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Hilary Rosen Gripes About iPod, iTMS
mijkal writes "Hilary Rosen, the former RIAA CEO and chairwoman, has spoken out against Apple's "lock-in" with iPod and the iTunes Music Store." From the article: "The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's." Ironically, she appeals to consumer rights and anti-monopoly tactics."
The RIAA asked for DRM. iTunes gave you DRM. Apple sees a way to leverage this technology to their advantage and you cry foul? Grow up.
So what, does Warp Records just not exist? And what about all those people all over the internet distributing mp3s of their own personally recorded music legally? Do they just not exist?
Oh, wait, I forgot-- those people aren't RIAA members. So I guess to Hillary Rosen, they don't exist.
Still, it seems awfully odd that "can play anything but WMA and FLAC" means "can only play personally ripped music and iTMS purchasers".
The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's.
Hmm... And whose fault would that be? If the Record companies didn't require DRM we wouldn't have to worry about this. Or does she want Apple to open up their DRM scheme?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
And some obscure audio file format. What's it called? Oh, yeah. MP3.
You must think in Russian.
I think whatever she would claim, she actually isn't worried about consumer lock-in. What she's worried about is producer-side lock-in. The RIAA members are locked in to the iTunes Music Store; they have to do business with the iTMS or their competitors will get the purchases there instead. The RIAA probably isn't happy about this. They're used to being able to dictate terms (like "you will carry X, Y and Z but not W because we said so") to retailers, not having the retailers dictate terms to them (like, "customers will be allowed to make as many CD copies as they like").
I beleive it is common knowledge that Ms. Rosen is a lesbian. However, let's despise her for being a shameless spokesperson for anybody willing to pay her to do so; her sexual preferences should be irrelevant.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Steve Jobs, Let my Music Go
Fricking cow. Why don't YOU and all the lawsuit happy pricks on your side let OUR music go.
That's some fricking gall to blame Steve Jobs for Apples answer to the RIAAs psycho DRM paranoia.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Yeah, she's lesbian. She's been pretty public about this for years, so it's not exactly news.
What's more, it doesn't have anything to do with anything: slam her for lying to Congress, lying about what dire straits the music industry is in, and wanting to throw kids in jail. There are plenty of things to complain about, but insulting her sexuality (which I see people do pretty often) is uncalled for, and casts all opponents of the RIAA gestapo in a bad light.
m-
You catch enchiladas by picking them up behind the head and holding them underwater until they don't kick anymore -VeGas
This isn't about Apple's lockin with the iPod and the iTMS, this is about Apple's lockin vs. everybody else's lockin on Windows machines.
This is sort of correct. Except Apple lets Windows users join in on their lock-in and you're forgetting Real who would be happy to lock-in windows and mac users, but has not managed either.
Actually, I do agree with Miss Rosen in that I think if we have to have DRM, it should be an open standard DRM that is not owned by MS or Apple. Of course it should be legally mandated an so MS can't break the law and embrace and alter it. On the other hand, I just buy all my music without DRM in the first place and I really wish the media would stop portraying DRM as having something to do with pirating. Anyone can pirate DRM'd music. If you can hear it, you can record it. This is about controlling what people who legitimately bought music do with it. And I think the RIAA has some very hard questions to answer regarding that. If only the media was not owned maybe someone would have the balls to ask them on camera.
Her own organization, the RIAA, hires people to create and distribute those viruses to deliberately infect P2P sites. I wonder if Hillary Rosen ever met the truth.
It's not about whether copyright is good or bad, it's simply this:
Makes me/our company/our friends lots of cash, probably at your expense: good
Gives you freedoms/etc at our expense: bad
Jobs was unique in finding a way to make the harsh restrictions placed on downloaded music by the recording industry palatable to a wide audience and profitable to boot.
Seeing as Apple took the risk and won, I think it's unreasonable to ask them to give up the fruits of their labors. As an Apple shareholder I'd hold Jobs culpable if he ever did such a thing. I say to Jobs: "Milk it for all it's worth." Especially since there are plenty of competitors out there to keep him honest. The iPod doesn't have a monopoly because Apple locked everyone else out of the market, ala Microsoft, it has one because it's better.
If you don't like the fact that you can't play your Windows Media songs on the iPod, buy a different player ... or do what I do and buy the physical CD and convert it into whatever format you prefer. I get my CDs primarily from Amazon.com, but never from Apple.
And Hillary, if you don't like the myriad proprietary forms of DRM on downloaded music, consider the fact that it's your fault it's there in the first place.
jim frost
jimf@frostbytes.com
The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's. But those other music sites have lots of music that you can't get at the iTunes store. So, if you have an iPod, you are out of luck. If you are really a geek, you can figure out how to strip the songs you might have bought from another on-line store of all identifying information so that they will go into the iPod. But then you have also degraded the sound quality. How cruel.
Y'know what? None of my MP3 collection has "degraded sound quality."
If any of the stores wanted to, they could easily sell me MP3's, which would go onto my iPod no problem. But they won't, because the RIAA still haven't wised up that consumers don't want their DRM crap.
No, now we get Hilary Rosen, mouthpiece of the RIAA for so long, whining about how "Apple" stops their songs from going onto the iPod rather than whining about how none of the stores are willing to sell a song in a format the iPod will take.
Give me a fucking break.
The latest fad in american business and politics is to spread FUD like it's going out of style. In post 9/11 america, it works way too well, especially for a people who lost the ability to reason a long time ago, if they ever had it.
This may seem like an incredibly stupid thing to say, but in reality you just have to follow the money. The RIAA doesn't like the iTunes model because Apple has this segment of the market locked up real nice because their system works so well for 90% of the American public. With power comes control of the cash. If the RIAA tries to leverage itself against iTunes, the egomaniacal Jobs will push back, because he likes using his power.
Market power translates directly to money, for all those who don't understand why companies like Microsoft have $40 billion in the bank. Apple has a lot of say over what gets sold and for how much. Too much for the comfort of the RIAA.
Bottom line, The RIAA wants to chip away at iTunes' power and get more of it themselves. The more power they get, the more money they get. And Joe consumer will buy it because only those educated in the supply chain of music understand the details.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Perhaps she's complaining because she doesn't follow the party line that permeates your world - namely that customer lock-in and DRM are bad only when they come from Microsoft or someone else, but A-OK when they come from Apple.
No, it's bad coming from Apple too.
I agree that Apple should open the iPod up a bit, to let others make DRM'd AAC's for the device without resorting to Real's Harmony approach.
What the problem here is is that while Apple is promoting vendor lock-in a little bit, Microsoft, via, walmart, napster, and all the other WMA stores, is promoting not only format lock-in, but the most hideous DRM ever conceived by mankind.
If you want a portable music device that will delete your music by itself simply because you haven't connected it to a computer recently, then look into WMA10 and the "Plays For Sure" logo. Because that's what it does, and that's what it means. Go read the WMA10 SDKs, it's pretty clear once you get past the pretty diagrams.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
If they would've let the stores sell MP3s from the start, we wouldn't be in this situation.
LordBodak's journal.
Apple actually aknowledges than when a person buys a song/album, they should be able to listen to it in their car, on the MP3 player (iPod of course), their computer, etc. No, they don't think you should be able to stand on a street corner and hand out copies to complete strangers. Apple's solution is actually that happy medium where music companies get money for online music downloads and consumers get music in a form that is convenient and easy to move around their different listening devices. So yes, the OP had a legitimate gripe and Hillary Rosen is just being moronic and trying to twist reality into something it isn't.
Space for rent, inquire within
Why not? Woudn't it be of benefit to consumers? Or better yet, how about Apple licensing their DRM liberally, like Microsoft does, so that we can play our iTMS songs on other-than-Apple devices? How would this hurt the consumer?
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Now I'm not arguing that the RIAA is good or anything, and yes, it's just about money.
But arguing that Apples DRM in any way means "Gives you freedoms/etc at our expense" for RIAA, is the epitome of hypocrisy. It gives you exactly what freedom? The "freedom" to have exactly one choice of online music?
Apple _is_ using two products in a way that each keeps you pretty much locked into the other. Same as, you know, Microsoft loves to use its own products to enforce a monopoly.
In fact, _that_ is MS's monopoly. It's not just "waah, they're evil because they have money", it's that each product reinforces the other, as to (A) make it painful to break out of that vicious circle if you're already hooked, and (B) make it a painfully high entry barrier: if you want to compete with Windows you have to pretty much compete with all of them at the same time.
So why is it good and "freedom" when Apple does it?
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
For ten thousand years culture has been the property of its society. People shared music to build their culture, in the same way that they shared stories and pictures. Till the last few hundred years or so when profit became more important than culture. In current Western society we do the same thing. Ever since the creation of blank tapes, and maybe before, teenagers copied music to share with their friends, to create their own cultural identity. When the majority of the people are engaged in this, but small but wealthy groups like the RIAA can control and alter our rights to do so, we no longer have the right to call ourselves a free democratic society. The whole DRM thing means now that we are often restricted from copying a CD we own to another format (MP3 or whatever) for our own personal use. That's 'our' music.
All available data suggest that regardless of any of this, the sun will still come up tomorrow.
not everyone who is against the RIAA supports music piracy. some of us are grown adults who just want things liek ot be able to get the music we want to buy and play it on any music player we own (much liek apprently hillary wants). we don't want to be hampered by anti-copyign schemes which restricts our fair use rights, costs us money, and in the end do next to nothing to stop the REAL pirates.
you wanna share my wife? that's a different story. let's talk about something that really is property? change that to a car. want to borrow my car? not likely. want to make an exact copy of my car and leave mien intact and not hamper me in any way, feel free.
as for the "laws" the RIAA is enforcing... in case you didnt' know.. they bought those laws, to serve their own interest. they took the original copyright laws, which were intended to give the artist a LIMITED time to recoupe some money from their work, then be contributed to the public domain and changed them so that the middle men, who have nothign to do with the creation or performign of the music make most of the the money. artists went broke long before P2P.. it's because the industry is ripping them off far worse than any pirate ever has.
i also contend that there would be no music if there were no copyright laws.. history proves otherwise. people who want to make music will make music. especially in this day and age, it's very easy for a small time artist to make music and get it distributed, even if he/she doesn't want to make any profit from it.
I believe sex is highly over rated... unless it involves me
It's there in black and white. "multiple (read Microsoft)"
She's actually complaining that some bastard has the audacity to come up with a file format which isn't open for Microsoft to copy.
The implication is that if iTunes dished out WMA, then she'd be happy, because MSFT are already bum-buddies with the RIAA. The rest is just whitewash.
It's been a long time since I last heard anyone complain that a system is too closed, because Microsoft don't have the license to use it.
I'm no fan of iTunes - it's still DRM'd music. I'd rather own a CD and the rights to the music on that CD - to play it in my car, at home, on my laptop, wherever I wish. Apple and Microsoft are apparently intent on denying these rights; from a PC speaker, MP3 will do okay for me. In the car, at home, I'll copy the CD, thank you.
I don't download music which I don't already own (unless the publisher allows it - eg www.slidepheromone.com) and I certainly don't pay to download music, as the only options are limited-rights downloads.
Author, Shell Scripting : Expert Re
Are you serious!?! Where is your sense of humor? Don't you realize the Register article is the satire!?! For crying out loud! They are mocking Huffinton's entire website by stating that Rosen's article is so obviously funny it must be written as a joke.
Rosen's article is so obviously a commercial for Microsoft's DRM that I couldn't bring myself to read anything else Huffinton's site offered. More shills no doubt.
Try rereading the Reg's article with a tongue planted firmly in your cheek. (^_-)
The Splintered Mind - Overcoming
but when, oh when, will Steve Jobs let me buy music from somewhere other than the Apple iTunes store and put it on my iPod?
They do. They're called CDs. You still sell music on those, right?