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New "MP3 100% Compatible" Logo For DRM-Free Music
Sockatume writes "A coalition of seven UK digital music stores have created a logo for DRM-free, MP3 music. The 'MP3: 100% Compatible' logo allows the stores to emphasize the advantages of the format, namely that MP3 files will run on any device and won't keel over and die as DRM-laden files are wont to. The BPI — the UK equivalent of the RIAA — is backing the scheme, emphasizing that it will also allow users to identify legitimate stores."
The tide has turned: A once geek-only outrage will now be slowly taken up by the AOL like masses.
About frigging time.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
Well, I suppose this is gonna get the suddenbreakoutofcommonsense tag.
Will it run on linux? :?
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing. Emo Philips
New logo on top of the Pirate Bays search logo in 5, 4, 3, ... ? :D
Yeah, but '73.38% compatible'* just doesn't have the same ring to it, you know?
*Number pulled out of ass, just so y'know.
Tell me something...it's still "We, the people"... right?
You are mistaking "compatible" with "open". .ogg is open, but is compatible with significantly fewer devices and computers at the moment. I don't think my computer will play it (though I could download a codec for it if I cared), and I know my phone, portable music player (aka MP3 player), and car stereo can't play it.
Proprietary or not, MP3 is THE audio format to play. Give an ogg file to most people, they are almost certainly not going to be able to play it without some hass.e Most audio devices don't play ogg files, while most audio file player devices can play MP3.
How does use of the logo show you're legit? I bet there are plenty of pirate and torrent sites that could stick that logo right on their front page today.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Swastika on all the DRM'ed files.
I record my sleeptalking
I think they mean that the file is 100% compatible with mp3-players. Ogg is not compatible with most portable music players.
But I think that the logo sucks if its purpose is to represent the absence of DRM in the songs..
If it was hard to write it should be hard to read.
I agree that mp3 is suboptimal, and I use flac or vorbis myself(rockbox ftw); but mp3 is pretty damn compatible. There exist several Free implementations of encoding and decoding, and Fluendo makes a binary version of their MIT licenced gstreamer plugin available, for free, with the mp3 licence fees paid. It isn't perfect; but it could be far, far worse. Also, mp3 is a fairly old format, all the relevant techniques and algorithms and whatnot are either unpatentable at this point, or already patented and on their way to expiration(I've seen estimates as optimistic as 2012 and as pessimistic as 2017).
I personally avoid mp3, and would encourage others to do the same, when they can; but I would argue that in the mass market, mp3 is by far the most Freedom friendly candidate(though, among demographics focused on audio quality, flac has strong potential).
Because it's hard, if not impossible to find a player that doesn't support MP3. You actually have to look for OGG or FLAC support while buying. This is about making it easy for consumers, not forwarding the agenda of open source/format nazis. Maybe, just maybe, something not completely open is actually...good?
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mp3 is nice, but... (by rampant_mac)
Haha, a mac user complaining about proprietary formats.
Let's face it, I'd probably never buy a song on-line if I had any doubts about whether I'd have to put up with DRMBS, and many others probably feel the same. The nifty little logo would make me much more likely to part with my cash because I would expect to actually get my moneys worth from DRM free files.
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...
Of course they won't. Unauthorized use of that logo would be copyright infringement... oh, f-
Circumcision is child abuse.
MP3 is supported on more handheld players and integrated chipsets that's why. It may not be the best compression scheme as there have been some great developments in psychoacoustics in the last 15 years, but MP3 just works.
Also, don't worry about Fraunhofer/Thomson. The patents are gonna expire in a couple years and none of the big companies have sued anyone for using LAME yet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MP3
Its saying the file is 100% compatible with the MP3 format. As in, there's no additional DRM that has been tacked onto the MP3 file.
I don't like encoding my music into a proprietary format.
You don't seem to have a problem using it on proprietary devices.
How does use of the logo show you're legit? I bet there are plenty of pirate and torrent sites that could stick that logo right on their front page today.
And your point is? They could tell me they have the cure for cancer and I, aware that I am on a freaking torrent site, will take that pronouncement with the required grains of salt.
Whole point's moot anyway. With Sony's rootkit et. al, do as Mulder did: Trust No One.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
Wow, what a mouthful. 12 syllables. "MP3 100% Compatible" doesn't exactly roll off the tongue. They should have gone with something shorter, catchier, but with the same meaning... like "plays for sure!" or something.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
The BPI â" the UK equivalent of the RIAA â" is backing the scheme, emphasizing that it will also allow users to identify legitimate stores.
I'd say their willingness to allow a distinction to be drawn between an open format and their restricted garbage is a temporary phenomenon. Odd in a way, since they (and their ilk elsewhere) have spent a lot of money convincing buyers that DRM-infected files are just as good as unencumbered ones. Makes me think that as soon as they have people aware that MP3 is different than whatever it is they're offering, they'll start spending billions vilifying MP3 files. These guys are sneaky and not to be trusted under any circumstances.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Car stereos, DVD players, etc, etc. Ogg's a solution to a non-existent problem.
Politas
This logo is horrible.
I don't like encoding my music into a proprietary format.
You don't seem to have a problem using it on proprietary devices.
Rockbox + your device with proprietary firmware (including iPods -- up to 5.5G) = your device with new, shiny open-source firmware, that, of course, supports .ogg.
If they'd only thought it through a bit more, they could've come up with a catchy, easily-remembered name.
Like, for example, PlaysForSure.
#DeleteChrome
Nicely done. Sometimes you can almost hear the whip of whit come right back to crack the smartass. Fail + 2 Rockbox = good stuff.
Actually, there's a legal, licensed MP3 decoder available for Linux. http://www.fluendo.com/resources/fluendo_mp3.php It's open source (MIT) with binaries approved by Fraunhofer available. So you're OK even if you do stick strictly to all patent law, live in a country where such law applies to software, and require source to all code running on your system (above BIOS/firmware level).
Yeah, I'm "definately" glad they didn't spell it that way.
:q!
I don't like encoding my music into a proprietary format.
That's OK. The files will come pre-encoded.
Ah, but who runs the Catholics?
the old dude with the tall hat isn't it?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Use of this logo doesn't imply that you're legit, only that you're MP3-compatible.
Proprietary and compatible do not have to be linked.
ogg is not closed source/proprietary, but despite this it only works on what, 60% of players? hardly "compatible". Being open source does not maketh compatible.
But then WMV9 is closed/proprietary, and only works in maybe 1/3 of the players. Probably an intersection of where "proprietary" marries "profit".
Then there's the third alternative, mp3. Proprietary, yet universally (100% for all practical purposes) supported.
Can you find an audio player that does NOT support MP3 but DOES support ogg? Maybe you can find one or two. But I bet I can find a heck of a lot more that do MP3 and not ogg.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
I remember another catch phrase by some strange little company, that promised something similar.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
I'd be really curious to see if rampant_mac would sully his Apple goods (including his latest iMac) with free software, including a free operating system. And if he is, why is he bothering to pay for a Mac instead of buying a generic computer.
Unless its quantum voting!
Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
Catholicism is a derivative of the Christian faiths, which is a derivative of Judaism. So in a diluted method, the Jews do run the Catholics.
...)
In other news, why isn't jews picked up in the right-click list of options as a spelling correction in my UK-dictionary in Firefox. Yeah, so jews corrects to Jews, but why is the correction not on the list (sews news dews mews pews
signature is pants
Ogg is Open and Free As In Speech, but it's compatible with almost nothing. Yes, devices could be MADE compatible with it with no licensing costs, but good luck convincing Apple, who alone controls over two thirds of the mp3 player market with the iPod. I doubt the Zune supports ogg right now either, though I'm sure many of the less-popular players that are trying to nail as many features as possible in the hopes of taking a couple of Apple's customers support the format.
That's not knocking ogg - it's hardly the format's fault. But I don't think there's a portable player in existence that doesn't support mp3, and that's what consumers care about. And from that standpoint, mp3 is as close to 100% compatible as any format ever will be.
Ogg is fantastic for some things (game audio comes to mind, with zero licensing costs), but portable media player compatibility is unfortunately not one of them. Likewise for FLAC.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
Well, if you use the logo and don't provide MP3 files to your customer, I'm pretty sure you've just gone and opened yourself up to a false advertising lawsuit.
Doesn't address piracy issues, but then again I don't tend to associate piracy issues with retail stores or well-known online sellers like Amazon.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
Solution to a non-existent problem? The gaming world seems to disagree, since Ogg is used in plenty of games.
So in a diluted method, the Jews do run the Catholics.
don't the jews run everything?
Stop Computers/Cars Analogies on S
No, it would probably be trademark infringement unless they didn't trademark the logo.
Flac, then. Turns into mp3 or ogg easily enough, and is open and unpatented.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Oh, I can explain this one (and burn karma)
1. People are idiots
2. Anonymous people are ignorant arseholes
3. See point #1
Signed
An anonymous Idiot.
...
Yes, tell us all about that proprietary Apple audio format.
Don't be so sure about Ogg being unsupported. While most of the players never list it as supported format, some will play it just fine anyway.
I have one like that - it does only list MP3,WAV and WMA. Even in the specifications, Ogg is not mentioned. Yet when I tried it, the player had no problem.
The moon is not fully subjugated. I demand a second assault wave preceded by a massive nuclear bombardment.
Catholicism is a derivative of the Christian faiths
If I remember my history correctly, aren't the Christian faiths derivatives of Catholicism?
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.
Indeed. The .ogg format would need a new label. "100% incompatible", perhaps?
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.
It's also fully lossless. I'm not sure people need or want that, considering the ballooning size of digital music libraries even with lossy compression.
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.
And requires you to go through a tedious conversion process to use it on most digital music players.
Hard disks are up to 1.5TB. That's maybe a hundred times what they were when Napster first became popular. FLAC is typically, what, ten times the size of an MP3? Seems to me the time for lossless compression is here.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Hard disks are up to 1.5TB. That's maybe a hundred times what they were when Napster first became popular. FLAC is typically, what, ten times the size of an MP3? Seems to me the time for lossless compression is here.
The problem is that it is only about half the sized of the raw uncompressed track.
So by the same kind of logic as above, and as has been apparent ever since the performance of lossless audio compression stabilized many years ago:
The point at which lossless compression (of music) becomes useful, is about ten minutes before it becomes pointless.
It might make a difference for slow transfers like torrents, but as for storage: If you can spend that much space, just double it and get rid of the whole encoding and conversion step.
sudo ergo sum
Not all of them. The orthodox churches are older, and there are gnostic christians who claim to trace their faith even further back. That last claim may be dubious, but hey do not at any rate descend from catholicism.
sudo ergo sum
Are there even any unhacked non-PC devices that play FLAC? Nothing against FLAC, but even Ogg Vorbis' ~5% market penetration is much ahead of FLAC's.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
This is slashdot. We know.
February 9th, 2009 8:55pm: Slashdot becomes self-aware.
Are there even any unhacked non-PC devices that play FLAC? Nothing against FLAC
FLAC is currently the most popular Lossless compressed format for hardware players.
High end living-room digital players usually support it. Some offer services where you send your CDs and when you receive your player it's pre-loaded with FLACs of your music (like Olive for example)
Several Jukebox also exist with support for FLAC, like in car systems from PhatNoise's.
Logitech's latest Squeezbox supports it too, for a more recent example.
For more detailed and longer list see FLAC's own list.
In addition to all these branded software, don't forget also about all the countless of no-name "multimedia-harddisk-case" (small box usually centered around some miniITX board running a small embed linux-based mediaplayer. Sold pre assembled in store and buy-your-own-harddisk in computer shops). Granted most of them DO use Linux and PC-like hardware. But they are sold as ready-to-use appliance, like your DSL/Cable modem and Wifi router (which is most likely to run Linux, too).
In short the fact the iPod doesn't play it, and Microsoft's "Play-for-Sure" logo forbids it in the USA, doesn't mean that the rest of the world isn't already using it.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Out of curiosity, which player is this?
-- Soruk
No one cares. WMP plays it, iTunes plays it, Rhythmbox plays it, etc. who cares that the ORIGINAL VERSION of the software (which no one uses) was closed source, it's simply irrelevant.
"Welcome to our world. We are the wasted youth. And we are the future too." Yes, I know these are stupid lyrics.
I think the whole point of this logo is to label DRM free mp3s, not legitimate them. Creating a logo to indicate mp3 legitimacy would be plain silly.
Check out my blog!
Ahh, but is that really the best use of those bits? I mean, sure, if you're starting with CD audio files, lossless from that is the best you can do.
But presuming the songs are actually recorded in something with much more fidelity than CD, I'd think that 30 megs of a careful lossy format taken from that would be better than 30 megs of pefect "CD" sampled from that.
After all, in this example, CD is basically a naive lossy compression format from the "original" higher quality master.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Like MP3 or DRM matters anymore.... let's stop deluding ourselves. Beyond us no one even realizes what format music is in...
-S
Traditionally the way logo-approval schemes have gone is that you apply to the group that owns the logo for permission to use it, and possibly pay out a lot of licencing fees. That's my biggest concern. I'd like to see this logo pop up on emusic.com, or ocremix, for example, but politically that may not happen.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
I've wondered about why no one is sued for using LAME> My theory is that almost everyone has licensed rights to MP3 patents if they have ever:
*Bought windows
*Bought am MP3 player
*Bought a music playing software
*.. etc.
I think most of us have paid F/T multiple times for the rights to MP3.. thus they wouldnt really stand a chance in court in proving that a person used MP3 encoder without rights.
Of course, IANAL, and my understanding of this is very naive.
http://dilemma.gulecha.org - My philospohical short film.
Ogg support is greater than 0% but it's also lower than 100%. I know that my last player didn't do Ogg even though one of its selling points was that Ogg support would come with a later firmware patch (it turned out the processor wasn't fast enough for Tremor). There still are players around that don't do anything but MP3 - but even on players designed for AAC or WMV, MP3 is no problem.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
Like say slashdot.org? Note the logo is printed on the article, and slashdot front page.
A logo is no hinderance to truly illegitimate stores, the true criminals will just download the logo from a legitimate store and illegally display a rendition of the logo on their own site.
In this manner, the logo suffers the same problem as security and trust logos that banking and e-commerce websites are so fond of displaying.
It is not hard for a criminal to display a fake logo.
And they don't have to bother making them clickable; hardly ever does the average computer user ever try clicking a security logo.
For all the user knows, the site didn't pay extra for clickability, they installed the logo wrong, or "THAT" logo isn't clickable to verify currently/anymore.
Linux is fine since you can always upgrade it, but what about older hardware MP3 players? I have some older players that don't work with MP3s encoded with a variable bit rate. If the MP3s being sold with this logo are truly "100% compatible", does that mean that they are encoded with the lowest common denominator MP3 format that will work in even the oldest players? And is that really a good thing?
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
The better class of music library software can automatically transcode files being transferred to a player. I believe Amarok will do this for iPods.
As an AC pointed out, it is a trademark, not copyright.
Secondly, if for example TPB would put this logo on their website, they can be sued for the use, and it's an easy case. Website uses logo without permission, gets fined.
The torrents they host on the other hand is not so clip and clear legally speaking: TPB is not directly infringing on copyright here, however they do facilitate it.
Anyway not likely that sites like TPB will use it unauthorised, way too risky.
Does it transcode more quickly than files can be transferred to the mp3 player? If not it requires tedious waiting.
I've had it do ogg -> mp3 and didn't find the wait all that terrible. And this is only remotely a problem for people who are constantly changing the music on their players AND have slow computers. Any machine made in the last three years will transcode flac or vorbis to mp3 with a time penalty per track of 20 seconds or less. I have a 2.4 Ghz P-IV that transcodes a typical 4 minute track from flac to mp3 in less than 30. I do it twice a month tops so I'm going to cheerfully chuck any music I like into my collection and not worry about the format especially since I can do any number of other things while the player syncs.
I could download a codec for [.ogg] if I cared
Hi. I'm mister pedantic.
Ogg is a container format, meaning you can stick audio and video data inside ogg files much the same way you can files into a zip file. Except that zip has features to enable corruption detection and ogg has features to enable corruption handling (find next magic number, continue from there). Also, Ogg is streaming friendly, zip puts the data first and all the inode-like data last.
The ogg container format is most typically used with Vorbis sound and Theora video. There's also a Speex audio codec optimized for human voices (as opposed to "all sound").
Similarly, AVI is a container format [AVI = Audio Video Interlace], often storing mpeg data I'm told. Other container formats include Matroska (.mkv).
See wikipedia if you lack something to nerd out over :)
Since they're going for patented technology anyway, I'm a bit disappointed that they didn't push the AAC format. While I know geeks tend to associate it with iTunes, it's pretty much a universal standard in newer players. As a bonus, it's smaller, better quality, and a heck of a lot easier to license than the craziness behind the MP3 and MPEG form
I too find this surprising. AAC, aka MP4 Audio, is where we should be going. Suddenly accepting MP3 in the mainstream is like accepting Vinyl records just as the CD is replacing it. The other craziness I find in the market are players that play back MPEG4 video, but can't handle AAC!? This is odd because AAC is the audio layer in MPEG video.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Maybe, just maybe, something not completely open is actually...good?
I send katana warrior. He reeducate infidel!
(http://xkcd.com/225/)
This is right up there with other common marketing statements you see on products and services, such as:
"Under new management". Translated: our new management wont screw you over like the old ones did, apparently.
"Improved flavor!". Translated: now it actually tastes good, because apparently before, it did not.
"10% larger!". Translated: now there's actually enough product to be worth the price and it might satisfy your hunger.
-- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
The vast majority of people can't tell the difference between lossless and a decent bitrate lossy encode. Why waste the hard drive space just because it's there?
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
If you can spend that much space, just double it and get rid of the whole encoding and conversion step.
Why would you?
On a modern Linux distro, much of the documentation, including the manpages, are gzipped. This is because even if it doesn't buy much space, modern CPUs are so fast that there's no reason not to.
Well, the same is true of Flac. CPUs have gotten fast enough to play it back in realtime on any computer made in the last 10 years, and fast enough to encode as you rip, or decode as you burn.
Given that it costs me nothing to encode to Flac vs storing WAVs, why wouldn't I? Given the choice, wouldn't you want twice as much space for no additional effort?
But here's the main point: Offer it in mp3, so people don't have to do anything to get it working. Also offer it in Flac, for anyone who dislikes the quality of mp3. That way, you don't have to support everyone's pet format -- just the one lossless one, so they can convert it themselves.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
If by "tedious" you mean "automatic", you're absolutely right.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Gapless? You mean between tracks? Neither XMMS (Linux) nor Winamp (Windows) has gaps between tracks any more.
However, there is a 1/44,000th of a second gap between every sample on your CD, and it IS audible, even with sub-audiophile equipment.
Free Martian Whores!
By "tedious" I mean "slow". It takes a few minutes to copy several hundred files to an mp3 player. It takes longer to convert them. Fine if you only have one or two, but if you have hundreds then it's far too long a wait.
Pretty much all of the Asian-made players are this way. Basically, if it lists multiple audio formats (mp3, wma, aac), then it's going to support Ogg Vorbis unless it's from a company that designs their own chipsets. Stock audio decoder chipsets pretty much all include Vorbis these days.
Heck, Microsoft's Media Transfer Protocol (MTP) defines a standard tag for Ogg Vorbis. That pretty much leaves Apple (and perhaps Sony) as the only company(ies) still trying to pretend Ogg doesn't exist. :)
DRM or not. Why would I want to do this? I'd be happy to pay for an .ISO, or .flac, but mp3? No thanks. If It's going to be encoded and tagged, I'll do the encoding, thanks.
But if you want to give me compressed files to see if they are worth purchasing the real thing? Sure, why not.
You have to look long and hard to find a portable audio device (from a vendor other than Apple) which doesn't support Ogg. They may not list it on the outside of the box, but it's built into the standard multiformat-decoder chipsets that nearly everyone uses. If it says "mp3, wma, aac", there's a very high chance it supports Ogg as well. Especially if the brand is Asian.
I've tried several players from Asia, and have yet to find one that didn't support Ogg. (Although I have my suspicions about Sony, but I'm not interested enough in their products to even try.)
FLAC is still not a good option for portable devices because the higher bandwidth required translates to shorter battery life.
As you have stated above, with simple encoding methods, most of the power wasted accessing a pile of bits is the power to access those bits, not the power required to decode them. On portable devices, FLAC will always be at a disadvantage compared to a codec that uses 10x less data. The question is: will power consumption ever get so low that a 10x power difference goes unnoticed?
This is the true power of mp3: an excellent combination of low complexity and high compression.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
A logo that conveys "This music is from before 1990 and hence worth listening to."
Say hello to my little sig.
As I understood it, the Eastern (Orthodox) and Western (Roman Catholic) churches went through a schism a little over 1000 years ago. So to say one is "older" than the other is a little off.
The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.
OK, it's not quite as simple as this, but it is entirely possible to argue that the catholic branch was the one that wanted to reform things and 'broke off', and that the orthodox branch most represented the established tradition of the time, even though of course it too was changed by the event.
sudo ergo sum
So when parent^n said "that people can share with their friends", meant it in the sense of what's easy to do, not what's legal.
Yep, I missed the point :(
In the legalize-all-noncommercial-distribution scenario, my post makes a lot more sense, right?
But why? Has anyone ever been sued or legally threatened for utilizing an unlicensed MP3 decoder algorithm in a program?
If not, then, as I said, Ogg Vorbis is a solution to a non-existent problem.
If the MP3 patent holders have been exercising their patent rights, then you might have an argument. People avoiding the issue doesn't really do it, unless they had good reason to do so.
Politas
First off, it's "are wont to", NOT "are wont do".
That's not some new-fangled fad language. I believe the expression 'wont to do' and variations on it are quite old (I don't know how old - hundreds of years?). It's not common in American usage of English, but I think the Brits use it more commonly.
Fine if you only have one or two, but if you have hundreds then it's far too long a wait.
Hmm. Do these players not also support syncing? As in, only convert/transfer new music?
How often do you have hundreds of new tracks to transfer all at once?
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
And I thought that no one would find a good use for that xkcd, kudos to you sir.
I know tobacco is bad for you, so I smoke weed with crack.
Optimus OptiPLAYER 2000V. Which is actually some Chinese crap branded for sale in Poland with Optimus logo. Looks exactly the same as several other cheap players, probably differs only in logo and default language.
Anyway, Ogg Vorbis compatibility in popular hardware is way higher that checking offered specifications would show, still since people don't see it offered as a supported format, most don't even know it exists.
Or as I've looked, I found one that does not list playing Ogg, but... it can record Vorbis. Funny.
The moon is not fully subjugated. I demand a second assault wave preceded by a massive nuclear bombardment.