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Sony and Universal Prohibit Sharing Via Zune
ack154 writes "Engadget has a story about Sony and Universal Music apparently denying Zune owners the ability to 'squirt' songs by certain artists to other Zune users. That's right, if you've actually purchased songs from the Zune marketplace and happen to run into another Zune owner, you're prohibited from sharing certain songs. From the article: 'In a non-scientific sampling of popular artists by Zunerama and Zune Thoughts, it looks like it's roughly 40-50 percent of artists that fall under this prohibited banner, and the worst news is that there's no warning that a song might be unsharable until you actually try to send it and fail.'"
would have cost $2 per unit for Universal, I gather.
So basically, the Zune is even more useless?
Why even bother including a transmission service if it isn't just limited to be barely useful, but not have it work at all for half of the songs you can legitimately get?
got sig?
A resounding "FUCK!" from all of those who have bought MSFT stock hoping that Zune will catch on.
Every song is treated identical, whether it's idie or big label crap it's all exactly the same.
A lot of people think that Microsoft is an abusive software company. However, the facts seem to fit the theory that Microsoft is an abuse company that sells software.
--
U.S. government violence has stopped the centuries-long violence in Iraq and created a peaceful democracy. NOT!
I'm not. Saw this one coming when they announced the song sharing thing. I had hoped, however, that the giant music conglomerations would grow up and let it go through. Zune shared music can only be played a few times, so what's the harm in a little advertising?
Earbuds/headphones that automatically mute when someone other than their owner tries to listen to music with them?
By reading this you acknowledge that you have read it.
It is not fair use if giant corporations think they can sell you a second license specifically for that use. You just got zuned!
Microsoft: Haha jackasses! The Xbox 360 is outselling the hell out of your overpriced console and there is nothing you can do about it!
Sony: O Rly? Squirt this bizitches.
Ahhh, the mysterious world of corporate interaction.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
It'd be a miracle if two strangers with Zunes were ever in the same area so they could "squirt" songs together. Man, that sounds wrong.
So 40-50% of randomly-selected songs by two major labels can't be shared between Zunes. How much do you want to bet that the songs that can't be shared are top 40 hits and everyone already has them anyway? As long as people can still share indie labels and underground artists, then they can still expand their horizons by listening to songs their friends have and like. Personally, I just prefer a large LAN with everyone sharing their thousands of MP3s.
Zune terms of service:
==========
14. Content Usage Rules
All music you purchase or acquire on a subscription basis from the Zune Marketplace is subject to this agreement and any other applicable terms and conditions, including limitations imposed by the use of digital rights management (DRM) technology. Content may be used for personal, non-commercial use only.
14.1 Purchased Content Usage Rules. You are authorized to use the content that you purchased from the Zune Marketplace on up to five (5) total authorized computers.
You are entitled to burn purchased content, and playlists containing purchased content, to CD solely for personal, non-commercial use. There is no limit to the number of times you can burn an individual song; however, you may only burn the exact same playlist a maximum of seven (7) times.
==========
Microsoft won't even follow it's own legalese anymore. That's good to know. Well, hey, good news is, there are shitball lawyers out there that aren't on Microsoft's payroll, perhaps one will bless us with a class-action filing...
if you've actually purchased songs from the Zune marketplace and happen to run into another Zune owner...
Given the near astronomical odds of actually finding another Zune owner within a 20-mile radius that you'd want to share your music with, I think this problem is pretty much moot.
Ok. So... lemme see if I get this properly. Lets say... Napster, instead of Microsoft, made this product. And lets say that Napster expected every music manufacturer to provide some sort of arbitrary identifier to make music "non transferable"... how soon do you think Napster would be burried in a sea of litigation? Now, does this not seem like something that "enables pirating by design"? Isnt that what Napster got smacked with? "Enabling and encouraging people to pirate" while making money off of the "medium" by advertising. Substitute "advertising revenue" with "product sales revenue" and I fail to see the difference. Well, that and they arent a multi-billion dollar corporation that not only wipes its ass with anti-monopoly legislation and court rulings, but forces those same governments to eat that shit covered toilet paper by "passing the costs" right back to them... the consumer... the government... lolcakez....
20th century Marxism is not progress...
I remember reading about Steve Jobs complaining about the RIAA and the prices they want to charge (while he tried to keep it at $0.99 per song, regardless of song) and the RIAA complaining back that iTunes was too powerful and whatnot and was steamrolling them.
Now Microsoft was fairly nice to the RIAA and even paid them a royalty per MP3 player and now the Zune's most vaunted feature, their crippled wireless, can't even be utilized correctly. If the Zune had any steam amoung any geek circles (not that I think it did), this will surely kill it because it had few other advantages. It seems the RIAA and its member companies have royally screwed Microsoft.
I guess this shows how business truly gets conducted and how the RIAA should be dealt with when it is whining.
A present to Microsoft:
http://allaboutfrogs.org/stories/scorpion.html
Haven't we learned, don't pay for it till after sp2 or later.
Is the HAHA tag applicable here?
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Fine with me. I'm still trying to scrub my brain out after picturing Ballmer squirting. *shrug*
C|N>K
Real "iPod Killer" you got there Mr. Ballmer. I'm sure it's only a matter of time before the sales start to take off.
Seriously though I just don't understand how something can come to a market like this with a major selling point like this crippled the way it is. This is a perfect example of the difference between Apple's approach to the iPod and the way pretty much everybody else has gone at it. If the recording labels had tried to limit a similar feature in the iPod this way it would have likely been a deal breaker or the feature itself would have been dropped.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
I've said it 1000 times but I'll say it again:
I haven't paid for music in almost 10 years... until this year: I've spent almost $700 on AllOfMP3.com
And all the evidence points to the fact that I'm not alone. AllOfMP3.com is making millions.
Illegal? Yes. Sure, whatever. So is Limewire. And there's no potential for revenue generation there.
Say what you will about AllOfMP3.com but there's a profound lesson there that the labels and the RIAA should learn from:
They're getting people who don't spend money on music to spend money. That's huge.
When the "real, de-facto" option for consumers is free vs. DRM crippled -- they should be rejoicing the fact that
there is, in fact a middle ground: DRM-free, high-quality music (not 128bit crap) at a price that
makes sense given the lack of shipping, manufacturing and retail overhead.
I still contend that if the labels embraced the pricepoint and the formula they'd be making multiples over
what they're making now.
The problem isn't piracy. The problem ultimately is greed.
Their business model is hilariously weak, and instead of adjusting to market forces like all other industries
must do -- they're attempting to ram it down the throats of consumers.
Good luck boys.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
I can only imagine how upset the zune owners will be once they find this out. Heck, both of them might even return the zunes!
today is spelling optional day.
Well of course there is no warning that a song might be unsharable! If they warned you, you might not buy it.
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &
Much easier solution to sharing songs: just get a portable headphone amplifier/splitter ($20 at Radio Shack) and have your friend plug his/her headphones into your player. Heck, if you're really that crazy about sharing your music with random people, carry around some of those crappy airline earbuds they give you for free. Then the other person doesn't even need a music player to begin with.
Karma-kazi (or at least Karma Sutra) to me.
Faith: n. -- That human impulse that drives them to steal appliances when the power goes out
Which part of the license agreement do you feel Microsoft is violating?
Section 14 deals with DRM and essentially says you're bound to whatever restrictions Microsoft imposes.
Section 14.1 does not discuss sharing songs from Zune to Zune but rather limits how many of your personal computers can play the songs.
The last section explains how you can burn the purchased music.
Where's the violation?
Ok... you may or may not remember the following item from billboard magazine a few weeks ago:
s p?vnu_content_id=1003380831
http://billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.j
"Yesterday, Microsoft agreed to share revenue from Zune sales with record labels and artists. Forcing the issue was Universal Music Group, which at deadline is the only label named in the program. UMG refused to license its music to the Zune unless it could receive a percentage of each device sold, in addition to standard music licensing fees for downloads and subscriptions.
"These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it," UMG chairman/CEO Doug Morris says. "So it's time to get paid for it."
When I saw the headlines on Engadget I thought for sure Universal wouldnt be one of the labels, after all Microsoft chose to pay them off causing good ol' Doug to say he's entitled to a chunk of iPod sales as well. This begs the question: what was the point of the payoff? What did it get them?
Universal is trying to psyche itself up to standing up to Steve Jobs and iTunes by demanding a cut of every iPod, I suspect this was part of the reason MS rolled over for Universal in the first place, 1% of every iPod is a fortune, 1% of every Zune is a pitance. When ever pressed, they stop short of saying they will pull their music from iTunes, I think they are well aware of the bottom line impact NOT being on iTunes would have, the ready to buy iPod owner will happily plunk down $.99 for a non-Universal artist that IS available, then blame the Artist for shunning them; killer recipie for popularity.
Compare that to the risk of not being available to Zune owners, or rather potential Zune owners who check store selection before buying a player. MS didn't do this out of the kindness of their hearts, the did it out of a desperate need to be competitive, the fact that it might hurt the other guy more than it hurt them is a footnote.
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
Pretty much had my jaw drop on that one - in light of MS stating the Zune with its wireless sharing features will 'kill' the iPhone and iPod and such you would have thought the Music Industry would play all nicey-nicey till the Zune had some market share then start doing thier stuff.
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
Yeah, both of 'em.
The chances of them meeting are far lower than the 40-50% chance of their "squirt" failing. Yet another unverifiable, speculative statistic.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
So so so wait... Microsoft gives Universal a chunk of change every time a Zune is sold, THEN Universal prevents certain songs from utilizing the only significant gimmick the Zune has?
Not that "squirting" was actually simple to begin with, nevertheless, this is how Universal repays Microsoft? F*cking classic.
Hopefully the nanotech battery angels will come down, make WiFI PMPs practical, and allow sharing that is at least similar to iTunes library sharing. And hopefully by then Universal will have pulled its head out of its ass.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
"if you've actually purchased songs from the Zune marketplace and happen to run into another Zune owner"
sig has been sent away for a few small repairs...
Since the Zune has WiFi, I'd assume someone would've tried to reverse-engineer the protocol so they can send any music file to any zune (and photos, etc). In other words, a perfect way to fill someone's zune with spam, or basically DoS their Zune by having the screen constantly filled with "xxxx wants to send you a file, accept?".
I guess with so few Zunes sold, well, the effort isn't worth the rewards. Though, captive audiences...
Proof by very large bribes. QED.
The Zune has only been out for something like a month and people have just noticed this out now??
Just how unpopular is it?!?
I stole this Sig
I was actually hoping Zune would be a viable competitor to the iPod, being so sick of the latter having saturated our culture (the vehicle with the integrated iPod dock was the straw). But Microsoft's DRM, the restricted media sharing, no Mac support... just crippled it horribly out of the gate. And now bowing/catering to the Monster Records when they should Stand Tall... is just pitiful.
I actually pity Microsoft in a small way, and recalling their other boners (such as BOB), I can't wait to see what they come up with to try and save face.
cuz me have to blow the jolt cola out of my nose...
Zune is done.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Karma!
Microsoft screwed its PlayForSure partners(1). Now Sony and Universal screw Microsoft(2).
(1) And customers get screwed too.
(2) And customers get screwed too.
"...and happen to run into another Zune owner..."
Really, what are the odds of that happening anyway?
#DeleteChrome
i can pirate music and put it on my (imaginary) Zune since Universal already got paid ?
...Microsoft enters a market where another company has a near monopoly with an inferior, more expensive product, whose only real advantage is a feature, which is now crippled half the time?
Why did they do that?
"Beam 50% Of Your Beats"
Basically, why did they even add the option to their DRM to prevent "squirting"? Did the seriously think that the paranoid recording companies would *not* use that option if it was there? If they had the slightest brains at all, they would have realized that they had in fact disabled one of the few features of the Zune. And they certainly should have known they had the power to refuse to implement such an option. Most of the DRM is there to lock people into using the Zune and thus satisfies Microsoft's own personal interests, but this option makes no sense what so ever!
No matter whether you think Microsoft is Satan's spawn or the greatest company in the world, it is obvious this decision is completely against their desires. This is proof positive that they are a bunch of idiots. This is scary yet relieving at the same time...
"These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it," UMG chairman/CEO Doug Morris says.
So I ripped my copy of The Eagles Greatest Hits to my iPod [I've personally purchased the LP, 8-Track, cassette and CD of that silly little record over the course of 20 years], and that makes me a thief?! Let me personally welcome the extinction of the music industry and mouth breathers like Doug Morris. They will not be missed. And "artists" can only gain from it.
with the Zune's bulk, you could easily use it to smash an iPhone or iPod.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I know I should expect it. The people that own the companies do so only because they've invested the most in the company, they don't really care about the music. But still, it's pretty ridiculous that these people -most of whom will never be able to spend all of their money before they die- are so wholeheartedly willing to ruin it for everyone and everything just to get every penny they can get. Scum, all of them.
You answered your own question! Precedent for forcing the same kind of "deal" on Apple is the payoff. Microsoft doesn't give a shit about the Zune; that's why it isn't a "PlaysForSure" device (and probably why it looks like a piece of shit too). It's greatest value to Microsoft is as a sabot -- a shoe to throw into Apple's works.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I think it's convience. It's worth a few cents to have a known-good, high-quality, easily downloadable song picked from a large selection. (Note that I don't use AllOfMP3, mainly because I just never got around to it)...
I just don't see Apple giving royalties on music except for sales of actual tracks. This entitlement business based on presumed guilt is a bit much, the labels don't directly see money for CD player sales, or CD writers for that matter, so there's little precedence for them to get royalties on other types of players. I don't think any of the RIAA can afford to drop iTunes, it is a top five seller for them and the margins are better for them. I don't doubt that a great many PMPs are being used to carry infringing copies of music, but that's no justification.
I'd think that Universal would embrace the Zune platform better than that, because they think they are being held hostage by Apple's dominance in the paid download market, having an alternative sales platform would give them leverage against Apple. The thought that they are dropping a fantastic viral promotional tool such as the "sharing" is just beyond baffling. We know the RIAA game is about control, but this is ludicrous to the level of "1) load gun. 2) shoot foot.".
I guess the real way forward is indie music and new, more enlightened labels.
meh,
I have a 30gb Creative Labs mp3 player and I downloaded all my gigs of music with P2P software.
I have no problems with playback or anything else.
To think these companies want me to pay them money to make my life a living hell as I try to figure out why what I paid for doesn't work.
Staying with 'off brand' hardware and stealing the music works for me, no reason to change that I can see.
"So I ripped my copy of The Eagles Greatest Hits to my iPod [I've personally purchased the LP, 8-Track, cassette and CD of that silly little record over the course of 20 years..."
Great little slab of tunes. I can neither confirm, nor deny, that I picked the whole thing up from alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.classic-rock using the Pan newsreader in about four minutes. Oh, if the labels only knew about that Venue-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named which is older than the web.
Two years from now that Goodwill thrift store a hop and skip away from Microsoft where I get all my software is gonna have more $4.99 Zunes than they had Jar Jar Binks action figures in 1999. They'll stick 'em over by the 8-tracks.
They won't go that cheap. They still play MP3's so they are still useful for the old Kaza and Napster music.
Kids will like them. There is still no restrictions (even 3 day 3 play) on video squirting. It'll be the rage for schoolyard porn sharing and worth more than $4.99 just for that. Does anybody know if the video is picture only or can sharing of music video's run unchecked?
The truth shall set you free!
This begs the question: what was the point of the payoff? What did it get them?
sigh...how long have you been on slashdot and you use "begs the question" incorrectly? Must have been the p2p viral marketing of the term.
back and forth
You know, the stuff that the "legit" music distributors are supposed to provide.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Microsoft could say anything they liked in those agrements. Who going to fork the money over to sue them. The US and EU combined couldn't get Microsoft to do what they want(though that was the courts picking on MS for serving the consumer).
Talk about digging your own grave. Way to go MS et al.
-- Cheers!
Reading this made me realize an implied feature of the iPhone - with an 802.11 connection and running OSX, this could essentially run iTunes. Well, when I open iTunes on my laptop on campus I see a dozen or so shared music lists on the network. If you want to share your music with the cute girl in the coffee shop it would be easy as pie with an iPhone - as long as you're on the same network. This scheme would work better than the Zune's squirt anyway. You can stream the music from someone else's machine as long as they are in range for as many times as you would like, and when you're no longer on the same network it goes away (iTunes doesn't allow you to copy the music over). Plus you get the added benefit of searching the other person's music list and you can share passively. The iPhone just might be a lot more social.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Well, that and thank god for Rio Karma's and Ogg Vorbis support. I don't care if I can't ejaculate a song from my music penis to another friend's music penis. All I want is to be able to plug it in my ear and hear tunes that are uncontrolled by anyone other than me.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
This basically shows that the majors don't even master strategy 101: divide and conquer; set Microsoft up to compete with Apple. Not beat on Microsoft...
Matt Jubelirer (product manager of Zune) interview. See the funny CNN video as well, wherein a shuffle steals the show from the Zune.
Microsoft buys friends in the music business for $1 per Zune sold.
Microsoft releases the Zune and listens to the laughs hear round the blogosphere.
MAFIAA realizes that $1 for each of the 8 Zunes sold only equal $8 which does not cover the cost of a single CD and restricts their music from being properly used on Zune
Microsoft learns that buying friends is a bad idea.
MAFIAA calls press conference which contains only one sentence: "So long and thanks for all the fish!"
Horror, Mental Pictures
Now *that* is a "train" I didn't want pictured in my mind!
bad you!
probably is to retarded to be able to say fuck.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
The most shocking thing is that there are multiple non-Microsoft websites devoted to the Zune. I mean, I kind of expect record companies and Microsoft to fuck over their customers; but people building a Zune news website? That's just perverse.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
Given that squirting only allows limited playing, and thus surely is good at promoting sales, you just have to wonder whether there's some strong-arming going on behind the scenes. Just like MS strong-arms computer vendors with Windows, you have to wonder if there is something going on between iTunes store and Sony et al to help bring Zune down (not that Zune needed any help, and will crash and burn anyway).
Engineering is the art of compromise.
MS should have made the zune a simple MP3 player with wifi and SMB sharing. that way it could share between windows PC's and not deal with any DRM bullshit. throw in a wireless chat application that worked with a stylus and they could have had a successful product instead of a steaming turd
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Almost all mp3 players on the market easily allow you to transfer music files onto and off of them. The only exceptions are the Zune and iPods.
Don't include any DRM or music service at all, and let your customers decide how to fill the device. Like every other mp3 player on the market.
Son, your life - and the people in it - scare the ever loving shit out of me.
i hope they pull their fucking music from itunes. they only produce crud anyway. it'll be a cold day in hell before jobs gives anyone a cut of the ipod, his ego wouldn't allow it it'd be like sharing the glory.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
I have a Zune. There, i'll admit it. I like it, too. The zune marketplace software can be a tad slow at time but the zune pass is the main reason to have one, if I could have bought it sans the player and used what I had before (and still have) I'd have done that. But okay, fine, they need a new player to expire the content, that's probably its main reason for existing and not being their previously endorsed "playsforsure".
Anyway, as I said the Zune pass is the main reason to have one, it lets you download whatever you want from the marketplace.
Now, odds are if you have a zune, you have the pass. Maybe not, but likely so.
So. If you meet another zune owner (and I'll admit this has never happened to me, and I live in one of the ten largest metro areas in the US), and you both have zune pass --- meaning whatever the song is, you could go home and download it and keep it on there for as long as you were a member (forget the 3 days 3 plays) --- you still can't zip it over there. Ridiculous. I guess you might as well just tell them the name of the song or artist.
The wifi feature of the device is pretty much a non-feature. The zune pass is really the only feature at this time. Something apple could easily implement, and hey, I hope they do at some point. But they'd probably have to pay through the nose after microsoft's deal for that. but that's neither here nor there.
Given the pass, the player is still worth it for me. They may update its firmware someday and add other stuff, but as I said, I mainly have this for the pass.
I actually keep the wifi turned on (sacrificing some battery) because on the zune boards I frequent (Zunerama) they kind of encourage everyone to do that in hopes paths might cross (on the boards this has resulted in exactly one reported encounter of people that didn't buy them together)...
Someone even went and made a way to chat with Zunes over wifi. How? Well, it lets you share photos. So he created a set of pictures with every letter of the alphabet, plus common phrases and emoticons. So you share photos in a certain order and your recipient can view the pictures to put together the message. A staggering amount of effort...
Anyway. Given that its Sony, and Sony and Microsoft are currently enemies on the gaming front, dunno if its somehow related. Sony doesn't allow sharing of music on PSPs, does it? I have a sony ericsson walkman phone which doesn't seem to have much in the way of DRM enforcement on it. It is supposed to have some kind of associated store from Cingular, but never got around to using it.
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
Welcome to the Social...Some of our chaperons have decided that they don't want you to dance with certain of their daughters so they're going to stand in the shadows and hit you with a stick when you pick the wrong one. For extra fun and suspense, we're not going to tell you which girls provoke the stick. God luck and enjoy the social, but not too much.
Allofmp3 isn't substantially less expensive than eMusic. If eMusic can pay their bills, certainly the RIAA could emulate their model.
Picture two people with Zunes (suspension of disbelief required):
A: Hey man, you should check out this rad song I got. It's called In Da Club!
B: Oh man I have never heard that before! Squirt it on me, big boy!
A: Alright... here goes! Did you get it? Oh... oh wait, it says I can't squirt it to you. Uhh... sorry about that.
B: Yeah, I guess I'll download it off BitTorrent when I get home. See you later, man.
Such a situation is awkward and somewhat embarassing. In the future these people would likely avoid using the sharing feature. So people are discouraged from using the sharing feature, indie music or otherwise, and the record industry continues to control the distribution of music.
I am curious how Fair Use applies to squirting.
there's more than one?
"It would be like the Beatles who simply refuse to permit distribution in any format except physical albums in either LP or Compact Cassette."t =rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-20&subject=news d e.html 0 7/01/15/daily57.html
I have seen and heard Beatles Compact Discs. (And I have heard of Beatles quasi-CDs.)
I have seen and heard Beatles music on DVD. I believe that's another format.
There are now hot rumors that Apple Records will finally release Beatles music in digital form.
http://news.com.com/2061-10793_3-6150862.html?par
http://blog.wired.com/music/2007/01/applebeatles_
http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/20
The digital Beatles tracks will be sold at the iTunes Store. That will hurt Microsoft further.
There is a fine line between recklessness and courage... -- Paul McCartney
and if you did not buy them, then maybe that old capitalism free market thing would kick in and *AA companies would realize how broke their business model is because to a business man a business model is only broke when it stops making money. Thus, they would allow MS to sell more songs as sharable, thus more people would buy the Zune and buy more songs from the Zune store... etc, etc. Essentially, it is a really stupid decision from Microsoft NOT to disclose which songs are unsharable.
But, full disclosure would require long term thinking and the ability to take calculated risks, neither of which are encouraged in American business culture.
While you may be right about Microsoft's ultimate goal to indirectly hurt the iPod, this strategy is not without risk for the record labels.
An out of left field idea that has been voiced before, but is now actually closer to reality. Apple has settled their dispute with Apple Records. A recent Slashdot story mentions a British band that made the Top-40 with an online-only release of their single.
How many artists would jump at the chance to directly release their music on iTunes?
There's plenty of money to be made in the music business without excessively bleeding the artists or the consumers. A direct to iTunes model could be a catalyst to ultimately changing the way artists reach their listeners. It's also Steve Jobs' tactical nuclear weapon in his dealings with the record labels.
And this is after Microsoft rolled over and started revenue sharing with the recording industry sales on the hardware end? Boy - lot of good that did them.
you and me and everyone we know... will not get this joke.
The parent comment: "So lemme get this right, Sony and other music companies that force Microsoft do implement DRM... but Microsoft is still at fault? Its not as if Microsoft has a choice in this matter."
It is Microsoft's responsibility to disclose any limiting features of their products that would cause customers to make a different decision about buying. Presumably most people who bought Zunes would not have bought them if they understood the limits.
--
Violence caused more violence in Iraq, not peaceful democracy.
Game Over. Good Bye.
Edith Keeler Must Die
I remember the story that came up wherein we learn that Microsoft shills out a percentage of each Zune sale to the recording labels and RIAA or whatever...
Wasn't the purpose of those fees to ALLOW these sorts of transfers? Are the groups backing out now?
This is downright stupid. I feel really bad for anyone who bought the damned thing now.
If you were offended by anything I said... No, I'm not sorry. Please lighten up.
The root cause is a lack of competition: if there were competing suppliers of Zunes, or an open standard for sending music wirelessly, then different manufacturers would offer different capabilities and consumers could choose which they prefer. Some model might allow unrestricted squirting, and the marketplace could decide. Instead we have a single supplier and an unhealthily cosy relationship with the record companies.
The verb 'squirt' is horrible but I propose we use it when talking about the Zune, in honour of Steve Ballmer:
Being squirted by the monkey man may be unpleasant but it's probably better than having chairs thrown at you.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
They should go with bluetooth. I mean I can transfer how many songs I want from my k800i to any bloody bluetooth device I want. And bluetooth is available in far more devices than WLAN.
From what i read, 'squirting' was pretty worthless anyway.
Now you get duped on top of it.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I can explanate how to administrate your network. You must configurate and segmentate it, so it can computate.
One thing that people are missing is how this undermines our school system. From the earliest age, teachers have universally emphasized the lesson "Share your toys with the others". Teachers understand that immature children are naturally selfish, and want everything for themselves but don't want to share with their friends (much less those awful kids that I don't like). But teachers have learned how to put a strong emphasis on sharing, to civilize the little beasts before they have to go out into the greater society.
But here we have a big, respected corporation selling a toy that does the opposite. What sort of message does this send the young minds? It says that the big, successful people encourage hoarding and not sharing. Is this really what we want our children to learn?
Sensible teachers would ban such anti-social toys from their schools. They would look for comparable toys that make it easy for the children to share the fun. And in this case, the electronic toy would be better than older "hardware" toys, because the child would learn that they can share something without losing it for themselves. In this case, sharing is done by copying, so you can share something fun as many times as you like and still have full use of it yourself. This is a valuable lesson for growing minds.
But apparently not if your toy comes from Microsoft.
Maybe we need to send their managers back to first grade.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
Oh, my!
I'm sorry, but this idea is perfectly keeping with the economics of "content" the way they are presently implemented in this country. That logic is:
-person X derives pleasure from something that owes some share of its existence to person Y
-X owes Y (or Y's grandchildren, if dead) a quantifiable amount of money.
The rest is just arguing about how to do the calculation.
We can accept this state of affairs, and allow every device we operate to constantly be calculating how much we owe and to whom, or we can adopt different logic, along the lines of
-person Y offers to perform some service or to transfer some product to X for a quantifiable amount of money
-X accepts or declines this offer.
You might say that "intellectual property" could be the product in question, but I answer that this is based on a misunderstanding of the word "transfer", i.e. the product is no longer where it used to be.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
To clarify, AoMP3 claims that it pays the artist a royalty. That statement alone makes it very unclear if royalties are distributed to all artists deserving royalties for a particular piece of music (songwriters, musicians paid via royalty.) Royalty distribution is almost never as simple as "100% of the artist royalty payments go to person X", and rules of distribution vary widely by country.
How does AoMP3 know how the artists with rights to a piece have decided to divide the royalties?
Hi:
This product is a zune. I ordered from the table d'hote but the dinner was a complete zune. I stepped in a pile of zune.
The problem is that Microsoft is in the business of making money, not products. The products come second. So, they have tons of lawyers who say, "we should negotiate with other companies to get the right feature set to avoid litigation and increase interoperability". The problem with this is obvious. Lawyers should never determine this stuff. Conversely Apple is a company that makes products which because they're good make money. Sometimes they get into trouble by "innovating" a little too much without talking to the competition.
The allure of allofmp3 is that they have almost every song, artist, and album imaginable, in a variety of formats and quality levels, all at a dirt cheap price.
You can search for this music for free in P2P, but you will waste a lot of time dealing with fake files, low quality compression, inconsistent or nonexistent ID3 tags, and lots of music that is just plain difficult to find at times.
Wow. That's incredibly pathetic. Is "Three plays or three days" not good enough for them?
The day the label companies start actually doing good for their customers and artists is the day hell freezes over.
Insert Sig Here
An idea: Why not have a website that lists exactly which songs zune won't let be shareable, and make certain that the artist, who doesn't let their work be shareable (according to the story), gets a good bunch of publicity on it?
I, for one, would make certain to not buy anything from 'non-shareable' artists. If enough people did that, the artists might rethink their stance. (Yes, I know that the artist may not even know what their company is doing with their product, but maybe its time for them to make a stand instead of accepting whatever their recording company dish out.)
If Ted Turner bought MGM just for it's library of old films, well, why do Apple and MS let themselves be randsomed by record company executives?
Why not launch their own record labels?
"Whoa man" you say "They're software companies." Look at SONY. They're into everything; electronics, PC, movies, spyware *and* records. Why can't Apple or MS do this too?
Yes, we might like to use the word "Arist", but it's a consumer industry just like any other. They can hire all the usual record industry types for the spotting/sleazing/recording/promoting. There is no shortage of "Artists" out there either: The plethora (yes, a plethora) of Idol shows show you can take pretty much anybody and make them a star. I'm sure there are many eager bands out there who would jump at the chance to sign. Apple are perceived as "cool", so they could get away with this (but can't call it Apple Records; maybe iRecords?). Microsoft *thinks* they're cool, and hey they're loaded, so they can do it too.
The whole DRM thing shows the copyright laws are badly broken, and no amount of lobbying is going to save the record companies. They've fumbled the ball, and keep missing the point. Look at the chance they had with Napster, and they let it slip through their greedly little fingers. They've fumbled again, so this is a good chance for Apple (or MS) to take the lead. I reckon with their sort of money, they could drive the big four out of existance.
Hmm... I think I just did some free Business Development work for Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Oh well. Enjoy anyway!
There are cases where they could distribute songs without any DRM according to the wishes of the artists, but they choose to use FairPlay anyway because they don't want a precedent of songs being available on iTunes that can be played on players other than iPod. They definitely strive to maintain a lock-in scenario between iTunes and iPod.
"Sixty percent of the time, it works every time."
Really!!!
I'm intrigued. Please explain. The best I can guess is that it is some sort of goatse reference.
So let me get this right. Universal essentially gets paid twice with the Zune, once for the Zune itself and then for each song purchased from them, and they still limit usage? Sounds like some very greedy, short sighted, short termed management types to me.
try "Ziun" or "Ziyoon" (Adj.)
if there is a hacked firmware upgrade that disables all the nastiness, would you buy it?
If you want to buy something you have to hack anyway - aren't there then a lot of other, better, devices to look at rather than a Zune? Like for instance the PSP which has a much higher resolution screen, or other devices that have keyboards. Realistically how useful is even a hacked Zune, when you can get other devices with even better raw features for around the same price?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
There are cases where they could distribute songs without any DRM according to the wishes of the artists, but they choose to use FairPlay anyway
The original poster said "this is where Apple gets it right, treating all songs equally". You are in fact AGREEING with what the parent post said, so your subject line is all wrong. Wrapping all songs sold from ITMS is a GOOD THING for users (in terms of usability) because then they know exactly what limitations to expect from any ITMS song. If you as a consumer do not like those limitations, you can buy CD's to rip or MP3's from other sources (such as band stores that "get it" and sell MP3's, like the Barenaked Ladies) - but that doesn't mean treating all songs sold from ITMS exactly the same is not a good idea for a usability standpoint for people that choose to use that store, and has not been a point of success for Apple with consumers and helped them become more popular, regardless of what the average Slashdot reader feels about Apple's DRM.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Yawn...one of the most idiotic discussions I've seen so far on Slashdot. DRM is DRM is DRM and it all stinks. What - you think you *own* the crap you buy from Apple? BWHAHAHAHAHAHA. Of course you don't. The Marketplace is a piece of shit, I'll grant you. But who's fooling who here? I used my 14 day free pass, downloaded everything I wanted and then used Tunebite to convert everything to .mp3 with no DRM (yeah thats right - like none of you Apple Fanboys have never heard of Tunebite). Add to that, my entire collection of music I had my 30G 5G iPod that I HAPPILY sold to pay for the Zune.
.wmv but if you buy a Zune and have vids you already converted for use on the iPod, the Zune software will convert them for you as is. IMToo has a nice tool set for conversion and you can get excellent quality vids with high quality stereo audio.
OMIFGOD, you say! That's right - I SHIT-CANNED the iPod for this beauty. We already have a sweet, elite "social" (yeah, sucky fucking name) community where I work and we send each other shit all the time, including movies.
Wi-Fi broken? The FUCK you say! Go get an education at Zunescene or the other dozen or so Zune Forum sites. The sharing problem was CRACKED a long time ago - so CATCH UP TO REALITY friends. I can send anything I want via Zune's Wi-Fi anytime I want - movies, music, docs, software, you name it.
Now I'm not a fan of the Marketplace business concept of having to pay a monthly fee to keep your tunes "alive". But, since I like DRM even less, I simply do away with it. Oh yeah - and that INCLUDES the 3-day limit on Wi-Fi transfers, also easily by-passed.
Now boys and girls, go and type-in "ipod vs zune" or similar into Google and look at the tech comparisons. Zune audio is superior to 4th and 5th Gen iPods, period, end of story, not that I still don't covet the 3rd Gen iPod which was a masterpiece of both technical excellence and beauty. I don't miss the click-wheel though. Dialing up a song in the car is a pain in the ass and you know it, unless you have something like "iPod Car" or similar which transfers the control to your steering wheel controls or other dashboard function.
The Zune interface is a dream come true. Yeah, its a modification of Media Center Mobile but its gorgeous and extremely functional. Once you experience navigation in Zune, you'll never want to go back to the iPod model. Yeah, yeah..."no clock, calendar, no contacts - not a single luxury"! That shit's coming soon, plus games. Like the XBox, the Zune is exceptionally hackable and infinitely upgradeable.
http://www.zunescene.com/forums/
Go check out the "Hacks" section.
Video? YEAH, BABY!!! I'm a video junkie and the Zune's Video gives me a stiffie while I was always disappointed in the iPod due to size and format. I was a big fan of Cucusoft's video converter for the iPod but their Zune converter leaves a lot to be desired. IMToo does a great job.
The trick of course, is NOT converting directly from DVD. You'll get beautiful video even on the iPod by converting your DVDs to the Mpeg4 flavor of your choice, then using a video converter such as described. OR, try out Handbrake (originally designed for Mac). The Win32 GUI isn't worth a crap but its rocks on the command line. My method is DVD Decrypter, then AutoGK in which the resulting XVid goes to my Media Center and then gets converted to my Zune.
I'm not a great fan of
Let's talk about the case. Take a look at every other contender to the iPod. What are they? Clones. Nothing original to see here folks, move along. No thanks, I don't want yet ANOTHER Scratch-Pod. The Zune case is functional, aesthetically pleasing and is NOT a grease and scratch magnet. No need for a protective case other than I went ahead and invested $2.00 in a screen protector (I was a big fan of the McCally protectors for the iPod - best $5.00 you'll ever spend). The Zune is UNIQUE in this aspe
I'm no fan of Zune, but what this tells me is that Sony and Universal think their music sucks so bad that after you've heard it no more than 3 times in 3 days you'll have heard it enough and won't want to purchase it. Doesn't that say a lot about what they think of the quality of their product?
Plausible deniability my friend.
One mans "Plausible deniability" is another mans Exhibit A.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I would imagine that per-play royalties are what the endgame is. Play a song, look at the album art, or even look at the song name, and cha-ching, your zune docks your credit card.
Never, ever, will these people get another dime from me...and I'll be doing my best to make sure they don't get a dime from anybody else. That's the only way we'll ever be rid of them.
This entitlement business based on presumed guilt is a bit much
This is what happens when you give money to people who whine. It only encourages more whining. The reason they are trying to get their sticky fingers in every pie is because they think they CAN. There was nothing they could do about cassette tapes and video tapes - since these were analog. But now that things are digital they think they can outsmart everyone and lock their stuff down. They will only be happy when they have music that expires after x number of plays, unless you fork up more cash.
I can't wait for the day for someone to actually call them on their supposed "losses", and oblige them to prove it. After all, there must be some penalty for lying to the court, lying to the government, and lying to the people. Oh, hang on, looking at GWB, maybe not...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Here's what happened at Apple:
Apple: Okay, it's $.99 or nothing.
MusicExec: But...
Apple: No.
MusicExec: We need...
Apple: No.
MusicExec: It's not enough...
Apple: No.
MusicExec: Okay fine.
Apple came up with FairPlay to give the Music people some peace of mind. As far as DRM goes, it's about as consumer friendly as I've ever seen. They've also limited iTunes sharing to the local subnet only. However, Apple also recognized that in order to grow the market they have to provide value to the consumer. Argue against that all day if you want. Millions of iPods and billions of tracks sold at the iTunes Music Store prove that they are providing value.
Here's what happened at Microsoft:
MusicExec: We need...
Microsoft: You got it.
MusicExec: We want...
Microsoft: Whatever makes you happy.
MusicExec: Jump.
Microsoft: How high?
Microsoft is not about creating value for consumers. It never has been. It's about dominating markets and doing whatever it takes to reach that end. Don't fool yourselves. Any value created for the consumer is an afterthought. This "limitation" was built into the Zune from the beginning. Microsoft is going to do whatever they can to get the labels to sign on so they have content to sell. This includes crippling the touted abilities of the Zune and paying the labels a percentage of each Zune sold. It has nothing to do with providing value to the customer.
Oh and one last thing. Do you really think the artists see anything of that $1 from each Zune sold?
For once in Apple's existance, they are competing in a market space with Microsoft where they are equal. They both sell music players, they both have music stores. May the best one win.
(and yes I'm voting for Apple)
"The avalanch has already started, it is too late for the pebbles to vote." -Kosh
"Someone even went and made a way to chat with Zunes over wifi. How? Well, it lets you share photos. So he created a set of pictures with every letter of the alphabet, plus common phrases and emoticons. So you share photos in a certain order and your recipient can view the pictures to put together the message. A staggering amount of effort... "
This made me shudder. Oh, the technology...
It's a reference to the movie "You and Me and Everyone We Know". A bit of a wierd indi flick, there's a very out there IM conversation involving "back and forth". It would be really hard to explain without seeing the movie.
Reasonable question. I think the answer has to be marketeers half understanding the tech market. They probably looked at /. one day and saw the iPod being critiqued for not having wireless capabilities and thought "We know how to beat this iPod thing, we'll add WiFi". They then tell this to someone higher up who says "Let's go for it, great idea" and then the box is developed. Then at the final meeting when all the different sections of the 'team' get together it slowly dawns on them they haven't thought about permissions from third parties. But, of course, they are stuck as there's already been hype and press releases so they have to stay on schedule (especially given MSFTs reputation for 'slippage') and the Zune gets released. So embarrassed are they about the failings of their USP (unique selling point) they decide to keep it quiet and hope for the best. Someone pipes up that isn't such a good idea and is quickly silenced. And here they are now.
spoonerize "magic trackpad"
Yawn...one of the most idiotic discussions I've seen so far on Slashdot. DRM is DRM is DRM and it all stinks. What - you think you *own* the crap you buy from Apple? BWHAHAHAHAHAHA. Of course you don't. The Marketplace is a piece of shit, I'll grant you. But who's fooling who here? I used my 14 day free pass, downloaded everything I wanted and then used Tunebite to convert everything to .mp3 with no DRM (yeah thats right - like none of you Apple Fanboys have never heard of Tunebite). Add to that, my entire collection of music I had my 30G 5G iPod that I HAPPILY sold to pay for the Zune.
.wmv but if you buy a Zune and have vids you already converted for use on the iPod, the Zune software will convert them for you as is. IMToo has a nice tool set for conversion and you can get excellent quality vids with high quality stereo audio.
OMIFGOD, you say! That's right - I SHIT-CANNED the iPod for this beauty. We already have a sweet, elite "social" (yeah, sucky fucking name) community where I work and we send each other shit all the time, including movies.
Wi-Fi broken? The FUCK you say! Go get an education at Zunescene or the other dozen or so Zune Forum sites. The sharing problem was CRACKED a long time ago - so CATCH UP TO REALITY friends. I can send anything I want via Zune's Wi-Fi anytime I want - movies, music, docs, software, you name it.
Now I'm not a fan of the Marketplace business concept of having to pay a monthly fee to keep your tunes "alive". But, since I like DRM even less, I simply do away with it. Oh yeah - and that INCLUDES the 3-day limit on Wi-Fi transfers, also easily by-passed.
Now boys and girls, go and type-in "ipod vs zune" or similar into Google and look at the tech comparisons. Zune audio is superior to 4th and 5th Gen iPods, period, end of story, not that I still don't covet the 3rd Gen iPod which was a masterpiece of both technical excellence and beauty. I don't miss the click-wheel though. Dialing up a song in the car is a pain in the ass and you know it, unless you have something like "iPod Car" or similar which transfers the control to your steering wheel controls or other dashboard function.
The Zune interface is a dream come true. Yeah, its a modification of Media Center Mobile but its gorgeous and extremely functional. Once you experience navigation in Zune, you'll never want to go back to the iPod model. Yeah, yeah..."no clock, calendar, no contacts - not a single luxury"! That shit's coming soon, plus games. Like the XBox, the Zune is exceptionally hackable and infinitely upgradeable.
http://www.zunescene.com/forums/ [zunescene.com]
Go check out the "Hacks" section.
Video? YEAH, BABY!!! I'm a video junkie and the Zune's Video gives me a stiffie while I was always disappointed in the iPod due to size and format. I was a big fan of Cucusoft's video converter for the iPod but their Zune converter leaves a lot to be desired. IMToo does a great job.
The trick of course, is NOT converting directly from DVD. You'll get beautiful video even on the iPod by converting your DVDs to the Mpeg4 flavor of your choice, then using a video converter such as described. OR, try out Handbrake (originally designed for Mac). The Win32 GUI isn't worth a crap but its rocks on the command line. My method is DVD Decrypter, then AutoGK in which the resulting XVid goes to my Media Center and then gets converted to my Zune.
I'm not a great fan of
Let's talk about the case. Take a look at every other contender to the iPod. What are they? Clones. Nothing original to see here folks, move along. No thanks, I don't want yet ANOTHER Scratch-Pod. The Zune case is functional, aesthetically pleasing and is NOT a grease and scratch magnet. No need for a protective case other than I went ahead and invested $2.00 in a screen protector (I was a big fan of the McCally protectors for the iPod - best $5.00 you'll ever spend). The Zune is UNIQUE in this aspect.
Y'know what I
Peter F. Hamilton uses the term "squirt" in his books too. Meaning something along the lines of "sending copy of some data from one device to another via some short-range optical interface using red light".
hany
...since the 23 Zune owners worldwide are probably having a hard time finding eachother anyway.
I doubt you could stream iTunes encrypted content normally, so it wouldn't even apply. There's no reason you couldn't stream the unencrypted content that everyone actually uses, though.
I kinda think he got the joke since he referenced it in his post.
No existe.
... for "toast".
A PSP doesn't have a hard drive which makes it a fairly limited music box. But the Zune appears to be a lot less hacker friendly than the iPod.
...Probably something like, "Sending this song failed for an unspecified reason. (Error 0x8000001237)"
I don't care two shits for Microsoft, but a semi-"solution" to this BS for their publicity would be to use the error message as an opportunity to out the responsible parties.
"Sorry, UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP has set the No-Squirt Bit for this song. Transfer aborted!"
(There's an obvious joke to be made somewhere about Zunes giving you Squirts, but let's not go there...)
Caveat Emptor is not a business model.
Just what is deserved for those in bed with RIAA/MPAA (M$)\
Exactly. The future is either more restriction on music or freedom via instant publishing and sales of music on iTunes, and presumably other online venues. Record music. Post on iTunes. Sell songs. Get money. That seems to be the way it will happen - Apple is happy because it gets some cash and massive iPod sales, Artist is happy becuase he/she owns his/her music and gets direct cash. All the ugly record companies simply disappear. Cool.
Important point; it's bigger, but it's the exact same resolution. At the sort of size we're talking about, does a slightly bigger screen of the same resolution make that much of a difference? After all you could simulate the same viewport size by bringing the iPod a few inches closer to your face...
Trust me, even if the established record companies disappear, it will not be simple. If your plan comes to fruition, expect the established labels--EMI at the least--to offer Zune exclusives before they go.
There is a fine line between recklessness and courage... -- Paul McCartney