Slashdot Mirror
Sony Announces DRM-Free Music at Amazon
sehlat brings us a New York Times report that Sony has agreed to start selling DRM-free music from Amazon's MP3 store. This comes days after Sony revealed plans for physical MusicPass cards that would allow DRM-free access to a small portion of Sony's library. Now that all four major record labels are on board with Amazon, some are expecting Apple to make moves away from DRM as well. From the NYTimes:
"Sony's partnership with Amazon.com also underscores the music industry's gathering effort to nurture an online rival to Apple, which has sold more than three billion songs through its iTunes store. Most music purchased on iTunes can be played only on Apple devices, and Apple insists on selling all single tracks for 99 cents. Amazon, which sells tracks for anywhere from 89 cents to over a dollar, offers the pricing variability the labels want."
i think we might be the only ones here right now. why don't we talk this over? i really think we still have a chance.
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?
He wants to know why suddenly everything down there is now... FROZEN!
Multiplayer Gaming (defined): Sitting around, discussing single-player games with my friends, at the bar.
Those of you who feel that the free market has no recourse against the large corporation and cartel, take note - this is the voting power of your dollar at work. Or, the lack of the dollar thereof, specifically.
It didn't take dismantling of the RIAA, court-ordered cessation of their ridiculous lawsuits, or legislative intervention to protect the consumer - it took your disillusionment with the industry and unwillingness to part with hard-earned cash to pay for crippled formats and less freedom with the content you purchased.
The next step will be the determining factor in the future of media sales. Will you buy MP3s, unrestricted, for a reasonable price? Or will you continue to download it for free via Limewire?
Option A will reinforce a reasonable business model that will benefit the industry, the artist, and you.
Option B will reverse the progress that has been made.
Choose wisely, Indiana Jones...
correct me if I'm wrong- but amazon only sells drm free tracks - and itunes sells a few drm free tracks. i don't think anyone is arguing over who did it first.
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?
Come on Sony, give iTunes some DRM-free love. You know you want to!
Hurry. Us Brits have just got into work.
Apple had become too powerful and arrogant, so basically the labels had become more scared of Apple than of the consumers.
Plus you get a nice plastic case, sleeve notes & a nice shiny disk that sounds better in a reasonable hi-fi than any lossy downloaded file.
Oh, and did I forget to mention that good music albums (of which there are thousands) do not have just one or two good tracks - that particular property is reserved for the "great unwashed" who never shop beyond the shelves of their local supermarket for music.
You mean ***PAY*** someone to cause the heads of my hard disk to write a few ones and zeroes????
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
he's not talking. but while you are here, let me just say that i love you guys. the football, the literature, the sitcoms. you all have done some great stuff. i know - there's lots more but that's what i see most often.
and you may gloat in your gmt, me being stuck in gmt -5 right now. but next week i'll be in gmt +1. we'll see who is who then, wont we?
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?
No-ones doubting that Apple was first, but for Sony to do this is a big thing indeed. They're a dinosour, and one of the worst DRM offenders (just having DRM isn't as bad as those darn silly rootkits), so if they have finally got the message, that's a sign of good things to come.
Personally I'm of the mind that iTunes tracks have always been DRM free though, since you are allowed to burn them to CD. If you just want to use the iPod alone, there's no need. This in built burn to cd option hasn't been the case for other DRM schemes that I know of.
Try as I might, I can't hear any difference to a track I've burned to CD and encoded as mp3. Aac has its advantages (aside from the drm everyone mutters about), I do like the bookmark feature.
Apple would love to "make moves away from DRM." Obviously they will do this as soon as the RIAA-signatory record companies make the DRM-free music available to them. The DRM is not central to Apple's business but is something the record companies forced on them to make the initial deals that created itunes.
After Jobs released the memo linked above, EMI made DRM-free music available to Apple, and Apple immediately started selling it DRM-free. Of course they'll do the same with the other labels.
Unfortunately, they didn't think to also drop their geographic restrictions, so this is only available to their US users. I can only presume that they got pressure from the music industry to do this, because they think they can get more out of people in their own countries. Of course, it really just means that overseas Linux users will either download the files illegally or they just won't listen to big 4 music at all.
X-Has-Sig: yes
That's not true. emusic.com was doing this years before iTunes.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
I argued it before here that DRM is a dead end, killing itself by limiting it's own market. And apparently this is really happening, and happening so much that it's starting to cut in profits.
Apple has more or less a stranglehold now on the market, and the labels demanding DRM on their music help Apple maintaining this stranglehold, and block e.g. Amazon from selling music that plays on the iPod. After all, when they must use DRM, they can not use Apple's DRM, and thus the market for Amazon and the rest is limited to the non-iPod market. And that market of course is small, and no serious competition for Apple.
The only way out for the labels, the only way to break Apple's hold including the demands of one price for all songs, is to drop the DRM requirement. And finally they do so - it started of course with some iTunes-plus songs, and then one after another the labels realised that they themselves are locked in by DRM as much, if not more so, than the consumers. Even "rootkit" Sony BMG apparently finally realised that.
Now the only thing I can hope for is some real competition. US$ 0.99 (HK$ 7.7) for a single song is imho way too expensive. For that price I can buy complete movies (legal, mind you - old ones, but still, a complete movie, on VCD, sometimes go for HK$10 for two). A new movie on VCD costs here HK$ 40-50, a DVD costs about HK$ 90-120, a music CD costs HK$ 70-100 for local artists and HK$ 110-150 for overseas artists. This for legal copies, not the cheap illegal import from China.
So now finally the labels have cut the DRM from the songs, allowing Amazon and presumably soon other vendors, maybe Microsoft or Yahoo, to sell songs without DRM. Amazon is now selling a lot at prices lower than iTunes, this will likely attract customers away from iTunes. iTunes is getting competition, and may be forced to lower their prices. iTunes may also decide to give up on their DRM, the lock-in is broken up by the supply side and there is no need for them to put on the DRM. After all adding DRM costs money: it takes computer cycles, requiring more computer power; it requires extra logic on their chips or software in the iPods, etc. DRM less media is cheaper, even if only marginally so.
So will Apple give up on their DRM? Sure. I'm really sure they will. Maybe not anytime soon, but as soon as Amazon et. al. get some traction, they will. As soon as there comes a real competitor to the iPod, they will do as well just to keep there store going.
Why thank you. I just hope that the BBC opens up the iPlayer to you guys in a reasonable manner. Of course, it is a truth that the U.S provides much of the best items of British television too. I expect we see just the best of what you have to offer, in the same way that you only get our best bits.
... questionable... policies of the current administration. But let's face it the U.S is still a scientific and cultural powerhouse.
It's fashionable to bash the U.S at the moment, largely due to some of the
Have fun in GMT +1 land next week - if you really want to get up that early, that's fine with me.
Of course, but remember that the definition of "reasonable" is that the price is something both seller and buyer will agree on.
Until the current pricing has proven to actually be reasonable, nobody knows if we're there yet. The "reasonable" price for a song could very well be $0.01 per song, and then the current uncrippling of extremely over-priced songs wouldn't prove anything.
Installed the Bubblemon yet?
Sorry, but that's nonsense. The fact that it is possible to burn to an inconvenient physical format an then rip to a DRM free format does not make iTunes DRM free. There is an inevitable loss of quality in this time-consuming process. I cannot play the original file on anything but iTunes or an iPod. That is DRM and it does not equate to consumer choice. Happily, Apple will now be forced to get rid of DRM - in the US, at least.
I have no problem with AAC - it's a good format and it can be played by Rockbox, but the DRM is not acceptable. I will never buy restricted media.
Satan "feels a bit chilly, puts on sweater"
Does anybody seriously believe that Apple wants to have DRM on iTunes ? Of course not - after all it was Steve Jobs who penned the open, anti-DRM letter in the first place.
What the record companies are attempting to do here is break iTunes' monopoly on music downloads. They see the way to do this as supplying another retailer with a superior product (ie. DRM-free music) whist still insisting that iTunes sells DRM'ed tracks. They are then hoping that people will move over to Amazon's system, killing iTunes, whereupon they will then either declare DRM-free a failed experiment and re-lock the music, or force you to download entire albums only, or set variable pricing, or any other nefarious scheme they have dreamt up.
If you believe that the record companies have 'caved in' or are doing this out of the goodness of their own hearts, then you really need to develop a healthy sense of cynicism, and quickly ! The record companies are actually being incredibly anti-competitive here, allowing one sales channel access to a superior product that they deny to another.
iTunes has been a massively positive force for music downloads - it offers a-la carte choice and fixed-price downloads. It's extremely easy to use, and, well, just works. The record companies were handed a 'get out of jail free' card for internet downloads, something they hadn't been able to figure out themselves, and all they can do in return is attempt to bring down the very system that saved their necks. I think this says something about their mentalities.
The thing is, I don't think this will change anything. The average consumer values convenience over DRM, and nothing is as easy to use as iTunes. Eventually the record companies will have painted themselves into a corner, or will face a legal challenge from Apple, and all have to offer DRM-free on iTunes. Either that or Apple will do deals directly with the artists (lets' hope) and leave these backstabbing, money-grubbing bastards out in the cold.
There was a number of online stores with DRM-free catalogs prior to Apple's involvement, and the DRM removal on iTunes was at the request of EMI, not the other way around.
It takes time to make songs available on an online store. Amazon currently has RIGHTS to sell more DRM-free songs than Apple, but Apple's been loading EMI DRM-free songs and DRM-free songs from independents for almost twice as long as the Amazon store has existed. The figure I've seen is that they have about 2 million DRM-free tracks (out of the 6 million total they have). That's about the same size as the whole Amazon store, so I think saying iTunes has "a few" DRM-free tracks is a bit of an understatement at the moment.
Until music producers start using open source software to produce and mix music, I refuse to pay for it. The vast majority of studios use proprietary software that runs on Windows and Apple operating systems, and their music suffers for it. It is a sign of narrowmindedness and sheep-like thinking that is reflected in their art.
TIAEAE!
technically, you could just burn them to a "cd image" with Daemon Tools, then rip them from that, then remove the image file :) tada, no burner needed!
"Some men just want to watch the world burn..."
[quote]It takes time to make songs available on an online store.[/quote] And that's exactly what's wrong with the whole digital music store business. They have to license every damn piece of music they sell, which means dealing with untold numbers of small and large labels, individuals self-publishing their music etc. For me, the biggest problem with online download stores has not been DRM, but the lack of selection. I don't give a damn about the 4 major labels, I can, on a good day, think of maybe one or two bands I might listen to from the whole bunch. Small labels is where it's at, and there sure are a lot of them out there to be making license agreements with all of them. Sure, emusic.com is doing a decent job of that, but even so, I still keep bumping into a whole lot of stuff I can only buy by ordering a CD somewhere, or having a brick-and-mortar store do that for me. Then there's the other sources, which have great selection but don't pay the artists a dime...
So what, in my opinion, is needed, is some way to allow users to get their content whereever they like, and still pay the artists. Sell a license to download, maybe? Of course, again, there's so many practical problems I don't even want to think about it. Fortunately I'm not in the music industry.
Sony - FUD. Redundant by design.
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
Still a very inconvenient way to transfer a file to an MP3 Player. And, of course, you have to use iTunes in the first place, which is the essence of DRM.
Sorry, but that's nonsense. The fact that it is possible to burn to an inconvenient physical format an then rip to a DRM free format does not make iTunes DRM free. There is an inevitable loss of quality in this time-consuming process. Sorry, but the sound from the "original" file and that of the riped CD are exactly the same, and turning that into a lossless format is in fact also lossless (compared to the original download at least) - and I doubt that the loss with converting it to a high-bit-rate format will be notable.
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
If I want an old sixties song, it is not worth 99c. No wonder Limewire flourishes. Old music should be more like 10c a track, then piracy can be combated. Apples rigid 99c rule has been a big impediment to the uptake of digital sales. And the music needs to be at a higher bit rate. 128kbs became popular when everyone used dialup. I would prefer 320, the very least 256. If I am paying for a track I want some audio quality. Apple do not own aac, it is a part of mpeg, the other music players can use it if they want, once it is free of DRM. But, again at a higher bit rate. my ten cents worth :)
Man, I'm really feelin' the love in this room.
From the guys that gave us the root kit come DRM free music? Whats the catch here? I have my doubts, experts out there, please check if this is true before i dive in.
Thanks in advance, and please post it on /.
No matter how great people think AAC is, the iTunes Store's 128kbps CBR is low to begin with. Losing any more audio quality is a shitty option, especially if you need to use high bitrate re-compression to minimize the additional loss in audio quality.
Apple and the music labels allowed this DRM "workaround" because it's a shitty option. It's the modern equivalent of pressing the tape recorder next to the radio's speaker.
You're expressing frustration, but don't paint "the other sources" as the way to go. Of course it takes effort to get the bands signed to a download store... this is what we all cheer for, "sticking it to the Big Label".
What you're describing is a market opportunity for labor. As I understand your post, once the majority of small labels are signed, you'll be content. This becomes a When-Not-If scenario. My projection is three years if a dedicated negotiating force buckles down with no more white noise interference.
Then there will always be the bleeding edge bands who formed last week, and it will be the thing to do to get them signed as a favor, in return for comped cd's *for services performed*.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Quote:
IN 2006 EMI, the world's fourth-biggest recorded-music company, invited some teenagers into its headquarters in London to talk to its top managers about their listening habits. At the end of the session the EMI bosses thanked them for their comments and told them to help themselves to a big pile of CDs sitting on a table. But none of the teens took any of the CDs, even though they were free. "That was the moment we realised the game was completely up," says a person who was there.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
There is, however, a loss of time in the process, and my time is important to me. There is a loss of usable cpu cycles, an increase in needed power, and a subsequent increase in my bills (basically requiring me to pay twice). Add to the fact that when I rip back into a lossless format, I am ballooning a small file into a large one, even though it is essentially still the small file, just a larger size, thus a loss of valuable hard drive space. Even though it appears to be lossless, I am losing a lot when I subscribe to your theory.
I don't like Linux. This doesn't make me a troll.
Hmmm, with Amazon's move into the digital music download market, I wonder if they are considering making music purchases available to Kindle owners. It has a built in mp3 player and a pretty fast wireless download capability. Wouldn't that surprise everyone if an e-Book became the oft-discussed "convergence" device before the cell phone did.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
Never, never, never trust these idiots. Don't run the risk that they will include some additional "content" but call it something other than DRM.
They will never have my business again. They proved themselves untrustworthy and only fools ask to be taken twice.
What do you mean Apple will be forced to get rid of the DRM? Do you have a clue? Apple isn't forcing the DRM now. Its the record labels. EMI dropped their DRM restrictions so Apple removed the DRM from EMI catalog on iTunes. I'm glad the other labels have woken up and realized that DRM is not working. The problem I have is they aren't being fair to Apple. They are allowing DRM free music on all these other online music stores, but won't let Apple sell DRM free music on iTunes. That is just wrong.
And there is one reason for it. Steve Jobs insists on keeping prices at 99 cents per song. The record labels don't like that. They want to sell you a song for 1.99. They are hoping that consumers stop buying from iTunes then the record labels know these other online stores will cave a lot easier than Steve Jobs would. $1.99 per song will become a reality on Amazon and such if iTunes goes away.
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
the DRM removal on iTunes was at the request of EMI
Where are you getting that information? Usually from an outsider's perpective it's impossible to understand how high-level corporate negotiations work, but the chronology was that Steve wrote a letter calling for DRM to be abolished first, then EMI's songs were sold DRM-free starting some time after that. It seems like if EMI were doing it on their own initiative, they would have made the announcement and claimed the credit, not letting Jobs pre-empt them and claim credit.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
The fish and chips are cool, but I'll never forgive you for the Spice Girls and Duran Duran.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Now that the content is there (or getting there), Amazon just needs to improve upon their already excellent store. Why can't I have a "wishlist" of songs I want to download? Right now I have a text file of songs I want, I just haven't gotten around to buying them yet. Shouldn't I be able to mark tracks for downloading later?
The fact that it is possible to burn to an inconvenient physical format an then rip to a DRM free format does not make iTunes DRM free
There is no difference whatsoever between a ripped mp3 file from iTunes, and a ripped mp3 from an album. I know, I've tried it. Same goes for Audible actually, but I didn't mention that because it's not music.
The purpose of DRM is to restrict what you can do with the music, but iTunes have never tried to restrict what you do with the music once you own it, just the original file you download, and that only because they were forced to. It is in their interest for you to rip it, because then you might have other copies on another iPod, as I do.
This is the key, I think. The labels want to play Amazon and Apple off eachother in order to push prices up.
Is that why most of the tracks (from all labels) are $.89 on Amazon, and albums are $8 or $9? Maybe it's because the labels have realized I want to be able to download a song and play it on my computer via Winamp or iTunes or Media player, and in my car via burned CD, MP3 CD, or any digital audio player with an FM out or aux out, or on any digital audio player while I'm elsewhere, or copied to a thumb drive and at work, etc. You know, rather than via iTunes on my computer, or via only an iPod while in the car, or via only an iPod while I'm away from the computer, etc. Ya know....
So...to buy music online...you have to go to a meatspace store?
Why not just buy the fucking CD at that point?
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
(just having DRM isn't as bad as those darn silly rootkits)
"darn silly?" Monty Python is darn silly. Sony's rootkits are God damned burn-in-hell evil.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I think it is a good move on Sony's part to release DRM-free music. But it is too soon to start buying their stuff. They are still Sony.
No, they are Sony Music. Big difference.
Don't forget the Blu-Ray DRM. With the region codes they intend to spring if they win the format war.
What? Why? That's not even under Sony's control, that's part of the Blu-Ray spec that a lot of companies developed. Heck, even HD-DVD uses the same DRM and SOny had nothing to do with that. And you are only SUPPOSING they plan to spring the region codes out.
What you meant to say (or what you should have said) was, remember the rootkit. However doesn't it seem like at some point if a company does something positive you like you should reward them instead of constantly punishing them? It's like if a cat actually decides to use the litter box for once, you go and taze them. Well don't be surprised if you find Sony peeing on your shoes again if you refuse to support the good actions they take.
And don't forget the rootkit fiasco. As I understand it, Sony continues to plant trojans on their CDs, they just don't contain rootkits anymore.
Oh, there's the rootkit. If you are upset with (again, supposed) "trojans" on the CD's, why not then punish THAT aspect by not buying the CD's and buy nice unprotected MP3's instead? How is Sony supposed to know which action is unacceptable?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apple seems to be dragging their feet in converting from Fairplay-restricted to DRM-free.
Incorrect, it's up to the label to allow this. SO far no label but EMI has (and some independents).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Terribly sorry old chap, being a bit too british don'cha know.
Fancy a nice cup of tea?
I got rid of floppies many, many years ago. I got rid of CD drives a couple years ago. Now my external media is memory cards (mostly SDHC) and whatever can plug into a USB, Firewire, or eSATA port. So now I have to plug in an external CD recorder and blow a recordable blank just to have the music I pay for in a usable form? This is a prime example of the silly shit we get when music is still DRM crippled. Not to mention I run the OS of my choice here.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
I'm going to throw this out there, but what are people's opinions about different DRM-free retailers?
I have liked Amazon for their ease of use, but their encodings are usually only 128-bit MP3s. I just found 7music, but haven't tried them yet. AudioLunchBox has nice encoding choices, but their music selection has been greatly limited in my experience. I used to have a subscription at Emusic, but the subscription model does not feed my desires.
They will never have my business again. They proved themselves untrustworthy and only fools ask to be taken twice.
In other words, Once Bitten Twice Shy -Ian Hunter (MOTT the Hoople)
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
That's not the chronology of events that I heard, and if you're referring to Jobs' open letter, it was clearly released far too late to have influenced the decision; it was a lot more like a publicity exercise.
It's still DRM. Apple still encrypts your songs with a secret key and only allows them to be decrypted by iTunes and your iPod after checking that you can play it. It still blocks you from playing it on more than a few computers and prevents it from being converted into other formats. Being able to burn to a CD doesn't make it non-DRM.
Now that I've made that point, most music stores that use WMA DRM also allow you to burn it to a CD. Just being able to play a legally purchased song on your computer or Sansa would be a foolish model, so Walmart and other songs that you purchase from let you burn it to a CD a certain number of times. You're probably getting it confused with subscription DRM which only lets you play it on your computer or WMA player for a limited time.
~~FutureDomain~~
Hydraulic pizza oven!! Guided missile! Herring sandwich! Styrofoam! Jayne Mansfield! Aluminum siding! Borax!
but amazon only sells drm free tracks - and itunes sells a few drm free tracks.
True, but Amaxon is selling tracks in the universal format. Apple is not. Tracks from Amazon will play in by son's iPod, my daughter's Creative Zen, my Coby MP3 player, and in my living room DVD player. Itunes tracks on the other hand will play on my Son's Ipod and a couple computers and nowhere else. The choice of music vendors is simply a matter of compatibility for many. DRM is a compatibility issue. So is formats other than MP3.
The truth shall set you free!
Now if they would just end the lawsuits I could buy music again..
B5 71 ED FB 55 D6 4E 68 07 25 E2 FA CA 93 F0 2F, is mine! All mine!
The letter is dated Feb 6, 2007. EMI and Apple jointly announced DRM-free tracks on April 2. iTunes Plus launched on May 29. This may be "clearly far too late" in your opinion, but I just don't see it. Jobs could easily have written the letter as part of a media pressure campaign during negotiations with EMI. EMI and Apple presumably came to an agreement sometime in February; otherwise why wait to make the announcement? Obviously there is some tech work that Apple had to do, but that could have been done in the time between April 2 and May 29.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
Where are you getting that information? Usually from an outsider's perpective it's impossible to understand how high-level corporate negotiations work, but the chronology was that Steve wrote a letter calling for DRM to be abolished first, then EMI's songs were sold DRM-free starting some time after that.
I don't know who approached who, but EMI did test the DRM-free waters on Yahoo Music (on Dec 6, 2006) two months before Steve Jobs published his open letter (on Feb 2, 2007).Also, Steve Jobs wasn't the first digital music store honcho to call for the end of DRM. Nearly one year before the open letter, Yahoo Music chief Dave Goldberg spoke out against DRM, even mentioning eMusic as an example.
This is not to downplay the importance of the letter. Apple was and still is the Big Kahuna of digital music stores. Apple's anti-DRM stance was very important, even if they might not have been the first.
TO START
PRESS ANY KEY
Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...
You're still transcoding lossy format, that's absolutely unacceptable.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Beeeeecaaauuuse... it existed for more than two years as a music player and easy digital music library converter before the storefront came about--and any DRM considerations to be allowed to sell any music through it at all? Because it also became a truly easy way to manage radio streaming and podcasts and a host of other free content through the same interface that you enjoy the rest of your music?
Both horrible software AND people, no doubt! It's the essence of that thing they were forced to deal with until they did it so well that they forced the labels to stop!
A year or two ago I would have agreed with you. But now, there are quite a few players with AAC compatibility. Even my phone plays AACs. As it becomes more common, MP3 compatibility is going to be less and less of an issue for people. If the Apple store ever becomes entirely DRM-free, it will be a pretty good source for music for a lot of people with non-iPod players.
-- OpenVerse Visual Chat: http://openverse.com
U.S. only.
I've tried to purchase a track at Amazon already two weeks ago. I was turned down. They only sell to buyers located in North America.
17779 eligible voters in a district, 17779 'vote' as one. This is Russia.
The Limeys are wearing off on me I guess. "Silly" does seem to be a particularly British word to my American ears.
An Irishman once told me how to tell if someone with a British accent is English, Scottish, or Irish: wait until a fly lands in his beer.
An Englishman will politely push the glass aside and order another.
The Scottsman will make a face, pick out the fly, throw the fly away and continue drinking.
The Irishman will take the fly by the wings and scream "spit it out you little bastard!"
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Um... Why is this even mentioned in the same post that's talking about them selling through Amazon as well? You can criticize the point of their "music pass" all you want, but they seem to be trying to do both that, and regular digital distribution. How would that be "not getting it?" It would seem like they're "doing it," plus something else random.
Makes you wonder why the guy above you got a 4 insightful and you, one who responded in kind to his comments got a 2
Because I am actually insightful and you are a rabid Sony hater?
If there's one thing I've learned in life, a policy of forgiveness and tolerance is a lot more healthy outlook to hold. And you haven't at all addressed the main point which is, if a company has a policy you don't like how are they supposed to change if you do not support good policies they implement? It's unrealistic to expect anything a company, or a person does is ever going to be perfect. Reward the good behaviour.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Isn't it odd how most who claim others are members of a "cult" are zealous fanatics themselves?
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
Man, me too. I love you guys. Group-mind hug.
P.S. Anyone else find it hilarious that the subject line is still "Re:Go fuck yourselves"
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, shame on me.
How many Yugos do you have to buy before you realize that every one is a bad car?
The Rootkit breached the license agreement with Microsoft, compromised the kernel, allowed anybody who could create an executable named $sys$****.com / exe to run - without showing up on the stack and they created a massive "phone-home" scam that stole your bandwidth and sent private data without your permission to their servers.
This is a massive intrusion and there is not a single reason on this earth that we should ever buy a Sony/BMG music/dvd again. Make it hurt. The decent artists will leave and other labels will pick them up. Sony/BMG acted like we were criminals and in turn violated Title 18 of the US Code.
Put them on the same shelf as anthrax, small pox and fascists. Things better locked away forever.
If they were nuts enough to do it once - they are nuts enough to do it again. Lock them out of the market.
I am. Yahoo was first. They started selling DRM free music (from an RIAA label) over a year and a half ago.
http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/news/2006/07/71427
Are you on crack? A 128kbit AAC is nothing like CD quality.
Are you on crack? A 128kbit AAC is nothing like CD quality.
Was that what I said?
Your assignment for today is to re-read my comment....
Because you need the actual physical presence of the card before you can acquire the music.
Yay, you can get it through Spamazon. And wait 3-4 days for it to arrive.
Instead of signing in to an actual SERVICE, setting up an account, hooking it to a credit card, paypal, gift card, etc, and start buying stuff IMMEDIATELY.
This is the very definition of Head Up Ass.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Thanks for the info. Maybe you can hint how the country is determined, so I can cheat the system to get that track? IP? Credit card issuing bank? Last shipping address? (By the way for me all three point to different countries right now... no system is ideal, I know.)
17779 eligible voters in a district, 17779 'vote' as one. This is Russia.
P.S. Namely I am dying for track 13 on this album (which I haven't found as a torrent). I collect recordings of Soviet and Russian national anthems, this is why I want to get it. Online music stores other than now-squashed allofmp3.com have never been a big help in getting records for the collection: there is always some pesky restriction that doesn't let me use them, either geographic or file format or payment method... I always ended up forced to use P2P for actual downloads (or mailorder the CD, but this quickly gets expensive for a project like this when you need only one track from the album and there are hundreds of tracks on my website).
17779 eligible voters in a district, 17779 'vote' as one. This is Russia.
You have my vote!
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
What bullshit. Here's why:
...is utter horseshit. That IS the free market; Virgin are selling their products at a price that, assuming Daft Punk's sales are shit, the market is willing to bear. Your saying that just because you can only get Daft Punk's music from Virgin it's not a free market is a lot like some penis saying that because they can't buy a shitty little exploding city car from Chrysler, it must be some kind of anti-free market shit and therefore stealing Fords is acceptable as "competition". Which again, is horseshit; no company should have to compete against their own products sold or otherwise distributed for unreasonable prices through illegal or barely legal means. That's not competition OR the free market, that's trading in stolen goods (please save me the shit about copying not being stealing, the end economic effect is roughly the same.)
;)
In all iterations of the free market, businesses have products which they either produce or pay to have produced, and then sell. In Virgin's case that would be Daft Punk, as they bankroll the production, distribution and whatnot of the two French house-DJing robots from space's albums. In, say, Ford's case, that'd be a shitty car of some kind which they've paid to produce. Meanwhile, EMI have soppy Brits Coldplay and Chrysler have some fucking great SUV monstrosity, which they both sell.
My point is this:
If you want to listen to Daft Punk, you HAVE to get it from Virgin Records. There's no legal free market.
Also, I would like to apologise for making my first and hopefully only car analogy on Slashdot, even if it was done in a roundabout way.
I write bullshit
> And wait 3-4 days for it to arrive.
You must have the slowest dial-up connection in the world.
Slightly disreputable, albeit gregarious
The fact that it is possible to burn to an inconvenient physical format an then rip to a DRM free format does not make iTunes DRM free. There is an inevitable loss of quality in this time-consuming process.
Burn 'em to a CD-RW - takes a couple of minutes on my machine, surf the web while it's burning - then rip the resulting CD to FLAC, Apple Lossless or some other bit-perfect format. No quality loss (beyond the original lossy compression applied to the file you downloaded from iTunes).
Clue: CD's are digital. Distributing/Selling CD's is distributing digitally.
"Digital" is not a valid term distinguishing 'network transfer/download of information' from 'transfer of information on a physical medium', when the information in both cases is "digital".
And of course you apparently missed that this is Sony announcing actual online download via amazon.com, without requiring any physical purchase at a store, unlike their previous announcement which did require physical purchase of some sort of card.
As far as whether it might make more sense to buy your digital music in a physical medium (eg, on a CD) than buying it in online downloadable form, is probably going to be dependent on the price of the online option. (The ability to buy single tracks versus having to buy 12 to 15 in a package on CD at once might also weigh in, as might the methods of payment they accept)
Here's a bit of pointless trivia for you.
Whya re we called Limeys by you American types?
Because the Lime was the Anti Scurvy fruit we used when traveling your way.
Why do the Australians call us Pommies?
Because by the time we got there, the limes would have run out, and we restocked our ships with Pomegranates.
Apple doesn't own the AAC format. They license it. Any music player can support AAC if they choose to. Apple has decided that they will sell AAC because its better than MP3. If you don't want to support a better format, thats your business. But don't blame Apple because they choose AAC over MP3.
Yes, Amazon sells songs for 89 cents. But the whole purpose behind moving off of iTunes is because the labels couldn't persuade Steve Jobs to go with variable pricing. Just wait. If iTunes is no longer the dominant online store, prices will go up.
I have what I think is an awesome idea for Amazon. Give everyone who buys mp3s a free S3 storage account. For every mp3 purchased, create a virtual link to the file in their S3 account.
Now you have a backup of all your purchased music at no charge, which you can download at any time at standard S3 download rates. And, of course, you can feel free to use that S3 account for other purposes if you like. But there's no monthly fee for storing the mp3s since Amazon only needs to keep a single copy of each song for all users.
They are selling songs, same as everyone else, through the Amazon MP3 store. (Or will be making their catalog available at the end of the month.) "All four major labels will be part of our service." Not, "Three major labels will be a part of our service, and Sony/BMG will sell these random cards which you then have to wait for, then use the code to download everything later on."
As in, both. They just also seemingly want to try to retain a physical presence that ties in with whatever digital download service they pursue.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly
Apple does not have a monopoly. They may have a large market share but it is not a monopoly. Others offer the same service.
qz
It is less of an issue as more player now take more formats, but many players simply have not joined the multi-format pool beyond 2 or 3 formats with MP3 as the only common denominator.
Take an Ipod of any model, Creative flash player of any model, most Cell phones, Zune, Car stereo with ability to play off a USB thumb drive, and any portable DVD player. Now make a list of all supported formats for each and look for the one common denominator. It's still MP3 and nothing else.
The truth shall set you free!
About a week ago someone pointed me to Amazon Mp3. I vaguely remember hearing about it a few months ago. I cared for the news then about as much as I do about every other online music service -- not at all. But this really is different. I am all for some of the high quality independent musicians out there, and all the ways to get good free music. But unless I am horribly inept in my searches, I think there is something to say for the quality of record-label backed music. Higher production values, more time and money to work on the music, I don't know what it is. While I would love Flac online, that is an unrealistic expectation, and 256Kbps VBR mp3 files are pretty damn good. I can say that I am now, finally, done with CDs. All the artists I could think of, with few tiny exceptions, are available on Amazon. Those few were probably with Sony. Just like I exorcised floppies from my life 5 years ago, I think I can do the same with CDs soon. The music is great quality, cheap, no restrictions, and just oh so easy to buy. (Yay 1-click patents!). As for using it in Linux, as some may be interested in. Individual tracks are a normal browser .mp3 download. Downloading an entire album downloads a .amz file, a tracklist more or less, that is opened by an amazon proprietary downloader, that queues and resumes files. While I would prefer a zip (or better), this is reasonable given that they want tighter integration to people's wmp and itunes organizations, and less disk space usage on their ends (storing an album twice - either that or zipping on the fly). The windows Amazon Mp3 Downloader works under WINE, mostly. It will D/L the album if you don't touch it, just let it do its thing. The program crashes if you try to operate it, but that isn't needed. The FAQ says that a Linux downloader is in development. I wish they just gave specs on the .amz file instead. Someone would have made a nice Amazon Mp3 downloader and it would be in my distribution repos by now. (I haven't looked at the .amz files myself yet, it can't be that complicated.) But still... this is great. My CD collection was fun when it was small, but it has become a large piece of furniture over the years. This is finally some real progress.
Thank you, I have wondered how you got that nick. Now I wonder why the Italians are called "wops" and "dagos". My brother in law is 2nd generation Italian and he doesn't know.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest