iPod would work with more stores (which Apple says that they don't intend on making money from). Even if they had to make it available for players as well, people don't buy the iPod because it can read FairPlay DRMed files. The iPod would have the same advantage over other players that it always had. It also wouldn't mean that iTunes would become compatible with other players. Currently, iTunes for Windows can't transfer music (even non-DRMed music) to any player other than an iPod.

If the whole thing got licensed, the iPod would still be the only player to work with iTunes (although, you could copy FairPlay DRMed songs to other players), Apple would get a license fee for any player or store using their FairPlay stuff, and the iPod would have the exact same davantages it has always had - in fact more if you consider choice in store an advantage. That's not to say that it isn't without risk entirely, but it is probably a blessing in disguise.

Re:Am I missing something?

[2nd Post!]

And isn't that the point in licensing it for other players? Get revenue in licensing and network effects, while minimising manufacturing costs?

Re:Am I missing something?

[TedCheshireAcad]

Well other players could then compete with the iPod, and music from iTMS could be played on them. But this also goes for the reverse. If the iPod is the most popular player, other stores could compete with iTMS selling iPod playable content. It's widely known that Apple breaks even with iTMS, and just uses it as a vehicle to sell iPods. Here's how I envision the New Hotness (tm):

I can shop around to a few different music stores for a song that I can play on my iPod, maybe even a-la pricewatch.

When I buy a CD, not only is the regular CD-quality audio on there, but also tracks that I can load right on to my iPod ( I know this can be done already with just ripping the CD ). Perhaps even I can buy a mini-cd with just the AAC-encoded tracks on them for less money than the full out CD.

If FairPlay is licensed out and becomes the de-facto standard, I can play my digital music on my Mac, iPod, and even in Winamp on my PC at work.

Re:Am I missing something?

[mZam]

One thing a lot of people dont realize is this: Though they've sold millions of songs.. Apple ISN'T making money on the songs, on average. It's a total loss leader. They make the money by allowing itunes customers to get their music onto their ipod.. and their ipod only! Its the ipods that they make all of their money on.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Moofie]

Microsoft has to stop abusing their monopoly power, yes.

Apple and IBM are getting along fine right now.

And, despite Virgin's claim, Apple is no more a monopoly than I am. They're being ridiculous.

Re:Am I missing something?

[discstickers]

There's a difference. Apple doesn't have a monopoly position.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Lord Kano]

Or does Apple stand to make a pretty penny by licensing FairPlay to the world?

Think back about two decades. Apple had come cool tech and wanted to keep it all for themselves. Microsoft had recently acquired some tech that wasn't nearly as cool or groundbreaking as Apple's BUT they let the other children play with it.

Look at where those two companies are today. Both are going strong, but the one who shared with the other children is in a much stronger position.

LK

Re:Am I missing something?

[UpnAtom]

I don't have any mod points, so I'll just agree with you. Flash cards are ideal storage for players: multiple 512MB ones should be sufficient. As soon as they work with Ogg Vorbis and don't cost as much as a 2nd hand car, I'll buy one.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Compenguin]

Apple doesn't have a horizontal monopoly but iTMS + iPod could be considered a vertical monopoly (also known as vertical integration). It's kind of like if Ford bought an oil company and then stipulated that all new Ford Cars could only use free gasoline or ford gasoline, and Ford gasoline could only be used in Ford approved engines. They wouldn't have a monopoly on cars or gasoline but they would be unfairly leveraging a vertical monopoly.

Re:Am I missing something?

[pgrst]

Why will players be profitless?

Right now there is plenty of competition in the player market. Many players have the same storage capacities as the Ipod, and are cheaper than the ipod.

The storage of the ipod has nothing to do with the profits!

The design of the ipod (and itunes) has everything to do with the profits.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Lord_Dweomer]

And what about when portable video players become popular and suddenly 2GB is worth about as much as a 128mb mp3 player?

Re:Am I missing something?

[Moofie]

In this particular instance of "vertical monopoly", there are DOZENS of other music players and online music stores. How does this particular monopoly infringe consumer choice?

I'm an iPod owner, and that hasn't infringed my choice to tell all the online music vendors to go screw.

Virgin's making a money-grab. Apple is not a monopoly in any meaningful sense of the term (except for the fact that they seem to be the only firm employing good industrial designers).

Re:Am I missing something?

[cyngus]

Firstly, I disagree that players will become profitless. The only way they become profitless is if they're all the same. If they're all the same then no one can charge more than someone else, and its a race to the bottom of prices. This is happening in the Wintel computer box world now, largely they're all the same. Yet, somehow, Apple manages to have pretty nice margins. Secondly, there is NO MONEY to be made in content distribution now. Apple barely makes money on iTMS. They'll have to sell orders of magnitude greater songs to have any impact on their bottom line. Even if they due that, the contribution is nothing compared to the iPod's. Finally, 2GB, way too small, even for me, and my collection is fairly small.

Re:Am I missing something?

[geoffspear]

No, actually, they'd be stupidly assuring that no one would ever buy a Ford product ever again, and they'd go out of business within a year.

"'car' is to 'gasoline' as 'some electronic device' is to 'some type of data'" type analogies are not only cliched, but they almost always miss the differences between the 2 industries. People buy Apple products because they perceive them to be better in various ways. I find it hard to believe that even a huge Mustang fan could perceive a Ford that could only use their own brand of gas to be better than a Chevy in any way at all.

Re:Am I missing something?

[slipstick]

Profitless like Wintel? Tell that to Dell.

Yes Apple has pretty nice margins and that's good for a niche player. But are you really suggesting that Apple should stick in the on-line music & music player game to be a niche player?

Currently Apple isn't a niche player in the on-line music & music player game. But all it takes is one cool new gizmo to supplant the iPod and their profits from it will be miniscule compared to the knock-offs. If your a geek you should know this.

This is a totally new market segment. Once things broaden out more, new technology hits the streets, peoples buying habits change just enough, the profits from low-cost players will far and away dwarf anything Apple could imagine with their "high margin" hardware. Trust me, there's a much larger market in the $199.99(Canadian) range than the $399.99 range. I'd much rather make 10 cents for each of a billion sold than $10 from each of a million sold.

Apple's best bet is to try and get a percentage of each on-line music sale. That's where the money will be even if it isn't now.

Re:Am I missing something?

[abhikhurana]

Well, it has always been and will always be players... I chatted with the MTV CEO about why they don't enter the music distribution business, considering that they already have the relationships in place. And then he brought me down to earth. How much do you think does apple earn from selling one song? About 20-30 cents. The rest goes to music companies and artists. So how many songs do you have to sell in order to make 50 million dollars, an amount which is fairly trivial actually for these companies. The answer is around 250 million... so there is no way that a company can make a lot of money here.. in fact apple pissed off a lot of people by carging 99 cents per song, because they set the industry standard, which no one can deviate from now.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Compenguin]

> Apple is not a monopoly in any meaningful sense of the term (except for the fact that they seem to be the only firm employing good industrial designers).

Again you are thinking horizontal. They are creating vendor lockout on their music player which has competitors to favor their music sotre which has competitors.

> I'm an iPod owner, and that hasn't infringed my choice to tell all the online music vendors to go screw.

Just because there are other competitors doesn't mean you have to do buisness with them you are free to continue buying from Apple.

Right now if Apple raises their prices on Music that comes on non-standard CDs customers have no recourse.

> Virgin's making a money-grab.

So is Apple.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Moofie]

Monopolies are only bad insofar as they unduly restrict peoples' choices. You're still free to not buy stuff from Apple, so there's no real restriction in choice. One of the choices you make when you buy from Apple is "Our stuff works really well with our stuff. If you want to use other stuff, you might consider something else."

Apple has, what? Less than 20% of the portable player market? But people still buy their music in droves at the iTMS? Sounds like they've got a good product, but hardly a monopoly.

Note: I think the iTMS is a bad deal too, and I won't use it. Other people disagree. Note that everybody involved is free to do so.

Apple is trying to build good products. Virgin is trying to use legal machinations to limit the value of Apple's investment in building good products. Apple good. Virgin bad.

Re:Am I missing something?

[2nd Post!]

Right, except that for every handful of songs, Apple has probably sold an iPod to PLAY those songs.

So 100 million downloads = $10 million dollars, plus $180 million in iPods (they've sold about three million by now, and I'm just guessing at $60 profit per iPod. I hear they have 22% margin, so if the average iPod is $350, that would be about $77) and there's no reason they can't sell another four million iPods in the next year and another 400 million songs, what with *three* new music stores and two new distributors!

Re:Am I missing something?

[abhikhurana]

Exactly, so Apple's model is to make money form IPOD sales, not from distribution of songs.... thats just an additional service to push the sales of IPODs... I was just responsding to the parent, and a few others who were speculating whether there is money in distribution or not, and the answer is that no, unless you can use distribution to push a hardware device, or maybe a DRM technology(something like what sony is now trying to with with Sony Connect) there is not a lot of money in distribution

Re:Am I missing something?

[black mariah]

This is fucking stupid. MS has never been a HARDWARE MANUFACTURER. Their software has always run on PC's. A more appropriate analogy would be IBM and Apple, but AFAIK IBM never really put much stock in the PC keeping them alive, they were more concerned with the server side of things.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have to disagree with you. What almost killed Apple was a lack of focus and licensing MacOS was one factor in a long string of bonehead decisions.
Apple missed several important events that should've been on their radar. It was clear early in the 1990s that they should have had a good plan to update MacOS which they didn't Instead, they blundered through many OSes: Taligent, Pink, Copland, etc.. They tried to maintain 100% compatibility in each of them and failed. Ironically, Microsoft fell into the same trap too.

Then they missed the boat on the Internet. In early days of Internet, Mosaic and Netscape ruled on Macs. But Apple has never really done much on this front until later. They saw Windows 95 on their radar, but stupidly underestimated the trend. Instead, they tried to be cute with something like C:\NGRTLTN WIN95 (I don't remember the exact phrase) and had nothing to counter the hype. Also, throughout the time, they had ungodly mess with their inventory. It wasn't odd to have them thrown out when they introduced a new line. Speaking of product lines, they had many of them: Performa 5*00, 6*00, PowerMac 6*00, 7*00, 8*00, and 9*00. They had multiple configuration such as processor speed and HD size and CD-ROM. Consumers were confused at this mess. Add this to the clones which added more confusion and ate Apple's profit.

By the time Windows 95 was hyped and the Internet took off, it was too late. The Internet boom placed demands on IT people who were trained solely as Win admins and there were the great purges of Macs from companies. When Jobs got back, the first thing he did was put Apple back in focus... cutting product lines, cutting off the clones, etc.. The rest was history.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Ohreally_factor]

Again you are thinking horizontal. They are creating vendor lockout on their music player which has competitors to favor their music sotre which has competitors.

They're creating vendor lock out? How's that? They don't control the music, the record labels do that. If they had monopoly power, they could limit inputs (music to distribute) to other companies, and basically not allow other online music stores to compete. As it is, the cartel of music labels, which we can just call the RIAA for convenience, controls the music. They will sell rights to distribute to anyone who wants to start up an online music store, so long as you meet their requirements.

I think part of the problem is that you are using the outmoded term "vertical monopoly" when you should be using the term "vertical integration". You might be able to use the term vertical monopoly if Apple had sole control of the music, as I have said, but they don't.

Vertical integration does not make a monopoly. Being the most successful player in a new area doesn't make one a monopoly. You're mischaracterizing the current state* of Apple's business by throwing terms around loosely. So is Virgin, for that matter, but they're attempting to make profit without providing a competitive product. They want to compete in the courts because they offer no innovation, no compelling reason to use their products over Apple's. Similar deal with Real, although Real chose to "innovate", although it remains to be seen whether this innovation will really help the consumer or hurt the consumer, or even help Real all that much. Still, at least Real's actions offer more choice, though not necessarily a good choice.

I'm not up on French law, but I can tell you that Virgin's strategy would not work in the U.S. courts. As far as Real goes, the only way Apple could take them to court and win is if they used the novel (perhaps whimsical) argument that their DRM works both ways, protecting the sanctity of the iPod as well as the rights of the music copyright owners. They'd have to convince the court that this outweighs the interoperability provisions of the DMCA.

*I say the current state because it is theoretically possible that Apple could eventually control both 95% of online music sales and 95% of mp3 player sales, in which case, you could argue that they were a monopoly. But we all know that the real monopoly, er, cartel, the RIAA is not going to let that happen in online music sales.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Anonymous Coward]

Last two quarters, they've made a small profit. If sales increase, this profit will increase, due to economies of scale. I.E., it's all gravy after the rent is paid.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Zork the Almighty]

I don't know what is funnier, you post or its moderation.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Anonymous Coward]

We already know the money is in the players and content, not in the distribution. Apple has publicly stated they net like a dime on every song they distribute.

Re:Am I missing something?

[Ohreally_factor]

Yeah, chalk up another score for the mods. They're big weiners. I mean winners.

Re:Am I missing something?

[wulfhound]

Apple manages to have good margins because it's premium, niche gear - they're the equivalent of yuppie-grade audiophile hi-fi gear. Nice design and above-average engineering sold at a large premium.

I have no doubt that Apple can continue to make some of the best players on the market, and even sell them at a profit - the question is, is it a market that's worth being in for them if they only have 2-3% of it, as they do with computers? When Sony have a $99 2GB player, no-name Chinese-made players are $50, and the Samsung phone you get free with your contract has a multi-GB memory, where's the market for a $399 hard-disk player? Yes, some people can and will buy them for the flash factor, but most of the market is Honda and Dell, not BMW and Macintosh.

Re:Am I missing something?

[wulfhound]

Yeah, like those Sinclair portable TVs did in the 80s? Or even those little portable DVD players that look like miniature laptops without the keys? Video and audio are fundamentally not the same thing (you really can't watch video whilst doing something else at the same time, which is the reason you need the tiny form factor in the first place; and those postage stamp screens are just too damn small for most people to enjoy video on anyways). The only time most people want such a thing is for live streaming video - news, sporting events, talking to a loved one or important business contact - and for that, a 3G phone is the right device.

Now, personally, I think it's a great shame that the phone, and not the handheld general purpose computer, is the device that everything seems to be converging around - the phone companies have the worst proprietary-software, secrecy, lock-it-all-down philosophy of any hi-tech industry besides the military. But it seems, unsurprisingly, that the phone is the device that the great unwashed find to be the best starting point - communication is what people want to do more than anything else, so they're prepared to work harder to overcome their natural technophobia when that's the goal.

Re:Am I missing something?

[wulfhound]

The reason the iPod is good compared to the other players is that engineering a small, light, hard drive based player, with good battery life and reasonable survivability, is hard. Most of those companies just don't seem to have the design and engineering skills that Apple is rightly famous for.

Take the hard drive out of the equation, though, and it's a total piece of cake. All of a sudden, the battery can be smaller, the electronics simpler, you don't need any of the impact protection... building a decent Flash player in an iPod-mini form factor is trivial. The only limiting factor, right now, is that cheap and readily available Flash chips are not quite big enough yet - Joe Average probably needs 2GB to hold all the music they want to listen to with any kind of regularity.

As to the software side... it would not surprise me to see the more advanced P2P players (Shareaza, eMule and the like) come up with an open API for portable player vendors (if such a thing doesn't exist already) - when that happens, iTunes might as well never have existed.

Holy!

[darth_MALL]

Virgins!?! Apples!?!? It's all sounding very biblical to me. Leave it up to the Big Man to decide.

Re:Holy!

[tuple]

Big Men in France? Ha, that's a hoot!

Re:Holy!

[superpulpsicle]

BigMan?? Does that mean Microsoft.

Re:Holy!

[Anonymous Coward]

And to think there was a time when our children were being taught that the "Antichrist" was an old Land-Rover.

Re:Holy!

[Anonymous Coward]

just wait to see that Gates (of Eden) wants a piece of the market too.

Re:Holy!

[Anonymous Coward]

Steve has already said that he doesn't want to license it.

Re:Holy!

[Brendor]

"Leave it up to the Big Man to decide."

Steve or Bill?

IE-only shoppe

[jez9999]

Le navigateur que vous utlisez ne vous permet de surfer sur ce site.
Pour surfer sur ce site nous vous recommandons d'utiliser Internet Explorer comme navigateur.

Looks like they don't want you using anything but IE to access their rather shitty site. Going in with IE, I can tell you it doesn't seem like there are any Windows-only features there that would justify not accepting other browsers; just doubtless lazy web design. Good example of a site to quote when somebody asks you for a major site that is incompatible with non-IE browsers.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Xshare]

Just use the User-Agent Switcher, works for me.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[PhilipPeake]

It gets worse. Try the site with Firefox on Linux and you get this:

Les navigateurs adaptés au surf sur ce site ne sont pas encore disponible pour le système d'exploitation que vous utilisez. Voici la liste des plate-formes permettant d'accéder à toutes les fonctionnalités du site : - Plateforme Windows (98 SE et supérieur)

Someone needs an attitude adjustment...

For the language impaired, this translates as:

The browsers suitable for surfing this site are not yet available for the operating system you are using. Here are the platforms permitting access to all the functionality of this site:- Windows 98 and later.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Anonymous Coward]

And they claim for interoperability with Apple format...
Contradiction ? Where ?

Re:IE-only shoppe

[armyofone]

"Just use the User-Agent Switcher, works for me."

Terrible advice IMHO. The more that other browsers identify as IE, the less likely these lazy designers will ever catch a clue. Do the world a favor and send them an e-mail explaining why you won't be back instead. It might not get through to them, but acquiescing definitely won't.

Just my 40% of a nickel...

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Midnight Thunder]

Looks like they don't want you using anything but IE to access their rather shitty site.

We'll have to complain to the French government to get Virgin to open up their website. We can't have this IE onlu monopoloy.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure that will work.

I modified my Firefox (on Linux) string to identify me as IE 6.0 on XP (tried with 98 too). This worked so far as it no longer told me I needed to use Windows, but they still identified me as not using IE for some reason.

Maybe it's the default if you can't load an ActiveX control?

Re:IE-only shoppe

[fred_sanford]

User-Agent Switcher, gets 'em everytime :)

Re:IE-only shoppe

[oliverthered]

I like to send in replies to job applications telling them how there curent site is badly designed, refering them to standards,
accessability documentation &co and asking them to make sure that anyone they hire has xyz skills (e.g. CSS).

I try not to mention things like 'firefox' or 'linux' in these emails unless it is a particular problem, just industry standards.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[ch3]

Bienvenue sur VirginMega.fr !

Pour surfer sur ce site depuis un Mac vous devez utiliser Internet Explorer 5.2 et supérieur, comme navigateur.

aargh. Seems even Safari is denied from access to this store!! Can't believe they want me to use IE5.2 Mac to view it!

I tried with Firefox (on a Mac using User Agent Switcher). Everything seems to work but then crash. Let's hope Apple won't be forced to licence its technologies to such company!

Re:IE-only shoppe

[dgatwood]

Dunno. With the exception of one little warning box (about being unable to load something with content type of MIMEole or some such similar Microsoftian crap), it works fine on Safari in Mac OS X if I change the user agent.... File a bug against FIreFox. :-)

Re:IE-only shoppe

[canavan]

And they are displaying this even to GoogleBot/2.1, which I'm usually using as User-Agent. It also kind of breaks google's indexing, they seem to have spidered hundreds of those pages, and cached almost none, since they are all the same.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[jc42]

So let's get together a list of the browsers that can either send an exact mimic of an IE ID string, or that can be given the ID string in a config window or such.

Lynx and Opera can do this. The reqwireless browser on my BlackBerry can do it to (and even asked me if I wanted it to pretend to be IE the first time I fired it up ;-).

Which other browsers can pass for IE to idiotic sites like this?

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Yaztromo]

The site apparently isn't Windows only -- on a Mac running FireFox and Safari, I get:

Pour surfer sur ce site depuis un Mac vous devez utiliser Internet Explorer 5.2 et supérieur, comme navigateur.

IE has to be one of the absolute worst browsers available for Mac OS X. It's slow, looks terrible, and was the very first thing I deleted from my PowerBook.

The truly galling part is they recommend I use IE 5.2 or better. And I am -- FireFox is better.

So let me get this straight. They don't support Apple Mac OS X users using the default OS X browser (Safari), but they want access to Apple's DRM technology Apple originally created to service the same people who use OS X and Safari. Uh-huh.

Methinks VirginMega needs to fix their own support for Apple before they worry about Apple supporting them.

Yaz.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[wrf3]

Don't appease the French? How politically incorrect of you! You're making John Kerry cry!

Re:IE-only shoppe

[josecanuc]

'cuz we all know that France is the expert at getting Virgins to open up... ;-)

-offtopic

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Anonymous Coward]

No, no, no... This is an election year. Don't you realize that your 'vote' for Firefox, Mozilla, Opera is a wasted vote. Your one voice doesn't matter. You must choose the lesser evil, let your browser ID as IE, just so you can participate. Or better yet, just don't browse at all until everyone supports your broweser of choice.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[petard]

Since it's a javascript trick, it shouldn't affect googlebot... the real googlebot will just ignore the javascript. What happens if you turn javascript off then try?

Re:IE-only shoppe

[skahshah]

Hey! 2 weeks ago they wouldn't even let you access the store with IE5.2. You just had an alert asking you to download the last version of IE for Mac (even if you went there with the said last version: IE 5.2.3).

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Lysander Luddite]

As a former web-monkey I can assure you the designer probably had very little input on what browsers to support.

Blame the marketing managers who probably made the call to do "IE-only"

Re:IE-only shoppe

[hawaiian717]

I do find Mac IE good for printing. It's become less and less of a problem, but there are still pages that IE does a far better job rendering for printing than Firefox.

Here's an example of a page I recently had to go into IE to get to print nicely -- Preview showed me that Firefox would have cropped off the right edge of the text. http://niap.nist.gov/cc-scheme/interps-process.htm l

Re:IE-only shoppe

[FredFnord]

Safari does a great job on that page, though.

-fred

Re:IE-only shoppe

[hawaiian717]

You're right. I just tried a print preview of it from Safari and it did look fine. I just haven't used Safari all that much. I started using IE at version 2.1, and finally moved away for good to OmniWeb 4 and more recently to Firebird/Firefox.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[hunterx11]

1. defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1
2. ???
3. Profit!

Seriously though, run the command in a shell, relaunch Safari and change user-agent in the debug menu.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[Ohreally_factor]

They would be if they could find any.

Re:IE-only shoppe

[canavan]

It's not just java script - it's a server-side feature. Just check the results in google yourself.

iPod needs WMA

[MysticalMatt517]

Truthfully I don't see the need for Apple to license their FairPlay technology as much as I see the iPod needing to support WMA. Apple has already stated that they don't make money off iTMS, but off iPod sales generated from iTMS interest. Consequently making the iPod able to play just about anything would help further increase their gravy. Most people will still end up using iTMS anyway.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Kosi]

WMA has absolutely no use, better make the iPod play Vorbis, Musepack, FLAC and APE.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[2nd Post!]

If everything you say is true, then WMA is pointless.

Especially since iTunes will transcode unprotected WMA... Not the BEST solution, but it is a solution.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[weez75]

Supporting WMA isn't in Apple's best interest. Controlling the format means controlling royalties. If Apple licenses FairPlay they make money from those who use it. If Apple supports WMA then they make money only on iPods and not their intellectual capital that is FairPlay. You suggest supporting WMA will sell more iPods which I counter because WMA doesn't really help sell any music devices today. The standard is MP3 which the iPod already supports.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Neophytus]

... apart from being the format of choice in almost every other online music store.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Kosi]

... which is one of the main reasons why they suck that much.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[enjoilax]

I agree. Plus WMA is the worst music format out there...

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Xugumad]

The other thing is, some of us like the iTMS, but don't like the iPod. The iTunes phone is a nice idea, and might suit me better, we'll see. What I really want is a small device with say 256mb of flash I can store music, and whatever other files I want, on.

Like, the Creative Muvo, for example.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[myrdred]

iTunes is able to import WMA songs and convert them to your format of choice (one that iTunes supports of course, ie MP3, WAV, AIFF, AAC, etc). You can then, further, transfer the converted song and play it on your iPod with out any problems.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Yaztromo]

Now what benifit would Apple see by helping Microsoft gain total dominance in the music format wars?

We're in the very fortunate position right now where the dominant music format has no digital rights management built into it (MP3), and where Apple's own format has fairly low restriction DRM built into it, and where there are other formats (ATRAC3, WMA) in competition.

But give Microsoft too much sway by making their format the ubequitous one and they'll be the ones in control. And we've already seen what sort of control they like to leverage given the opportunity -- just look at what happened once Windows became a defacto standard.

Sorry, but supporting WMA would be a terrible idea for Apple and for consumers. I applaud them from staying away from it.

Now if only my iPod would play Ogg Vorbis...

Yaz.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Yaztromo]

iTunes is able to import WMA songs and convert them to your format of choice

Slight correction: iTunes is able to transcode WMA on Windows. iTunes on Mac OS X has no such capability.

Yaz.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Lord Kano]

I agree. Plus WMA is the worst music format out there...

Remember .MID?

LK

Re:iPod needs WMA

[enjoilax]

it has its uses! (ringtones...?)

Re:iPod needs WMA

[thephotoman]

Don't remind me. I used it in the early 90s for some music composition and recording I did at the time. It was a terrible format that was next-to-impossible to encode and had no support outside the very small community of users.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[jcr]

the format of choice in almost every other online music store. ..which all add up to approximately 1/4 of a hill of beans, IIRC.

-jcr

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Anonymous Coward]

apart from being the format of choice in almost every other online music store.

..whose market share adds up to squat. "Every other online music store" is nobody.

And, BTW, WMA is not the format of choice in every other online music store. Red book CD is. Apple's format, plus WMA, plus MP3, all combined, add up to an nearly insignificant share of the music market. I bet Amazon does more business in a day selling CDs, than Apple;s music store does in a month.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[TheoMurpse]

i have a muvo...it's nice and all... however there are things wrong... for one, seeking is not possible through trakcs for another skipping to a certain track takes a while, even if you only have 15 songs on it...gotta wait a split second between each press of the 'skip track' button for another there is no display to see what song you are about to play...to see if you got the right song, gotta wait until the song is loud and faded in so you can pick up on it to determine if you have the right song playing. so in summary: the muvo is sexy enough to where my japanese friends see at and say "OMG IT"S SO SMALL!" (which is always a good thing to hear from the land of all-is-small), but has a horrible interface for -real- music listening

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Bricklets]

Can Windows Media Player on MacOSX even play WMA files downloaded from places like Napster?

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Yaztromo]

Can Windows Media Player on MacOSX even play WMA files downloaded from places like Napster?

I don't think so, although admittedly as my network consists of one Mac, one OS/2 box, and four different Linux boxes, I've never downloaded any Windows Media files to try them out (as the only system they'll possibly play on is the PowerBook).

Yaz.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Ohreally_factor]

Hey man, that's still a lot of beans, if you're talking a metric hill.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[kmcneely]

Do you know what sucks? The fact that making the best product possible isn't the best thing you can do for business.

Re:iPod needs WMA

[Yaztromo]

Do you know what sucks? The fact that making the best product possible isn't the best thing you can do for business.

Amen to that.

Yaz.

Heh

[Anonymous Crowhead]

- Plateforme Windows (98 SE et supérieur)

Re:Heh

[ShadyG]

Linux est supérior de Windows, n'est pas?

Re:Heh

[prockcore]

- Plateforme Windows (98 SE et supérieur)

Strange.. I've got linux.. what's the deal? Virgin must not think its superior to 98.

Wouldn't this be good for users too?

[rokzy]

isn't Apple's DRM the sensible one apart from being WinXP/2000 (and Macs) only?

Re:Wouldn't this be good for users too?

[drinkypoo]

There is no sensible DRM. What would be good for consumers is if VirginMega sold songs in MP3 format, which has no DRM, and which the iPod (and everything else) already plays.

What is Apple dominant in?

[SuperKendall]

Virgin claims that Apple is abusing a "dominant" position by not licensing its own DRM.

But "dominant" is not really applcable yet. Are they dominant in music sales overall? No way. Are they dominant in being able to play music you buy online? Not even that is true, since the percentage of PC's is so much larger than Macs.

Perhaps at some distant point, when online music sales erally exceed physical CD sales (if ever?) then Apple might be called "dominant". In this case it's like a black hole calling the kettle black.

There is even an out if they REALLY want to sell music that can play on an iPod - MP3. Just because that format lacks technological features they would like, does that really give them cause to proclaim Apple is a monopoly that should be forced to share?

It will be interesting to see what the courts make of it.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[ElForesto]

You're right on track. If I start a company in a new industry and instantly get 100% market share, does that give new entrants the right to sue me for not licensing my technology? Hell no! Virgin doesn't quite seem to get that just because Apple is the most popular, it hasn't done anything really nasty/illegal to be there.

Sounds like Virgin doesn't really want to compete in this market. It just wants a big chunk of it handed to them.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Anonymous Coward]

iTunes and FairPlay run on PCs. This issue is not limited to Mac users.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[proj_2501]

"Are they dominant in being able to play music you buy online? Not even that is true, since the percentage of PC's is so much larger than Macs."

The iTunes Music Store claims 70 percent of all legal online music sales and works on both Windows and Mac. If they are correct, I'd call that a dominant position.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[afidel]

I don't know French law but under US law you have to abuse a monopoly position in order to get your wrist slapped (see Microsoft), simply having a monopoly does not place any burden on you. Natural monopolies are not a bad thing, if you have a superior product and the market naturally flows most of the business your way then you have been a good capatalist and produced a superior product at a price point that most of the market will bear.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[proj_2501]

I didn't mean to imply that Apple was indeed abusing their (possible) monopoly. I think they have a dominant position in the market due to a desirable product.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[timeOday]

I agree there's no need for govt. intervention here. That means not forcing Apple to open up, but it also means not punishing Real for uncovering the trick to compatibility (which under US law might well happen).

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[prockcore]

Are they dominant in being able to play music you buy online? Not even that is true, since the percentage of PC's is so much larger than Macs.

But it is true. iTMS has a 70% marketshare (market being "legal online music downloads"). That means 70% of all legal music downloads require fairplay, and Apple refuses to license fairplay to anyone.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Elwood P Dowd]

I wonder who patented the selling-DRM-music-on-the-intarweb business model.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[SilentChris]

They're clearly dominant in legal digital music sales, which is their concern. Especially since Jupiter predicts 20% of all music sales will be downloads in a few years.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Durandal64]

What's stopping other stores from selling their music in MP3 format? That plays on iPods just fine. Oh, the record labels won't license unless you use DRM? Well I don't really see how the record labels' policy is Apple's problem.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Forbman]

...but this is in France.

My guess would be that Apple simply stops iTMS in France. In spanish, I think the phrase would be something like "come mierda".

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[coenbros]

Let's assume for the sake of argument that Apple is not only dominant, but has a monopoly in the music download market. According to U.S. antitrust law, it is not illegal to gain a monopoly in a market segment if you do it through legitimate market forces, such as selling a really good product that the public really wants to buy. But once you are a monopoly in that market segment, you cannot use the power you now have as a monopoly to exert undue influence in other market segments. This was the crux of the antitrust suite against Microsoft. The findings of fact determined that they were a monopoly in operating systems, and that was OK. But they used the monopoly power to exert illegal influence in the web browser market (Doesn't that seem like such ancient history now?).

So, by my argument, where has Apple done anything illegal by not licensing Fairplay? Of course, French and/or EU antitrust law may have more restrictive definitions. Apple's stance may also backfire on them in the end, but that would be another example of market forces making the determination.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Quikah]

Uh, well apple refuses to license the DRM tech of the ipod to its competitors thus keep the entire ipod market to themselves. Sounds pretty abusive to me.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Cameroon]

IANAL but that doesn't seem even close to abusive. Apple has a product and doesn't want to sell tools to create competitors to that product. How is that abusive? Where is it a law that a company has to sell it's competitors the tools/technology to compete?

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Quikah]

So I gather you thought it was OK for Lexmark to chip their printers to only accept Lexmark created cartridges then?

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[slipstick]

Which product, iTMS or iPods?

This is what you get when you have 2 products that you tie together.

I'm not saying Apple's right or Virgin is wrong but I am not surprised in the least by this.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[slipstick]

You missed one part, once you have a monopoly you cannot exert undue influence to MAINTAIN the monopoly. By not licensing FairPlay Apple is exerting undue influence in their current monopoly or so the argument could go.

(This presumes of course you believe they have a monopoly in a mature market.)

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Donny Smith]

Of course - if the fact is known or could be known prior to the purchase, what's the problem?
If you have a problem with that, just buy some other printer.

You can't buy a Benz and then accuse D-C of overpricing spare parts. Are they supposed to be good guys and sell them at cost?

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[prockcore]

What's stopping other stores from selling their music in MP3 format? That plays on iPods just fine. Oh, the record labels won't license unless you use DRM? Well I don't really see how the record labels' policy is Apple's problem.

I'll tell you what the problem is. Because Apple is being stubborn about allowing people to create DRM'd AACs they're going to lose the format wars.

Then we're all going to be stuck with WMA because it's free to use, and MS is going to mop the floor with apple again.

This is definately apple's problem. The iPod isn't a sure thing. You think it's that difficult for someone else to come out with a device that works better than the iPod? It's only a matter of time.

Consumers are going to be given a choice between purchasing an iPod, which only works with Apple's store, or purchasing *anything else* which works with all the other stores. Apple will lose. Just like every other market Apple has ever tried to dominate.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Quikah]

An ink cartridge is a consumable part. The consumable parts on a Benz (oil filter, air filter, brake pads, tires, gas, etc) are all available from 3rd party manufacturers. Try again.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Ohreally_factor]

In French, it's Bon Apetit.

(Man, I'm really ragging on the French tonite. I'm not normally a franco-phobe. Sorry French. I still like your mustard.)

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Ohreally_factor]

That's still a pretty huge stretch. Think about it. That's like saying that MS maintains their monopoly illegally by not releasing their source code.

The more fruitful avenue would be product tie-in, but that too is a stretch, since you can play other formats on the iPod (such as mp3) and you can play DRMed AACs on other devices (such as computers running iTunes.

Re:What is Apple dominant in?

[Donny Smith]

First, I did not claim they aren't available from 3rd party manufacturers. There are, and many of them are made in violation of trademark laws - the same thing as ink cartridges "for HP printers" (trademark violation) or copies of completely GPL-ed "Red Hat Linux".

Second, using parts from unauthorized 3rd party manufacturers (in case of printer cartridges usually there are no authorized 3rd party manufacturers) voids your guaratee, pal.
http://www.mbatc.de/english/bedingungen.htm

So if you think this is "unfair" or that original cartridges are "too expensive", either don't buy such printer (car) or take the risk of screwing up your printer (car) and buy fake cartridges (spare parts), but don't bitch about it.

Make it the standard

[5n3ak3rp1mp]

because PlayFair already cracked it and will allow us to unlock what we've purchased. The main site's taken down, but you can just google "playfair-0.5.0" or the like.

Or just burn to CD and re-encode, but who wants to waste cd's and time doing that?

There are also already plugins for Winamp that will play both .m4a as well as .m4p files (as long as you have iTunes installed)

Re:Make it the standard

[MORTAR_COMBAT!]

I think you meant to say: HYMN.

Re:Make it the standard

[rokzy]

couldn't you burn to a virtual CD drive (.iso) and rip back?

semi-OT: I got rid of my (legal) mp3s recently cos all they did was make backups a pain and I like to encode in FLAC via Grip now, and play back with XMMS and CrossFade. Having all my CDs as mp3 seemed great until I realised I really only listen to a couple on a regular basis.

Re:Make it the standard

[johnny_sas]

"but who wants to waste cd's and time doing that"

YOu can just use CDRWs

Re:Make it the standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, I think he said what he meant.

Re:Make it the standard

[MORTAR_COMBAT!]

(the hymn project is the continuation of the playfair code -- the playfair code is obsolete).

Re:Make it the standard

[jc42]

Or just burn to CD and re-encode, but who wants to waste cd's and time doing that?

Why bother? All I did on my PB was tell iTunes to convert its files to MP3, which it was happy to do. I then scp'd them to my linux box, and the software there played them just fine. I put them up (in a hidden directory so I couldn't be charged with a crime ;-) on the linux box's web server, and downloaded them back to the PB, and that worked fine, too. Funny thing was that the browser on the PB (I forget which one) just handed them to iTunes, which apparently recognized them as the same as the tunes it already had, because rather than entering them as new tunes, it just played the tunes that were already in its iTunes directory tree.

I'm tempted to do this copy cycle a few more times, and see if the limit to copying is enforced. I wonder if there's a place for Apple's DRM data in an MP3 file? Or maybe it's in those *.m4a and *.m4p files that I see here and there.

There is the minor objection that the initial conversion to MP3 is lossy. I wonder if there's an approach that isn't? Can iTunes convert to WAV? I don't see that as an option.

Re:Make it the standard

[fiftyvolts]

I think that to do this you have to use some smoke and mirrors to convnince iTunes to burn onto it. I haven't done too much research on that, but it's totally not a 1-2-3 solution.

Re:Make it the standard

[swb]

Is there a virtual CD-R(W) like Daemon Tools is for CDs?

That would be awesome then -- you could literally burn the data to a virtual device, and rip it back from the virtual device and never waste blanks. If they can stimulate a virtual CD, it would stand to reason that a virtual CD-R wouldn't be impossible.

Re:Make it the standard

[Kiryat Malachi]

Yes and no - you can do that if you aren't re-lossy encoding it, otherwise you're going to suffer the doubled artifacts of two lossy conversions.

Re:Make it the standard

[Anonymous Coward]

FYI, iTunes can convert not only to WAV, but also to AIFF and Apple Lossless, both lossless encoding.

Re:Make it the standard

[Lehk228]

piggyback a FLAC encoder onto Daemon so it will catch CD-Audio burns seperately and make a folder of FLAC files.

What do they whine for?

[Kosi]

If they sold normal MP3 or AAC files, they would play perfectly on the iPod, and the customers were more pleased. So their claim that they could not sell songs "for the iPod" is absolutely ridiculous!

Re:What do they whine for?

[prockcore]

If they sold normal MP3 or AAC files, they would play perfectly on the iPod, and the customers were more pleased. So their claim that they could not sell songs "for the iPod" is absolutely ridiculous!

Why doesn't Apple sell normal MP3s or AAC files then? Oh that's right because the RIAA won't let them. Yet you expect Virgin to do the impossible?

Re:What do they whine for?

[jfengel]

They can't, for the most part, sell unprotected MP3s or AACs; the content owners (read: RIAA in the US, and others in Europe) won't let them.

Whether they should let them, P2P trading improves record sales, information wants to be free, I bought it so I can do what I want to with it, yadda yadda, isn't my point. Virgin can't sell unprotected MP3s, so they can't sell to that valuable market ofiPod owners.

I'm afraid I have no clue as to French monopoly laws. Actually, I'm not an expert on anybody's business laws, but I gather that this wouldn't work in the US: you have to abuse your monopoly position; for example, by selling things under cost to drive competitors out of business, then raise rates. Actually, arguably iTunes Music Store does just that, so they may have a case.

Re:What do they whine for?

[larkost]

So... Apple is now legally responsible for the decisions made by the RIAA? Interesting idea.

Re:What do they whine for?

[Heywood Yabuzof]

Well, that's not really Apple's problem, is it? That's something Virgin and the RIAA need to figure out.

Apple figured out a fairly good way to get a compromise between easy online purchase and satisfying the RIAA. Why should other online stores benefit from all the work Apple did to figure that out? Apple is under no obligation to let competitors take advantage of the deals Apple made with the RIAA.

Re:What do they whine for?

[prockcore]

So... Apple is now legally responsible for the decisions made by the RIAA? Interesting idea.

No, my point is that hipocrites should shut the hell up. They defend Apple's usage of DRM, saying that it's the RIAA's fault and if Apple could sell music without DRM they would. Then they turn around and say that if Virgin wants to compete, they should sell DRM-less music.

Re:What do they whine for?

[Durandal64]

Bullshit. Virgin is claiming that it is impossible to sell legal music that will play on the iPod. That's simply ridiculous. They could sell vanilla MP3 or AAC files. So there goes their entire argument. The RIAA's policies on who to license their music to simply is not Apple's problem.

Re:What do they whine for?

[Kosi]

the content owners

Aehm, isn't Virgin one of them? They could sell at least their own stuff in every legal way they want, including DRM-less.

And another thought: Apple did surely not implement the DRM mechanism because they wanted one, it were the content owners, of whom Virgin is a part. So they temselves are (partially) to blame that the iPod has this DRM included. And now they want do sue Apple because Apple did what they requested? That's a good laugh!

From which point you look at it, their claims are simply insane and ridiculous!

Re:What do they whine for?

[jfengel]

From which point you look at it, their claims are simply insane and ridiculous!

In general, when you find yourself saying this, you may need to reconsider the issue. They may be fools, but it's more likely that they have a different, potentially valid, opinion on something. If you think they're stupid, odds are good that they may have a point you have missed.

In this case, Virgin (the record store) and Virgin (the record label) are different companies; the record label was spun off some years ago.

Even besides that, it is still in the interests of Virgin (the record store) to sell DRM content. They wish to sell stuff to you, and to each of your friends. They believe that the best way to do that is to prevent you from giving it away to your friends for free. Thus, DRM.

They may be wrong that DRM is necessary, and it may even be detrimental, but it's not ludicrous to think that some sort of mechanism of limiting copying would increase their profits over allow you to give it away to all of your friends, or the entire world, for free.

Unfortunately for them, they don't have the DRM that can play on iPods. What they want from Apple is to "open" the DRM in the sense of allowing Virgin (the record store) to encode music so that they can sell to iPod owners. That would allow Virgin (the record store) to sell music from their suppliers (including, but not limited to, Virgin [the record label]) to iPod owners.

Thing is, that may be best for Apple, too, since Apple makes next to nothing on the music they sell; the whole thing is a ploy to sell iPods. If Virgin could sell to iPod owners, that makes iPods more valuable, which means more profit for Apple.

I'm not sure what Apple's strategy is, but I assume they have one. It may be "brand unity"; they like to own the entire process, just like they are the only vendor of Mac computers for the MacOS operating system.

But I doubt Virgin-the-record-store would find it profitable to sell DRM-less music, even if they did own Virgin-the-record-label (and even though they receive less of the sale than the record labels do). They don't wish to break Apple's DRM; they want to get in on it.

Re:What do they whine for?

[Kosi]

Virgin (the record store) and Virgin (the record label) are different companies;

Isn't this like T-Com, T-Mobile and T-Online, which are all "different companies", but are completely owned by the Telekom?

Unfortunately for them, they don't have the DRM that can play on iPods.

Then they should sue Virgin (the label) and the other labels for forcing DRM on Apple, not Apple. Apple didn't do this because they wanted to have DRM, they did it because there was no other way to get to terms with the labels.

Re:What do they whine for?

[Ohreally_factor]

Or perhaps Virgin should find artists/copyright holders that are willing to license their music for digital distribution without DRM. I don't see what is stopping them. Then they could sell DRM free mp3s or AACs.

This begs the question, would anybody buy such songs in enough volume for Virgin to be profitable? Since they'd probably be distributing music from non-mainstream bands, probably not. But that would be their problem, not Apple's.

It might not change much...

[brainstyle]

...at least for now. Unless Virgin can offer a music buying experience that works as seamlessly with the iPod as Apple's - since it's clear that they're trying to sell their tunes to iPod owners - then they'll still be missing the point. I suspect what most people dig most about the iTunes store is integration and ease of use. They aren't terribly concerned about file formats and rights managements schemes. Sure, some are - plenty here on Slashdot, for instance - but I doubt the average person is too concerned by that.

Plus, Apple's the cool music company right now. I just saw someone on the street this morning walking with her nice custom-made iPod purse which still clearly had an Apple logo on it, so you knew it was an iPod in there, and that she dug Apple. I suspect she'd use the iTunes store (except I'm in Canada, alas).

But then, I may be underestimating the tech literacy of the average person. I'd be glad if that were the case.

Re:It might not change much...

[Anonymous Coward]

On my way to work, I saw another person driving a Mustang and even had the Flowmaster 2 chamber catback exhaust system just like mine. I thought, who really gives a fuck? I can not make an assumption of this persons character based on this. I do not feel some strange interconnection between him and I. Why do Apple zealots feel they have some kind of connection with the company or other Apple users? Wake up and realize that when push comes to shove, you will be treated like a dog. Other companies have tried to make the iPod capable of doing more things and yet all zealots claim it is a bad thing. Some idiot puts a text file on the iPod that lists wireless access points and the same zealots think it is great. On one hand more is bad, on the other more is good. Wake the fuck up. Disconnect yourself from the brand name, the time for that is mid life crisis, not now. Stop making excuses for why you bought the product. You compile software, work with computers all day, have driven many different cars in your life, dealt with electronic gadgets in your life, but yet, claim the iPod is so much easier to use then brand X, bragging about the iPod being so much easier and having such a hard time with brandX only shows your stupidity with anything more then basic building blocks that 3 year olds play with.

Re:It might not change much...

[Anonymous Coward]

I suspect she'd use the iTunes store (except I'm in Canada, alas).

I think you mispelled "eh"...

Pay?!?

[eviltypeguy]

Burns: Excellent! My secret plan to "reluctantly" license FairPlay DRM is coming along quite nicely, don't you think Smithers?

Smithers: But sir, won't we lose our exclusivity?

Burns: Smithers, you bumbling idiot. They may be able to license our DRM, but they'll pay, ooohh, yes, they'll pay...

old story

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet another company that can't win in the free market who needs the government's guns to help them steal a living.

Re: IE-only

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed. The trouble seems to come from this ugly routine in their JavaScript module:

function blockEnter(e,buttonName)
{ var characterCode ;
if(!ie)
{e = e;characterCode = e.which ;}
else
{characterCode = e.keyCode ;}
if(characterCode == 13)
{
if (getObj(buttonName))
{
if (ie)
setTimeout("getObj('" + buttonName + "').click()",100);
else
setTimeout("getObj('" + buttonName + "').click;",100);

return false ;

}
else
return false ;
}
else
{return true ;}
}

Apple monopolizes

[bunburyist]

Apple is a monopoly only to those who wish to purchase Apple products (which is a single-digit segment of the market). Virgin, on the other hand, controls all these record labels which are all involved in an organized scam of the public for cash...15 bucks for a CD?! thats insane! If anyone is abusing a monopoly its Virgin and their weird CEO branson.

Re:Apple monopolizes

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Branson is no longer CEO of Virgin Records, he sold it.

2. The question is not if Apple is a monopoly in any other market it participates in, but if it is a monopoly in the relevant market of selling music online and providing a player to play the music and if it is abusing its market share.

3. Just because you like Apple, something I can really understand, does not mean that they are acting the way they should in a market where they have an unusal big market share.

4. When it comes to anything else having to do with computers you as a Apple user (assuming you are one) would probably care a lot about open standards, why make an exeption when it comes to online music stores?

Re:Apple monopolizes

[proj_2501]

The Virgin Group controls exactly one record label: V2. VirginMega (the site up in arms) is the Virgin Megastore part of the business. Virgin Records was sold to EMI in 1992, and Branson no longer controls it.

I don't get Apple's reluctance to do this

[smartin]

If they opened up the format sure they will have to deal with competion but by having more devices that play it will increase demand for ITMS. By having other stores selling FairPlay files it will increase demand for the ipod. Seems like a win win situation. Surely they can compete on both the quality of the hardware and the store.

Re:I don't get Apple's reluctance to do this

[ViolentGreen]

Apple doesn't care about increasing demand for ITMS. Apple has said many times that they break about even on ITMS. The sole purpose of it is to sell their iPod.

Re:I don't get Apple's reluctance to do this

[Javagator]

The sole purpose of it is to sell their iPod.

Kazaa does more than ITMS can
To justify iPod to Man.

(Apologies to A. E. Houseman)

Re:I don't get Apple's reluctance to do this

[Bricklets]

Same thing with the iPods. People didn't understand before why Apple made iPods exclusive to Mac users. They were griping Apple for not realizing iPod's full potential. We all know how that's turning out. Apple bided its time and came out with a PC-compatible model when it was ready to take on the market.

Same can be said about iTunes. Just because Apple isn't opening iTMS today doesn't mean they don't have plans to do so in the near future. Everyone just needs to chill out a bit and be patient. Apple is probably biding their time again and tweaking iTunes into a better service until they're ready to take on the market.

Yey I can finaly download music...

[AngryScot]

...from other stores and play them on an iPod now I need an iPod..

Bad thing.

[ActionPlant]

In the earlier days of the iTunes music store, Apple itself reported very meager earnings indeed. It's long been Apple's policy to charge less for software and more for hardware; if this were to happen, sure, the resulting surge in sales would probably be high, but would iPod sales take a hit? Who knows. It seemed to me that Apple introduced iTunes and the music store on both Apple and PC platforms in order to help drive up iPod sales, from which it makes a tidy bundle. It may be pure speculation, but one could probably assume that doing this would probably hurt iPod sales, and the company in the process.

Re:Bad thing.

[1010011010]

No biggie. They can just license Fairplay "for use with the iPod" and avoid cannibalizing iPod sales.

They could also license the iPod "protocol" so to speak, as a package with the Fairplay DRM. This would require that iPod-compatible devices behave in certain ways, and be usable with iTunes, etc. Much like Microsoft specifies certain features for its various gadget designs (Pocket PC, for example -- has to work with ActiveSync).

Re:Bad thing.

[ActionPlant]

That would be ideal, but not much different from what they're already doing anyway. I think that any DRM licensing should be industry-wide, rather than targeting a specific company. I happen to think that iPod sales wouldn't really be hurt too badly if suddenly every other avenue were opened, WMA included. There's a reason Apple is dominating the market with the iTMS and the iPod; people prefer it. Standardize the DRM OR license all available DRMs, and chances are iPod sales will only continue to go up.

hm...

[MORTAR_COMBAT!]

methinks Virgin needs to go look up the definition of a monopoly: "Exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service."

There are a dozen online music stores. There are several dozens of portable music players. There are a half-dozen DRM solutions. Apple does not have anything even closely resembling a monopoly in any of these areas.

Re:hm...

[SnoBall]

Even though there are a dozen or so music stores around, most of them don't use a portable MP3 player (such as Napster, etc).

And yes, you are right about Apple not having a monopoly, that title belongs to Microsoft.

Re:hm...

[mrchaotica]

Yeah they do... any player that supports WMA!

The only advantage Apple has is the ease of it. There's nothing stopping Virgin from making their own player that supports their own DRM, or making their own software that makes syncing WMAs with a Muvo or Karma or whatever as easy as syncing iTunes and iPod.

It's not Apple's fault that they're too stupid to do so!

(although, I'd still rather Apple license FairPlay, since I'd rather them control the "standard" than Microsoft... but that doesn't mean they should be forced to by Virgin)

Talk about abusing Monopoly.

[mikeophile]

Pot, meet kettle.

xmms: Quick, sue Virgin in France

[iamacat]

Make them disclose any copy protection they use on their CDs and WMA tracks to ensure interoperability with our favourite Linux player. Fair is fair, right?

french virgins love their music...

[dj42]

...but of course they want you to use protection.

If, if, if....

[Anubis350]

Apple doesnt make (much) money on itunes anyway, its a way of selling iPods. That being so I'v never understood why they've not licenses their FairPlay DRM. The only reason I've ever been able to think of is that they're afraid that if they do, someone will make abetter iPod. However, thats why the free market exists. More competition will make the iPod better because Apple will have to compete more; and if the iPod stays good people will continue to buy iPods no matter where they get their music.

final opinion, this could be a blessing for apple if they welcome it, or a curse if they dig in their heels.
--Aaron

Re:If, if, if....

[Bricklets]

How about Apple forsees iTunes as being a potential major money maker in the future. They're looking out for iPod and iTunes, and not just the iPod.

Whoops, try this URL instead.

[mikeophile]

Pot, meet kettle.
/damn parser

Apple's response

[iamacat]

Should be to ask Virgin to use MP3 format, which is already licensed to everyone. I don't understand how they can accuse Apple of anti-competitive behaviour and then demand that m4p format is given to them but not everyone else. When it comes to competition, the more the merrier!

Apple caves

[Elwood P Dowd]

submits to licensing FairPlay decoder for $400 per device and the encoder for $2,000,000 per song.

Seriously, though, what's preventing Virgin from selling songs that play on an iPod? The copyright holders. Is that Apple's fault?

Re:Apple caves

[Altus]

no need for such outlandish pricing.

a buck a song will do just fine... thats what they sell the songs for at the ITMS anyway right?

Re:Apple caves

[Ohreally_factor]

10 cents per song and $60 per device and they'd be making the same profit with less work.

Re:Apple caves

[scottgfx]

Well, you can be either oh so smart, or oh so pleasent. I hope Apple chooses smart.

Re:Apple caves

[Elwood P Dowd]

Wouldn't that be a little monotonous? Just Apple, cold beer, and "Poor, poor thing" for your iPod?

...translation

[morcheeba]

so, they're saying some monopolies are good because it lets their webmonkeys design for only one platform?

SJ is kind of a hypocrite

[johnny_sas]

I don't understand this...

He says he won't add MSN support in iChat because it's not an open format.

But then refuses to open up/license the fairplay stuff.

Perhaps he should set the good example by licensing it, or else simply not say anything about what other aren't doing.

Re:SJ is kind of a hypocrite

[Deviate_X]

He is nota hypocrite. He is a businessman.

Its good for apples business to keep fairplay locked away.

Re:SJ is kind of a hypocrite

[Anonymous Coward]

MSN isn't an open format because Microsoft wants you to use the MSN client. If they decide to change the format so that it locks out competitiors it's their choice to do so. Steve Jobs understands that and respects that. He wants other companies to treat fairplay like that. They're both closed formats because the vendors want users locked into their product. So how is that hypocritical? If anything it's the opposite. Steve Jobs won't support the "hacker" mentality that he objects to.

And although I don't agree with his usage of the term "hacker" you know exactly what practices I mean.

Oh, the irony

[Weaselmancer]

...of a music company accusing anyone of being an unfair monopoly. And, just to double your irony goodness...accusing Apple.

Re:Oh, the irony

[jdwest]

It's drama, plain and simple.

To witness: Apple has less than 3/4 (70%) of the downloaded music business, which comprises less than 5% of music sales.

That, my friends, makes Apple a monopoly these days (compounding the humorous irony point you made).

Re:Oh, the irony

[Altus]

hum... if they control 3% of the music sales market and that is a monopoly then it follows that their 3% of the personal computer market is also a monopoly!

STOP THE PRESSES! Microsoft has been beaten... Apple officaly has a monopoly on PCs!

SWEET! I knew someday the world would come around!

I would be in favour of this if ...

[for_usenet]

I would be in favour of Apple being "forced" to open up their DRM, if it meant that EVERY DRM scheme had to be opened up and cross-liscensed (it's all about setting a precedent). I know that no-DRM is better than the lightest available DRM, but since "no-DRM" is very unlikely, then the next best thing is "wildly" cross-liscensing EVERYTHING. For example, I would not mind having MS forced to also open up their DRM scheme, if Apple is now forced to do so.

Re:I would be in favour of this if ...

[Fareq]

Not going to matter much if you set a precedent in France.

This is a French lawsuit. If the French government required all this stuff, and the rest of the world did not, Apple could simply put up a disclaimer saying "You may not use iTMS if you are currently in France" and then get on with their life.

Re:I sent this to there wabmeister!

[Anonymous Coward]

Either they changed it within 10 minutes of your post or you don't know what a Powerbook G4 actually looks like. Notice how the screen doesn't open with the screen behind the body, but attached to the top like most other laptops. Also notice how it doesn't look anything like a Powerbook in any other way.

Labels suck

[The Lost Supertone]

We all know Apple has been screwed by the labels ever since this started. That's why the iTMS wasn't able to launch until after a bunch of other stores in different companies because the labels didn't want Apple to have the dominant position they deserve for being the first with the good idea and good marketing. This is probably also the reason why we STILL don't have the iTMS in Canada! Oh and for the record, if you're going to abbreviate it, the i is ALWAYS lower case, and everyone does it iTMS not IMS not anything else, and don't act like iTunes is only for selling music, I've been using iTunes since version 1, and the music store came in at version 4.

Re:Labels suck

[proj_2501]

as I have said in two comments already, Virgin in this case is not the label, but the record store. The record label "Virgin Records" is no longer owned by the Virgin Group. (weird, I know)

What Monopoly?

[Macka]

Sure, Apple have the largest single share of the legal download market so far, but they're not the only legal download service in town, nor are they the only purveyor of portable music players. So who''s to say that they are a "monopoly"? They certainly aren't a monopoly in the Microsoft sense of the word, their market share isn't anywhere near as big. Consumers aren't forced to use iTMS and iPods to listen to their music. They can get perfectly usable alternatives elsewhere. Plus Apple's current market position doesn't make them immune to being knocked off their perch by their competitors in the future.

Frankly I don't see that Virgin have got a case here.

No abuse, only the M$ does.

[TheM$Man]

Apple did not abuse monopoly because they are not the M$. Only the M$ abuses monopoly! Why you ask? Because M$ is bad. Every company could do what the M% does but only when the M$ does it shall it be bad. Therefore Apple did not abuse anything, only the M$ did. Thank you.

Monopoly?

[sjb2016]

As one poster already stated, the only monopoly here would be the record label that is probably part of the RIAA (in the US anyway and its equivalents in other countries). The entire DRM debate would be avoided if the labels would stop forcing Apple, Real, Napster etc to use DRM. Hell if Real could sell their AAC songs without DRM they would automatically be compatible with the iPod. The labels have some extremely curious views here

Re:Monopoly?

[proj_2501]

as I have said in three other comments already, Virgin in this case is not the label, but the record store. The record label "Virgin Records" is no longer owned by the Virgin Group. (weird, I know)

(but V2, their actual label, is a RIAA/european equivalent member, yes)

Re:monopoly?

[Ohreally_factor]

Fuck you and balloon you wafted in on

Don't you mean, "the balloon you were smuggled in"?

A Virgin in France?

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Now *that*'s real news!

Bur Apple doesn't *own* FairPlay!

[sh00z]

The article ignores the fact that Apple has licensed FairPlay from Veridisc. It was not created in-house. Now, they may have negotiated themselves an exclusive license for some period of time, and more power to 'em, but this is NOT "Apple imposing an Apple-proprietary standard" as some would have us believe.

Re:Bur Apple doesn't *own* FairPlay!

[Altus]

wow... that is interesting... I wish I had mod point for you but it looks like other will take care of that.

Im very intersted in this. It seems odd that people would keep bitching at apple to open their standard when it isnt even theirs to open... you would think that one of these companies would have noticed that by now.

Re:Bur Apple doesn't *own* FairPlay!

[Anonymous Coward]

Half the posters say FairPlay is licensed from VeriDisc; the other half say Apple created FairPlay and just licensed/stole the name from VeriDisc. Which is it?

Re:Bur Apple doesn't *own* FairPlay!

[MoneyT]

VeriDisc used to have a list of the people that used their technology and Apple wasn't on that list, so I'm inclined to think it's the later.

Re:Bur Apple doesn't *own* FairPlay!

[thatguywhoiam]

The article ignores the fact that Apple has licensed FairPlay from Veridisc [64.244.235.240]. It was not created in-house. Now, they may have negotiated themselves an exclusive license for some period of time, and more power to 'em, but this is NOT "Apple imposing an Apple-proprietary standard" as some would have us believe.

T'would be an excellent point, sir, were it only true.

VeriDisc's FairPlay and Apple's FairPlay are not the same thing. Apple's version was indeed developed in-house, as a custom QuickTime-compatible DRM wrapper.

Why do you think Real is browbeating Apple these days over 'opening' the iPod, when they could have otherwise just gone to VeriDisc and bought a license?

Sorry I had to...

[pyrrhonist]

To all the Virgins: Thanks for nothing!

Apple just wan't to sell MORE iPods.

[crovira]

Some one come up with a way that opening their hardware to the Virgin megastore does that and you've got it.

That would mean that Virgin would have to garantee that a link to the Apple store be on every page and that they WON'T start a competing line of hardware.

You've got to dangle the right carrot.

Scope is way too narrow...

[sockonafish]

Apple has just as much as a monopoly on FairPlay as Nike has on Air Jordans. That is, they have a monopoly on a product, not a monopoly on the music player/music store market. By revenue, Apple has a 55 percent market share for mp3 players. By units, only 31 percent. I don't know how much of a market share iTunes has, but FairPlay songs are only able to be played on 31 percent of mp3 players. Good luck crying monopoly in court on a company whose market share isn't even close to a majority.

They do have competitors, and those competitors are obliged to compete. If they can't, tough.

monopoly?

[ellem]

So there are no other portable music players? There are no other online music stores? Apple has the only DRM?

Eff you Virgin. It's not Apple's faulty there's got crowned king. Fuck you and balloon you wafted in on.

Apple - always a hardware company.

[VasiliTerkin]

According to this article on CNET, Apple looses money on iTunes store, and makes money on iPods.

"... the music store is close to profitability but is still losing money. Apple doesn't see the business as having much long-term profit potential either."

I tunes was just a facilitator for iPod sales.

I foresee Apple allowing others onto iPod eventually. I always took the "hardware" route under Jobs.

Re:Apple - always a hardware company.

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at the date on the article. Apple has reported a small profit for iTMS for the last 2 quarters. So it's no longer a loss leader, as they've begun to achieve economies of scale.

xole object?

[oliverthered]

I got kicket to here....

http://plugins.netscape.com/plug-in_finder.adp?m im etype=application/x-oleobject

Web monkeis can't even write java.

It's obvious

[hawkbug]

It's a blessing, and here's why. Earlier in the year Jobs said Apple makes no money off songs sold on iTunes, correct? Well, if he was telling the truth, Apple stands only to make money with the iPod sales. In which case, other online music stores selling music that works with the iPod could only benefit Apple. Unless somebody comes out with a device that holds as much as the iPod that also plays those type of files....

Re:It's obvious

[Masker]

Actually, in the last quarter, the iTMS did post a small profit.

Also, the point isn't that FairPlay is driving sales of the iPod, but that Apple controls the total user experience of the iPod. It controls:

1) The UI & hardware of the iPod
2) The loading of music, playlist creation, etc. on the computer you use to interface with the iPod via iTunes
3) The online purchasing of music for use on your iPod

Apple, as they usually do, wants to have total control over all of those factors. It's the same damned thing they do with their OS & Hardware combo and their retail experience. They want to control everything, not because they're control freaks, but because "if you want it done right, do it yourself".

Re:It's obvious

[hawkbug]

I mostly agree with you - until we think about the fact that HP has licensed this technology and will be building players based on the standard. That changes everything.

Re:It's obvious

[Bricklets]

I fail to understand why so many people can't see that just because iTunes doesn't make any money TODAY doesn't mean it be rolling it in TOMORROW.

Let's stop it with the "Apple says they don't make money off of iTunes so why should Apple care what happens to it" argument.

Re:It's obvious

[Ohreally_factor]

Not necessarily. Will HP actually be manufacturing these themselves? Or will they use the same manufacturer that Apple does. Will they design their own iPod using some Apple spec., or will Apple design them?

The way I understood it, HP was just going to rebadge them.

Dominant maybe, but Monopoly no.

[Qwavel]

Windows has effective monopolies with Windows Client and MS Office.

Apple does not (yet) have a monopoly with FairPlay. I don't know the numbers exactly, but it is my understanding that more than half of the MP3 players out there don't support FairPlay (ie. everything other than the iPod). And many of them support Microsoft's DRM technology don't they?

Yes, this market does have network effects, so it has excellent potential for a monopoly, but let's not jump the gun.

And aren't Sony and MS planning to enter the market for downloadable tunes later this year?

Re:Dominant maybe, but Monopoly no.

[Ohreally_factor]

Numbers quibble, although you did get a number right, sort of. The half number is for revenue. Apple is pulling in half of all money being spent on players. The number they're selling is roughly one third of all players being sold.

This Is Nuts.

[MBCook]

This is nuts. First of all Apple is not a monopoly, their player is just head and shoulder above everyone else. As for the argument they are preventing competition by not licensing FairPlay there are two points. First is that there are tons of other players on the market and if you include all the flash players sold over the years the iPod isn't the majority of sales (I don't think). Second of all they CAN SELL MUSIC FOR THE iPOD. They have to use this magical format that the iPod plays. What was it called? MP3. They can sell MP3s. You can't force Apple to open it's product because they don't want to use the dominant format on the market to sell their music.

Virgin is just plain wrong. Forcing Apple to open FairPlay would be a miscarige of justice, there is no good reason to do it other than to stick it to Apple because other companies are mad they aren't as successfull.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[SilentChris]

Virgin Manager: "Say Bill, I see those iPod things everywhere. I want us to get music onto them."
Virgin Tech Guy: "We can't do that sir."
Virgin Manager: "Why not?"
Virgin Tech Guy: "The only protected format that runs on them is Apple's Fairplay AAC."
Virgin Manager: "I thought they were MP3 players".
Virgin Tech Guy: "If we sell MP3's, people can copy them wherever they like".
Virgin Manager: "Screw that. Apple's format is the only protected one on iPod?"
Virgin Tech Guy: "Yup."
Virgin Manager: "So they have a monopoly on a protection standard for the #1 hardware. Where are the lawyers?"

Re:This Is Nuts.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I don't know if I would go as far as saying MP3s are dominant in the market.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[SuiteSisterMary]

Can I buy a portable player that isn't an iPod that can play the DRM'd iTunes AAC files?

No?

Well, then, sounds like they're using their strength in one market to sell product in another.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[nzkbuk]

The real question is can you buy a portable player that isn't an iPod that can play AAC files (drm'd or not)?

Re:This Is Nuts.

[mrchaotica]

Yep. And all that means is that the Virgin Manager is an idiot.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[Bricklets]

iTunes came out shortly after iPod became Windows compatible. Both have grown to dominate at roughly the same pace in their respective markets. This may be a case where Apple has built up two monopolies in similar but separate markets. And both monopolies just happen to complement each other.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[n8_f]

So? Unless a company has a monopoly and is abusing its monopoly in one market to increase its share in another market, it is irrelevant. Neither iTMS nor the iPod are monopolies in their respective markets (they are dominant, but that isn't the same), so what is the problem? By your logic, you would force Apple to port OS X to PCs, because they are using their OS to force people to buy Macs. "Is there another computer that can run OS X? Well, then, sounds like they're using their strength in one market to sell product in another." Except, in neither case do they have monopolies. This happens all the time. A Sony digital camera will require a Sony battery and a Sony memory card (MemoryStick). If you don't like it, buy something else. They don't have a monopoly, so there is plenty of competition. Apple is free to integrate their products as much as they like as long as their aren't abusing a monopoly to stifle competition.

That is the consumer's protection in a healthy market. If a company ties a product to proprietary components that provide no advantage to the consumer and cost the same or more, then the consumer will choose another product that uses standard components. If, however, the proprietary components provide a marked advantage to the product over more generic components, consumers will choose that product. Why punish an innovative company for using a better component by nullifying that advantage? If you do that, companies will stop developing better ways of doing things, because as soon as they come up with one they will have to share it with every one else. I am not a huge fan of market economies, but when they work (i.e., there is a healthy level of competition), they work better than anything else we've got. Don't mess with it.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[melatonin]

Can I buy a portable player that isn't an iPod that can play the DRM'd iTunes AAC files?

No?

Eh? Apple has a music store called iTMS and they have a music player called the iPod. They only work with each other. They both happen to be really popular. Good for Apple.

It's silly to accuse someone of being a monopoly in an emerging market; the iTMS isn't even 2 years old yet (IIRC it hasn't been on Windows for even a year). There's still plenty of room for other music players (say, everyone who's doing WMA) and other music stores.

Tip for other companies. (a) make music players that don't suck/that people want to buy (not too hard). (b) make music stores that don't suck. I'm sure if today's music industry was in control pre-vinyl, we'd never have CDs today, and you'd rent your music over the radio (by paying a radio-ownership tax or something). They'd NEVER have come up with something as liberal as the iTMS (a vision from a non-music-industry-cartel company), and unless they do, they'll never win customers from iTMS.

Re:This Is Nuts.

[BandwidthHog]

It's a bit misleading to say that iTMS and the iPod only work with each other. It is true that the iPod is the only portable device that will play songs purchased from iTMS, but in the other direction, the iPod will play MP3, WAV and AAC files, meaning that you can rather easily use Windows Media Player to rip a stack of John Denver CDs and dump the resulting MP3 files to the iPod just as if it were a Firewire hard drive (because it is).

Now as to the question of whether ripping all your CDs with WiMP or ripping John Denver CDs at all is the greater transgression of societal mores, well, I'll leave discussion of that to those who aren't stuck at work on a Sunday morning.

Re:The should tell virgin

[Anonymous Coward]

Offtopic? Come on, it's hilarious!

See, it's funny because the company's name is Virgin. To be virgin is to not have yet had sexual relations. The poster is suggesting that the company to sod off by telling them to "get fucked". Getting fucked can also mean having sexual relations, therefore they would no longer be virgin.

Did I mention jokes aren't funny if you explain them?

DRM is never a blessing

[Anonymous Coward]

DRM is never a blessing; it is a curse.

If VirginMega wants to sell music to people to play on Apple's iPods, VirginMega should sell non-DRMed mp3s.

Pot, Kettle, Black

[Kurt Wall]

Lovely. One monopoly, Virgin, complaining about the monopolistic practices of another (alleged) monopoly? Please. Richard Branson has enough money.

shut the F up Virgin

[Anonymous Coward]

why is this even news. A mega corp's store is bitching they can't force feed everyone and dictate what goes on. yeah, like I'm suppose to feel bad for them. How about get a clue and stop your whining.

fsck france

[EaterOfDog]

I give Apple 50/50 odds of discontinuing iTMS in France if this actually goes though. Then the consumers will go apeshit.

Re:fsck france

[black mariah]

Knowing what an outright bastard Jobs is (and I mean that in a good way), you may be right. He seems the kind to piss off an entire country at the cost of his bottom line, and I respect that.

PlayFair is now Hymn ...

[rpeterman]

and is at this web site - http://www.hymn-project.org/. Enjoy!

Re:PlayFair is now Hymn ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Couple of problems with it -- first, hymn leaves the id encoded. Second, it requires you to have the key to open it. We still need more development then this...

monopolies are bad for consumers

[Anonymous Coward]

It could only help the end user to have more choice for the iPod. Some of the benefits of monopoly busting are,

• lower prices
• better customer service
• more choice

As much as I love Apple, their vertical monopoly has been bad for consumers. Apple's prices are much higher than if they had direct competition. If Apple is more liberal with their DRM, more small labels will be able to enter the market. This is is very important as some of the most creative music is only available on small independent labels.

A double-edged sword..

[wfberg]

This just shows that DRM, while being so vilely derided on slashdot, can actually be used for evil, as well as for evil.

Why doesn't Virgin license the iTunes store?

[mveloso]

It worked for HP. License the whole thing, not just the DRM. Plus Virgin could make Virgin-branded iPods (in red, no less).

Plus, the iTunes store is much nicer than the Virgin store.

Woah! Hold up!

[TiggertheMad]

Let me get this straight. Virgin, (a memeber of the RIAA, right?) is accusing Apple of being a MONOPLY?

Man, I couldn't write a better joke if I tried. Hey Virgim, how do you like them apples...

i am a bigger dork than you!

[proj_2501]

JLG left apple in 1990. Apple allowed officially-sanctioned clones for the first time in 1995, unless you count the DynaMac, which salvaged parts from existing Macs.

Re:I sent this to there wabmeister!

[Altus]

well it is vaguely shaped like a powerbook... and the ones from 1.5 years ago had screens that attach like that (the Ti books not the Al books) but year... the parent is an idiot, if that is a powerbook it was painted black and had a new cover put on the back!

you must be new here.

[OS24Ever]

This is Apple we're talking about, not another company. Apple doesn't license thing, they make an industry leading product only to have the rest of the world scramble to come out with something 'close enough' that everyone accepts and then go to a miniscule but violently loyal fan base.

Re:you must be new here.

[2nd Post!]

Right, they haven't licensed the iPod to HP, and they haven't licensed iTunes for Motorola's cell phones, right?

Re:you must be new here.

[Bricklets]

Apple also doesn't make hardware compatible with Windows either. Uh huh. (Hint: iPod, Airport Express, LCD Screens, etc.)

This isn't 2000 anymore.

Slashdot experts can do better

[Chemisor]

> Virgins!?! It's all sounding very biblical to me.

The Big Man is not even a virgin. Surely, the Slashdot crowd has far better experts in this area.

If you can't compete...

[b-baggins]

...litigate!

This is insane

[Palshife]

Virgins don't even PLAY monopoly.

re: Virgin Accuses Apple of Abusing Monopoly

[Anonymous Coward]

Why am I envisioning some nymph getting upset with a piece of fruit about a damn boardgame?

But the dominance has nothing to do with FairPlay

[SuperKendall]

The thing is, both Virgin and Apple sell a product (online music) that can be played on essentially the same number of computers. Thus Apple does not have a "dominant" lock on the market in the same way Microsoft does. All PC's come with the ability to play music from either store, in fact APple is really at a disadvantage despite having larger sales as people must download and install iTunes.

Other competitors (eMusic) do sell music that can also play on iPods, and still do not have the market share of Apple. If Virgin's real complaint is they want a way for customers to use music on a iPod (which although having a very large share of sales I'm not sure is truly dominant yet) then there are options for them to do so that do not involve using FairPlay.

If you think about the big picture, is it fair that a far larger company like Virgin is able to disloge any compay from a niche in the market that they fancy? Apple is only dominant is a very narrow segment of the market. Virgin may see the possibility of Apple truly being dominant in the future, but it's too early to make that call and WAY to early for the courts to essentially make Apple give up sales in the online music industry and give them back to Virgin.

In the end, perhaps this will be the best imapct iTunes has - forcing other online stores to sell plain MP3's so they can be used on the iPod. That's the only way for other stores to truly attack Apple.

Virgin Monopoly?

[lacrymology.com]

I have a monopoly on the virginity of a few virgins. :)

Who am I kidding? I'm on /. :(

-m

Re:Virgin Monopoly?

[Anonymous Coward]

I usually flame Slashdotters for such reasons, but I like you. You are at least honest. Half of these obese dumbfucks post on threads like this as if they are "pimps" of the "ghetto", and then proceed to discuss their life-time of programming experience (the PERFECT compliment to a life-time of horrible slave-like treatment of women, of course).

You're a good poster, and I liked your post.

How ironic!

[2nd Post!]

So Virgin wants to be able to sell Fairplay enabled AAC tracks.

BUT their store won't work with Mozilla, and I doubt it would work with Safari. I'll have to check that later, at home.

Who owns the content on their music store? If they do... why is it they can't sell their music through iTunes? I don't see why Apple wouldn't be happy to see a Virgin-iTMS if they get 10% of the cut!

Re:But the dominance has nothing to do with FairPl

[proj_2501]

I agree with all of this. I was just pointing out that iTMS is top of the heap in legal online music downloads, which you appeared to discount as Mac-only legal online music downloads. Notice what I quoted from your original post :)

iTunes:being primed to BECOME profitable/monopoly

[cecirdr]

Think about it.... presently Apple makes little off selling tunes. Most of the money comes from selling iPods. BUT, they just licensed the rights to motorola to be able to play aac files from upcoming mobile phones made by moto. Hmmm, wouldn't this eventually cannibalize iPod sales if other companies came onboard and also were capable of decoding aac files? Yeah it would. But it wouldn't matter if Apple's eventual goal is to dominate online music distribution. Once they become THE music service to use, they can increase their profit per song. Even a 1-2% change in how much money they make from selling songs would be a huge profit.

That's why Apple's so furious at Real for cracking aac and creating "harmony". Eventually hardware and software become mature products. R&D to stay ahead of the crowd costs lots of money. Sales drop because you're no longer the cream of the crop, or there's no reason to upgrade because the products are mature. But being the seller of music content, now that's a never ending stream of "new and improved". People are *always* looking for new music.

You guys are just to funny

[Anonymous Coward]

I just don't get it. No matter what issue you see /. posters allways advocating open standards and rightly so.

You allways see them slaming every company that abuses it's dominant marketshare and rightly so.

Now Apple is accused of all the things /.ers normally argue against and now a lot of you guys start whining how unfair it is to accuse Apple of such things.
Why? What is the difference of Apple abusing it's market share or an other company abusing it's market share?

Open standards and free access to a market are allways the right things to demand regardless of who is accused of foul play.

As Michael Jackson will attest...

[fragamus]

...you never want a virgin to accuse you of anything!

Virgin, home of the $19.99 CD

[mojoNYC]

have you been in a Virgin Megastore and seen their CD prices?

how do you think their $1.99 per song pricing structure will work out?

Two things working against Apple here

[micron]

I am not saying this JUST because I am in the USA here...

1) Apple is a company based in the United States of America. It is not based in France, and it is not based in a member country of the EU. Virgin is making a play here by filing this claim with the FRENCH antitrust authority. I have no illusions about this being even close to a fair fight.

2) iTMS is a huge potential threat to the record store business. Virgin Megastores is begging the courts to save them from a potential future demise. I would expect other record store companies to follow suit. Why compete when you can sick a French court on another oppresive American company.

Apple's Digital Hub

[ztirffritz]

Apple is not planning on living off of the iPod for the long term goal. They are planning on building the hub of your future digital lifestyle. Digital music, movies, communication, etc. DRM is key to that goal. Apple is just funding this project with the iPod. Eventually iTMS will will either dry up or redefine the music distribution model. I think the latter. Apple will develop an iMovie (iTV?) store as well. With Airport express or a similar product they'll be able to stream files to your entertainment center. Eventually your computer will become part of your entertainment center. Who wants to pay for 24x7 Cable or satelite service if you can pay for just the progamming you want to see/hear? In the end, there will probably be Apple computers, Monitors, Amplifiers, speakers, and a multipurpose digital recorder for audio and video. Video will be pay per view while audio will be owned.

Re:Apple's Digital Hub

[HawaiianMayan]

Maybe. If there's a ton of money to make that way, sure. But I think Apple's corporate culture goes against your vision for their future.

Apple has a very idealistic corporate vision. Apple is about people being creative. iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD are all about people CREATING things. The Apple way of thinking does not value sheep who merely consume whatever is put in front of them.

Jobs has spoken more than once about how (I'm paraphrasing) Music distribution is cool, because listening to music isn't the whole point; you can do other things (hopefully creative and interesting things) while listening to music. But TV is uncool/uninteresting, because there's nothing creative or interactive or useful about it. It's just pure consumption. That's why Apple will probably never ever make a TiVo.

Put another way, everybody else wants their customers to just surf the Web. Apple wants their customers to create their own web sites.

It's definitely true that there are more sheep than creative people in the world (to me that's a huge reason for Apple's market share), and so they could make more money selling video streams to passive sheep. But to do so would require a massive change in the traditional Apple culture.

Re:Apple's Digital Hub

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only will there be all those things, but there will also be.... MONSTER CABLES!!!

Re:Apple's Digital Hub

[ztirffritz]

I agree that Apple has a different view on video than audio. But if you can selectively control what you watch rather than watch what is provided (fed?) for you I think TV would be a different experience altogether. Tivo is heading that way, but it isn't there yet. Tivo attempts to select from the available programming what it thinks you would like and proactively records it for you. Imagine if you could just do a Google search for documentaries, news (of a particular subject even), or whatever, and watch a stream of that whenever you wanted. Sure some people would sink to the lowest common denominator of on-demand Reality TV, but some of us would actually be watching educational TV, documentaries, Art Films, etc. too. As it is now, I have to wait for PBS or Discover to air a show about the subject that I want. TV can still be saved from its current brain-numbing usage. I don't know if Apple will be the one to pull it off, but they sure have a big head start over any competition. Keep in mind that this is not likely to happen in the US anytime soon because the infrastructure is not in place and will cost more than in small but densely populated areas. In Japan and Korea for example they are already streaming video to their Cell Phones!!?! Add a bigger screen, bigger hard drive, faster CPU, and a deal with the RIAA, MPAA, TV networks, and the FCC and and you're set. Apple has the RIAA almost sold on the notion of digital downloads. Apple can use Pixar to pioneer the movie idea. They have the new video compression standard built into their new OS that is due next year that will allow you to stream almost full screen video at normal frame rates. The new version of iChat allows you to video conference call with how many people at once (thanks to the new video compression software)? These things alone give all of the tools needed to get music, video, and communication from one device. Now if you get $.03 from every song sold, $.25 from every movie streamed, and $.0001 from every minute of conversation you've got a pretty good income stream if everyone is doing it that way. I'm not predicting that Apple will dominate all of these markets, but as usual, they are definitely ahead of everyone else. They are making the opportunity happen.

Not what I expected...

[pyrrhonist]

Virgin Accuses Apple of Abusing Monopoly

Considering the title, I was expecting something like this:

CUPERTINO, CA (Reuters) -- A virgin was playing the Parker Bros. game with Steve Jobs, when he noticed the Apple CEO give himself an interest free loan. "That's not allowed under Monopoly version 3 rules", said the avid Slashdot reader, "You come to expect more from someone who plays a CEO in real life; it was clearly an abuse of the rules". Jobs, who was playing the banker in the game, could not be reached for comment. "I should have known when he insisted on being the car, leaving me with the damn boot", the virgin later lamented.

Ok, I'll stop now.

Apple A Monopoly?

[nurb432]

Thats funny..

Typo in the headline

[dave_mcmillen]

There's obviously a typo in the headline. It should read "Virgin Accuses Microsoft of Abusing Monopoly". This is Slashdot, people, get it right!

A virgin accusing apple of something?

[OverkillTASF]

Why do we care what a slashdotter says of Apple? Unless of course, you mean Virgin the company....

by extension?

[crono_deus]

Hrm.
Ok, so, say for instance, a compay makes software that runs on only one platform. The software is an incredible hit and fuels the sale of this platform. Other companies want this killer app on their platform. Do they have a right to force the original company to make the software for their platforms?

Draw your own conclusions, but my opinion is thusly: hells freakin' no. Say my company makes software for Apple hardware (and by extension OSX) and it's so freakin' incredible that everyone goes out and buys OSX. No on, but _no one_ has the right to force me to port my app to their platform. It's _my_ software.

I see a similar thing here: Apple has this "app" (AAC wrapped in FairPlay) and it works on the iPod. Apple hasn't stopped anyone from writing other "apps" for the iPod (within the specs of the iPod, of course, just like you'd have to write hardware specific stuff for PPC), but it shouldn't be forced to license that "app" to anyone else.
Now, it _may_ be really good for them to let other people use FairPlay, but I don't feel I have the information I need to make that call.

Re:by extension?

[Anonymous Coward]

But you have no *right* to stop someone coming up with a reverse-engineered interoperability layer to convert formats.

Either Apple stops bitching about Real or Virgin can go ahead with this...

Re:by extension?

[crono_deus]

Point conceded. Yeah, I suppose you can't have it both ways. Frankly, I'd prefer that Apple just leave Real alone, crooks though they may be, and tell Virgin to go screw themselves. Now /that's/ a thought... if Apple told Virgin to go screw, and Virgin did, would it still be called Virgin?

A distinction...

[Big Sean O]

Apple may well be a monopoly (i.e.: A situation in which a single company owns all or nearly all of the market for a given type of product or service), but they don't seem to be an illegal monopoly (ala Microsoft, convicted illegal monopolist).

Of course, I agree with you, 3 years ago Rio and Creative were the big dogs in MP3 players and Apple was nowhere to be seen. The iPod revolution happened because of two things: it's a superior product and Apple marketed the heck out of it.

iTMS was the icing on the cake: a legal way to get the music you want at a right price. Plus, the labels like it too because of the DRM. And Apple marketed the heck out of it.

The iPod isn't an illegal monopoly, but the iTMS (with it's DRM) may be. The problem is, who wants part of a monopoly with razor-thin profit margins? Can you ever sell enough to make some coin? If 500 people get in the game, will anyone make money?

They should work on making digital distribution of MP3s profitable, then they would have as much as Apple's market as they want.

Re:A distinction...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope apple is not a monopoly. I can walk into just about any store and buy an mp3 player that does not have to license apple technology in some way. Can you say that about PC's? Nope, every aspect of a PC has some MS licensed tech in it in some way.

Re:A distinction...

[mrchaotica]

The problem is, who wants part of a monopoly with razor-thin profit margins?

That's some good evidence that it's not a monopoly, because one of the characteristics of a monopoly is that the company can set prices (to an extent). If it is a monopoly, Apple could raise prices without affecting sales, and I don't believe they can.

Poor Virgin!

[Performaman]

They're going to have to get the French DGSE to spy on Apple for them! Don't believe me? The French will do it:

• http://www.forensics-intl.com/art9.html

"You may not be much safer while aboard an airliner. Anderson says the French have been accused of bugging seats in the first-class section of their airliners. Ditto for French hotel rooms frequented by executives. "

Re:Poor Virgin!

[Ohreally_factor]

Ditto for French hotel rooms frequented by executives.

The French bugged Paris Hilton? Even the rear entrance?

Seems this is source if this webcopy ..

[Anonymous Coward]

http://macslash.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/20/104925 0&cid=67843

I must be missing something.?

[nasor]

How is Virgin being hurt by their current inability to use the iTunes DRM system? Since the iPod can play any mp3 file no matter where you get it from, it shouldn't be interfering with Virgin's (or anyone else's) ability to sell people digital music to play on the iPod. Right?

Re:I must be missing something.?

[smcavoy]

Yes you are missing something, it's called DRM!
the whole point of NOT using mp3s is to restrict people to when/where/how they can use their purchase.

Re:I must be missing something.?

[nasor]

" Yes you are missing something, it's called DRM! the whole point of NOT using mp3s is to restrict people to when/where/how they can use their purchase."

Well I realize that, but I don't understand how Apple refusing to share their particular DRM scheme hurts Virgin in any way since you can play *any* mp3 on an iPod, no matter where you get it. So I don't understand how specifically Apple is hurting Virgin's business. I mean, Virgin can still start up an online music store to sell me music and I'll be able to play it on my iPod. It's not like the iPod is DRM locked so that I can't play other people's music on it.

Re:I must be missing something.?

[smcavoy]

I don't think you realize what's going on here....
Virgin (nor any other big lable) will not sell non-drm music.
If their DRM music can't be played on the iPod they lose out on millions of potential customers.

Re:I must be missing something.?

[Bricklets]

Not Apple's problem

Re:I must be missing something.?

[Ohreally_factor]

Then maybe they need to rethink the part about not selling DRMed music.

Re:I must be missing something.?

[smcavoy]

Personally, that'd be awesome if a major label decided to do that.
Realistically, Hell will freeze over several times before that happens.

Re:I must be missing something.?

[Ohreally_factor]

There is one scenario that would make the labels shit their pants, though it is probably unlikely to come to pass.

What if. . .

A musician or band (or small coalition of musicians) with sufficient star power to dictate terms, refused to sell online rights to a label, prefering to deal directly with Apple or some other online distributor. They could do this if they were big enough, by refusing to sell CD distribution rights without this condition. Eventually, one of the labels would cave, since CD distribution is still pretty lucrative (more lucrative than online sales for the moment).

Once one powerful artist did this, the floodgates would open. The RIAA cartel would lose their monopoly power, and that power would return to the artists (though obviously not in monopoly form, unless the artists formed their own cartel).

Physical distribution would still exist profitably, but would not be the huge profit center for the huge multinationals that own the labels. This would lead to some sort of rationalizing of those business and perhaps an end to the excesses.

I'm sure that the RIAA companies are aware of this possibility, and would pull out all the stops to prevent it from happening, but the possibility exists.

On splitting hairs...

[IncohereD]

V2 Records is now their record label, started in 96 after Branson's non-compete clause expired.

So what you're saying is they Virgin as a whole still DOES own a record label, although they might not BE one per se, and its not that business unit doing the suing.

Re:On splitting hairs...

[proj_2501]

yes.

Re:On splitting hairs...

[gryphokk]

And in other news, it has been learned that the The Iliad was not acutally written by Homer, but by another man of the same name.

VirginMega?!?

[JBMcB]

I think it's funny that a company called VirginMega is suing a company for being a monopoly. "Globex MegaCorp PanGalactic Enterprises is being harmed by Frank's PC Haus monopoly on the computer service business in Saginaw, Michigan. We are suing!"

I bet the French government will back Virgin just 'cause Apple's DRM wasn't programmed in French or something.

Re:VirginMega?!?

[Anonymous Coward]

You stupid french basher shove your fucking unfunny humour in your ass you miserable dirty american asshole

Re:VirginMega?!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm? Oh a Parisian wandered in, I thought I smelled dogshit and urine.

Re:VirginMega?!?

[Barto]

It's like the Microsoft case: having a monopoly is fine, abusing that monopoly is not fine. When a company has a monopoly it is their responsibility to still act competitive - or face the consequences.

Re:VirginMega?!?

[Senjaz]

I bet the French government will back Virgin just 'cause Apple's DRM wasn't programmed in French or something.

But they did localise iTMS for the French, Mac OS has been available in French almost forever. Apple loves the place so much that their major European show is in Paris.

Shame Steve can't speak French, that would be the clincher ;)

This could be bad for consumers, I know I know...

[mcnut]

Not because of product lock-in.. because as downloading music becomes more and more popular, and more people have the devices, and more places begin to sell it, you'll see the market will move to make a profit instead of decrease like typical goods. So buy your music now, before its US$2.50 a song.

What about Windows/Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

If they can get Apple to open up FairPlay, I wonder if we (Sun, IBM, Apple, whoever...) can get Microsoft to open up Windows, Office, etc by using the same arguement since they have more of a monopoly than Apple's iTMS/iPod.

Future of My iTunes...

[endofoctober]

"...or will it be the downfall of the mighty iTunes Music Store?

Not wanting to purchase an iPod, I kinda already gave up on iTunes. Despite it being a nifty integrated player/store/library, iTunes chose a format I'm not willing to switch to, much less buy a player to play on. My CDs have been converted to the format of my choice, and I'm NOT cataloging 500+ CDs again.

I bought about seven songs, then decided that the hassle factor (burning songs to CD, then converting to MP3 or OGG for my portable device) was too high. If they become the standard, then I'll give up completely on downloadable music, and stick to buying CDs from non-RIAA labels.

Gotta go - my high horse has the munchies.

Re:Future of My iTunes...

[Anonymous Coward]

I applaud your high horsemanship. Most people who attempt to ride a high horse whine, cry, complain, and snivel the whole time they are in the saddle. Thanks for showing how it is correctly done.

The answer is NEITHER

[nusratt]

"will this be a blessing in disguise for Apple, making their DRM format the defacto standard, or will it be the downfall of the mighty iTunes Music Store?"

What it WILL be, is a perfect reason for Virgin to buy up Real -- who recently reverse-engineered FairPlay -- as a new outlet for Virgin's catalogue, bypassing Apple.

Muddy the DRM waters till it goes away ...

[slapphappe]

In the interests of putting an end to encryption based DRM I'm quite happy that Virgin Records sues Apple Computer (although I think their case isn't strong) -- even though I don't want Virgin selling DRM'd files either. Similarly, while I don't think much of Real, I'm happy they've reverse engineered FairPlay.

The bigger the DRM mess becomes, the less likely it is to survive.

It's absolutely not right that we're buying file formats instead of content. Anything that muddies the DRM waters, as they currently exist, works for me.

Re:IE-only shop

[Anonymous Coward]

Vous êtes imbeciles. IE est débile. Il n'y a pas de raison pourquoi on ne peut pas utilise Firefox ou Mozilla au surf sur votre site.

=====

Feel free to send them the above in reply to that inanity. I just hope that Slashdot doesn't strip any of the accents (and that I am still literate enough in French for the above to be comprehensible--I haven't really used my French in some time).

Re:Fair Play isn't really cracked

[Anonymous Coward]

No, Fair Play isn't cracked. You can play your own purchased m4p's with the help of play fair and key recovery, but that's ownly because they are your songs and Apple has supplied the keys for them. Fair Play is still fully secure as it relates to other peoples songs.

Well...

[ccharles]

... if a virgin said it, then it must be true :P.

MONO

[Anonymous Coward]

1.GNU has a monolpoly in binutils
2.linux has a monolopoly -freely available kernel
3.cars have a monopoly --in day today vehicles
4.slashdot has monopoly -number of nerds cribbing about nothin

A double edged sword

[cmirza]

If the FairPlay DRM is opened up for music stores, wouldn't also be possible for hardware manufacturers to then adopt it for their hardware? That would allow 3rd party devices to use iTunes Music Store and be one less advantage that the iPod would have.

well done

[Anonymous Coward]

On my way to work, I saw another person driving a Mustang and even had the Flowmaster 2 chamber catback exhaust system just like mine. I thought, who really gives a fuck? [endless bitching etc etc]

Hey dude - you made your point so well in the 1st sentence that I didn't need to bother reading the rest of whatever you were spewing. Thanks for that.

What could have been...

[MirgNave]

Man that headline would have been much cooler if Apple had chosen Cherry for its corporate name instead.

I don't mean to toot my own horn here but...

[slipstick]

Ah sure I do, was this clairvoyant or what, yes this isn't Real sueing Apple, but I pointed out the threat of litigation for anti-competitive behaviour here in my second point,

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=116179&cid=983 6790/

Hmm, Miss Cleo move on over a new Shaman's in town...

This must be a mistake!

[Anonymous Coward]

I never accused apple of anything!

You're right...

[bstarrfield]

If Virgin succeeds, it will not be a blessing to Apple -- it will be a curse.

MS will use this as an opportunity to leverage their influence with the RIAA to embrace, extend, and exterminate fairplay and the iTunes music store. There is no way, no possible way, that Microsoft will stand by and let Apple (and a group of other music stores), dominate the delivery of electronic music.

Additionally, Apple developed FairPlay for use with iTunes / iTunes Music Store and the iPod. Will Virgin sell iPods, support the Music store, or simply use the licensing of FairPlay to create their own MP3 player?

Here's the question I find interesting

[mcc]

What happens if Virgin drops the whole "Apple=monopoly" thing and instead chooses to simply license the Harmony hack from realplayer in order to get their music onto iPods?

I don't care if it is good for Apple...

[doneWithMyTattoo]

It would be good for me. FairPlay-AAC and WMA are the two DRM formats available. Microsoft seems to be licnesing out since I can buy home or car audo/vedio elecrtonics to play WMA files. But I can't buy any of that stuff to play FairPlay-AAC files. And I wish I could. Also that Vergin-whatever company has no angle on providing me with a FairPlay-AAC home/car audio device. They are just in it for settlement money. As for Apple, it would be good for them to choose their partnerships, not get forced to lincens to anyone who fills out the court order form. They should get their buddies, Phillips, to start making FairPlay-AAC compatible DVD and CD players.

France??? Cede it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Say Virgin wins in France. France is a not a nation of early adopters -- like, say, Japan or The Netherlands. Cede the market. Go to it Virgin.

The new economy

[rd_syringe]

If you can't compete, accuse them of "abusing their monopoly."

Intellectual Property

[sybert]

A French company want to take away an American company's inalienable right to private property, what a surprise. FairPlay is Apple's private intellectual property, which they can use as they see fit. If it is Apple's best interests to license their IP then it is up to Apple to make that decision. It is not up to government to nationalize anyone's property, intellectual or tangible.

Re:Intellectual Property

[cranos]

A French company want to take away an American company's inalienable right to private property, what a surprise.

Thats right its only American companies who are allowed to use the government to interfere with their competitors. Sheesh pot this kettle calling, I think your black!

Re:Intellectual Property

[colinleroy]

A French company want to take away an American company

Please, don't turn that, which is a rather standard corporate greedy behaviour, into a french/US troll. Thank you.

Re:Intellectual Property

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny how our American "inalienable right to private property" (by which I think you mean "pursuit of happiness", which actually includes much more)completely trumps France's inalienable right to, oh, sovreignity?

Oh wait, I forgot, we Americans no longer respect anybody's sovreinity but our own. A dangerous precedent...

When viewed historically, most government nationalizations of private property occurred in countries that were, or felt, victimized and exploited by the one whose stuff they were grabbing. Nationalizations can be big, messy things, typically with lots of either blood, sweat, or paperwork, and generally aren't undertaken shy of provocation. The fact of the matter is that the Bush administration has chosen to deliberately make an enemy of France. When you make an enemy your trade relations suffer. This is just part of the fallout.

We'd have less hostile trade relations if we had less hostile relations, period. We've always experienced our periods of greatest economic heights while we're beloved in the world, not hated and feared. We only have more of this kind of thing to look forward to with President Dumbass at the helm, so everybody just keep on jerkin' those knees...

Interface patents create natural monopolies

[MythoBeast]

It was determined a long time ago that requiring someone to purchase a second item with a first item was a monopolistic tactic. IBM lost that one when they were requiring a service contract with their computers.

Interface patents do the same thing. It allows a company on one side of that interface to monopolize the sale of the software or hardware on the other side of the interface.

This comes up a lot, expecially when people attempt to use the DMCA to protect their right to do these things.

Interfaces are essentially a language. It has already been tested in court that you can't patent a language, simply because you need to release it into the public domain for it to be useful. Interfaces are a little different - you don't have to release them into the public domain for them to be useful, but you do have to do so if you aren't attempting to hold a monopoly on both ends of its use.

Re:Interface patents create natural monopolies

[Ohreally_factor]

Please, explain what you mean by first item and second item. Is the first item the iPod? But you're not required to purchase music from iTMS to use the iPod.

Is the first item music from iTMS? But you do not need to purchase an iPod to play that music. Any computer with the free iTunes software installed will do.

And lastly:

Interfaces are essentially a language. It has already been tested in court that you can't patent a language, simply because you need to release it into the public domain for it to be useful. Interfaces are a little different - you don't have to release them into the public domain for them to be useful, but you do have to do so if you aren't attempting to hold a monopoly on both ends of its use.

Huh? Not even sure where to start. . .

The map is not the territory. While you might find analogous qualities in two different things, that does not make them equal. I think you're confusing semiotics with linguistics. While we might speak of a system in semiotic terms, as if it was a language, that doesn't really make it a language. If we were comparing and contrasting "The language of the English garden vs. the language of the French Garden, we wouldn't actually be discussing a real language.

I'll just pass on the part about needing to release a language into the public domain being tested in court. That just sounds wacky, but whatever. It has no bearing on the matter, so why argue it.

The last sentence, Interfaces are a little different - you don't have to release them into the public domain for them to be useful, but you do have to do so if you aren't attempting to hold a monopoly on both ends of its use.

Excuse me, but I've NEVER heard of any law that rewuires you to release a design for an interface into the public domain because otherwise you'd be attempting to "hold a monopoly"at both ends". Maybe you're from a different country than I am and the laws are different, but this just sounds completely non-sensical.

Someone modded you insightful, so maybe I'm just not getting what you're saying. Could you try to explain it again in a different way?

Re:Interface patents create natural monopolies

[MythoBeast]

In the case of IBM, the first item was a mainframe and the second item was a service contract. In the case of Windows, the first item was the operating system and the seconds are the browser and/or the multimedia software.

The case here is a little more complicated. You can play other music on your IPod, but ITunes has an exclusive on the rights-managed music protocol. Other companies can't sell music under other rights-management schemes and have them play them on the iPod. Since the iPod has a massive market share in the digital rights managed music player department, that constitutes a monopoly that they're shutting the record industry out of.

Protocols and languages are both methods of transimitting information from one entity to another. Certainly protocols aren't NATURAL languages or human languages -they have a much smaller bredth of information that they need to be flexible enough to transmit - but the analogy is sound.

On that legal case, I'm going to have to recind my statement about patenting a language, I meant to say "copyright". A man named James Cooke Brown invented a language named Loglan around 1950. I'll spare you the details about the synthetic language, but around 1987, a sub group of the Loglan community decided that they had a different goal in mind for the language. They altered the vocabulary in order to create a new language called Lojban. Brown sued them for copyright violation and lost on the grounds mentioned above. Unfortunately, I can't find a link to that lawsuit.

You're right in that there is no law like the one you discussed. I never said that there was, unless you want to reference the Sherman Act as mentioned in the above IBM case. I'm saying that allowing interface patents creates a situation that violates the Sherman Act.

Re:Interface patents create natural monopolies

[hexgrid]

It was determined a long time ago that requiring someone to purchase a second item with a first item was a monopolistic tactic.

This isn't the case here, though. Both the iTMS and the iPod can be used independently of each other.

Ah, sorry...

[SuperKendall]

I see now... I didn't really mean to give that implication.

ESPECIALLY since

[SuperKendall]

Virgin would be the one controlling the policy to start with! Apple had to bargain to use the policy they have now.

I guess Virgin could sulk and pull all Virgin music off iTunes, boy THAT would sure show Apple! But once that money starts flowing in, record companies cannot bring themselves to turn off the spigot. They're just mad that thier own spigots only provide a trickle and are trying to re-route some of Apple's water...

Pretty arbitrary definition of market.

[SuperKendall]

But it is true. iTMS has a 70% marketshare (market being "legal online music downloads"). That means 70% of all legal music downloads require fairplay, and Apple refuses to license fairplay to anyone.

You can't deduce one from the other. Apple's 70% mrket share is based on many things, you can't say that FairPlay alone is responsible for it. In fact, I think you could come very close to saying that Apple's 70% market share comes DESPITE using Fairplay! Indeed I think Virgin would have a stronger case arguing that APple should be mandated to include WMP support in iTunes and the iPod.

Furthermore, the "legal online music downloads" would include some things like allofmp3.com and even canadian P2P, does it not? Do you still think that Apple maintains a 70% share?

Apple maintains a 70% share of a narrow niche, that is the only way record companies can imagine selling music. Apple should not be required to do anything to "make room" for the poor beleagured record labels. After all, if Virgin is really so upset why not pull all thier music? Oh, that's right, the precious money would stop flowing.

No problem with that here

[SuperKendall]

I agree that Real should probably be left alone. I'm not sure why Virgin did not go this route, apart from the whole APple-Can-break-your-files-any-moment thing which engenders much anger from the customer.

That is to say...

[FredFnord]

Indeed, and the reason for this is that the cloners were very limited in what they were allowed to do. They weren't allowed to design their own motherboards, for example, but rather had to buy them from Apple.

First: that's misleading. They bought motherboard DESIGNS from Apple, not motherboards.

Second: let's just look at this for a second. One of the StarMax machines included a custom-made PCI card with ethernet and something else (video? SCSI?) on it. The drivers were from Motorola. When the next version of the Mac OS came out, the card simply stopped working because of the way they'd written the drivers. Apple was called over the next week by hundreds of irate StarMax owners.

But I'm sure that if they had just been able to design their own motherboards, everything would have just worked fine and there wouldn't have been any problems with compatibility or anything.

As for the idea that the PowerTowers were the end-all and be-all of Mac-hood, only two things to say. One: they were cheaply made. Things broke. Hardware failed. The case was a generic PC case with flimsy drive-bay doors with plastic fittings that broke off under the slightest bit of pressure. The actual basic design was nice, but the execution *sucked*. And two, especially at that year's MacWorld Expo, PowerComputing sold significantly below cost, because they wanted to entice as many people away from buying a high-end Mac and into their camp. When Apple had really hired people on to cover the low-end while they tried to get the high-end business. Now, you can decide that this was a slimy thing for Apple to do, to try to get someone to shore up their weaknesses rather than steal their best customers. And that's a valid point of view, I suppose. But when it turned around and Apple saw a whole lot of lost sales to people who otherwise would have definitely been buying the highest-end Mac kit, they got miffed.

I would've too. And having worked on a number of Mac clones back then, as a techie, I have to say that none of them were engineered even as well as the PM8500. Which in and of itself was one of the most bone-headed piece of engineering as I have ever seen in all my days.

But at least it was STURDY bone-headed engineering.

-fred

Re:That is to say...

[Anonymous Coward]

Second: let's just look at this for a second. One of the StarMax machines included a custom-made PCI card with ethernet and something else (video? SCSI?) on it. The drivers were from Motorola.

I believe you might actually be thinking of UMAX. They released the E100 that was a combination SCSI and 100bt ethernet cart for the s900.

Re:That is to say...

[BandwidthHog]

I have to say that none of them were engineered even as well as the PM8500. Which in and of itself was one of the most bone-headed piece of engineering as I have ever seen in all my days.

A friend of mine acquired one of them a few years back, and brought it to town for an install-fest when 10.1 came out... that has gotta be the coolest OldWorld Mac I've ever seen. My impression of it is that Apple engineers were working on the NewWorld designs, and were practicing their acrylic fabrication skills on the last generation of beige machines. So maybe a bit boneheaded internally, but that, the SE and the IIfx are the old school Macs I'd love to have in my collection fifty years from now.

Re:That is to say...

[FredFnord]

> A friend of mine acquired one of them a few years back, and brought it to town for an install-fest when 10.1 came out...
>that has gotta be the coolest OldWorld Mac I've ever seen.

I am willing to bet that you are thinking of the design of the 8600. Which was quite similar to the design of the beige tower G3.

It was prettier, it was smoother, it was nicer on the outside. On the inside, it was beautifully designed, and it and the 9600 were the beginning of the 'opens easily, folds out, and everything is really convenient inside' towers. (Well... actually Apple had made stabs at this before, but the 8600 was the first time that it really stood out as a design goal in a tower case.)

The 7200, 7500, 7600, and desktop G3 were all a WONDERFUL design: butterfly, you could fold out the power supply and the entire set of drives on a hinge to one side and a little cover over the PCI cards on the other. Then you could plug the power supply back into the outlet (having needed to unplug nothing else), and run the machine with everything open and out there. Shut down. Plug in a DIMM. Hit the power button. Did it work? No? Take it back out. It was that easy. It was lovely.

The 8500 and 9500, by contrast, were awful. I never thought them at all attractive (the 8500 looked just like the Quadra 800) and the insides were a sheer nightmare. There is a recurring story (which I can't swear to) that someone brought them to either a board meeting or a meeting of the lord-high-mucky-mucks at Apple and challenged them to change the memory on them. You had to unhook all your drives, unhook the power supply, unhook all the other cables. I *think* you had to remove the power supply. Then you had to take out the motherboard and slot the memory. And you had to reverse the entire process before you could find out whether the new memory worked or not. According to the story, none of the people at the meeting who tried it managed to add memory without cutting themselves. And thus the 8600 and 9600, which otherwise could have been simple motherboard upgrades with the same case, were born.

I don't know if it's true in fact, but it certainly was in spirit. The 8500 and 9500 were just plain painful, the former more than the latter. The 7500's case, in contrast, was a dream. Smaller, more compact, a more DIFFICULT piece of engineering, and yet it was easier to use in every significant way.

-fred

Re:That is to say...

[MelG]

Yup, I still have my old 9500 and 9600. My wife was using the 9500 with a 400MHz card until a couple of months ago. It was being used with the case off for the last FOUR years, because of that design. Didn't have to take the power supply out though (thank god!). One thing that annoyed me. When I went to MacWorld in Boston in 1996 and spoke to the head of the case design team, and asked him why they designed it with so little thought to memory upgrades, he said that if I wasn't happy I shouldn't buy a Mac!!! Amazing.

My G4's, of course are much better. The G5 seems like half a step back though.

Uh huh...

[FredFnord]

A liberal translation:

I can't tell the difference between a good product and a lousy one. Since there clearly couldn't possibly be anything wrong with ME, it must be all you people who are deluded. Therefore I shall use my rapier with to puncture you.

And you can tell something about a fellow with a Mustang and a Flowmaster 2. That is to say, he's someone who likes to have people look at him and think, 'gee, he must have a big...'

Yeah. Anyway. (It'd be different if they were at least decent cars. Oops, I forgot, you can't tell the difference.)

-fred

Wit. Rapier wit.

[FredFnord]

Teach me to puncture people with my 'rapier with' without clicking 'Preview'.

-fred

Actually...

[FredFnord]

...I don't know about that. French law only counts product sales in France. If Apple has a 95% market share in France, it has a monopoly in France, regardless of what is happening elsewhere. And that wouldn't surprise me as much as it might you, because the French have an eye for elegant hardware, and an unconcealed loathing for 'wanna-be' junk. It's just one of the traits that makes Americans hate them so much.

So before you start spouting off on it not being a monopoly, let's see your numbers on French music player sales.

-fred

Re:Actually...

[nanojath]

But is Apple's share of the MP3 player market anything to do with the file format? I don't know, I'm not claiming to have data I don't, but it seems to me the suggestion that the proprietary format music for sale on iTMS are driving iPod sales is suspect. I mean, I'm considering picking up an iPod, and it sure won't be because of the iTunes music store because I won't touch it with a ten foot pole - because I happen to hate DRM on my music. The whole argument seems misbegotten to me. Having an iPod doesn't stop you from buying music from other sources. iTMS music only plays on an iPod, but there are plenty of other ways to get digital music - the CD being the most obvious and I would have to imagine far and away the dominant source of digital files for almost all MP3 player owners everywhere.

Apple Abusing of Virgin?

[agoliveira]

No wonder one can't find a virgin nowadays!
That's an absurd. Apple should be prosecuted for assault, indecent exposure and... oh wait... is The Apple and The Virgin...

This is not news

[phillymjs]

This is Slashdot, people! I don't know about you, but pretty much every article in the Apple section that I've read has posts from virgins incorrectly accusing Apple of being a monopoly.

~Philly

Repeat After Me

[Anonymous Coward]

Steve Hates TV
Steve Hates TV
Steve Hates TV

It's not going to happen. Though if he's stuck in a bed for his recovery, he might get suckered in. You never know.

cry me a river...

[lungbutter]

...and Virgin Megastores haven't sold Mac software since their inception. Virgin never cared about Apple! Why should Apple give the time of day to Virgin? The point of iTMS/iPod is TO PUT THE BRICK AND MORTER STORES OUT OF BUSINESS! They're obsolete...cry all they want...they didn't come up with ANY of the technology to make this happen so why do they think Apple owes them ANYTHING?!?

VPC6 runs iTunesWin just fine

[caveat]

if you really want to transcode WMAs with iTunes on an OSX box, get a copy of VirtualPC and Win98; it runs iTunes just fine. bit slow, but beggars can't be choosers.

Re:VPC6 runs iTunesWin just fine

[cbirdsong64]

iTunes PC only runs on 2000 and XP.

Re:VPC6 runs iTunesWin just fine

[caveat]

yeah, i realized that after i posted; i have all three, kinda hard to keep track of what's what (specially since i don't care, since i only ever fire them up if i Need to run a win app)

The real question is...

[Warlock7]

Did they get turned away or did they not agree to the licensing offered by Apple in the first place? Motorola has a long-standing relationship with Apple and most likely agreed to an exclusive DRM license deal that Apple agreed with and allowed them to distribute. The long term goals of the iTMS and iPod appear to be getting the Fairplay DRM distributed to the masses without interference from some other competing DRM.

really a virgin? Re:This Raises An Excellent Quest

[swschrad]

virgin music has released product before. it is no longer a virgin. apple should countersue to have them change their name to "slut entertainment" since they are obviously selling their wares for money.

that'll teach 'em.

Back to the whiteboard

[Ohreally_factor]

It's widely known that Apple breaks even with iTMS, and just uses it as a vehicle to sell iPods.

Last two quarters, Apple has reported a small profit with iTMS.

As to your bullet points. . .

1. Why not buy your music on priceline? Name your own price. I don't think there is anything stopping a person from creating a price matching site, so have at it. Remember, we're talking 99 songs here, so pardon me if my butthole doesn't get wet when I find a 5 savings on "Freebird".

2. A. Not in Australia. B. And the music companies would do this why? Because the AAC miniCD is a smaller physical size? Maybe you should buy your digital music in bulk by weight and get a really great deal?

3. Profit!!

Actually, point #3 is probably a good thing, since it offers more choice to the consumer, but personally, I'm good wit iTunes. I'm already very comfortable with it, so even if a better jukebox/music organizer came along, it would have to be a whole lot better to interest me.

Re:Back to the whiteboard

[Ohreally_factor]

muthafu. . .

no cent symbols on /.?

99 songs above means 99 cent songs and 5 savings means 5 cent savings.

Someone bring tortilla chips

[Ohreally_factor]

If they've got MIMEole!

I'll whip up a batch of fresh salsa.

Re:Wit. Rapier wit.

[Ohreally_factor]

He could tell you, but then he'd have to puncture you.

Wait...

[The Grassy Knoll]

>Virgin Accuses Apple of Abusing Monopoly

Wait... Is this a story from the Bible??

.

More to come.

[Gordon Bennett]

Just goes to show what happens when record companies spend most of their resources on litigating against piracy rather than empowering listeners to fairly purchase music. Go Apple!

Right...

[2nd Post!]

Just like CSS and Macrovision somehow DIED, right?

I don't see DRM dying; I see ineffective DRM thriving over literal DRM because one is more consumer friendly, and as long as we're comparing Apple's DRM to Microsoft's DRM, Apple is always ahead because it is more lenient to the user.

I can't see why you think encryption based DRM is going away; as processing becomes cheaper and cheaper, encryption becomes cost-less, to the point where I envision encryption on email, IM, voip, and everything... effectively DRM to protect our privacy, yes?

I have the right to these contents. The recipient has the right to these contents. The government, my boss, and my neighbor do not. How is encrypting email, then, not DRM?

Thanks for getting back to me

[Ohreally_factor]

The case here is a little more complicated.

Exactly my point. It is very far from clear cut which is why you can't call it a "monopolistic tactic" without major qualifications and equivications. Two further counterpoints. One, last I heard, one in three mp3 players sold was an iPod. Apple might currently be the most successful player, but it is wrong to claim that they have anything approaching a monopoly position (yet. I'll concede that it could happen.). Second, they're not shutting out the record industry! The record industry, in the form of the dominant cartel, the RIAA companies, has the monopoly power and ultimately controls the product.

Protocols and languages are both methods of transimitting information from one entity to another. Certainly protocols aren't NATURAL languages or human languages -they have a much smaller bredth of information that they need to be flexible enough to transmit - but the analogy is sound.

It might be a sound analogy, but it not a perfect analogy. You and I could develop a computer programming language and not publish it in the public domain, and that language would still be useful for creating effective programs. There is no law that would require us to open that language to others, either freely or for recompense. We could have a "monopoly" on that language, but it could never become a monopoly because there would always be the (very easy) possibility of lots of competition.

In your example, it sounds like the community created a new language, and the original work is not necessarily protected by copyright law when creating something new. Definitions of derivative works come into play here. If the language had been patented, the result might have been different, since patents do generally control derivative works, even new work if it is based on the patented work. Still, I don't know tha particulars.

I do think you're on a good track that deserves further thought and follow up regarding interface as being langauge-like. (And I do agree with you philosophically about patents.) May I suggest you read Roland Barthes on the topic of Semiotics and Semiology? Check out Mythologies . From the Amazon book description: "For Barthes, words and objects have in common the organized capacity to say something. . ."

As your argument currently stands, I find much fault. However, I do think you are on to something, maybe something larger than the current set of issues under discussion.

They do not have entire iPod market to themselves

[SuperKendall]

Apple shares the iPod market with eMusic, and anyone else willing to sell unrestricted music.

The only thing Apple holds is the DRm, but it by no means locks anyone out from using the iPod - they just can't restrict usage rights. How is that Apples problem?

Right BUT ... (was Re:Right...)

[slapphappe]

Well, for one, you're not selling me your encrypted email and I'm not buying it. Next you'll tell me that your car's electronic lock is DRM. Well it is, but not in the context I'm arguing against it. Did I browse iTunes and tell myself I'm going to buy a piece of DRM today, or did I go in there to buy Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony -- which I'd like to play on my iPod, when it's convenient, but would also like to stream to my Tivo and download to my Treo. When I buy music, why should I be thinking about the encrytion and where and how I may or may not enjoy the performance of it?

Re:Right BUT ... (was Re:Right...)

[2nd Post!]

That's exactly the reason iTMS DRM is so successful. You're buying the music, the DRM is only there to appease the RIAA. Just like a proper mail client handles the encryption for you, only notifying you, "This recipient has never sent you an email before, do you wish to view it?" and automagically grab the proper keys to decrypt it. Imagine spam as a victim of encrypted email!

As long as encryption has legitimate uses, I don't see why it would go away for, say, financial uses ala DRM as well.

Come on now...

[Anonymous Coward]

How many French Virgins really need Apple's DRM?