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Napster To Campaign Aggressively Against iPod
rocketjam writes "Forbes reports that Napster plans an aggressive marketing campaign against Apple's iPod as part of its subscription service full launch later this quarter. Napster's service uses Microsoft's Janus technology to enable DRM protected music files 'bought' through subscription services to be transferred from a PC to a portable music player. Napster CEO Chris Gorog said the company is betting heavily that their monthly 'all you can eat' subscription service will win the battle for online digital music services, claiming, 'It's exactly what consumers want to do. Napster To Go is very similar to the P2P experience.' He believes the best way to market the service is to emphasize its advantages over iTunes and its iPod-only compatibility. 'We're going to be communicating to people that it's stupid to buy an iPod.' Maybe I'm too old to get it, but I fail to see the attraction of paying a monthly fee for as long as I want to have access to my music." Of course, if Napster To Go supported iPod, they'd have a much larger install base to convince to use their service, instead of still pleading people to buy a portable player with compatible DRM installed.
I list to internet radio stations on Real or shoutcast on XMMS.
You can pick up just about every public radio station in the US.
It's a lot closer than that. Rhapsody (Listen.com) do that today on the PC platform.
;)
Check out the 3GSM conference starting Monday for movement from the mobile side of things
Definitely not 2020 - more like 2006/7.
Actually, when you use the Napster service you also have the option to purchase "most" tracks (don't know what that really means) for an additional $0.99 per track. So it really depends on whether you find that $15 a month for essentially an unlimited free trial (until you quit the service) of all the music a value added.
But as another poster pointed out, the music you "purchase" in iTMS or Napster is still not really yours, because you're still restricted by their DRM from doing a lot of things (protected by fair use) with the music you payed for. You're still tied to certian supported platforms and players, restricted in what computers you can move it to, and forbidden from reselling. Personally, I chose Emusic, because I actually own the music I pay for (well, in the sense you own the music on a CD anyway) and can do what I want with it (within the confines of law). There are other services like this out there too. Of course, many major labels/bands won't allow anyone to actually sell their music in a digital format not encumbered by DRM.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
... Go to www.allofmp3.com. The following might sound too good to be true, but just go check it t out. It's an online music store (run by a Russian company) where you:
... all up to CD quality.
... *looks it up*... 2241 songs weighing in at 11.33 Gb.
1) Have the choice between Mp3, WMA, Ogg, Mpc, FLAC, Monkey Audio, Mpeg - 4 AAC (iTunes compatible)
2) Pay by the MB.
3) Have a library almost as large as any of the US services in the market (and much better as far as back catalogue is concerned).
4) CAN BUY MUSIC LEGALLY, at least in my country. I checked and had checked by representatives of the Austrian music industry, they grudgingly conceded that yes, it is legal for me to buy music there for a tenth of what it costs me at home.
I have spent over 140 dollars there in the last six months. But those 140 bucks bought me over
Heck, you can even pay using PayPal. There is NO reason not to use this service. Economically, music is a luxury. Lower the price for luxuries, and sales go orbital.
Just a quick nitpick...
People seem to forget that, even when "purchasing" music, even at $0.99/song, you don't really "own" the music, just the right to play it on a portable device, burn it onto a CD or two, and play it on a few machines that you own... and a significantly "upgraded" machine is considered a new machine. Upgrade enough times and, with most of the DRM software out there, you can't have your music any more.
Actually, that's not exactly true. There is an option in iTunes that will allow you to deauthorize your computer, so that if a machine is going to be reloaded, serviced, what-have-you, it's not going to take up one of your five allotments anymore. If you forget to deauthorize a machine and have already wiped it, they even provide a web-based form which allows you to deauthorize it without being on the machine.
There's an Apple knowledge base article which explains it more here.
Just my $.02...
Janus came out last year in May.
/. articles to pick through:
.com.com articles, all the comments on both threads, and THEN come back to this one, head a'burstin' with knowledge! :D
We have two
Microsoft Preps 'Janus' Music Copy-Prevention Scheme
Microsoft's Janus DRM Software Officially Unveiled
Now, go read both
You dont need a CD to convert AAC to MP3. You just need to convert it to AIFF on your harddisk first. then you can transcode it. Yes. that is two steps but you can write an apple script to do it auomatically. the AIFF step does not lose quality so the transcoding is effectively a single step. To prove this to yourself just do the following. open iMovie (not iTunes). pick any protected AAC song from the library and addit is a sound track. now look in the iMovie folder that contains your new movie. Voila there is the AIFF file. Now drag this into iTunes and transcode it to MP3. Now automate this with Applescript. Install the script into the iTunes services and viola you have a new menu item in Itunes to convert any protected AAC to mp3 with no more loss of quality than any other trascode. alternatively you can just use DVD John's hack to break the AAC protection, though that might have some watermarking issues that someday could crop up in the future if apple wanted to get ughly about it
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I signed up for the two week trial, just to see how much I like it. I have some really mixed feeligns on the subject. I haven't decided if I am going to keep the service or cancel.
There are several benefits: It's easier than file sharing. I can download an entire album with the click of a mouse, and I actually get it in a reasonable amount of time. So while I am signed up for the $10 a month fee, I think that it is worth it so that I don't have to worry about all the crap that comes with a P2P program. Then you're allowed to have it on three computers. Which I think is pretty slick -- you can have a set on your work computer and then on your home computer. I would have to say that the three computer deal was one of the things that made me sign up. Between my laptop, desktop and my work computer, I'll be able to get tunes where ever I work. It's also cheap and convient. I don't have to worry about getting charged $XX amount for every CD. And if I want to buy the CD then I can.
The biggest annoyance is the fact that you can't rip them to a CD without buying them. I wanted to rip them to a CD to listen to them in the shower and in the car, but I can't without buying the rights. Then there is the feeling that I really don't own the 6.5G that I downloaded, and that if I stop paying then I am screwed. Pretty much the only way that I have been able to reconcile the cost is that I have access to far more music than I would normally have access to if I were to buy the music individually. I don't have to run out and buy the music on iTunes or to Wal-mart.
In prior posts people have questioned the economic value of iTunes verse Napster. The main economic difference is that I am able to download and listen to as much as I want to with Napster. While I don't own the music, and there are limitations on what I can do with the music, it is far cheaper than acquiring the music in other means. And it's legal.
I have only been in my trial for about four days now. But if you look at it like renting two movies, or three movies if you get the portable option, then it doesn't hurt that much. I have spent far mroe money renting movies in one year than I will spend on Napster. $120 a year for unlimited listening isn't all that bad. For $120 in CD's I could seriously wear out the utility on 8 or so CD's that it would buy me. To those that have massive CD collections, how much of those CD's do you actually listen to?
So you can call me stupid for making an economically unsound decision -- but for students and others who have a limited budget, it isn't all that bad. I would suggest that people give it a try before knocking it. There are things that I don't like, but at the same token the $10/15 isn't all that bad for a unlimited rental program.
The views expressed are mine own and do not express the views of my employer.
This means that in order to play any Download after the end of a Subscription Month, you must log on to the Service so that Napster can renew your rights for those Tracks. The Client will count the number of times that you play a Download, including while you are offline, for royalty accounting and analysis purposes.
In addition to that, you need to plugin each device at the end of the month to "renew" the tracks. I'm sorry but most folks, who aren't Slashdot readers, tend not to read this stuff and will probably be really pissed off at the end of each month when their PC works and one of thier "Plays for Sure" compatible players does not. I'm dying to see how disasterous this turns out.
I have a MP3 player that is CD based. I've yet to find a online music store that will let me use my mp3 player.
I got a CD based player because it offers 700mb at a time, and with a 50 pack of CDs I've got 3.5gb of mp3 playing for only $70 (CDRs+MP3/CD Walkman.)
In my car the CD Changer (10 disks) is also a mp3 machin, I've got 7GB at my fingertips (and well integrated into my head unit) for only $300 ($525 if you count the head unit.)
The current systems of online music sales are totaly worthless to me because of the DRM built in. My CD changer can't connect to the internet and validate a current subscription. It can't do DRM.
My only options for mp3s are to rip my conventionaly recorded tracks, download free(legal) tracks from the internet, or go to the darkside and run the risk of RIAA lawsuits.
There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.
True, nobody can.
However, it's not true you're trapped to a single brand of player. I don't own an iPod, but I do own a bunch of CD players which play iTunes songs burned to CD just fine.
Off the top of my head:
eMusic
MP3Tunes
There are also a number of individual artists and labels that sell ordinary MP3s you can use with your player, as well as a number of places offering free sample tracks.
In fact, Apple barely locks you into anything. Want to convert your music and save it to a CD? Go ahead. Want to download MP3s for free? They'll work. Etc.
You forgot one: Want to switch from Mac OS X to Windows, or vice versa? Go ahead. iTunes exists for both platforms, and your iTMS DRM'd music can go with you easily-- just authorize the new computer.
If you're a Windows user, good luck trying to migrate to a Mac and take your DRM'd WMA files from non-Apple online music stores with you. Windows Media Player for the Mac doesn't do DRM (or much of anything else, for that matter).
Microsoft is way more guilty of lock-in attempts than Apple.
5 computers can have the file, along with an unlimited amount of iPods.
Not since Marie-Antoinette played milkmaid has looking simple and honest been so fake and complicated.
Dude, fuckin' read the thread before injecting a half-assed rant in midstream, okay?
SIERRA TANGO FOXTROT UNIFORM
That's not neccesarily true. If you use a program like Total Recorder ($12), it can rip directly from your computer's digital output, and forces the program to go as fast as it can. So, if you have the song on your hard drive, you could have the album in an MP3 in a minute or two. Then you can get a cuesheet from cuesheet.info and feed that into a program like mp3DirectCut (this will take the main MP3 and split it into songs). That sounds like a lot, but if you get the hang of it you can have an album ripped and perfectly tagged in a couple of minutes. BTW. You can also use this method to turn Rhapsody or internet radio into MP3s. This probably violates their terms . . . but in this day and age copyright issues are usually borderline anyway. Note that I'm not affiliated with any mentioned programs/sites.
I see too many problems with Napster/Janus. End-users want to _own_ their own music, not rent it. I have no clue what the Napster CEO was talking about by saying that the subscription service is just like current P2P. Current P2P allows you to _own_ the song. You don't lose the song if you don't' continue to pay for it. However that is exactly what Napster and the MS Janus crap does. If you don't pay, you no longer have access to content, even the content that you have ALREADY PAID FOR.
First let me say that I am 32, married with two kids. I don't own an iPod and don't think they are "cool". However, I remember what it was like to be a teen and if I was currently a teen or a young twenty-something, the iPod would be the only choice of a "cool" player. All the other players are just such crap. That whole garbage from MS about being able to download from "many sites" means crap. iTunes/iTMS/iPod seem to give young music lovers just what they want. There is really no space in that market now for anyone other than Apple. Maybe MS and the others can market to the 40+ market, however, they wont get back the young market. Especially by pushing more restrictive DRM on them. Seriously, WTF is Napster and MS thinking? What young music lover is going to switch from a service like the iPod/iTMS where they actually get to _buy_ the music to a service where they only get to _rent_ the music and if they don't pay, they lose it all?
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
There isn't exactly a watermark (unless Apple is being very secretive about it), just some metadata in the headers that says the file was bought from iTunes and identifies the purchaser. There are tools that can edit or remove this metadata, but hymn and iOpener don't do it automatically.
All that this means is that music files made usign hymn and iOpener can, in theory, be traced back to a particular iTunes customer. This was a deliberate choice by DVD Jon and the other hackers, as they wanted to restore the same kind of fair use that people get with CDs and analog media, not enable anonymous P2P file sharing.
But while you're using the service the value for iTMS is 15$*number-of-months while Napster has a value of a few hundred thousand dollars if you calculate the value by utility
What a fanciful (and ludicrous) claim!
Since "a few" is imprecise, let's simplify that to "one". This smaller claim is that the "value by utility" of napster is $100,000 per month. There are 44,640 minutes in a 31 day month. Even if one could derive value from listening to songs 24 hours per day, this works out to $2.24 per minute for listening to music.
Also, I doubt that listening to music while sleeping is of any tangible subjective value. Here I'll be generous, and allow only 6 hours of sack time per day. This raises the cost to 2.98 per minute to listen to music. Since your numbers were presumably based on per/song pricing, If we choose the value of 3 minutes per song, your purported "value by utility" is $8.96 per song.
These numbers do not make any sense, thus your claim does not make any sense. I'll refrain from figuring out what you meant by "a few hundred thousand", since even 100,000 is so far off the mark.
You can't burn a playlist with ITMS songs as a MP3 disc. Try it, it won't let you... You can only burn as an Audio-CD or Data disc.
Well, not if that family member is a close family memeber.
Here's the official answer from the local ASCAP. It's the same in most countries, maybe not the USA (DMCA?).
#include "coucou.h"