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iTunes DRM-Free Tracks Now Same Price As DRM Tracks
jawtheshark writes "Apple has made the decision to revise the pricing of Plus songs on the iTunes Music store. Whereas previously the DRM-less tracks were more expensive than the 'normal' option (at $1.29 vs. $0.99), DRM-less tracks bought via ITMS will now be priced on the same level as DRM'd tracks. 'Apple plans to expand iTunes Plus to include certain indie music labels starting Wednesday, October 17 (or sometime this week, at least) ... This expansion won't include all independent music labels just yet, although we're optimistic that more will be included in the future. While we have no information on whether the iTunes Plus songs are selling well, we assume that the decision to drop the price is a response to the Amazon MP3 store. Amazon sells individual tracks for between 89 and 99 apiece, all without any DRM restrictions. With that in mind, it's kind of hard for Apple to compete at $1.29.'"
Competition is good.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Now I have to figure out how to tell the DRM-tunes from the non-DRM tunes. It was easy when there was a price difference.
...but for now, I'm not terribly impressed. Apple:
- still has only EMI (and the independents) at this new rate (compared to Amazon, which also has Universal)
- still embeds buyer information inside the files
- is still more expensive (ten cents, granted, but still...), and
- chose to react rather than innovate
It's the fourth bullet point that dismays me the most.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, write technology blogs.
Maybe Amazon had something to do with it, but Amazon was only trying to compete with iTunes Store. Personally I think consumers win there is competition like this.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
It'd be nice to see how well DRM-free music is selling compared to DRM'd music now the the prices are the same on iTunes. More curiously, how long until the other labels remove the DRM restrictions? Will this price reduction prompt people to favor the DRM-free option? I hope so...
I know it's nothing novel to complain about the quality of Slashdot summaries, but it really would have been nice to mention that the new price for all songs is 99. The last line in the current summary gives the impression that they were all going to be $1.29...
... Time! For the "First bruise on the Apple" stories to swamp the intertubes.
Somehow a bunch of "journalists" are going to find a way to spin this as a negative.
Everybody put on your pundit hat. How would _you_ do it?
Theory and practice are the same in theory, but different in practice.
Why are they selling DRM and non-DRM for the same price? Is that sort of like:
"If you want to ride the roller coster you have to get corn holed first, or you can just get on the ride."
I smoked pot once. But I DID NOT inhale. Will you hire me?
Amazon and Magnatune work on Linux. Or just about any OS, for that matter. And they work with any MP3 player ('cause they're, you know, MP3s).
--
Given enough personal experience, all stereotypes are shallow.
Brilliant.
Announce the "intermediate" step of "no DRM, we'll pacify you by raising the price. X months later we'll do what we really wanted to."
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I'm curious if Radiohead's Name-Your-Price album prompted the announcement, Apple thinking they could catch a bit of positive press while the anti-RIAA/DRM sentiments are flowing.
Who knows.
We are one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. Back to you with the weather, Bob!
...but for now, I'm not terribly impressed. Apple:- still has only EMI (and the independents) at this new rate (compared to Amazon, which also has Universal)
It's the fourth bullet point that dismays me the most.
I'm not sure that's entirely a fair analysis of the situation. Many labels appear to be either hesitant to sign or left Apple because they would not give them the pricing or the DRM they wanted.
As I see it, Apple did innovate in pushing the digital market a heck of a lot harder than anyone else, and by pushing the price to a fairly reasonable level that people are actually buying songs at. Because they were first, they're getting shat on for it, or so it seems.
It's the fourth bullet point that dismays me the most. You must have a short memory then. Apple was offering DRM free songs well before Amazon's DRM free songs. Offering the songs for only $.30 more at twice the bit rate quality wasn't innovative, but they were doing it before Amazon.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
They're dropping the prices of DRM-free music? But what about us early adopters who've already bought music from them? Are they going to give us a refund since they clearly scammed us of our hard-earned money? Maybe I'll just sue Apple...
think it applies here
It seems to me that DRM is digging it's own grave, thanks to the immense popularity of the iPod (I heard in the US like 80% market share).
The iPod uses DRM, but only Apple's DRM. And it can of course play unprotected songs.
Apple does not license it's DRM to other vendor: in effect becoming the only vendor selling DRM'ed songs to 80% of the market of digital music players. The rest of the players can fight of the left-overs.
Apple gets a lot of market power: the labels want to sell music, but only music with DRM. To reach the majority of the market, they must play together with Apple. And Apple has proven not to be very easy a business partner.
Thus the only way the music labels can tap into that 80% of the market, without going through Apple, is by selling non-DRM'ed songs. And there is a good reason for a music label to have multiple resellers for your product: then the resellers have to compete with each other to buy their music. Which likely gives rise to higher prices for the labels.
This way I see DRM having dug it's own grave: one DRM scheme became very popular, giving one player a very powerful virtual monopoly over online music sales. The label-mandated DRM now locks everyone in to that one player: Apple with their iTunes Music Store. And the only way to break this monopoly is to drop DRM, and that is exactly what is happening now.
And already we see the fruits of this development: iTunes forced to lower their prices, other stores offering flexible pricing options ('priced between 89 and 99 cents' - not much of a difference but there is flexibility), and certainly this will start opening the market for more online music resellers. This can not be a bad thing.
Getting even more off-topic: here in Hong Kong recently retail chain HMV started to sell tracks through ATM-style kiosks. Digital sales, but not online. These kiosks are in their retail outlets, offering buyers a huge collection (about half a million tracks or so; that requires quite a large brick 'n mortar store to house), and instant downloads to their digital music player. Again they use DRM: in this case Microsoft's Plays For Sure scheme. Now without DRM I'm sure HMV would have a much bigger market. I have no idea on the market share of Plays For Sure devices, though it's for sure less than half. So DRM free can instantly double one's market. If PFS devices are only 20% of the market (just a guess), they could increase their market five times just by dropping the DRM.
I doubt the record labels will ever agree that DRM limits their sales; confirming the R in DRM stands for Restrictions. Not Rights. Restricting not only what the user can do, but restricting your own market even more in the process.
Wouter.
So the dinosaurs bellow in the night, pull their tracks, and now look at the shelf space for the independents: smaller, hungrier people who see opportunity in the new distribution technologies. The dinosaurs seem to have forgetten the door they left open during the three years they didn't get MTV.
If I were Apple, I'd talk to the independents and help them start some internet radio channels and provide sponsorships so the new channels can afford the air talent and the short-term loan to Sound Exchange (who will be collecting all internet recording performance fees and then giving out to the record companies who hold the copyrights on the recordings.) People only buy what they hear and can find.
Does this mean that all iTunes Plus songs, which are currently DRM-free and 256kbps AAC, are now $0.99? Or just that DRM-free songs are now $0.99 but 256kbps are still $1.29?
Death to DRM!
Seems like iTunes PLUS should now be called iTunes, and the remaining stupid studios that still demand DRM should be put in iTunes PLUS. Afterall, you are getting MORE with a DRM laden file. They should also charge $1.29 for the extra stuff (drm) you get in those songs.
For the love of Christ would you think of the artists! How can they make any money without DRM? You are steeling food from their family's table!
Maybe I'm a bit naive but I thought it usually took time, work, and negotiation to reverse the practices of an entire industry. Apple did it first with EMI. EMI is sticking to their strategy hoping that they will survive and has started to offer it to Amazon. Universal is not happy with Apple right now so this is a bit of revenge on their part. Other than that, what is the major complaint here?
Information that is not hidden and can easily be removed. Information that reveals nothing more than the owner of the file. Information that has been embedded in every track Apple has sold (DRM or not) since the begining of iTunes. It's Apple's way of trying to track if someone buys a DRM free track and puts it on a P2P. When you buy anything (especially with a loyalty card), don't you think more information is gathered about you and sold to third parties?
Company 1 offers new product or service.
Company 2 offers more or better features than Company 1 months later.
Company 1 matches Company 2's offer a few months later.
In your scenario, you've called out Company 1 for failure to innovate. Wasn't Apple the first of the two to offer DRM free tracks? Didn't Apple convince EMI to do so? In my world, the two are just competing.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
If we look at the situation, we can see that there is a major problem with Amazon's service:
Step 1 - Universal wants higher prices, but Apple refuses.
Step 2 - Universal dumps Apple and goes to Amazon, and Amazon starts selling songs at prices lower than the iTunes Store.
Step 3 - ?
In Step 3, Universal needs to achieve the goals it set out with contract re-negotiations with Apple. The goals were higher prices, with a larger percentage going to Universal for sending over a digital copy of an album four years ago. (The artists, are, as you might imagine, quite irrelevant in their calculations).
So why are they selling tracks at $0.89? To drive people away from the iTunes Store, knock it off its pedestal as the dominant online music retailer, and then jack up the prices once that has occurred and there is a new major player on the block who is more...accommodating...to the wants of the major labels.
Am I suggesting that people abandon Amazon and start paying more of their hard-earned money to Apple? No. What I am suggesting, and what I have done, is to put a moratorium on my online music purchases until things settle down a bit, as I strongly believe Amazon is going to end up screwing us in the end. We have to keep in mind the only reason Universal went with Amazon was because Apple refused to let them dictate terms that would end up raising the price of online music to a point higher than physical CDs themselves.
It's ridiculous to think that these prices are going to last, and that when the "correction" comes, that it will be anything but drastic. Giving Amazon a great deal of business, and thus, the big labels more leverage over operations that have fought for the end users, is detrimental to online music retailing as a whole.
Let me reiterate, the problem is not that the music is being sold by a company other than Apple, but WHY that music is being sold by a company other than Apple at the prices currently asked.
Apple invented this juggernaut knows as online music stores. A billion or more song sales don't happen due to lack of innovation.
He may have removed the DRM, but iTunes still refuses to convert these DRM free tracks into MP3, Jobs is determined to hang onto his stupid DRM regardless.
And yes I did say Jobs, it's Jobs that blocked that feature for AAC to MP3 conversion on DRM free tracks not the record companies. Rumour has it Amazons store is a raging success.
You can learn how to get it fixed:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcasm
Pricing is probably in the contract with the music labels. While I agree its kinda stupid to sell the DRMed and non-DRMed music at the same price, they probably don't have a choice in the long term.
Ignoring the DRM for a moment, I think 128Bit music should cost less than $0.50 a song anyway. Full CD quality costs about $1.50 a track when you buy a CD; depending on tracks of course.
Back to DRM, I think this is great for the user. It give Apple more leverage to push down prices for DRM'ed music simply because people are going to say why pay $0.99 for this crap when I can get DRMless, higher bit rate music for the same price.
Think Deeply.
"Maybe I'm a bit naive..."
Certainly not, but I don't think you've understood my point. Of course Apple has set in motion a great thing: the re-invention of an industry whose practices and ethics have always been suspect. But is what I said, at face value, not true?
"Information that is not hidden and can easily be removed..."
That's beside the point. Amazon doesn't do it. While this was to be expected in files containing DRM, why can't Apple now do the same?
"Wasn't Apple the first of the two to offer DRM free tracks?"
Yes, as you and another poster pointed out. That, however, was yesterday. Yes, I admit I'm a fanboy, and as such, I want to see Apple always on the leading edge.
Thank you for your thoughtful reply. For some others, I guess it's easier to negatively moderate than to reply.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, write technology blogs.
Just for an unscientifc experiment, I randomized my iTunes playlist by artist and got the above sample. Not until "Fall Out Boy" in the 11th spot did I get an artist of my liking that is available from Amazon's mp3 stores. One or two songs would be ok, but 10 out 11 is simply not acceptable. Unless they sign more labels, this model is DOA.
I wish that the Amazon MP3 store was available in Canada. Why do we always get left out? *sigh* I want to buy legal DRM free music too!
However, this can only be a good thing with Apple and Amazon competing. I'm sure it'll come to other countries eventually.
Since DRM and DRM-free tracks cost the same, it proves that DRM is worthless!
song_value + DRM_value = song_value
DRM_value = song_value - song_value
DRM_value = 0
...but for now, I'm not terribly impressed. Apple ... still embeds buyer information inside the files
... still has only EMI (and the independents) at this new rate (compared to Amazon, which also has Universal)
... chose to react rather than innovate
... is still more expensive (ten cents, granted, but still...)
What precisely is the problem here? It's not as though you're sharing those files around is it? And it's only your name, in an easily removable tag. I'm yet to hear a serious reason why this is so bad that uses actual logic. At the absolute worst and most cynical, it could be described only as a "minor inconvenience."
Apple
And that's because Apple clearly don't want Universal to go DRM-free, is it? And you know this how, exactly? Could it be because EMI were willing, but other companies wanted different rules or wanted to break Apple's dominance? Will I end every sentence with a question mark? No, I have other punctuation waiting in the wings!
Apple
Other people have reminded you that Apple were doing this before Amazon. Not first in the online world (it's not hard to find other labels like eMusic) but they were the first really big, unquestionably legal player to offer DRM-free tracks.
Apple
Good point. Apple picked the 99 cent price point early on and stuck with it. There have been many accounts of pressure applied to Apple to raise the price, and they've resisted. Hopefully Amazon's lower price will force Apple to compete at that level (really, I mean force the labels to realise this level is the price people are willing to pay).
I think you've tried hard to criticise Apple here, but failed to come up with a compellingly damning criticism. Better points could have revolved around the poor support for indie DRM-free tracks (improving now though) and purchase of lossless media (256kbit versus lossless is hard to hear though). Sadly you didn't grasp the nettle of opportunity when you could've.
Lossy compression => you lose information when you compress, so you don't have the same thing
back again after a compression/decompression cycle.
Lossless compression => you don't lose any information, this is ideal
non-lossless => double negative
to buy from it ? and does the mp3 work in all devices ? whereas $0.99 is still a tad bit expensive, i might consider acquiring some niche songs from over there.
Read radical news here
How is the first one Apples fault? Except pricing or something.
...
Yeah, Apple is just copying amazons music store! Without drm and all! Bad Apple bad!
But to keep this on topic, people aren't going to rebuy their songs if the come out with higher quality, because most people are happy with what they already bought. Some people will start buying higher quality songs, given the choice, but only if the price is right. Car analogy time: I bought a BMW 3 series recently, but feel no desire to rush out and by the 2008 model, even if it were vastly superior at a much lower price. Guess what, I liked what I purchased, and the fact a newer/better/cheaper one is available doesn't affect my original desire to drop $30k+ on the car I have now.
Oh my God Apple dropped another price! It's just like the iPhone all over again. SUE!! SUE!!
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
I didn' buy any of the more expensive DRM-free tracks, but I think what Apple has done is reprehensible to potential early adopters like myself.
I demand that Apple pay me, and others like me, ONE MILLION DOLLARS! Or I'll send in the sharks.
When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
Btw, exactly WHAT do you want them to "innovate" in the music area? Or where have they copied someone? What's your point really?
That they won't offer anything other than AAC. Which means for those of us with "other" types of players, the iTunes Music Store is completely useless.
I have an iPod as well as a few other devices, and frankly, I will continue to buy CDs or go through Amazon that has MP3 format available. Yes, it's not Ogg but not all devices support that. Every device supports MP3, and so the popular format that Amazon releases is the one I'll by. I will usually save money anyway.
I do wish Amazon had a better front-end to search their MP3s though... this way I can re-download them incase I lose them.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
You don't need an iPod. These are completely unprotected files.
The files are 256kbps MP4 files, somewhat better quality than comparable sized MP3s.
You will need to transcode them to MP3 for most media players, because pretty much all music players only support MP3 and WMA... things like MP4 (AAC - Advanced Audio Codec), OGG, etc are pretty rare.
No iPod required. The music store has, since its inception, allowed the burning of purchases to CDs (action restricted by DRM, but the final product is a real, DRM-free CD). You could also listen to the tracks using the iTunes on your computer, stream it to other authorized computers using iTunes, and stream it to your home entertainment system with Airport Express or Apple TV.
What's changed is that you now have even more flexibility. You can now stream it using anything that understands the (documented) AAC format. Play it on many more portable music players. Remix it using Audacity or other audio editing software.
You still don't need an iPod to use the iTunes music store. Now its just way more flexible, especially if you don't have an iPod.
That they won't offer anything other than AAC.
AAC is just the MPEG 4 audio codec, it's a publicly defined standard, and somewhat better quality than MP3 for equivalent file sizes. There are a few other media players that support it... but most only support MP3 and Microsoft's proprietary WMA. It's ironic, too, when some company whines about Apple's "non-standard" formats when it's *their* decision, not Apple's, not to support MP4.
One wonders if Microsoft cuts them a deal on the license for WMA if they leave out MP4/AAC, OGG, etcetera...
You can transcode to MP3 if you need to, if you must buy a media player from a company that kowtows to Redmond.
There is no lossless encoding possible in reality.
An audio waveform encoded to CD loses resolution. We can't usually hear the difference but it still loses information between the instrument or voice, and the CD.
The only useful argument is how much loss are you prepared to suffer?
I would argue that 128kbit/s is okay for outdoor listening and 256kbit/s is good for just about any form of audio indoors. Some music is improved by listening to the CD (as opposed to the 256kbit/s AAC) and some music can only be truly appreciated in the concert hall with the orchestra in front of you and the acoustic surfaces around you.
All recording or playback devices suffer losses either from A/D (or D/A) conversions or from components altering the information as it passes through. Even if we eliminate those losses, our senses degrade and by the time we're adults we're not hearing what we heard in our teens.
You want truly lossless? Well, no recording you can own now will satisify you and no amount of money will help. Instead, work out what you'll settle for and aim for that.
It's ridiculous to think that these prices are going to last, and that when the "correction" comes, that it will be anything but drastic. Giving Amazon a great deal of business, and thus, the big labels more leverage over operations that have fought for the end users, is detrimental to online music retailing as a whole.
It's ridiculous to think that these prices are not going to fall more, maybe even to a point that I will find reasonable. Universal essentially lost the war, and now they're just trying to pick up the pieces. This is how I interpreted the whole series of events:
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
I suspected last week that they'd add more music to iTP and that iTP would be reduced in price. I purchased Lauridsen's O Magnum Mysterium and was informed that I would be getting the iTunes Plus version at no additional cost. (The song wasn't marked as available in iTP on the store).
Who's talking about "standards"? I'm talking about using a common format that works across players.
Nobody's stopping you from transcoding the MP4 you get from iTMS into an MP3. Your MP3 from Amazon is 256k, the MP4 from iTMS is 256k, and if you have a golden ear you'll probably prefer the MP4 to the MP3. Transcoding the MP4 to MP3 will probably not produce as good an MP3 as you'd get from Amazon, but unless you have a golden ear you won't be able to tell... and even if you do it's unlikely to be noticable on an MP3 player through an earbud.
Once you have the music in a standard unencumbered format nobody's ever going to stop you from transcoding it into another format.
Allow me to recommend some great free music sites:
- Your local public library. The URL depends on your location. You can get a search for the type of music that you like and get a list of titles that can be put on reserve. When the CDs are returned, they are shipped to your local library branch and an e-mail notice is sent to you. You go over and pick them up, rip them into any format and bitrate that you want, and transfer them to your digital music player. Take the CDs back to the library and just slip them into the night slot as you would a rental video.
- eBay.com Search for the CDs that you are interested in by quote artist unquote or genre. Significantly cheaper than loudmouth billionaire Steve Jobs' store. Also try the other musical areas of eBay.
- eBay.com The musical instruments section. Ever wonder what it would be like to actually play your own Strat, sitar, or synthesizer? They're all for sale at a better price than you could find anywhere. Every type and every price range. And here's a secret. Because instruments sold on eBay are at their lowest price level already, you can always resell them for what you paid for them. So you can have a Strat, sitar, or synthesizer for a few months or years and then resell it on eBay. It's in effect a nearly-free instrument rental service. The only charge is the eBay listing, PayPal, and shipping charge from the previous owner. Save the packing that it arrived in for reshipping. Or sell it locally on CraigsList or the free listings in the Wacko Weekly newspaper of your city.
- Guitar tab and MIDI websites. While at the library picking up your free CDs, pick up a book or two on beginning music theory and sheet music reading. With all the cutbacks in public schools, music and art programs are often the first to go. Many people don't get a chance to learn to read music. They have no clue of how to get the sounds that the quote artists unquote are playing on the CD out of the instruments that they bought on eBay. Tab and MIDI websites are the answer. Google your favorite song with the word tab or MIDI after it. Tabs (short for tablature, which is a form of writing guitar music, not the study of Indian drums) show you how to play guitar.
MIDIs show you the sheet music, that is what notes to play. But you have to have a MIDI notation program and you have to know how to read music or at least know which notes arrange themselves into what chords, and how to play them. All available on the web.
- Jam sites. These are websites where you plug your MIDI instrument into your PC, go to the site, find a channel where someone else who is playing their MIDI instrument to the website, and join into the groove. A musician's Napster. Actually I don't know if these even exist. Please let me know if they do. If not, please code it as your senior project.
Music is free. There is no musician out there, rich or poor, who didn't learn the craft from listening and copying exactly from someone else and then changing it to fit his needs as a quote artist unquote. Music is like air. The fact that it goes into your body, gets mixed with your chemicals, comes out, and goes into someone else's body doesn't mean that you can claim to own it. The fact that a few giant global corporations can use media, lawyers, and police to attempt to convince people that they 'own' music means little in the long run. They are wrong. We are right. Music is free. Always has been, always will be.
It's lossless if the audio was a digital signal to begin with, though.
I bought 2 iTunes Plus tracks just 2 months ago and now they drop the price almost 25%? I want my refund damnit! Or at least an iTunes credit for $0.30.
So when are they going to start offering DRM-free tracks in FLAC as well as AAC/MP3/whatever-else-they-sell? I'm still reluctant to spend $1 on a low-quality MP3 when for the same price (per song) as I could buy the PCM CD.
Personally I think that Apple has never made a perfect product but I do think that they do a pretty good job. I just don't agree with all the negativism (not unbiased criticism) that happens every time Apple comes up with something new. :)
Looking back at the history of the iPod you can see what I mean:
Apple: Introducing the iPod: 1,000 songs in your pocket
Nay-sayers: No wireless, less space than a Nomad. Lame. (Despite the fact that wireless wasn't available by anyone until 5 years later).
Apple: Introducing the iPod with video. Now with iTunes you can watch your favorite shows and clips.
Nay-sayers: Where is my wireless? Where is my iPod/phone hybrid? And the video is only 320x240. Why isn't it wide-screen? Why isn't it a touch screen? (Despite the fact that no one had video or a touch controls yet?)
Apple: Introducing the iPhone: Phone, browser, widescreen iPod with touch controls and wireless
Nay-sayers: Really I wanted all those features without a phone. How come I have to use AT&T? Why can't I wireless buy music from iTunes? It's $600! That's $400 too much. (Despite the fact that no other device can do everything an iPhone can do for any price.)
Apple: Introducing the iPod Touch: Just like the iPhone but without the phone. You can now wireless buy songs from iTunes.
Nay-sayers: It's only 16GB! It should store a TB worth of video. Why can't I download a GB movie in 20 secs?
In the future . . .
Apple: Introducing the iPod femto: Size of a credit card. Stores 2 petabytes. Interfaces directly with the brain. Uses uranium batteries that last 5,000 years so no charging is required.
Nay-sayers: It interfaces only in standard definition not hi-def! And why can't I customize the menus? I wanted 2 exabytes. 5,000 years? Apple should have used plutonium batteries that last 10,000 years.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
If you think Apple gets more criticism than they deserve you must be on crack. There isn't a company out there that gets higher praise and lower criticism.
True that. Sadly, this is probably the beginning of the end of eMusic, which is currently the world's second-largest (legal) online digital music store. They carved out a nice niche for themselves by making it very easy for indie bands to get their music to the fans and bypass the labels.
Unfortunately as Apple and others start to get their act together, the real innovators such as eMusic who "did it right" from the beginning will probably suffer. (Of course eMusic's insistence on offering only subscriptions instead of per-track sales is not helping them any...)
A flaw in this argument's basic assumption is that people know what specific musical recording that they want. This assumes that they have heard the musical recording and know of its title and band. Which in turn assumes that the musical recording is played in a wide public forum (such as radio) closely followed by its information (band and title) so people know what specific recording to buy from the thousands available.
When people tune out commercial radio stations because of over-commercialization and homogenized playlists, or stop going to clubs that play new musical recordings, they break this connection to new music industry product. And the whole business model falls apart. It doesn't make any difference if a recording has DRM if a potential customer isn't buying anything because they have no idea what the CD package sounds like.
In this model people will buy what they have before or try new stuff only if it has ties to what they have liked before and is very cheap. By business definition, no recording with DRM is going to be cheap. The entire purpose of the DRM is to preserve the price point of the product. But how can you do this if people don't know the product? DRM basically kills the 'long tail' by limiting a product's exposure to the media corporation's captive audience, i.e. the people who listen to the media corporation's public outlets for religious, political, or marginal entertainment reasons. This is a major flaw in the DRM business model in the era of 'long tail' marketing of cultural products.
competition working like it is supposed to.
Also, Good job to all the people who have continuously talked about DRM and it's disadvantages. Getting that information out is the only way for the market to make good decisions.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
This could be market research. If they sell more DRMed music for the same price as the same music offered DRM free, you can bet that it will be spun as users wanting DRM.
"What precisely is the problem here? It's not as though you're sharing those files around is it? And it's only your name, in an easily removable tag. I'm yet to hear a serious reason why this is so bad that uses actual logic. At the absolute worst and most cynical, it could be described only as a "minor inconvenience.""
because I may want to resale the track, as is my right.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's great that Apple's finally seen sense. Because, if you think about it, when iTunes Plus songs cost more, you're actually paying more for something that has less attached to it. It would have got to the point where someone with no computer at all walks past an Apple Store and gets handed a bill for a billion pounds.
Those using pirated Tinysoft signatures(TM) are a real threat to society and should all be thrown in jail.
Unfortunately for DJs, Serato Scratch Live still does not support AAC. Of course, this is Rane's problem, not Apple's, but it is frustrating, especially when you have to explain to the person throwing the party that you can't play songs off their ipod or hard drive even though you are running your system from a computer. Rane is supposedly working on it for an updated version but of course it still won't support DRM'd files, so most of the stuff people have already bought from the iTMS is useless. It's frustrating - I've wanted to support iTMS since the day they opened the doors but the DRM issue and the format issue have been dealbreakers from my perspective. They should offer downloads in several different formats, preferably including MP3 and at least one lossless format (FLAC or Apple Lossless). They could charge a little extra for higher quality, like allofmp3.com used to, and have several different gradations, from 128 to 320 bps encoding on compressed formats. A scheme like that could bring in a lot of DJs who regularly buy music from beatport and emusic....
I'm saying that much of the criticism that they get about new products comes from unrealistic expectations. Often times, people criticize Apple for not putting in features that no one has put into their products yet. For example, wireless. Up until the Zune in 2006, no one had wireless (Even then it was debatable whether the Zune had true wireless). Yet people were complaining for years that Apple didn't make an iPod that had it. And people want these features now, not 2 releases from now. When Apple finally makes a product that has all the features that people wanted, then it's complaints about other unrealized features.
You can complain about the imperfections in Apple products that exist like some models were easy to scratch. That's valid. But complaining that Apple didn't make your dream iPod isn't valid.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Too freaking great man...hilarious
~~"Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong." ~~Dennis Miller
Say what!? Killing DRM is bad for the iTunes/iPod lockin, it means that iTunes tracks can now be played on any MP3 player out there! Apple's already subverting their own monopoly, what more do you want them to do, start supporting Microsoft's DRM on iPods?
Regarding the fourth bullet point, I had the same thought. If Apple isn't one of those big "evil" companies, why couldn't they have expanded iTunes+ to indie labels (and to everyone, really) before Amazon gave them the "competition"? I hate to think that my iTunes purchases are actually working against my own wishes (seeing those big labels become less relevant and eventually die).
Then you would remove the offending information from the file and sell it.
If it truly is your right, then just do it. The fact that your name is inside doesn't change what your rights are. (Or just remove your name.)
Any MP3 player? AFIAK iTunes still only sells in m4a/AAC format, so you still can't use with Creative Zen, Sandisk or Microsoft without converting (kind of a pain) and losing quality. Maybe I'm wrong? I have an iPod but don't use the iTunes store because I'm not sure I'll always have a player that will read those files - first because of their DRM and now just the format.
MP3 despite Fraunhofer's licensing still seems to be the most universally supported and has had such market penetration I'm much more comfortable using that as my lossy format for ripping, which is why I like the idea of Amazon's MP3 store.
In the market, my subject might be wrong. . . time will tell. I've, personally, made a decision. Any song I can't buy without DRM *does not exist* to me. I *will not* purchase any music with DRM, as it just perpetuates the problem. So, maybe some of the songs I know from the radio, tv, and movies isn't available to me. I don't really care. Instead, I'm trying to use this as an opportunity to discover new music by musicians/labels that *will* sell me the music without DRM (I realize a lot of artists don't have control over their own music, but that's between them, their agent, and their label).
The biggest problem, I see today, isn't the mindset/culture/attitude of labels. It's the mindset/culture/attitude of consumers. The greatest power consumers wield is the power to take their business elsewhere. Note, you do NOT have the power (legally) to rip off the music by downloading it from illegal sources, and when you do that, you are just proving that you are still that labels/artists *slave*. They own you. When you simply don't purchase their music, and instead purchase someone else's music, you do 2 things that are very powerful. 1) You make it profitable for people to sell you non-DRM'ed music, thus making it a viable alternative to DRM'ed tracks, and 2) the money that you send to those sellers can be used, over time, to shift power from the labels whose DRM'ed music sales are declining, to the labels whose DRM-free music is growing, thus ensuring that more and more artists will be signed to non-DRM labels, and fewer and fewer are signed to the DRM labels, making it more likely that your favorite music will be non-DRM.
And of course, the DRM labels will, if they see the other labels having success at their expense, do a complete 180 on this issue. They won't ride DRM into their own graves. By myself, I will likely make no difference, but if a lot of consumers vote with their dollars, it will force the labels to sell the music without DRM. Essentially, consumers get what they pay for, and right now, they are paying for DRM. I for one refuse to pay for DRM.
Lossless has practical advantages which go beyond "it sounds closer to the original". 128kbps is ok for outside use? Right; but I don't want to make that from a 256kbps file, I'd rather make it from a lossless source, and in a few years maybe I'd like to switch to 64kbps HE-AAC, and encode that from my original source too. In 5 years maybe I'll want to use Vorbis 2 or WavPack Hybrid.. and I can do that too. And I can keep doing this until I die or I lose my data outright.
That 256kbps AAC is never going to be of much use other than as a 256kbps AAC.
I definitely will not buy subscription music, and have no desire to do so in the future. I am in favor of buying CDs so that I can have the whole album and keep the music. The problem with the subscription model is that they can raise the price to anything they want once it gets popular. It is a trap, and I hope people are smart enough to avoid them. Buying music is like equity to me, where renting music is like having no rights.
The perfect model for me would be to have a music license provider that keeps all purchases on my account and gives me unlimited downloading of my music. Most people will only re-download in emergency situations like losing a hard drive, so it will not be a continual bandwidth issue for the companies. Furthermore, they can restrict 1 IP address per month so that people cannot hand out their login information for others to download. There has to be a trust that the company will be around in the future, and with new music constantly coming out, I think people will really like unlimited access downloads with their licenses. This protects my music from fire and theft.
An audio waveform encoded to CD loses resolution.
You don't know what you're talking about. Read up on the Nyquist-Shannon Sampling Theorem.
In summary: if your sampling of a signal is band-limited -- and there's no reason for it to not be band-limited within the range of human hearing -- it is possible to perfectly reproduce the original signal from a digital sampling as long as your sampling rate is at least twice your bandwidth.
Try again after you've done some research.
way to use misleading language.
lossless compression means that you don't lose information in the signal that's being compressed. why the hell are you talking about the recording techniques? it's completely irrelevant.
i don't know what color shirt the bassist was wearing when he recorded the track. but if you want to apply the mp3 algorithm to 2-inch reel-to-reel tape with a magic marker, then be my guest.
Considering that MPEG-2/4 AAC is much easier to get patent licenses for, and the fact that it's like the "modern version of MP3" so to say, many MP3 players support AAC as well nowadays (and generally WMA when it also supports that PlaysForSure thing from Microsoft that they don't even use anymore ;p). Shouldn't be that much of a problem...
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
I'd be happy if ogg vorbis was more supported but since support for it is practically nil on devices, I use FLAC for lossless (don't use lossless files on portable devices anyway) and MP3 for lossy.
I guess if I were convinced I was going to stick with Apple forever I'd go ahead and use AAC.
I think you're the one on crack. Apple gets more criticism than just about any company. What makes it so strange is that the criticism is mostly unfounded, or about bizarre, irrelevant things. Microsoft commits crimes and largely gets a free pass in the press, while Apple gets miles of press criticism for something insignificant like a "non-replaceable battery" in the iPod. Yet Microsoft has been releasing shoddy products for years, and you barely hear a peep out of the media.
Yes, Apple gets a lot of praise, too. But they also get way more negativity than anyone. I think you may have a short memory. Only ten years ago, Apple was considered a joke - and the only coverage they got was FUD about how they were going out of business and nobody uses Apple products anymore. There were even articles in the mainstream media about how Apple computers are "for girls" with undertones of homo[phobia thrown in.
... and then they built the supercollider.
Why is parent modded up? Apple did NOT invent online music stores. There have been online music stores for much longer than iTunes Music Store has existed. Mod down!
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Nay-sayers: Where is my wireless? Where is my iPod/phone hybrid? And the video is only 320x240. Why isn't it wide-screen? Why isn't it a touch screen? (Despite the fact that no one had video or a touch controls yet?) Noone had video? I think Creative might be offended by that (haven't you heard of the early Creative Zen?) Apple: Introducing the iPhone: Phone, browser, widescreen iPod with touch controls and wireless
Nay-sayers: Really I wanted all those features without a phone. How come I have to use AT&T? Why can't I wireless buy music from iTunes? It's $600! That's $400 too much. (Despite the fact that no other device can do everything an iPhone can do for any price.) Everything an iPhone can do can be duplicated on any smartphone on the market, with a little effort.
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Sorry, but your friend was wrong. Try reading the actual news stories, like this one: http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/10/16/drmfree/index.php
Pardon me. "Invent" is not the correct term. Please replace with "Mastered". What other online store before or after iTunes has had anywhere close to the success that Apple has had?
From http://www.zune.net/en-us/meetzune/techspecs/player.htm The Zune plays the following AAC formats
.m4a, .m4b, .mov): Up to 320 Kbps, Low Complexity (LC), up to 48-kHz sample rate
* AAC (.mp4,
From Creative
Listen to your music in multiple supported formats. With support for MP3, WMA as well as non-protected AAC (.m4a) from iTunes® Plus, sync your player to enjoy all your favorite hits today. Learn more on the quick transfer of AAC music using the Creative Media Explorer.
Did you even look at the manufacturers sites?
Do the following really mean anything? SCSA MCP CCSA CCNA
--I'm not actually after an answer!
Yes I did look at the manufacturer sites (obviously with the exception of the Zune site, I just assumed incorrectly).
I looked at the Sandisk site here:
http://www.sandisk.com/Products/Item(2057)-SDMX4-8192-A70-Sansa_e280_MP3_Player_8GB.aspx
Doesn't list formats (at least not where I can see) so I just checked newegg (specifications tab):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16855125013
The specs tab lists "Supported Audio Formats MP3/WMA/WMA with DRM"
no mention of mp4/AAC.
And Creative Zen W:
http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=15752&nav=1&bypass=1
Audio Playback Formats: MP3, WMA, WAV
no mention of mp4/AAC.
So I checked a couple other players -
Zen Vision M won't or doesn't list it: http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=14331&nav=1&bypass=1
Zen Stone plus won't or doesn't list it: http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=16696&nav=1&bypass=1
The regular Zen does
So at least one player from their current offering supports it but many of their players don't seem to unless I'm missing something.
Still the one consistency is that they all support MP3.
I do find it interesting that the Zune supports AAC, filed under "learn something new every day". Thanks for the link.
What is allofmp3.com?
Another person who knows a theory but not really what it means. Nyquist-Shannon sampling theory shows that you're not even trying to keep audio above half the sampling frequency. That is, you're choosing to lose audio data.
Sampling original analogue frequencies to a CD (44.2kHz I think) loses anything above 22.1kHz, which some people can distinguish (especially as harmonics to lower-frequency sounds). I used to be able to pick out sounds up to about 26kHz, although it's been a while since I was tested and I'm probably well below 20kHz these days.
If you can distinguish frequencies above 22.1kHz and want "pure" sound, you won't get it from a CD.
Multitouch and motion-sensing are pretty hardware centric features. You'd be hard pressed to duplicate those in software if you didn't already have the hardware in place, and I somehow doubt every smartphone on the market has those features.
Sunwalker Dezco for Warchief in 2016
I don't think that you're entitled to resell it.
I emailed them about expanding the DRM free music store to Canada... and this was the response:
Thank you for writing to us at Amazon.ca.
We expect our Canadian web site to expand and improve the selection
of products and services we provide, but we have no further details
to give you at this time regarding our plans for a DRM free MP3
music store.
However, I have passed your message along to the appropriate people
in our company for their consideration.
We hope you enjoy our current offerings, and encourage you to check
back on our web site often.
Thank you for your interest in Amazon.ca.
In summary: if your sampling of a signal is band-limited -- and there's no reason for it to not be band-limited within the range of human hearing -- it is possible to perfectly reproduce the original signal from a digital sampling as long as your sampling rate is at least twice your bandwidth.
it is possible to perfectly reduce the signal from a sampling if you have perfect filters but perfect filters cannot exist.
furthermore digital sampling implies not just sampling but also quantisation.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
Yes, you're wrong. Even freaking Zunes play AAC. It's becoming hard to find MP3 players that don't support the format.
I thought I remember reading that EMI approached Apple with the idea of DRM free tracks, not the otehr way around. It's been a while, so I can't say for sure, but that seems to have been one of the debate points when this whole thing started.
Which means for those of us with "other" types of players, the iTunes Music Store is completely useless.
Rockbox plays AAC.
Da Blog
Sandisk Sansa, Creative Zen W, Creative Zen M, Creative Zen Stone...
http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=15752&nav=1&bypass=1
http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=14331&nav=1&bypass=1
http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=213&subcategory=214&product=16696&nav=1&bypass=1
it really wasn't hard to find them.
It's actually kind of surprising to me that AAC isn't universally supported, since iTunes has sold like a bazillion songs in the format. It's also disappointing that something patent-free like ogg vorbis isn't more supported.
Creative Adds AAC to Zen
"Creative has integrated AAC support to its Zen MP3 players, PC Pro reports."
SanDisk Sansas support AAC, too.
Again, I already said this earlier.
The regular Zen supports it but as far as I can tell some of their newer products like the Zen Vision W and Zen Vision M don't. If you have anything new to add to that feel free. I linked the mfr site already earlier but here's a review:
http://www.mobiletechreview.com/mediaplayers/Creative-Zen-Vision-W.htm
Quote from the review: If you're an iTunes user who has ripped CDs into AAC format, sorry the Zen Vision W doesn't support AAC so you'll have to re-rip your CD or use a converter.
Review of the Sandisk eSansa 280:
http://www.zdnet.com.au/reviews/coolgear/audio/soa/SanDisk-Sansa-e280-8GB-/0,139023372,139267548,00.htm
Quote from the review: The biggest shortcoming we can see is that the e280 does not support the AAC file format, meaning those who have purchased a wealth of songs from the iTunes Music Store will not be able to transfer them to the player.
I'm sure some of their models support/supported AAC which is why it's on the Wikipedia entry.
I linked the newegg page earlier that doesn't list AAC as a supported format; maybe they'll add it later.
I think it'd be great if they all supported AAC but they don't. In fact it's puzzling to me that since AAC is so popular that players are released that don't support it, but they don't.
They removed AAC support from newer players? That is pretty strange...