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EU Countries Call Out iTunes DRM
seriouslywtf writes "Europe is upping the pressure on Apple to open up its restrictive DRM that ties iTunes to the iPod. Norway ruled last year that the iPod-iTunes tie-in was unreasonable and gave Apple a deadline to make a change to its policies, but was unsatisfied with the response they got. Now France and Germany have joined forces with Norway, making it a lot harder for Apple to just walk away from those markets. From the article: 'France's consumer lobby group, UFC-Que Choisir, and Germany's Verbraucherzentrale are now part of the European effort to push Apple into an open DRM system, with more countries considering joining the group. However, the company has been under some fire over the last year due to those restrictions, first with France and then Denmark looking to open up restrictive DRM schemes (including, but not limited to iTunes) ... Norwegian consumer groups were unimpressed by Apple's response. Norway has now given Apple a new deadline of September of this year to change its policies, and the pressure on Apple will likely grow in the months leading up to the deadline.'"
Without the hardware tie in there's realy no incentive for Apple to keep running iTunes. Its the iPod & iTv sales that make them money.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Is this a great country, or what?
Sigh.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
Surely it is the job of the RIAA/Record labels to define an open DRM standard. After all they are the ones who demand DRM. Apple did not demand DRM on their own. Of course DRM suits Apple to tie users lightly into the iPod.
In any case, no user is actually tied - just burn a playlist on to a CD and copy the MP3's to any device.
Should Wallmart be forced to allow K-Mart to sell goods via the Wallmart checkout systems?
"You're being too successful. Please stop."
:-)
Look, I loathe DRM as much as the next guy, but Apple's not using their market dominance to smack around, say, Microsoft from making a run at them. Microsoft is doing a FINE job all by themselves at lousing up their attempts to dethrone Apple.
Ergo, this is just market forces at work. The market has spoken, and people prefer the iPod and iTunes to the competition. Until there's good evidence that iTunes prevents someone from, say, playing a WMA file on Windows or the like, Apple's in the clear on this. Let them have their success, and stop monkeying with the system.
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
DRM, by definition, causes vendor lock-in. If DRM schemes were licensed under a fair and non-discriminatory policy then they would not work, because anyone who wanted to get around them would be able to get the specification. You could even legally create an open source application which did all of the rights checking inside #ifdefs so if someone defined the IGNORE_DRM symbol then they could compile a version that decrypted the DRM'd content but didn't apply any restrictions. This wouldn't even be illegal, since they would be distributing the version that respected the DRM and end users would be applying the modification.
The correct solution, then, is not for lawmakers to go after Apple, but for them to go after DRM in general. Except on books, where it makes perfect sense.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
If you don't like iTunes and Apple's DRM scheme, don't buy from the Apple music store.
I like my iPod. I own an iPod.
I don't like the iTunes music store. I'd quite like to try out some of these subscription services, ignoring the DRM aspect (which I'm addressing now) I quite like the idea of paying "rent" to have access to a huge music library. And if someone did the same for films I'd like that too, I'd happily pay a fairly big monthly fee to the music and movie people to get unlimited digital viewing of whatever they produce.
What these countries are trying to do is let you use any music player with any music store, and vice versa, and hopefully get rid of the extra DRM problems created by all of this in the mean time. And it doesn't seem to be exclusive to iTunes, it applies to everyone. I'm certainly hoping for these kind of changes, more choice is nver a bad thing.
Or realize it but don't care. Last time I brought this up I got blasted by Slashdot because people seem to think that just because I don't want golden, infinite access to every track purchased since I was 5 years old that that somehow means I have horrible taste in music. Slashdot group thing seems to completely neglect the fact that a dollar for a track is worth it (to me) to get a good amount of use in a very convenient manner (where convenient means: purchase, sync, correct meta-data, no virus, searching, ethical dilemas,etc...) ...but if tomorrow I lose the song, I'm not going to miss out considerably. If I really like and want to keep something- I'd just go buy the whole CD. Or... just get over it. That 99cents is the price I pay for "easy"
It's not the EU The title is misleading, Norway isn't even part of the EU! France and Germany, as sovreign nations, are following Norway's example. It dosn't appear to be anything to do with the EU at all.
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
I hope you are sarcastic...
That easily takes 15 minutes per cd (burning and ripping), and results in quality loss (as 128kbit AAC is good enough, but re-ripping to another format is a bit much).
The time aspect alone makes this route prohibitive...
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
You said:
I own music that I bought from iTunes.
and:
I paid for that music, it's mine
Actually, one of the problems with DRMed media is that the record and movie companies don't view that you have bought anything. They view it that you have rented it for play on one specific device, which means that if you want an iTunes purchase to play on, say, Zune, you need to buy it again for Zune.
"Norway has now given Apple a new deadline of September of this year to change its policies...."
Or else they will send a letter to Apple telling them how upset they are.
The pursuit of absolute tolerance leads to the most rigorous and ludicrous intolerance. - REX MURPHY
Without getting into the "correctness" of the EU's position ("just don't buy it" speaks loudly to me) I fail to see the issue here.
Instead of forcing Apple/et al to open up their standards, simply make it legal to break that very DRM if it isn't open. You will very quickly see applications for sale to do it (come out from the shadows) and the Apples of the world will be motivated to change to an open standard.
If you can't be good, be good at it!
1. Norway is not part of the EU. 2. I cant see how actually an EU country is doing something here.. only organizations that work in this countries.... Conclusion: Catchy but wrong title
That's not a good analogy at all.
There is a good reason why screws are and drill bits are available in different sizes. Some jobs warrant larger screws (shelves that carry more weight, etc.)
Typically the user will decide the size required and drill a hole and buy a screw to match. The user _wants_ differing sizes sometimes.
Now, what is the reason I would _want_ to pay for some music that only works on a subset of playback machines? Or want to pay for a music player that didn't play any of my existing collection?
The people making screws in different sizes are not deliberately limiting what the user can do with them. It's the nature of them that creates a limit. Conversely, the nature of digital data is that it can easily be copied to other devices. It takes interference from the manufacturer to create artificial limitations. This is where the problems lies.
-- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz
France and Germany, as sovreign nations, are following Norway's example.
One might add, that - at least for the German side - it is not "Germany" (or the German government), but the "Verbraucherzentrale", which is a non-profit organization with task to support consumers. They are (partly) sponsored by the German state(s), but they are not a state organisation, ie this is not a political decision.