Tell me, what kind of leverage does Microsoft have to negotiate terms here? The people providing the content lose nothing if they exclude their music from Microsoft's service.
The options are: 1) put in the stupid DRM features and get a license to sell the specified content 2) don't put in the stupid DRM features, and watch as people continue to buy iPods because of the diverse selection of music available in the iTunes store 3) don't sell a device at all
The technical crap going on behind the scenes doesn't matter to a user. Usability matters to the user. Usability means complying with the user's expectations for how something should work. That's why your mouse cursor moves up instead of down when you move the mouse up.
If the sum of your life experience conditions you into thinking that "media" is removed from a device by pressing a button on the machine, then you damn well better believe that a user is going to expect to find a button on the machine to remove the media. And as society has not been exposed to alternate methods of removing media, they don't have any built in behavior that helps them locate that functionality (well, short of reading the user manual).
I view the keyboard and the computer as two physically separate things.
The "device" is the thing I stuck the disk into. I didn't stick the disk into the keyboard; I stuck it into the computer. Now, that isn't to say I don't think you shouldn't have an eject button on the keyboard (the computer equivelent of a remote control), but removing the physical button from the device doesn't make for an intuitive experience.
I don't expect to have a play/stop button, as those aren't operations I can perform (nor would I expect to perform them).
Well, hardly, because if we lived in a strange alternate universe were Apple ruled the market people would be criticizing IBM clones for having the button on the drive. Most people's complaints about OS X fall under this category.
That would only be true if, in that strange alternate universe, your tape player, vcr, cd player, dvd player, various floppy drives on computers made prior to 1985, etc, didn't provide a way to remove the disk from the device itself.
The "there should be an eject button on the device" precident was set long before the PC became popular.
You can probably learn a bit about what kind of user research they did by looking through old posts in this blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/
Some of the stuff they discovered was unexpected, but at the same time cool. An example would be positioning of content under a ribbon title. By tracking peopel's eye movements, they discovered people started looking directly under the title and moved to the right, only starting at the beginning of the line after hitting the end (instead of starting all the way to the left and scanning to the right).
The difference is this change results in a productivity increase (ie: you earn back your training costs over time), whereas the OO change results in no change in productivity (ie: you don't earn back your training costs over time).
The Infiniti G35 sedan shipped with incredibly buggy firmware... the center console would sometimes stop responding. It was really fun when the fans got stuck full-on.
Why would I want to waste my time with that? My iPod is in my backpack or other equally inconvenient location. Why must that option exclude other conveniences?
What if the world's reaction to iPod integration was "Why plug your iPod into your car stereo when you can just stick in a CD you burned?"
What if the world's reaction to burning a CD was "Why don't you just buy one at the store?"
What if the world's reaction to playing a CD in a car stereo was "Why don't you just listen to the radio?"
We'd be more than happy to sell the type of vehicle you describe if Americans would actually purchase them. In the meantime, while Americans continue to put trucks, SUVs, and cars with large displacement at the top of the sales charts, we'll be happy to continue building and selling them.
We know that CO2 does have an impact on atmospheric temperatures, and it easy to argue that humans are having SOME impact on climate change. It is, however, difficult to argue to what extent we are influencing it.
CO2 is not the only "lever" which modifies global temperature. The earth has been both far colder and warmer than it is today, and those changes occured without any human influence. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that by the time we have enough data points to draw a valid conclusion, it will be too late to act.
Apple's DRM functions as intended and normal users are not bypassing it. You can't copy the files at will. You can't play it in an arbitrary device. IT FUNCTIONS AS INTENDED. People like you and me are not most people; "most people" are stuck with it.
What does Microsoft's DRM do that Apple's doesn't? Which of those "features" are mandatory and what are "options" providers can turn on or off? Or if their only crime that they created a system that isn't "flawed"?
Options for DRM free music are not opening up. It will only get worse over time, and once viable competition for Apple hits the market the shit will really hit the fan.
Consumers don't accept Apple's DRM. They accept the iPod. They put up with Apple's DRM, which is the only legal (digitally purchased) music they can use in their iPod.
Apple is only getting a pass because you're invested in their system. Once more people start getting bit by the lockin generated by Apple's DRM you'll start to see fewer and fewer supporters of it.
That's a load of crap and you know it. Either they're using DRM to control distribution or they're not. They don't get a pass because they're bad at it.
Do you suffer from short term memory loss? You keep saying its better!
Tell me, what makes Apple's DRM so much better? You can only burn the files a limited number of times. You can only play them on iPods and using iTunes. And you are limited in the number of computers you can play them on. Sounds like every other retarded DRM-for-purchase scheme out there to me.
Niggling over the numbers is like bragging about how you only beat your wife once a week.
DRM content you "purchase" is a ripoff. The only DRM scheme that is viable to end users is a subscription/rental model, and Apple doesn't support it.
It is most certainly NOT the most lenient you can get. The most lenient you could get would allow infinite copies to be burned onto cd and it would allow you to copy the file onto an infinite number of computers and play it.
Apple's DRM is just as restrictive as Microsoft's. Microsoft's DRM format has more "options" available to content providers; that's it.
The only one with a double standard here is you with your Apple's DRM is good while Microsoft's is bad perspective. They're both DRM formats; they're the same fucking thing.
Honestly, DRM sucks and is a bad deal for us all the way around.
As a side note, I firmly believe that DRM (for music and video) is only useful in subscription or rental models. It is a complete ripoff in every other situation...
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But everyone else who bought in when it was in the $21 range last year is probably pretty happy with the 50% return on their investment right now...
Tell me, what kind of leverage does Microsoft have to negotiate terms here? The people providing the content lose nothing if they exclude their music from Microsoft's service.
The options are:
1) put in the stupid DRM features and get a license to sell the specified content
2) don't put in the stupid DRM features, and watch as people continue to buy iPods because of the diverse selection of music available in the iTunes store
3) don't sell a device at all
The technical crap going on behind the scenes doesn't matter to a user. Usability matters to the user. Usability means complying with the user's expectations for how something should work. That's why your mouse cursor moves up instead of down when you move the mouse up.
If the sum of your life experience conditions you into thinking that "media" is removed from a device by pressing a button on the machine, then you damn well better believe that a user is going to expect to find a button on the machine to remove the media. And as society has not been exposed to alternate methods of removing media, they don't have any built in behavior that helps them locate that functionality (well, short of reading the user manual).
I view the keyboard and the computer as two physically separate things.
The "device" is the thing I stuck the disk into. I didn't stick the disk into the keyboard; I stuck it into the computer. Now, that isn't to say I don't think you shouldn't have an eject button on the keyboard (the computer equivelent of a remote control), but removing the physical button from the device doesn't make for an intuitive experience.
I don't expect to have a play/stop button, as those aren't operations I can perform (nor would I expect to perform them).
Well, hardly, because if we lived in a strange alternate universe were Apple ruled the market people would be criticizing IBM clones for having the button on the drive. Most people's complaints about OS X fall under this category.
That would only be true if, in that strange alternate universe, your tape player, vcr, cd player, dvd player, various floppy drives on computers made prior to 1985, etc, didn't provide a way to remove the disk from the device itself.
The "there should be an eject button on the device" precident was set long before the PC became popular.
You can probably learn a bit about what kind of user research they did by looking through old posts in this blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/
Some of the stuff they discovered was unexpected, but at the same time cool. An example would be positioning of content under a ribbon title. By tracking peopel's eye movements, they discovered people started looking directly under the title and moved to the right, only starting at the beginning of the line after hitting the end (instead of starting all the way to the left and scanning to the right).
Keyboard shortcuts were not changed in the new version.
"alt-f" would bring up the file menu in 2003. In 2007 it drops down the "office" menu/button (which is roughly the equivelent of the old file menu).
If you hit "alt-f then "a" in 2003 you'd select save as in 2003. In 2007 it does the same thing.
The difference is this change results in a productivity increase (ie: you earn back your training costs over time), whereas the OO change results in no change in productivity (ie: you don't earn back your training costs over time).
The old keyboard shortcuts are still in, and there is a way to navigate the UI via the keyboard.
I never said it was a must have. Merely that your life would be slightly nicer if something else took care of it for you.
Yeah, that's SOOOO much better than not having to fuck with it at all....
The Infiniti G35 sedan shipped with incredibly buggy firmware ... the center console would sometimes stop responding. It was really fun when the fans got stuck full-on.
Why would I want to waste my time with that? My iPod is in my backpack or other equally inconvenient location. Why must that option exclude other conveniences?
What if the world's reaction to iPod integration was "Why plug your iPod into your car stereo when you can just stick in a CD you burned?"
What if the world's reaction to burning a CD was "Why don't you just buy one at the store?"
What if the world's reaction to playing a CD in a car stereo was "Why don't you just listen to the radio?"
Sometimes I wonder how the human race has progressed as far as it has with so many myopic people in it ...
Did you ever sit and think for a moment that maybe, just maybe, you wouldn't have to sit there "operating" the thing while driving?
Wouldn't it be nice if you could sync music to your car like you did with your iPod?
Wouldn't it be nice if podcast you downloaded last night would be in your car ready for you to listen to the next morning on your drive into work?
Wouldn't it be nice if the thing knew where my next meeting would be and made it easy to select that as a destination on my GPS?
Of course it would.
But dumbass kneejerk reactionary idiots like you that riddicule everything certainly try your very best to block such progress...
Dear American car buyer:
We'd be more than happy to sell the type of vehicle you describe if Americans would actually purchase them. In the meantime, while Americans continue to put trucks, SUVs, and cars with large displacement at the top of the sales charts, we'll be happy to continue building and selling them.
Sincerely,
The Real World.
Concurrancy does not imply causality.
We know that CO2 does have an impact on atmospheric temperatures, and it easy to argue that humans are having SOME impact on climate change. It is, however, difficult to argue to what extent we are influencing it.
CO2 is not the only "lever" which modifies global temperature. The earth has been both far colder and warmer than it is today, and those changes occured without any human influence. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that by the time we have enough data points to draw a valid conclusion, it will be too late to act.
Welcome to the real world. If you honestly think that Microsoft beta products are special in this regard, you're kidding yourself...
VS2005 works fine as long as you have it run as Administrator. And what poor soul is running SQLServer on a non-server?
Apple's DRM functions as intended and normal users are not bypassing it. You can't copy the files at will. You can't play it in an arbitrary device. IT FUNCTIONS AS INTENDED. People like you and me are not most people; "most people" are stuck with it.
What does Microsoft's DRM do that Apple's doesn't? Which of those "features" are mandatory and what are "options" providers can turn on or off? Or if their only crime that they created a system that isn't "flawed"?
Options for DRM free music are not opening up. It will only get worse over time, and once viable competition for Apple hits the market the shit will really hit the fan.
Consumers don't accept Apple's DRM. They accept the iPod. They put up with Apple's DRM, which is the only legal (digitally purchased) music they can use in their iPod.
Apple is only getting a pass because you're invested in their system. Once more people start getting bit by the lockin generated by Apple's DRM you'll start to see fewer and fewer supporters of it.
That's a load of crap and you know it. Either they're using DRM to control distribution or they're not. They don't get a pass because they're bad at it.
I never said that
Do you suffer from short term memory loss? You keep saying its better!
Tell me, what makes Apple's DRM so much better? You can only burn the files a limited number of times. You can only play them on iPods and using iTunes. And you are limited in the number of computers you can play them on. Sounds like every other retarded DRM-for-purchase scheme out there to me.
Niggling over the numbers is like bragging about how you only beat your wife once a week.
DRM content you "purchase" is a ripoff. The only DRM scheme that is viable to end users is a subscription/rental model, and Apple doesn't support it.
You are so full of shit.
It is most certainly NOT the most lenient you can get. The most lenient you could get would allow infinite copies to be burned onto cd and it would allow you to copy the file onto an infinite number of computers and play it.
Apple's DRM is just as restrictive as Microsoft's. Microsoft's DRM format has more "options" available to content providers; that's it.
The only one with a double standard here is you with your Apple's DRM is good while Microsoft's is bad perspective. They're both DRM formats; they're the same fucking thing.
Honestly, DRM sucks and is a bad deal for us all the way around.
As a side note, I firmly believe that DRM (for music and video) is only useful in subscription or rental models. It is a complete ripoff in every other situation...
Basically, you're saying it's ok because Apple is completely inept? Or are you arguing that their attempts at "control" are intentionally flawed?