Slashdot Mirror
Real Feels iTunes Backlash
BunkAsInBed writes "CNET reports RealNetwork's recent campaign against the iTunes music network that involved tactics like slashing the costs of their downloads in half, reverse engineering Apple's FairPlay format (Harmony), and recently an online petition and bulliten board have received the opposite reponse that was anticpated."
There would be a time when *CONSUMERS* would be the ones AGAINST reverse engineering DRM?
Are you secure enough in your masculinity to run 'man touch'?
The way I understand it, Apple makes most of the money on iPods. The iTunes business is to make ipods more attractive and brings almost no profit. Why don't they want to let others sells songs for ipod?
If there's one thing that Apple as a company has managed to succeed with for a very, very long time, it is building a fiercely loyal customer base. Apple customers don't jump ship when the company is at its worst, let alone when it appears to be sailing relatively smoothly. Apple customers also of late really, really seem to want stuff that "just works" without any extra work on the part of the user.
While I don't doubt that RealNetworks is going out of their way to make it relatively easy to ultimately play their stuff on Apple's hardware, the user still has to get third party software, still has to subscribe to another service that isn't affiliated with their computer (in fact being a direct antithesis), and has to do extra work. Combine that with the large amount of market burnout regarding Real, and I'm really not surprised by this. I'm more surprised that Real pursued this attempt to begin with.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
That was from the CNET article, and I cannot say I agree. While what RealNetworks did is not entirely ethical, it isn't theft. It's essentially what the Linux on iPod group is doing (on some level) and I believe it's wrong to condemn them for it.
The major issue I have with Real is that they tried to cut a deal with Apple and *THEN* decided to go and 'hack' the iPod. It seems to me that Apple has no problem with an agreement with Motorola -- so what did Real do wrong?
My guess is that Real was unwilling or unprepared to make the necessary accomodations to get on Apple's boat (so to speak). The best-selling hard disk digital music player isn't going to be pushed around by Real, so it seems obvious to me that the lack of negotiation skills on the part of Real is the problem.
As such, *that* is the problem people should be focusing on: why Real's management was too inept to make a deal happen.
I'm not popular enough to be different.
Homer Simpson, The Simpsons
...have it spot-on. Why should Real have any say in what the iPod plays? They may rant on about it being 'freedom of consumer choice', but that's not a little hypocritical from Real - whose own music store isn't even Mac-compatible yet. Perhaps it Real were to support the Mac crowd, create a player that people would prefer to use, and generally better themselves, they'd have more success in luring people away. As it stands, however, people have exercised their freedom of choice - and they've chosing the iPod and iTMS.
And tomorrow the stock exchange will be the human race
Let's get one thing straight here. For the actual audio compression, Apple uses 128kbps AAC for ITMS downloads. AAC stands for "Advanced Audio Compression", not "Apple Audio Compression" or anything else. AAC is an MPEG standard, just like MP3, only better. RealNetworks uses 192kbps AAC in their store. It's the same damn format. The quality will be slightly better, if you have some nice headphones to plug into your iPod, you'll probably hear the difference. The only new thing that Real has brought with Harmony is that they've enabled tracks bought from the Real store to play on the iPod by wrapping the AAC tracks with FairPlay DRM. The fact that the tracks cost $0.49 and are encoded at a higher bitrate makes this a good buy for anybody who isn't an Apple groupie or against DRM on principle. If you don't trust Real, then don't buy from them, but I fail to see how this is anything but a net positive for consumers. I'm amazed that there are people screaming "Please! Give me a monopoly in the digital music market!"
It's easy to make your digital music store compatible with the iPod. Just sell un-DRMed AAC or MP3 files.
For the record, I love my iPod, and I don't use the iTMS.
Apple did not want to license their DRM scheme (which, by the way, seems awful darn liberal) to Real. I wouldn't want to do business with Real either...they've been making themselves the enemies of their customers for the better part of a decade.
I don't think Real has done anything wrong reverse-engineering the DRM scheme. I just think that anybody who buys music from them is really not very smart, because the next iPod firmware update is going to nuke this loophole something fierce.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
Let's please get one thing straight - Real is not doing "freedom" any favors with harmony. All it does is reapply the same DRM limitations on the resulting iPod-compatible file. You're still stuck with a hobbled, limited file.
Meanwhile, look at it from Apple's perspective (please, give it a try, just for a moment). User buys songs from Real, with their DRM limitations. User converts them, loads them on iPod, assumedly through iTunes. Now, the user tries to play them on multiple computers, etc like Apple DRM allows... and it doesn't play. Who are they calling? Do they remember which store they bought it from? No, they see that iTunes isn't playing something, and they call Apple. Now some Apple tech has to figure out that this is a Real AAC, not an Apple AAC, and figure out how the hell their DRM integrates (or doesn't) with iTunes, etc. This is a support disaster waiting to happen, and it will be Apple's, not Real's.
And finally, for those who read veiled threats into the press release Apple sent out about the iPod maybe not working in the future with such files - why not take it at face value for a moment? It's widely known that third parties supply the chips and guts of the iPod, so it's not such a reach that one of these new generations of chips and software just won't be prepared for whatever hack Real has done, and it will break. No conspiracy, no revenge, just simple fact of life in development.
I don't know what kind of crack I was on, but I suspect it was decaf.
I think it's fair to say that Real is conceding the mac market to iTunes. After all, why would mac+iPod users want an alternative to iTunes+iTMS? Since that's clearly the case, not supporing the mac platform is not a problem at all, though it seems to be a rallying cry for zealots.
But changing the brand wouldn't change the perception.
I mean, Real could change their name to "NotRealNetworks", but all us savvy geeks wouldn't be distracted.
"NotRealNetworks? Oh yeah. They used to be Real Networks. Not gonna buy their crap. You remember trying to install their damn player? Change the state on EVERY SINGLE RADIO BUTTON or it's spam for years."
It's not just branding: It's building a reputation for good products (or failing to do so). Brand is a factor, insofar as a company's product history informs my decision, but it's not at all the most relevant factor.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
Fair to concede the Mac market, but not the Windows market?
I'm a zealot because I love Apple products, but I wouldn't discard the option of Real music. Real wants to compete, then fine, compete. Maybe I'm being greedy, but why shouldn't I want $0.49 192kbps AAC files? You really have to ask, "Why would mac+iPod users want an alternative to iTunes+iTMS"?
I would be using iTunes+RMS because it's cheaper and higher quality. Duh.
GPL Deconstructed
A specific example of this is1 how differently the brands owned by Real are viewed by the user population.
RealPlayer tends to cause immediate irritation in people's minds and postings on the net.
Mention Rhapsody, though, and not a lot of flak is sent up. Why?
Other than the obvious trespassings Real had in the past, they've continued to exhibit ambigous messages to the public. The Helix system is open, but doesn't support premium services the Realplayer does, You have the Realplayer for Windows, Mac and Linux but the majority of servies and features only work on Windows, Harmony loads content onto almost any device (not just the iPod, that's a misconception) but the Real music store only works on Windows PCs, no Macs or Linux boxes. There's the implied message they are universal but in truth they're really a Windows product with some reach into Mac.
With Rhapsody, there's no bad name attached. They've never gotten mixed up in bad consumer practices- due in large part to the fact they listened to their consumers (imagine that!), they have a compelling product but the key difference is that Rhapsody is never marketed in any light other than the one that shines for Windows PCs. There's no ambiguity.
Yeah, Real had made serious attempts to clean up the brand but heavy promotion focused around ads that show a friggin iPod implying universal support but not actual having it is the next biggest hurdle. Mac users who have an iPod can't take advantage of the 49cent service because there's no store for the Mac.
Plus, does Real seriously think that by considering the feedback they received only the work of a "vocal minority" instead of 1200+ (at this writing) comments that might actually have some value, even if it is buried in vulgarity.
R(k)
And I don't mean a suit by Apple - I mean the Fed and the RIAA.
What I can't beleive is that we have a company willfully admitting that they went out of their way to crack a DRM related schema, and that no arrests have been made.
Shouldn't Real Networks have its hardware seized?
Kulakovich
Once upon a time streaming audio was available on many sites in both Quicktime and Real. Then several major radio sites (notably NPR ) made the decision to drop Quicktime coverage, If I was Steve Jobs I'd really want to crush Real just to get a bigger market share for Quicktime. And Quicktime has got to have a huge profit margin compared to a piece of hardware. So maybe this battle is about more, and subtler, goals than just the iPod.
Ok, first of all, even if Real Rhapsody or Jukebox or whatever was available for the Mac platform, most Mac users probably wouldn't use it.
Now, who does this interoperability "improvement" benefit? Windows users of course. iTunes and iPods both work well with Windows. Real is simply undercutting the iTunes song prices. I really see nothing inherently wrong with offering a lower price, it benefits the consumer.
In my opinion, why not buy some albums you wouldn't ordinarily buy for 4.99? I am sure the whole reverse-engineering of DRM will be taken to court. May as well benefit from the lower prices while you can. I am sure Real's Rhapsody/Jukebox files sound just as good on your iPod at half the price.
Keeping a business like Apple alive simply by running a "music" store seems like a flawed way of operating a hardware/operating system business.
Real has the reputation of being jerks.
Why? Because their software has a very annoying nagware component. The default real player installation leaves a blinking and blinking icon on the Windows toolbar. Even the new real one player that came on my Dell computer attempts to modify the registry every time it runs to add a "realsched" program of somesort that takes up my precious CPU cycles.
Thank god I 1) don't use real products all that often; and 2) have a nice utility pop-up that warns me whenever any software tries to add to the registry (I wish I could remember what the program is, and where I found it).
To me, even as a Windows user who bought an iPod and will never ever buy an Apple PC, Apple has been for the most part a class act. Real has not. Although, admittedly, quicktime does the same thing... Why can't they be more like Adobe Reader, which has the common decency to check for updates only when it runs, rather than wanting to do it every time you turn on the damn computer?
144l. ph34r my 133t l3g4l 5k1lz!
The fact that ... makes this a good buy for anybody...
Well, any iPod user who (1) has built their music collection in Windows and (2) never wants to use iTunes or the iTunes Music Store in the future.
'Cuz the next time you plug your iPod into your WinPC, iTunes will update the 'pod by adding any new songs & playlists, and removing any that are not on the iTunes list... just like it was originally designed to, way before the Real issue arose. As a result, you erase your Harmony tracks every time you use that marvelously easy/fast update. Then, you will need to either (a) manually re-copy all those tracks to your iPod, or (b) stop using iTunes and switch permanently to the Real jukebox, losing any iTMS music you got from Pepsi caps, free downloads of the week, or your hard-earned $$$.
And Real wants to claim they're offering a superior alternative?
Real justifies this lock-in with fine print as to "why you want to use the Real jukebox." Either all the songs you bought from iTMS or from Real, will become useless on an iPod, or you become a low-paid servant to that little tune player that you used to love.
The big deal with the iPod -- for me, and I think I'm typical with this -- is that it lets me just listen to music without all those techno-horrors. Not that it's cool, or sexy white, or Apple®. Real is offering a techno-horror of gotchas.
No wonder there's outrage. Mine is directed at Real's bait-and-switch, false sanctimony and their phony Dot-ORG marketing BS.
A universal DRM format? It'll probably have to be imposed on the hardware and software types by our friends the "music industry." Real, MS and Apple all have vested interests in promoting their kits. The only twist is that Apple actually has the upper hand here. And while it may look like the labels would benefit from selling the same program many times because of Balkanization, sooner or later they'll realize that commoditizing the players and stores leaves more money for them.
"Inquiring Minds Want to Know!"
I hope I don't get flamed or modded down, but this is real.
I have paid for RealOne since 2001. I love CNN and ABC News on-demand, and also BBC. I am willing to pay for content understanding that it cost money to produce, and it is the same reason I purchase iTunes songs.
I have to use the RealOne player to watch CNN and ABC on their website.. It is a closed licensing deal. I understood it was a closed system using Real's interface and I was ok with that. I cannot copy CNN newsfeeds and put them on my PocketPC, I can't watch RealOne content in Quicktime. That is their right.
However, now they are wanting to preserve that right they have with their content providers yet seek to access other closed systems through inflammatory websites that only quote people that agree with them.. it's not even a feedback or debate site but a propaganda website in it's purest form..
I cannot give my money to a company that would use my money to be so low and dispicable. This isn't a battle for fair-use, this is a business bully taking their desire for marketshare to the consumer thinking they'll buy that it's "just about consumer choice"
I guess I have to get cable now...
There is a rage in me to defy the order of the stars, despite their pretty patterns.