"Yeah, like Gateway, Opera, XBox...wait a minute..."
Gateway -- been losing money for years Xbox -- has lost MS money since it existed. Is Opera profitable?
10% of the "hard drive" market
on
A Million Zunes Sold
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Because the Zune has not achieved 10% of the market. If you read the marketing speak carefully, they said they have achieved 10% of the market in which they compete. The Zune has 2.9% of the MP3 market and ranks #5. They have 10% of the hard drive market only.
MS Has NOT Sold 1M Zunes...According to TFA
on
A Million Zunes Sold
·
· Score: 1
"EDIT: The text of the interview says Microsoft has sold already more than 1 million Zunes, but listening to the podcast Robbie Bach says Microsoft will have sold more than this number by the end of this fiscal year, end of June. A small detail. "
"The only shows I watch now are Comedy Central's political satires. 8 shows per week. $16 dollars per week. $64/month. No thanks. That is way more expensive than cable and Tivo. I am all for paid downloads of ad-free shows. But I am not prepared to pay $2 for a 30 min show. It just adds up very quickly. I would be happy to pay $15/month and be willing to take hosting heat off providers through something like Joost."
I assume those two shows are the Daily Show and the Colbert Report. Season Passes for those two shows are $9.99/16 shows. You would pay $20.00/mo not $64.
Mobile and Embedded Devices Operating Income 2006 -- $2 Million profit Operating Income 2005 -- $65 Million loss Operating Income 2004 -- $237 Million loss
I don't think it will be too hard for the iPhone to be more successful than MS's mobile division.
"to all the people that download music, if you think you are only hurting big companies you are wrong. There are two working people with families who no longer have jobs because of music piracy."
What about all of the people who are downloading music legally and cheaper than the mom and pop stores? Times change, markets change.
This article was written by a member of the Microsoft Zune team. It basically says that the music industry charges $11.95/per user for subscription music on portable devices. Microsoft and most of the other subscription services charge $14.95/mo. That's only a $3.00/mo profit. Even if they give away a $60 1GB flash player. It still would take them 20 months just to break even.
"As an aside to the Americans who think this is an example of EU socialism bashing a successful American company, consider this: what would your government do if Apple had different stores for each state, or for people of different races, each with varying music and pricing? I doubt you would be so accepting."
This has nothing to do with race. But in fact, Apple or any other company can set up stores in different states and charge different prices.
"It makes no sense to offer those downloads in WMA format. Why lock out 80% of the user base? If I was an online music retailer, I would sell mp3s. Apple doesn't care about AAC the way that Microsoft cares about WMA. WMA is Microsoft's attempt to control digital music the way they control operating systems. AAC is the format Apple used so that they could have the DRM that the labels wanted."
Where to start?
1. AAC is not an Apple format. It's licensed by the same company that licenses MP3. 2. The DRM Apple uses is FairPlay. It's wrapped around the AAC file.
"Are you serious? How many people out there that would even be interested in a device like this use DRM encrusted formats vs. DivX/Xvid? Just look to P2P/Usenet for the answer. How many posts items on P2P/Usenet do you see that use DRm encrusted wmv or DRM encrusted m4v? I can tell you the answer, none. How many users encode the DVD's that they bought to DRM encrusted wmv or DRM encrusted m4v? I hope the answer is none, I know I do not. "
Are you just pretending to be dense? The AppleTV supports regular non DRM'd MPEG and H.264. You load Handbrake -- free open source software available for Macs, Windows and Linux -- you insert your DVD and you press convert. You then have a regular old non DRM'd MPEG or H.264 file.
"Uh, MPEG uses up way to much space. The AppleTV has a very small HD, way too small IMO."
It's not meant to hold all of your media. It's meant as a streaming device.
" H.264 under QuickTime sucks. It uses up way too much CPU and can be jerky."
Do you really think that any company is crazy enough to put out a dedicated device that can't handle one of the only two video codecs it supports well? What difference does CPU utilization make on a dedicated device?
" I personally want DivX or Xvid. That is why I don't think the AppleTV is a good product. "
That's your choice, but how much more of the market would Apple get by supporting Divx?
"Why do you Apple fanboi's run around trying to "damage control" when someone says they do not like an Apple product?"
It wasn't about "not liking" the device. I don't like the device either. I have a Mac Mini connected to my HDTV. The original poster said that the AppleTV only supported DRM encumbered formats. He was mistaken. MP3, AAC, MPEG, H.264, WAV, Apple Lossless, and AIFF are not DRM encumbered. All of those formats except for Apple Lossless are publically documented, licensed standards.
"Should every human in the world love Apple and all of their products?"
No one said anything about "liking" the format except for you. The original poster made a factual claim that was incorrect.
"How were you marked "informative"? Does the AppleTV play FLAC? Because Quicktime sure doesn't. Ogg Vorbis files? Not without plugins from Xiph. It also doesn't play Xvid, an open format, which the GP was (IMO rightfully) griping about."
He said DRM'd format. Since when did any of the previously mentioned formats have any types of digital rights management? All of those formats are documented standards, There's a difference between a licensed format and a DRM'd format. Why bother supporting formats that no one outside of a few Slashdot geeks care about?
"There's no excuse to exclude these open source formats unless Apple is trying to maintain utter control over the information being swapped between their products."
Apple doesn't control any of the formats listed except for Apple Lossless. What type of closed format is the Apple TV? It has already been shown to be running a slightly stripped down version of MacOS X (which has a BSD core), on a standard 2.5 inch hard drive, formatted as HPFS+ and a simple username and password of frontrow/frontrow. Apple didn't go through any measures to try to keep this box from bing hacked.
"I'm not trolling here; I'm typing this on a Macbook Pro. But I think it's pretty universal knowledge the Apple loves closed systems. This is just another realization of that."
Because they don't support formats that no one cares about and focuses on the most popular formats (MP3 and MPEG) makes them a closed system? Why wouldn't Apple rather support a free format instead of one for which they had to pay license feed if it made business sense to do so?
"I own a DirecTV TiVo DVR and I love it. It's simple to use, yet it has advanced features"
I have two DirecTV Tivo's and saying that it has "advanced features" is a great overstatement.
-It doesn't support networking -The USB port is disabled -It doesn't support Internet scheduling -It doesn't support Tivo2Go...or any of the other advanced features of the standalone Tivo
"That is a lot of crap to do just to support a non-DRM encrusted format. The blurb even said you need QT Pro, which means more money for Apple to just play a file. No thanks, I will stick to MythTV."
How in the world is this marked "insightful"? There is so much misinformation in those two sentences its ridiculous.
1. The AppleTV plays MP3, AAC, AIFF, WAV, Apple Lossless, Mpeg4 and H.264 all non DRMd formats. 2. You don't need Quicktime Pro for any AppleTV functionality. You can use Handbrake (free open source software available for Windows, Macs, and Linux) to rip DVDs to either MPEG or H.264 3. You don't even need QTPro to re-encode into an AppleTV format. There are plenty of free tools that can convert from Divx to Mpeg. If you're using a Mac, you download the codecs for QT, and you import the Divx movie into iTunes (Movie2Itunes) and then choose the "Convert to iPod format.
"You actually have to buy quicktime pro to export anything."
On the Mac, if you can play it with Quicktime (with the appropriate codecs) you can convert to a standard MPEG using iTunes without buying QTPro. Now the problem is getting it into iTunes. Download the free Applescript Movie2Itunes (http://dettmer.maclab.org/movie2itunes.html) and drag the video on top of it and it will import the file into iTunes, then just choose "Convert to iPod format" (or something like that). I've been able to convert standard Divx files this way.
If you're ripping a DVD just convert into MPEG format in the first place (Handbrake will do it one step DVD->MPEG or H.264). Handbrake is free, open source software available for Macs and Windows.
"Let's be clear on what the Apple TV unit is: a very big Ipod video with wifi and no screen of its own."
If that's the case why not just get a DLO HomeDock, hook up to your TV and dock the iPod with it? You get more storage (if you have the 80GB iPod) and its cheaper.
"Don't forget no PVR functionality in the Apple box."
How do you suggest Apple implement PVR functionality?
1. Include an Analog cable tuner? No support for digital cable boxes or high definition. Then to keep up with the state of the art they would need two tuners. 2. Include an analog cable tuner and an IR blaster for digital cable boxes? Tacky and unreliable. 3. Include cablecard support? If the newest Tivos are any indication you can't do that for only $300
"The question is. When will we get (non Disney) content?"
Paramount and LionsGate Movies are already available on iTunes. But the better question is why? You can get DVD's cheaper and convert them to MPEG in one step with Handbrake. HB is free open source software available for Windows, Macs and Linux.
"I did. When I sell the DVD, it will play in your player just fine. It will play in all my players just fine unlike any DRM music format which won't play in most of my digital music players and certianly won't play on anybody else's player when I sell it on Craigslist."
When I buy a song from iTunes I can easily play the song on anyones CD Player, I can play it on my XP laptop, my Mac Mini, my work computer running Windows 2000, my two iPods. I can use it with Keynote, iDVD, I can dock my iPod into my car.
"DVD's are high quality (not compressed)"
DVDs are not compressed?
So how is a 720x480 (well actually less considering the aspect ratio of most movies) DVD high quality on a 1920 x 1080 monitor?
"unlike any DRM music store's product. iTunes tracks are not the same quality as CD tracks."
And DVDs are not the same quality as the original movie, or even the same quality as they show on HBO HD or the network HD feeds. I can guarantee you that more people can tell the difference between DVD quality and the quality of an HD video source than can tell the difference between a 128kbps AAC file and the original CD.
"Buying DRM music tracks is like buying a VHS tape of a DVD at the DVD price"
So what store can I walk into and buy just the song I want for $0.99?
"and having it locked to your player guranteed to not work in anybody else's player. No thanks. I'll stick with the original DVD instead. It will play in someone else's player."
I've bought plenty of songs to make a mix CD for other people and plays fine. They can rerip it and do anything they want to with it.
"So pray tell, how did you vote on the DRM issue with your pocketbook? Did you not buy the DRM track and do without? Did you buy a DVD or game instead? or did you vote for DRM by buying the DRM track?"
Did he buy a DVD or game instead of a song with DRM...Think about that statement for a minute....
I am a part time fitness instructor who buys a lot of singles from iTunes. I currently have over 500 "DRM infected songs". I have no problem copying the files from my Mac to my Windows XP laptop over a home network, backing up the files, copying them to my iPod and copying them off at work, burning a CD, using the songs as background music for the title sequences when making a DVD, using them with KeyNote or basically any other app that can embed Quicktime. The only time DRM has been a slight hinderance is when I need to edit the song with Audacity or do DJ style mixing with MixMeister. Then I have to use a CDRW to burn and rip. While DRM might be bad, shoddy programming is even worse.
He's complaining (to use your analogy) that his DVD's won't play on his HDTV at all, he's not asking for any better resolution than before.
Your analogy in other words was fucking stupid."
If he wanted to play a DVD on his HDTV he would have to connect a compatible device -- a DVD player. If he wants to play ITMS movies on his HDTV he has to buy a $10 cable and connect the iPod to his TV.
2006-11-01 ABI Research Reveals 58% of iPod users may choose Zune.
"ABI Research has released the findings of a new study that reveal that many prospective MP3 player buyers - including current iPod owners - would be likely to chooseMicrosoft's ( News - Alert) Zune over Apple's star product.
When 1,725 teenage and adult US residents were asked whether they planned to buy an MP3 player in the next 12 months, of those responding they were likely to do so, 58 percent revealed they were "somewhat likely" or "extremely likely" to choose a Microsoft Zune player over the iPod or another MP3 player brand.
This 58 percent that were likely to go the way of the Microsoft Zune - all identified themselves as existing iPod owners. The respondents owning other brands, 59 percent, were also "somewhat or extremely likely" to purchase the Microsoft Zune as opposed to another brand - including the iPod."
"Why did the music industry think consumers would accept DRM?"
Actually the consumers have accepted DRM. iTunes Music Store is the fourth most popular seller of music in the United States according to Soundscan (1 CD=10 songs) behind only Walmart, Best Buy and Target and ahead of Amazon (#5). iTMS was #10 2 and a half years ago. I'm not making a value judgement either way, but the facts are the facts.
Slashdot Mirror
"Yeah, like Gateway, Opera, XBox...wait a minute..."
Gateway -- been losing money for years
Xbox -- has lost MS money since it existed.
Is Opera profitable?
Because the Zune has not achieved 10% of the market. If you read the marketing speak carefully, they said they have achieved 10% of the market in which they compete. The Zune has 2.9% of the MP3 market and ranks #5. They have 10% of the hard drive market only.
"EDIT: The text of the interview says Microsoft has sold already more than 1 million Zunes, but listening to the podcast Robbie Bach says Microsoft will have sold more than this number by the end of this fiscal year, end of June. A small detail. "
"The only shows I watch now are Comedy Central's political satires. 8 shows per week. $16 dollars per week. $64/month. No thanks. That is way more expensive than cable and Tivo. I am all for paid downloads of ad-free shows. But I am not prepared to pay $2 for a 30 min show. It just adds up very quickly. I would be happy to pay $15/month and be willing to take hosting heat off providers through something like Joost."
I assume those two shows are the Daily Show and the Colbert Report. Season Passes for those two shows are $9.99/16 shows. You would pay $20.00/mo not $64.
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/reports/ar06/flashve rsion/10k_fr_dis.html
Mobile and Embedded Devices
Operating Income 2006 -- $2 Million profit
Operating Income 2005 -- $65 Million loss
Operating Income 2004 -- $237 Million loss
I don't think it will be too hard for the iPhone to be more successful than MS's mobile division.
"3) Apple risks pissing off the movie studios that offer video on iTunes stores. (AFAIK, only Disney so far.)"
Apple has movies from Disney (and its subsidiaries), Paramount, MGM. and Lions Gate
"to all the people that download music, if you think you are only hurting big companies you are wrong. There are two working people with families who no longer have jobs because of music piracy."
What about all of the people who are downloading music legally and cheaper than the mom and pop stores? Times change, markets change.
This article was written by a member of the Microsoft Zune team. It basically says that the music industry charges $11.95/per user for subscription music on portable devices. Microsoft and most of the other subscription services charge $14.95/mo. That's only a $3.00/mo profit. Even if they give away a $60 1GB flash player. It still would take them 20 months just to break even.
i ce-finance-101.html
http://www.zunester.com/2007/01/subscription-serv
"As an aside to the Americans who think this is an example of EU socialism bashing a successful American company, consider this: what would your government do if Apple had different stores for each state, or for people of different races, each with varying music and pricing? I doubt you would be so accepting."
This has nothing to do with race. But in fact, Apple or any other company can set up stores in different states and charge different prices.
"It makes no sense to offer those downloads in WMA format. Why lock out 80% of the user base? If I was an online music retailer, I would sell mp3s. Apple doesn't care about AAC the way that Microsoft cares about WMA. WMA is Microsoft's attempt to control digital music the way they control operating systems. AAC is the format Apple used so that they could have the DRM that the labels wanted."
Where to start?
1. AAC is not an Apple format. It's licensed by the same company that licenses MP3.
2. The DRM Apple uses is FairPlay. It's wrapped around the AAC file.
"Are you serious? How many people out there that would even be interested in a device like this use DRM encrusted formats vs. DivX/Xvid? Just look to P2P/Usenet for the answer. How many posts items on P2P/Usenet do you see that use DRm encrusted wmv or DRM encrusted m4v? I can tell you the answer, none. How many users encode the DVD's that they bought to DRM encrusted wmv or DRM encrusted m4v? I hope the answer is none, I know I do not. "
Are you just pretending to be dense? The AppleTV supports regular non DRM'd MPEG and H.264. You load Handbrake -- free open source software available for Macs, Windows and Linux -- you insert your DVD and you press convert. You then have a regular old non DRM'd MPEG or H.264 file.
"Uh, MPEG uses up way to much space. The AppleTV has a very small HD, way too small IMO."
It's not meant to hold all of your media. It's meant as a streaming device.
" H.264 under QuickTime sucks. It uses up way too much CPU and can be jerky."
Do you really think that any company is crazy enough to put out a dedicated device that can't handle one of the only two video codecs it supports well? What difference does CPU utilization make on a dedicated device?
" I personally want DivX or Xvid. That is why I don't think the AppleTV is a good product. "
That's your choice, but how much more of the market would Apple get by supporting Divx?
"Why do you Apple fanboi's run around trying to "damage control" when someone says they do not like an Apple product?"
It wasn't about "not liking" the device. I don't like the device either. I have a Mac Mini connected to my HDTV. The original poster said that the AppleTV only supported DRM encumbered formats. He was mistaken. MP3, AAC, MPEG, H.264, WAV, Apple Lossless, and AIFF are not DRM encumbered. All of those formats except for Apple Lossless are publically documented, licensed standards.
"Should every human in the world love Apple and all of their products?"
No one said anything about "liking" the format except for you. The original poster made a factual claim that was incorrect.
"How were you marked "informative"? Does the AppleTV play FLAC? Because Quicktime sure doesn't. Ogg Vorbis files? Not without plugins from Xiph. It also doesn't play Xvid, an open format, which the GP was (IMO rightfully) griping about."
He said DRM'd format. Since when did any of the previously mentioned formats have any types of digital rights management? All of those formats are documented standards, There's a difference between a licensed format and a DRM'd format. Why bother supporting formats that no one outside of a few Slashdot geeks care about?
"There's no excuse to exclude these open source formats unless Apple is trying to maintain utter control over the information being swapped between their products."
Apple doesn't control any of the formats listed except for Apple Lossless. What type of closed format is the Apple TV? It has already been shown to be running a slightly stripped down version of MacOS X (which has a BSD core), on a standard 2.5 inch hard drive, formatted as HPFS+ and a simple username and password of frontrow/frontrow. Apple didn't go through any measures to try to keep this box from bing hacked.
"I'm not trolling here; I'm typing this on a Macbook Pro. But I think it's pretty universal knowledge the Apple loves closed systems. This is just another realization of that."
Because they don't support formats that no one cares about and focuses on the most popular formats (MP3 and MPEG) makes them a closed system? Why wouldn't Apple rather support a free format instead of one for which they had to pay license feed if it made business sense to do so?
"I own a DirecTV TiVo DVR and I love it. It's simple to use, yet it has advanced features"
...or any of the other advanced features of the standalone Tivo
I have two DirecTV Tivo's and saying that it has "advanced features" is a great overstatement.
-It doesn't support networking
-The USB port is disabled
-It doesn't support Internet scheduling
-It doesn't support Tivo2Go
"That is a lot of crap to do just to support a non-DRM encrusted format. The blurb even said you need QT Pro, which means more money for Apple to just play a file. No thanks, I will stick to MythTV."
How in the world is this marked "insightful"? There is so much misinformation in those two sentences its ridiculous.
1. The AppleTV plays MP3, AAC, AIFF, WAV, Apple Lossless, Mpeg4 and H.264 all non DRMd formats.
2. You don't need Quicktime Pro for any AppleTV functionality. You can use Handbrake (free open source software available for Windows, Macs, and Linux) to rip DVDs to either MPEG or H.264
3. You don't even need QTPro to re-encode into an AppleTV format. There are plenty of free tools that can convert from Divx to Mpeg. If you're using a Mac, you download the codecs for QT, and you import the Divx movie into iTunes (Movie2Itunes) and then choose the "Convert to iPod format.
"You actually have to buy quicktime pro to export anything."
On the Mac, if you can play it with Quicktime (with the appropriate codecs) you can convert to a standard MPEG using iTunes without buying QTPro. Now the problem is getting it into iTunes. Download the free Applescript Movie2Itunes (http://dettmer.maclab.org/movie2itunes.html) and drag the video on top of it and it will import the file into iTunes, then just choose "Convert to iPod format" (or something like that). I've been able to convert standard Divx files this way.
If you're ripping a DVD just convert into MPEG format in the first place (Handbrake will do it one step DVD->MPEG or H.264). Handbrake is free, open source software available for Macs and Windows.
"Let's be clear on what the Apple TV unit is: a very big Ipod video with wifi and no screen of its own."
If that's the case why not just get a DLO HomeDock, hook up to your TV and dock the iPod with it? You get more storage (if you have the 80GB iPod) and its cheaper.
"Don't forget no PVR functionality in the Apple box."
How do you suggest Apple implement PVR functionality?
1. Include an Analog cable tuner? No support for digital cable boxes or high definition. Then to keep up with the state of the art they would need two tuners.
2. Include an analog cable tuner and an IR blaster for digital cable boxes? Tacky and unreliable.
3. Include cablecard support? If the newest Tivos are any indication you can't do that for only $300
"The question is. When will we get (non Disney) content?"
Paramount and LionsGate Movies are already available on iTunes. But the better question is why? You can get DVD's cheaper and convert them to MPEG in one step with Handbrake. HB is free open source software available for Windows, Macs and Linux.
"I did. When I sell the DVD, it will play in your player just fine. It will play in all my players just fine unlike any DRM music format which won't play in most of my digital music players and certianly won't play on anybody else's player when I sell it on Craigslist."
When I buy a song from iTunes I can easily play the song on anyones CD Player, I can play it on my XP laptop, my Mac Mini, my work computer running Windows 2000, my two iPods. I can use it with Keynote, iDVD, I can dock my iPod into my car.
"DVD's are high quality (not compressed)"
DVDs are not compressed?
So how is a 720x480 (well actually less considering the aspect ratio of most movies) DVD high quality on a 1920 x 1080 monitor?
"unlike any DRM music store's product. iTunes tracks are not the same quality as CD tracks."
And DVDs are not the same quality as the original movie, or even the same quality as they show on HBO HD or the network HD feeds. I can guarantee you that more people can tell the difference between DVD quality and the quality of an HD video source than can tell the difference between a 128kbps AAC file and the original CD.
"Buying DRM music tracks is like buying a VHS tape of a DVD at the DVD price"
So what store can I walk into and buy just the song I want for $0.99?
"and having it locked to your player guranteed to not work in anybody else's player. No thanks. I'll stick with the original DVD instead. It will play in someone else's player."
I've bought plenty of songs to make a mix CD for other people and plays fine. They can rerip it and do anything they want to with it.
"So pray tell, how did you vote on the DRM issue with your pocketbook? Did you not buy the DRM track and do without? Did you buy a DVD or game instead? or did you vote for DRM by buying the DRM track?"
Did he buy a DVD or game instead of a song with DRM...Think about that statement for a minute....
I am a part time fitness instructor who buys a lot of singles from iTunes. I currently have over 500 "DRM infected songs". I have no problem copying the files from my Mac to my Windows XP laptop over a home network, backing up the files, copying them to my iPod and copying them off at work, burning a CD, using the songs as background music for the title sequences when making a DVD, using them with KeyNote or basically any other app that can embed Quicktime. The only time DRM has been a slight hinderance is when I need to edit the song with Audacity or do DJ style mixing with MixMeister. Then I have to use a CDRW to burn and rip. While DRM might be bad, shoddy programming is even worse.
"Did you read his complaint?
He's complaining (to use your analogy) that his DVD's won't play on his HDTV at all, he's not asking for any better resolution than before.
Your analogy in other words was fucking stupid."
If he wanted to play a DVD on his HDTV he would have to connect a compatible device -- a DVD player. If he wants to play ITMS movies on his HDTV he has to buy a $10 cable and connect the iPod to his TV.
2006-11-01 ABI Research Reveals 58% of iPod users may choose Zune.
"ABI Research has released the findings of a new study that reveal that many prospective MP3 player buyers - including current iPod owners - would be likely to chooseMicrosoft's ( News - Alert) Zune over Apple's star product.
When 1,725 teenage and adult US residents were asked whether they planned to buy an MP3 player in the next 12 months, of those responding they were likely to do so, 58 percent revealed they were "somewhat likely" or "extremely likely" to choose a Microsoft Zune player over the iPod or another MP3 player brand.
This 58 percent that were likely to go the way of the Microsoft Zune - all identified themselves as existing iPod owners. The respondents owning other brands, 59 percent, were also "somewhat or extremely likely" to purchase the Microsoft Zune as opposed to another brand - including the iPod."
"Why did the music industry think consumers would accept DRM?"
Actually the consumers have accepted DRM. iTunes Music Store is the fourth most popular seller of music in the United States according to Soundscan (1 CD=10 songs) behind only Walmart, Best Buy and Target and ahead of Amazon (#5). iTMS was #10 2 and a half years ago. I'm not making a value judgement either way, but the facts are the facts.