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Apple To Face $350 Million Trial Over iPod DRM

Posted by Soulskill on from the yearly-reminder-that-replayer-is-still-a-thing dept.

An anonymous reader writes: A U.S. district judge ruled last week that a decade-old antitrust lawsuit regarding Apple's FairPlay DRM can move forward to a jury trial (PDF). The plaintiffs claim that in 2004, when "Real Networks launched a new version of RealPlayer that competed with iTunes," Apple issued an update to iTunes that prevented users from using their iPods to play songs obtained from RealPlayer. Real Networks updated its compatibility software in 2006, and Apple introduced a new version of iTunes that also rendered Real Networks's new update ineffective. The plaintiffs reason that they were thus "locked in" to Apple's platform, and as a result "Apple was able to overcharge its customers to the tune of tens of millions of dollars". If the plaintiffs succeed, media content purchased online may go the way of CDs and be playable on competing devices.

103 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. Old issue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    This lawsuit won't change anything today. All iTunes music is drm free.

    1. Re:Old issue by Anubis+IV · · Score: 5, Informative

      Strangely, this isn't even about people suing Apple for DRM'd music that Apple sold. This is about people suing Apple over DRM'd music that RealNetworks sold which couldn't be played on the iPod because it used Real's proprietary DRM.

      What happened was that RealNetworks was running their RealPlayer Music Store back then that competed with the iTunes Store, but the iPod was the best-selling MP3 player, and tracks purchased from the RealPlayer Music Store couldn't run on the iPod since their Helix DRM wasn't compatible with the iPod. Rather than making the music available in MP3 or some other non-DRM'd format the iPod supported, RealNetworks released a tool called Harmony that converted the tracks their customers purchased from their Helix DRM to Apple's FairPlay DRM, allowing the tracks to be loaded onto the iPod. Understandably, Apple was none too pleased, both because it meant the FairPlay DRM was being circumvented, but also, obviously, because it damaged their ability to lock people in (this was about a year before Steve Jobs posted his "Thoughts on Music" open letter that called for the record labels to stop requiring DRM).

      Apple patched out the exploit that allowed Real to create their Helix->FairPlay tracks in the first place. After a few rounds of back-and-forth which ended with Real's Harmony tool being broken, Real made a lot of noise and that was that.

      Which is all to say, this case makes no sense to me. These people bought music they knew was DRM'd, wanted to use it on an unsupported device, were able to use an exploit to circumvent the DRM scheme of the unsupported device so that they could create their own DRM'd files, and were upset when that device later got patched to prevent the circumvention. If anything, they should count themselves lucky that no one decided to sue them under the DMCA for circumventing DRM protection. *eyeroll*

    2. Re:Old issue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Which is all to say, this case makes no sense to me.

      This confuses me, you yourself mention the reason for the lawsuit in your own post.

      ... but also, obviously, because it damaged their ability to lock people in ...

      TFA mentions that is the reason for the lawsuit. Apple used their DRM specifically for vendor lock-in to shut out competition and unfairly raise prices.

    3. Re:Old issue by UnknowingFool · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Yes it reminds me of the Palm Pre iTunes sync fiasco. Now Palm could have (1) written their own sync software and music library (2) read Apple's iTunes XML library or (3) trick iTunes into thinking that a Palm was an iPod. Palm chose #3. Then when Apple enforced the USB device recognition parameters to lock them out, Palm complained to the USB Implementers Forum but the USB IF scolded Palm instead for breaking rules on how USB devices should identify themselves.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    4. Re:Old issue by harperska · · Score: 5, Informative

      TFA mentions that is the reason for the lawsuit. Apple used their DRM specifically for vendor lock-in to shut out competition and unfairly raise prices.

      That is RealNetworks' allegation as to the use and purpose of the DRM. Apple's rationale for using DRM on the other hand was an insistence from the record labels, according to Jobs' "thoughts on music" essay. The truth will come out in the court case, but I have a feeling that Apple's reason is probably more likely. They abandoned DRM shortly after that open letter at a time when the incentive for lock-in was probably stronger than ever, as they had just announced the original iPhone a month before the letter was published.

      With that in mind, it really is silly to claim that any patching of a security flaw is done maliciously, just like how when Apple patches a bug that is exploited by a jailbreak, they are not doing it to 'get at' the jail breakers. They are simply patching a flaw and there is no rational reason for them to intentionally leave that flaw in place.

    5. Re:Old issue by jrumney · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Record company policies may have been the reason for Apple to use DRM in the first place, but it wasn't the reason they modified their syncing software every time a competitor managed to make their music compatible with that DRM.

    6. Re:Old issue by Anubis+IV · · Score: 2

      Lock-in is a normal part of business. Stating it as fact as something that was happening here does not mean that I understand why people are suing a company over it. And I don't. Understand, that is. Apple simply patched a hole that had a demonstrated exploit, and there were numerous ways to get music onto an iPod that didn't involve buying music from Apple. These people would have a better case for suing RealNetworks for false advertising, since Real was claiming to have a way to put their music onto an iPod, which was a promise they couldn't deliver in the long-term.

    7. Re:Old issue by Anubis+IV · · Score: 3, Informative

      There was speculation regarding this topic at the time that as part of their contract with the record labels, Apple was being compelled to patch the holes RealNetworks was utilizing. Basically, the record labels were demanding DRM to protect their music, and Apple (which was MUCH small than it is now, keep in mind) was being forced to protect that DRM if they wanted to continue selling music. So, record label policies may very well have been both the reason the DRM was in place and the reason Apple was so quick to break any exploits that circumvented it.

    8. Re:Old issue by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I actually briefly confused the two cases in my head and had to go review the facts before that last post of mine. The RealNetworks one I could at least understand, and I remember being a bit up in the air about it at the time. The Palm one never made sense to me though. They had so many valid, viable options available to them for doing what they wanted to do, but they instead chose the route that relied on a hack in their competitor's software. Which was also the route that took the entire user experience out of their hands and put it squarely in the competitor's hands. Why would a company do that? Makes no sense.

    9. Re:Old issue by jrumney · · Score: 2

      Adding DRM to a file is not circumventing the DRM. If anything, it was Real Network's DRM that was being circumvented by the conversion.

    10. Re:Old issue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      There was speculation regarding this topic at the time that as part of their contract with the record labels, Apple was being compelled to patch the holes RealNetworks was utilizing. Basically, the record labels were demanding DRM to protect their music, and Apple (which was MUCH small than it is now, keep in mind) was being forced to protect that DRM if they wanted to continue selling music. So, record label policies may very well have been both the reason the DRM was in place and the reason Apple was so quick to break any exploits that circumvented it.

      This paints a very rosy picture of Apple's intentions, when at the time Apple obviously had a huge commercial advantage in keeping the lock-in on their iTunes users, as Apple made a ton of money on selling iPods. Apple did not move to DRM free before the competition had already done it.
      If Apple hadn't been so quick to block RealNetworks, do you really believe music industry would have pulled out of iTunes which at the time was a huge success. I'm not sure Apple would have lost a gamble on that, if they really wanted to.

    11. Re:Old issue by CODiNE · · Score: 1

      I believe iTunes had an SDK for making device drivers to sync with as well. Many suspected they were either idiots or it was an intentionally manufactured controversy.

      --
      Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
    12. Re:Old issue by Firethorn · · Score: 1

      So, record label policies may very well have been both the reason the DRM was in place and the reason Apple was so quick to break any exploits that circumvented it.

      Were they really holes though? Real was APPLYING their DRM, not removing it. Depending on the encryption/encoding system, that's not circumventing. The music was still paid for through Real, still protected from copying to the extend the DRM ever worked in the first place, etc...

      Questions to be figured out in court, I guess.

      --
      I don't read AC A human right
    13. Re:Old issue by Firethorn · · Score: 2

      Lock-in is a normal part of business.

      Perhaps, but anti-trust legislation were specifically passed to limit this.

      --
      I don't read AC A human right
    14. Re:Old issue by Uberbah · · Score: 1

      obviously, because it damaged their ability to lock people in

      Apple had no interest in locking people into formats when the company was making their money on hardware. If they wanted to force people into buying from the iTMS, why allow MP3's at all or build cd-ripping into the iTunes application itself?

    15. Re:Old issue by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

      While I agree with you, I'll point out the obvious as a counterpoint: locking someone into a format, in this case, also locks them into a specific piece of hardware. More or less, lockin wasn't their goal, which is why they allowed open formats as well, but there's no denying that it would have been a nice benefit coming out of the DRM being forced on them by the publishers.

  2. Re:Ridiculous sentence by mythosaz · · Score: 3, Funny

    He's probably still just mad about being forced a copy of a U2 album.

  3. No problem... by Kenja · · Score: 3, Funny

    just check the couch cushions, I'm sure they've got a few hundred million in there amongst the Cheetos and lost tv remotes.

    --

    "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
  4. RealPlayer? Sigh... by CohibaVancouver · · Score: 5, Insightful

    RealPlayer - Talk about a wasted opportunity. In the '90s those guys OWNED streaming "Internet Radio" and the nascent business of streaming video. All squandered as their player degraded into a process-hogging bloatware-laden pig that people began uninstalling in disgust.

  5. F RealPlayer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    As much I dislike iTunes lock-in and DRM, RealPlayer are not by any means good guys. They were peddling a competing DRM system. Sod them both to Hades.

  6. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 5, Funny

    RealPlayer - Talk about a ...BUFFERING... wasted oppor ...BUFFERING... tunity ...BUFFERING...

    --
    #DeleteChrome
  7. This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by willoughby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Back about the time of the first iMac, Apple also introduced the "G3 (blue & white) Tower". A few months later, when everyone knew that a G4 Mac tower was in the works but hadn't been introduced yet, some aftermarket outfits offered an upgrade kit which allowed you to install a G4 processor in your G3 tower.

    Apple released an update (disguised as something I can't remember, a video card update, perhaps) which broke all of these aftermarket G4 upgrade kits.

    The behavior described in this court case was just the way Jobs ran things.

    1. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Charliemopps · · Score: 1, Informative

      Ever noticed every MP3 player on the market can be plugged into your computer and you can browse the music files as if it were an external hard drive? With the sole exception of the iPod? The idiocy of people buying that device still boggles my mind to this day. The iPhones the same way. Why on earth would you buy an inferior device for twice the price with no ability to manage its content on your own?!?!?!

    2. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Kenja · · Score: 1

      Actually... many of them use an obfuscated database to store the songs, just like the iPod. This has been the case going back to the first hard drive based player I got, the Rio Karma.

      --

      "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
    3. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 2, Funny

      Old iPods let you do this. I had one that did, I don't miss it at all.

      For those who think "oh I wish i had a device i can just browse as a hard drive"... well, how do you make playlist with a filesystem? I have 2 thousand files on my iPod, and I'm not even trying hard. Because some are based on last time i played them, dozens of files come and go based on metadata changes every time I sync. You want me to manage that myself? How can I have a file in two playlists, do I have to have two copies on disk? There's no real good way on filesystem only. You have to have some managing software. And at that point, you need to sync between Filesystem image and Managing software image. At that point, I'm willing to drop the Filesystem access for a decent player. I had the second gen iPod.

    4. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by UnknowingFool · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Ever notice that people with thousands of songs find navigating by file incredibly inefficient. Seriously with this kind of navigation you are limited to a single hierarchy. Most people have Artist --> Album --> Song. With a database you could navigate by all three and Genre and Composer and so on.

      Why on earth would you buy an inferior device for twice the price with no ability to manage its content on your own?!?!?!

      Because managing files in a hierarchical system is not what people care about. Seriously with other MP3 players before the iPod you had to do this as there was no other choice. After the iPod, the only people who care about this are control freaks that want every single file in place where they think it should be on the HDD. The only aspect I care about how the files are arranged is which directory I needed to back up to back up my music. Users/Me/My Music is pretty much all I need to know.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    5. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by John+Bokma · · Score: 1

      I drag the folders with music on iTunes and hit sync. How hard is that to get?

      --

      Perl Programmer for hire
    6. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by brianerst · · Score: 1

      Ah, the Rio Karma. The reason I encoded all my CD rips in Vorbis. Those were the days... and once it died, time to reencode everything to MP3s as nothing else really supported Vorbis (fortunately, I saved everything in FLAC too, so it was a simple reencode).

      I also can thank the Karma for my Decemberists collection - "Here I Dreamt I was an Architect" was on every Karma released in the States.

    7. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I can manage my iPod's content on my own just fine. I think the idiocy you're referring to is in your mirror, if you really think that managing songs by files is superior to managing them by (smart) playlists.

    8. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Karlt1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Ever noticed every MP3 player on the market can be plugged into your computer and you can browse the music files as if it were an external hard drive? With the sole exception of the iPod? The idiocy

      So how do I have the same song in multiple playlist when the definition of a playlist on other players were "files in a folder"?

      How do I create smart playlist?

    9. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by lgw · · Score: 3, Informative

      You do realize a playlist is just a file, right? And they can be auto-generated based on whatever - directory structure, tags, etc? Whatever algorithm the player has to organize sings into playlists will work just fine with playlist files too.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    10. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by lgw · · Score: 2

      Most people have Artist --> Album --> Song. With a database you could navigate by all three and Genre and Composer and so on.

      Obviously, you can do both. There's no reason, none at all, not to keep the actual mp3s in a sensible file tree, and all the relevant meta-data in the mp3s directly (so that you can scan anything copied to the filesystem directly and provide whatever clever interface you desire to them).

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    11. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by kelemvor4 · · Score: 1

      Old iPods let you do this. I had one that did, I don't miss it at all.

      For those who think "oh I wish i had a device i can just browse as a hard drive"... well, how do you make playlist with a filesystem? I have 2 thousand files on my iPod, and I'm not even trying hard. Because some are based on last time i played them, dozens of files come and go based on metadata changes every time I sync. You want me to manage that myself? How can I have a file in two playlists, do I have to have two copies on disk? There's no real good way on filesystem only. You have to have some managing software. And at that point, you need to sync between Filesystem image and Managing software image. At that point, I'm willing to drop the Filesystem access for a decent player. I had the second gen iPod.

      There's that whole "subdirectory" concept. I know, it's new and obscure so you probably didn't hear about it yet.
      Also, every filesystem player that I owned support .m3u playlists. Of course all that was before cell phones rendered dedicated music players totally obsolete. Those phones also support .m3u. At least Android does. I've no idea if Apple stuff does, they're not real big on using "open" anything.

    12. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by UnknowingFool · · Score: 2

      Yes and Apple does not take that away. I seem to remember there was an option to "Let me manage my own music" a long time ago. People that were pissy about it were people who wanted Apple to load it onto an iPod into a clear directory layout that they could access. This means they could easily share music. But with Apple's system you had to load music as files and as music which meant twice the space required.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    13. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by GrumpySteen · · Score: 1

      Because managing files in a hierarchical system is not what people care about. Seriously with other MP3 players before the iPod you had to do this as there was no other choice.

      Actually, that isn't true. Diamond Multimedia started introducing those features at least 2-3 years before the first iPod came out. Shoddy build quality, inept marketing were and the need for a huge-ass adapter that plugged into the parallel port on your computer prevented it from becoming the hit that the iPod was a few years later.

    14. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 2

      yes. i realize there are these things known as files.... :)

      But, do you think about the huge mental model difference between a filesystem (and not mentioning specific limitations per filesystem, say what I can do in FAT) vs what I want a playlist to look like. You may revel in "hey I can map these two different models in my head interchangably" I've done that too, hey I"m a programmer (who's actually written one of these so called "files") but most people don't like to play that way. They just want to listen to music.

      How does this playlist work? Do you hand generate it? Is there one copy of the music file in a sinular location on disk? that makes sense to me... but then now I have a JOIN. I have the same file in multiple lists,, I need to JOIN with a fileID. How are primary keys generated suquentially? At this point I need a program to manage the stuff on disk. Now, I have this model difference between filesystem (I have to balance my nodes, not everything goes into 90s, 80s, i need a well balanced hash, maybe dirs AA1, AA2, ZZ9, etc). So, now I have to use the app, cause my disk is a mess to satisfy constraints of the device. At this point, do I care to look at the disk? It's a balanced hash of files, and the real info is in the playlist. The playlist has metadata and JOINs, can i do all this in my head? Nahhh, just use the app. At this point, you have an iPod without a visible filesystem, and iTunes.

    15. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1

      See my above comment to lgw, but Apple does do m3u, and a lot of opensource.

    16. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by gmhowell · · Score: 2

      People with different use cases than you are displaying 'idiocy'?

      Not sure that I've ever seen the Slashdot superiority complex more blatantly stated.

      Can you tell us now how much tablets suck because you can't 'do real work' on them?

      --
      Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
    17. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by MachDelta · · Score: 1

      Actually, Cowon makes an MP3 player (X7) with a 120 or 160gb HDD, although I haven't used that model myself.

      They also have an audiophile device (Plenue1) that has 128gb flash + SD card (up to another 128). Beautiful device with some crazy features (when's the last time you saw optical out on an MP3 player?) - just don't ask about the price.

    18. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Anonymice · · Score: 1

      Playlists don't, and never have, copied files or required sole access to them. All of the common playlist formats are basically just text files with a list of filenames - you can open & edit them in Notepad!

    19. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by lgw · · Score: 1

      However you want your music software to organize files? Represent the result with playlist files and ID3 tags. Now it's 100% device independent.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    20. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      Really? I think I could create an XML playlist from an unstructured collection of files with the Unix "find" command, if the file names were reasonably parsable. It doesn't sound that hard.

      I had a 3rd gen ipod for the longest time, but a few weeks ago I switched to a thumb drive. My latest dashboard radio will read directories as album names and filenames as track names, and even displays the cover artwork as a jpg if it exists, from a thumb drive. It also somehow knows the genre, although I'm not sure how. I just got the radio so I don't know yet how playlists work, but I suspect they're just XML files, easy to fabricate.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    21. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by danthemanvsqz · · Score: 1

      A linux box can browse an Ipod just like an external HD.

    22. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 2, Insightful

      well, how do you make playlist with a filesystem?

      really? that's your question?

      % cd somewhere; find . -print > playlist.txt

      or equiv.

      yeah, that was REAL hard. filesystems suck for audio playback.

      oh wait, NO THEY DON'T.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    23. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Mr.+Slippery · · Score: 2

      So how do I have the same song in multiple playlist when the definition of a playlist on other players were "files in a folder"?

      Good lord, they really do let anyone in here nowadays, regardless of technical savvy. Son, have you never looked at an m3u file? It's a list. Of songs, each song being one file path. You give this m3u file to your music software and it plays each one, in either sequential or random order.

      --
      Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
      You cannot wash away blood with blood
    24. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by chromeronin799 · · Score: 1

      Because it is more than just getting your songs onto the device. It's playlist management, and the metadata it syncs, making songs and podcast you played as played in itued too. I just wish they would remove rest of the i device synching to an always running service so I don't have to keep itunes open All the time just to sync my phone.

    25. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      You are an idiot in search of a problem.

    26. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by garote · · Score: 2

      Solution: PodWorks
      It's a 1.4MB application you can copy onto your iPod. Plug the iPod into your friend's computer, launch the application, and you can ""share"" music by dragging straight out of your playists, or browsing the on-board database. There's even a "recreate in iTunes" button that will make local copies of your selection and do just that.
      It (PodWorks) hasn't been updated in at least 7 years and it still runs fine!

    27. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Divebus · · Score: 1

      If you show invisible files on your Mac, tada... there's all the music on the iPod right in the file system. But, I haven't actually fired up a plain iPod in many years, so I don't know what the newer ones act like.

      defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles true

      --

      Most of the stuff on /. won't survive first contact with facts.
    28. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by reanjr · · Score: 2

      I can't tell you how much of my purchased music disappeared after switching to iTunes. I had always used Dropbox for my music. But when I switched to iTunes, files would go missing all the time, and because there was absolutely no HDD organization I could never figure out what was missing. Instead I stopped using iTunes and the problem disappeared.

      iTunes is a bloated, buggy, unusable piece of shit. If you don't buy into doing things exactly how Steve tells you to, everything falls apart.

    29. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by jo_ham · · Score: 2, Informative

      You didn't see the really obvious checkbox that says "keep my iTunes media folder organised" and unchecked it?

      Maybe the software was too "bloated and buggy" for you to open the options menu.

      It's hilarious how much misinformation gets passed off as fact when it comes to talking about Apple stuff in order to bash something you don't like.

    30. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by jo_ham · · Score: 2, Informative

      Right, but that's not what the OP was talking about - the argument was that the iPod was inferior because you couldn't organise your music manually (even though you actually can), and that "files in in a folder" was superior to "letting the iPod handle where the files are and using a database/m3u style method" to address and play them was somehow inferior because Apple.

      What you are describing with m3u files *is exactly how the iPod works*. The only difference is that the iPod also copies the music files for you, you don't have to drag them onto the iPod yourself (although you absolutely can manage them on your hard drive yourself, despite what people on slashdot will try to tell you).

    31. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      It's hilarious how much misinformation gets passed off as fact when it comes to talking about Apple stuff in order to bash something you don't like.

      Now you know how Windows/Android/Linux users feel.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    32. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Playlists are just lists of files. A file an be in more than one list.

      Smart playlists are based on things like listening history or metadata. Even if you use a directory structure to organize files you can still keep stats in another file, or scan them for metadata and build a database from it. That's what iTunes does, after all. It's what Android does as well, and thus you can just copy files to your phone and browse them either by filesystem or metadata and no desktop software needed.

      It was kind of understandable that very early iPods might benefit from having desktop software do the hard work for them, but modern devices have no problem scanning thousands of files and building a database on their own.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    33. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Karlt1 · · Score: 2

      That's a great solution! Why didn't Apple think of doing what Android does. I'm sure they could have just put a 1ghz+ ARM chip and 1GB of RAM in $399 device back in 2001.

      I'm sure it would have also been very power efficient and fast to read and index the entire contents of an 80GB spinning hard drive with an 80Mhz processor. On top of that, just think how great it would have been trying to create a complicated playlist using the click wheel on an iPod.

      Or were you thinking about using a separate app on your computer to create the playlist, sync the playlist to the MP3 player and then copy the files over using the file system?

      I guess CmdrTaco was right, "less space than a Nomad, no wireless lame". It's no wonder that the ipod was such a failure....

    34. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      That was my point. It made sense back in 2001, but not any more. In fact they need a fast ARM chip just to decrypt the iTunes database now, and the encryption serves no purpose other than blocking interoperability.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    35. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 2

      Playlists don't, and never have, copied files or required sole access to them. All of the common playlist formats are basically just text files with a list of filenames - you can open & edit them in Notepad!

      So they break when somebody moves or renames the files. Wasn't the whole point being able to "manage your files" - which then breaks things?

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
    36. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 1

      I have a PMP that you load music onto like an external hard drive. It also has an internal database that it keeps updated, so that it's used in the same manner as the ipod. (Philips GoGear Vibe, so it's not a pricey one by any stretch).

      When you've finished changing the files you just unplug from the PC, the device automatically takes about 15 seconds to scan the files on it and rebuild its database, and that's it.

      It also supports MTP.

      I had an older Sandisk model that ran of a AAA cell about 9 years ago that operated in the same way. You never had to navigate the filesystem to play media - it was just there to make syncs easier.

      Wow, just 7 years after the iPod came out, MPs are able to run a SQLite database - I guess if Apple would just have waited 6 years, they could have done that instead of wasting their time with the iPod.

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
    37. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 1

      That was my point. It made sense back in 2001, but not any more. In fact they need a fast ARM chip just to decrypt the iTunes database now, and the encryption serves no purpose other than blocking interoperability.

      Translation: Booh-Hooh, Apple keeps backwards compatibility instead of throwing everything over board!

      Why don't you stick to that the next time discussing anything regarding Apple , okay?

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
    38. Re: This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by oji-sama · · Score: 1

      Right, but that's not what the OP was talking about - the argument was that the iPod was inferior because you couldn't organise your music manually (even though you actually can), and that "files in in a folder" was superior to "letting the iPod handle where the files are and using a database/m3u style method" to address and play them was somehow inferior because Apple.

      What you are describing with m3u files *is exactly how the iPod works*. The only difference is that the iPod also copies the music files for you, you don't have to drag them onto the iPod yourself (although you absolutely can manage them on your hard drive yourself, despite what people on slashdot will try to tell you).

      OP said: "Ever noticed every MP3 player on the market can be plugged into your computer and you can browse the music files as if it were an external hard drive"

      Your interpretation of this is curious.

      --
      It is what it is.
    39. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      Yes I had a Rio PMP 300. It could only hold 32MB and later 64MB. There was an additional SmartMedia slot but that was maxed out at 32MB at the time. At most you could hold 90 minutes of music. From what I remember you could use playlists or directory navigation. I don't remember being able to search using ID3 but then again with 90 minutes, I didn't need to.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    40. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1

      True, but even then, you're (probably) better off not going after the filesystem directly, but dealing with the XML file that iTunes can generate for you. It has a lot of metadata about rating and playcounts and such that won't be accessible from the filesystem view. But if you can use your system to manage 30K objects, it obviously works and I'd never try to convince you against it.

      My issue was mostly with the "everyone would want to deal with filesystem view and why does iTunes exist at all" crowd.

    41. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1

      A billion years ago, in System 7 days before Win 95 even came out, I worked in a Mac lab. Not once, but twice, when I told someone to point the mouse to the hard drive on screen, they picked the mouse up off the desk, and jabbed it towards to the screen. They had no mental model of GUIs, it was "well, this is how you point". I didn't laugh at them, either in front of them or after they left. They just used the normal idea of pointing. Nothing hilarious about it, but it does mean they have a very very shallow view of what computing is. Steve Jobs wrote software for those people.

      yes, *you* could do the find . -type f > playlist.m3u. But could the person above do that? what the hell is a shell. What does find mean? what's an m3u file? Maybe that was my error above... i didn't say nobody could do it, just the vast vast majority woudn't do it nor want to. I submit that find > somefile.xml would be a lot harder, you probably need to write a real script for this, further making it harder to deal with your device. Again, not saying nobody could do it, just >99% of people wouldn't have the skill nor want to learn.

      That playlist XML script? Yeah, I personally did that. For about two weeks. I had my WinXP machine use Cygwin and a series of perl scripts specifically written to write back and forth to the iPod musicDB and some XML. Then manipulate the XML (not hard, but it took a while to get the quoting right). At first it was "hey, I can control the songs better this way..." Then i realized there wasn't a lot I wanted to do with scripts I couldn't do with iTunes. Yeah, In theory there were more things available, just that iTunes did the things I cared about. Eventually I just dropped it all and just used iTunes. Nothing Apple did to get in my way. I already had the Cygwin setup, I didn't have any startup costs any more. It just wasn't fun and wasn't a good use of my time.

    42. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      So... a knowledgeable person scripts it, and a regular user runs the script.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    43. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Uberbah · · Score: 1

      Now you know how Windows/Android/Linux users feel.

      You know Windows/Android/Linux users that have to deal with the Hatorade Distortion Effect?

    44. Re:This is typical of the "Jobs era" Apple by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 1

      So... a knowledgeable person scripts it, and a regular user runs the script.

      A) how does a regular user find a knowledgeable person just to write a script to generate playlists?
      B) will that "knowledgeable person" fucking know how to handle " " in filenames?

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
  8. ROMs by mangamuscle · · Score: 1

    Now if this also applied to roms bought on the sony, nintendo or xbox store, then I would be a happy camper.

  9. TPB ftw by jovius · · Score: 1

    Users were continually forced to either stop playing any songs they had bought from the Real store, or convert them to a non-DRM format, for example by burning the music to CD and then ripping the CD to their computer.

    Or just share stuff.

    Maybe the companies mentioned in the article should sue themselves rather than each other. The cumulative losses from the panic strategy moves by the companies who were not in anyway in control must be astronomical (per the official RIAA magical calculations). It seems that they are trying to come up with something to pay the consultant bills, picking each other in vain. I hope nobody wins, the consumers already did.

  10. All you song by ziggy_az · · Score: 4, Funny

    are belong to us.

    --
    "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup."
  11. The secret with the iPod was not DRM... by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1, Informative

    You can buy mp3s from Apple now. Did all these other MP3 players suddenly jump up and be popular? Nahhh...

    There are two secrets with the iPod popularity, and neither is DRM. One is that it was, relatively to other players, easy to use. Click a button, you have a song. Drop a disc to your computer, you have an album. Yeah, I could have used CDex, and chosen between Gracenote, and opencddb.org and all that, but iTunes was a decent ripper and there you go.

    The other thing, and the thing that would keep me from moving much, is all the metadata about songs. Most of my playlists are metadata based, mostly to do with star ratings, Id have to find a way to translate all that to a massive download to another device type. It's too much of a hassle, to change off a device that to be honest works pretty well for me anyway.

    1. Re:The secret with the iPod was not DRM... by ArcadeMan · · Score: 2

      You cannot buy MP3 files today, nor since the iTunes store launched because Apple used AAC from the start.

      And yes, metadata and smartlists are the way to go, I still wonder why some people want to manage their music files manually.

      --
      Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
    2. Re:The secret with the iPod was not DRM... by mythosaz · · Score: 1

      Once you kill the competition, sure. Then you can make everything available as .mp3 and show how awesomely open you are.

      They had a great product, but don't think for a second they didn't also use every weapon at their disposal to stop their competitors.

    3. Re:The secret with the iPod was not DRM... by wierd_w · · Score: 3, Informative

      MP3s have had metadata since the 90s, when the ID3 tag was introduced.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I...

      All a knockoff player needs is a file system checksum initiated rescan+index routine to probe for new ID3 tags after the filesystem changes and the USB connection is removed.

      Walks the whole filesystem, checks each MP3 file it finds for the ID3 tag, references it against a small internal index file to see if it has already been catalogued, then adds/remove entries as needed.

      When the user wants to "browse by genre", it just queries this catalogue, and fetches file handles.

      There is *A LOT* of data you can put into an ID3 tag, including whole jpegs of the album cover!

      This whole shitfest has been solved for a long, LONG time.

    4. Re: The secret with the iPod was not DRM... by ArcadeMan · · Score: 2

      Apple sells AAC files, Amazon sells MP3 files.

      --
      Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
  12. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by irq-1 · · Score: 1

    They're not dead yet. Now with Cloud! Sharing! Mobile!

  13. Apple did us a favor by Technician · · Score: 3, Interesting

    i for one am glad Apple took this course of action. It made it abundantly clear that DRM is a failed business plan. Between the Mini Disk MO player/recorder with serial copy protection and then iTunes with copy protection, they left a void that quickly became filled with alternatives with much higher compatabiliy. DRM simply meant incompatability to many as the Mini Disk was incompatible with desktop music production. It gave way to simple recordable CD's. DAT tape, competing company, with mandated DRM was knifed in the cradle. In my life I have only seen one DAT tape recorder, but neve any tapes for it. It was pretty much a dead format due to DRM.

    The huge public awareness of DRM and incompatibility was presented to the public with iTunes and it's incompatibility with everything else. DVD player could play MP3 CD's and DVD's. In dash car stereos began to support MP3 CD's and some play MP3's on a thumb drive. A few supported an iPod dock, but none could directy play Apple DRM content which made the public aware of the problem.

    Apple finally had to support non DRM industry compatability to stay alive.

    Thank you Apple for educating the large portion of the public. DRM on music is mostly a thing of the past.

    --
    The truth shall set you free!
    1. Re: Apple did us a favor by Karlt1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Apple finally had to support non DRM industry compatability to stay alive.

      Apple supported DRM free music before any of the other stores sold DRM free music from the major labels.

      Steve Jobs wrote "Thoughts on Music" where he publicly asked the labels to let Apple and all of the other companies sell DRM free music instead of licensing FairPlay (what the industry wanted) months before music stores start selling DRM free music.

    2. Re: Apple did us a favor by Collective+0-0009 · · Score: 1

      I remember http://mp3.com/ having more mainstream acts than the poorly written Wiki article indicates. But they certainly sold DRM free well before Apple.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...

      --
      I finally updated my sig, but now it's lame.
    3. Re: Apple did us a favor by Karlt1 · · Score: 1

      MP3.com had deals with the major record labels?

    4. Re: Apple did us a favor by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 1

      Apple finally had to support non DRM industry compatability to stay alive.

      Apple supported DRM free music before any of the other stores sold DRM free music from the major labels.

      Steve Jobs wrote "Thoughts on Music" where he publicly asked the labels to let Apple and all of the other companies sell DRM free music instead of licensing FairPlay (what the industry wanted) months before music stores start selling DRM free music.

      I'm not sure if this is true...IIRC I started buying music from Amazon because it's music did not carry DRM while Apple's still did.

      D'uh. Amazon paid the music industry major studios so Amazon (and not Apple or anybody else) could sell DRM free music exclusively for a couple of months. Apart from EMI of course, which allowed Apple to sell their music DRM free before Amazon Music even started as a beta.

      Anybody claiming Apple didn't want DRM free music is thus proven wrong. Period. The fact that the Majors delayed Apple's sale of their music DRM free was actually to spite them because they forced the change.

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
    5. Re: Apple did us a favor by Uberbah · · Score: 1

      Er, no. Apple's cash cow was selling hardware, not music. DRM wasn't at their insistence, but the pushing industry's. If they wanted to "lock" you into using the iTMS, they wouldn't have supported mp3's in the first place, or included CD ripping with the iTunes program itself.

  14. RealPlayer? Sigh... by FlynnMP3 · · Score: 1

    Now the only people that use them are educational facilities and some sports video distributors. These 2 are seemingly the only ones that can be swayed by Real's sales department. That or they are getting some pretty good kickbacks for using realplayer. Even my Mom knows real video is crap.

  15. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by vivek7006 · · Score: 2

    Interestingly iTunes has become process-hogging bloatware-laden pig. So its the new RealPlayer!

  16. Re:Well, we already have this for music by camg188 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    For being the "Land of the free" we sure have alot of people attacking individual freedom.

    C'mon now. Please don't try to put music sales from Apple in the same category as political or religious freedom, which is what "land of the free" is about.
    This Apple thing, DRM and such, is a business transaction. You are completely free to make a business transaction for equivalent products with different companies. You could even go to a library, borrow a CD and rip the songs you want. How much more free do you want?

  17. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 3

    You just described how many of us feel about iTunes today. My iPods are essentially offline now because I don't want Apple software on my PC.

  18. Re:Well, we already have this for music by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The right to own what you purchase doesn't belong in the same category as political and religious freedom? Really?

  19. Kickbacks... I wish by Immerial · · Score: 1

    Sadly, the reason the RealMedia stuff is still around is due to legacy files. Since they were the leader in streaming for a bunch of years, there are still a lot of files still in this format. I currently have 569 RM files that I need to replace with the ones that I've converted to mp4 and mp3. The older stuff is lower priority so it probably won't be done for another year or two... ugh.

  20. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by jrumney · · Score: 1

    And China. Most pirated Chinese movies and TV shows are in RMVB format.

  21. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by jrumney · · Score: 1

    I felt that way about iTunes at least 8 years ago.

  22. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by danknight48 · · Score: 1

    degraded into a process-hogging bloatware-laden pig that people began uninstalling in disgust.

    Strange, it does seem like the realplayer devs are still active in the majority of todays software.

  23. DRM on ... apps? by garote · · Score: 1

    So people seem to generally agree that the solution to this industry-versus-piracy problem, with music, is to abandon DRM and instead chase the piracy out of the market by offering something easier to find, easier to get, and easier to play.

    I wonder, how does this crowd feel about piracy of software then?

    The story of DRM on software is long and twisty, including things like proprietary ROM cartridges, weird disk sectors, and hidden codes printed in paper manuals. These days, no physical media is required at all, so those old methods don't work. It's all encryption-based. This makes it equivalent to what music is now: Infinitely copyable for virtually no cost.

    On portable devices, the potential arena for app piracy is gigantic, and there is a thriving piracy sector, but users in general are turning to it less than their PC forebears, and DRM on smartphones has been a huge shot of cash into the arm of the software industry. Coders are more in-demand, and paid more, than ever.

    Say you purchased Angry Birds on your iPhone, and now you own an Android device. You have to purchase Angry Birds again. You fully expect your DRM-less music to be interoperable. Why not your apps?

    1. Re:DRM on ... apps? by EmperorArthur · · Score: 1

      Actually that's a common justification for piracy. Ex: "I've already paid for it once, I'm not paying $XX just to get a Blue Ray version."

      The thing to remember about phone apps is they tend to transfer within the same ecosystem. You buy an app for your old phone, and it'll pop up on your new phone as well.

      PC software piracy is alive and well. Just look at any college where the students have to use proprietary software. Sure they could go to the labs, but they want it on their PCs and can't afford the $1000s per copy licence fee.

      --
      So lets pretend that we've just completed writing this code, as opposed to having just completed sabotaging it -Altera
    2. Re:DRM on ... apps? by garote · · Score: 1

      So the difference is the _perception_ of an ecosystem, then?

      That is, we (and by "we" I mean a large majority of the userbase) expect music to have portability because almost all music playback devices are perceived to be one ecosystem, whereas smartphones are perceived to be multiple ecosystems divided by operating system?

      Why do people have this perception, though? Isn't it a matter of time before this perception changes?

      Back in the day, if you bought Photoshop for the PC, you were expected to buy it again for the Mac, even if you only used one at a time. Now, you "subscribe" to Adobe's software and they treat the platforms interchangeably. If Adobe can do it, why not everyone else? Because cross-platform software development is "too hard" to justify pay-once-play-anywhere?

      That's no excuse. It's hard to develop a great modern website as well, but your work is judged to be clearly defective if it doesn't run on almost every device around, regardless of platform. Is it so hard to port Angry Birds from iOS to Android that the user MUST pay twice? No, not in my opinion. Not after all the other transitions I've seen in my 25 years in this industry.

      The only real reason this doesn't happen is something else: App stores want their cut.

      I assert that the perception of multiple ecosystems for software is going to rapidly disintegrate, and the only resistance will come from app-store middlemen.

      Or put another way, it is in the direct interest of companies like Google, Apple, and Microsoft to make software as easy as possible to license on their own platform while simultaneously making it as hard as possible to move that license to another, and we are all rapidly coming to the point where we will need to fight them, quite hard, for the sake of our own userbase.

    3. Re:DRM on ... apps? by garote · · Score: 1

      That would seem to be an argument in favor of DRM-less software. If the person has that "nugget of moral fiber", then they will make the right ethical decision.

      But what if we changed the price from $1000 to $5 instead? And what if the software had a cloud-based component - some database it needed to draw from - and the additional installation resulted in more traffic cost for the software company? Wouldn't the ethical thing to do suddenly be "just pay the five bucks; it's easily less than the gas you save driving to the lab, and it covers their operating costs"?

  24. Re:Ridiculous sentence by Gonoff · · Score: 1

    I have bought music on Amazon and Google. They both play fine in iTunes. I am wary. however, of buying music in iTunes after finding problems playing stuff I "bought" in iTunes on anything that didn't have a picture of part eaten fruit on it.

    --
    I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
  25. Why isn't it a crime? Didn't they tamper? by Marrow · · Score: 1

    Why isn't it computer tampering.....tampering with a computer device or program?

  26. Re:Ridiculous sentence by jo_ham · · Score: 1

    I have bought music on Amazon and Google. They both play fine in iTunes. I am wary. however, of buying music in iTunes after finding problems playing stuff I "bought" in iTunes on anything that didn't have a picture of part eaten fruit on it.

    So what you're saying is you're blaming Apple because other vendors/programmers don't know how to implement a standard properly?

  27. One step above patent trolls by cwatts · · Score: 1

    Say what you like about Apple, but their shit works. RealPlayer was always crap, and the i remember feeling sorry for any company that used RealNetworks software on their site. That company must have had some seriously high pressure salespeople because then, quicktime blew it away. Even windows media player sucked giant huevos. While quicktime player was JKL-ng glorious porn all over the baby internet, windows media files had a tough time with jumping backwards or playing in reverse.

    Seeing that there are still people who've kept their cart latched to the Realnetworks donkey makes me sad.

    --
    chris watts íë¦ìS ì(TM)ì
  28. Re:Ridiculous sentence by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 1
    http://news.cnet.com/2100-1027...:

    April 28, 2003 12:16 PM PDT
    Apple unveils music store
    ...
    The songs cost 99 cents each to download, with no subscription fee, and include the most liberal copying rights of any online service to date. Jobs has been an outspoken opponent of so-called digital rights management (DRM) in the past, arguing that limitations on digital music will undermine the market for legitimate content.

    --
    Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
  29. Think like a lawyer... by jriskin · · Score: 1

    1. Apple super rich
    2. Statute of limitations probably running out (guess as its 10 years)
    3. Reasonable possibility of winning (regardless of merit) or settling for millions
    4. $$$

    They probably were like, 'why not?'

  30. Re:Actually, they do. by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 1

    A bit meta, but at least it wasn't only me downmodded...

    I think slashdot users get a little too technical, and feel others should be exactly the same way as them. But people have different mental models, and different preferences. I do technical things all day. I don't want to have to root my MP3 player to just play a damn file.

    I do have one very minor quibble - I don't think they'd necessarily be a Luddite. If anything, their manual manipulation requires a much higher order of mental mapping. To me, it's just why bother. You bought a product that can deal with the tediousness of mapping metadata from two sources (device and user) but for some reason you decide you can do it "better". Meh.

  31. Re:Actually, they do. by garote · · Score: 1

    I appreciate your desire to find common ground for all sides, but my take is different, as per the attitude in my above comment and the reason it was downmodded as a "troll".

    Slashdot's active userbase has undergone an astounding contraction over about the last five years. A significantly larger proportion of it now consists of old-guard geeks looking either for validation, or for a fight, and in both cases they often find it because their fellow old-guard geeks are here looking for the same thing.

    So when I declared the ad-hominen of "luddite", I was being serious. A texbook luddite is one opposed to technological innovation beyond their own immediate purview. I've met enough folks like this in my work history to know they're around, and they're as annoying as hell. Take for example the entrenched sysadmin who consistently denies your request to integrate a modern tool because he mistrusts it on principle, and won't even do the research that might lead him to trust it, because what's Best for him is Best for you. His attitude affects the workflow of many other people. And then he comes here and proudly declare his luddite nature, with examples, as though it were a point of pride.

    You're right - it's a different mental model. But around here, amongst the luddites, it also gets special treatment. And so, my post gets labeled "Troll", and the parent gets labeled "Insightful", and so it goes.

  32. Re:RealPlayer? Sigh... by Uberbah · · Score: 1

    You just described how many of us feel about iTunes today.

    Otherwise known as Hatebois, since comparing RealPlayer to iTunes requires Hoekestranian levels of contortion.