This isn't really true. WMA is licensed freely from the Microsoft website, with clear licensing terms. The license term is 10 years, so there can't be any bait-and-switch (at least within that timeframe). (www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/licensing) fyi, many have asked apple to license fairplay. But why would they? they'd just created competition for the ipod.
First, AAC is an MPEG standard, but that's not what Apple is selling. It wraps it in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM format (Fairplay) thus shutting off all other devices and software from playing it. AAC itself has no DRM capabilities. Fairplay is a solution tailored to the apple music store. WMA and WMDRM have much more flexible rules - you can do timed rentals, trial downloads, unlimited download subscription plans, etc... This is why it's being adopted by most other music services.
One more thought - you are correct that you don't pay *APPLE* to use AAC. But you must pay the MPEG Patent pool, and it's much more expensive to license than WMA.
You forget an important point - AAC from Apple is wrapped up in the proprietary and unlicensable Fairplay DRM. This means nobody but apple can play it back. So if you buy music from Apple, you're locked in to Apple's device and player. If you buy an iPod, you can only use music from Apple's service - you can't listen to music from WalMart, Napster, BuyMusic, etc... With WMA, Hundreds of device manufacturers licenses, and it's used by nearly all services other than iTunes. This is closer to the CD experience - buy a CD from any store and it plays in any CD player. You can also choose which media player/jukebox to use - Musicmatch, WMP, WinAMP, etc... Very different from Apple.
Sadly, it's tough to provide a link because they're mostly done by device manufacturers. This is how Rio, Creative, and others do WMA playback on nonwindows OSs. It's also how the chip manufacturers are adding it to their DSPs. But nobody is giving out the IP or packaging it off of their device yet.
There are several software projects currently in progress - I'll post when one finalizes.
Good point. So it can potentially be played back in multiple software tools on the platforms Apple chooses to support (win/mac). BUT WMA can be played back even without Microsoft's libraries - third parties can build their own implementations of WMA. So nobody is dependent on Microsoft bringing WMP libraries to a platform to be able to play WMA. The result is why WMA/WMDRM is available on many more platforms (RTOS, Linux, and dozens of chips) and devices than AAC/Fairplay. After all, listening to music on your PC isn't really the point. It's getting into the living room, car, gym, etc...
I hear you, and was super excited when wininfo said this. But now it appears to be untrue.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61897,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1
Ironic to hear HP say that adding WMA to iPod would have *created* confusion.
I've read through this thread and have some overall responses and see some common misperceptions.
First, Fester's comments are not about AAC or the iTunes app - they were about the Store, iPod, and iTunes in combination.
Second, Fester is right that music purchased from iTunesMS can only be played in an iPod and iTunes because apple wraps AAC up in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM. Once you wrap a 'standard' codec up in such DRM, it's no longer a standard from the all-important interperability standpoint.
third, WMA and WMDRM are freely licensable to ANY music store, device vendor, or software developer to use as they see fit on ANY platform. That's why both are supported in multiple vendor devices (Creative Labs, Rio, etc...), software tools (Adobe, Real, Musicmatch, Winamp), and music stores (Napster, Musicmatch, BestBuy).
You may be opposed to WMA for other reasons, but it currently comes closest to replicating the world users currently enjoy, where CDs from any store can be played in CD players from any vendor.
This isn't actually true. WMA can be played back on dozens of OS's, from OSX, to OS9 to Linux to hundreds of real time OS's used in Creative, Rio, Panasonic, Onkyo, Denon, and other manufacturers. AAC locked in fairplay can only be played back using one piece of software (iTunes) and one device (iPod).
Apple fairplay *may* be based on this fairplay (apple won't say), but you can't license apple's version from veridisk. I have spoken to several Consumer Electronics and software firms that have asked Apple for the right to use fairplay and they have *all* been told no.
Why would apple enable their competitors to build iPod replacements?
Keep in mind that AAC is being "proprietized" by these companies. Apple wraps it in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM. Real takes just the codec, puts it into a proprietary file format, and then wraps it in Helix DRM. These formats won't interop with each other or with the few devices that support the AAC standard.
I don't believe HP CAN make devices that compete with iPods since the music their customers are buying from apple are in Fairplay DRM and thus can't be played in any other device.
It means that a use can buy tunes from Napster, Musicmatch, or BestBuy and use those tunes together in devices made by Dell, Creative, Rio, etc....
With the iTunes music store and ipod, you can only buy from one store, and those songs can only play in iPods (unless you burn and rerip, in which case quality suffers).
Speaking with some knowledge of Microsoft's perspective on this, it's not that consumers will find renting preferable over purchase, but rather that it's better to have the choice. Also that it's better for services of both kinds to be tested and hopefully to flourish.
You can also get a nifty driver and power toy that let's you mount the music partition of any creative nomad (including zen) as a normal hard drive, accessible from Windows Explorer. Totally circumvent playcenter.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/plus/dme/portable devices.asp#PTAudio
Remember, he was *AOL's* CEO. From an AOL shareholder's standpoint, the merger was a steal - literally. It's the Timewarner guys and shareholders who really got screwed.
Huh? Who calls mpeg-4 free? Alex St. John has called mpeg-4 a "technology cartel" in CPU.
It's a group of companies who got together, wrote a spec, and are *selling* it for a price - mostly to themselves, so they can pass on the cost to you, the consumer of devices.
You'd prefer everyone collude on price rather than have multiple parties compete, driving the price down, and making things less expensive for the customer?
Ok, you're right...forgot the networking. I think the main point is the one we agree on...that it was a full pc disguised as a stereo component and thus cost waaaay too much.
I think we'd disagree on the value of Ogg to saving the device - ogg hadn't shipped yet. And it's not clear to me what value it would add in *practical* terms. In religious terms, I understand.
Yes, but the $1000 box was a much sillier concept - full linux box running HD, no networking, RealAudio, etc. This is a Digital Audio Reciever. Much better. I'm glad to see increasing competition in this space.
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This isn't really true. WMA is licensed freely from the Microsoft website, with clear licensing terms. The license term is 10 years, so there can't be any bait-and-switch (at least within that timeframe). (www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/licensing) fyi, many have asked apple to license fairplay. But why would they? they'd just created competition for the ipod.
First, AAC is an MPEG standard, but that's not what Apple is selling. It wraps it in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM format (Fairplay) thus shutting off all other devices and software from playing it. AAC itself has no DRM capabilities. Fairplay is a solution tailored to the apple music store. WMA and WMDRM have much more flexible rules - you can do timed rentals, trial downloads, unlimited download subscription plans, etc... This is why it's being adopted by most other music services.
WMA is freely licensable to any third party from the microsoft web site. Nothing is stopping Apple from adding WMA but their own choice.
One more thought - you are correct that you don't pay *APPLE* to use AAC. But you must pay the MPEG Patent pool, and it's much more expensive to license than WMA.
You forget an important point - AAC from Apple is wrapped up in the proprietary and unlicensable Fairplay DRM. This means nobody but apple can play it back. So if you buy music from Apple, you're locked in to Apple's device and player. If you buy an iPod, you can only use music from Apple's service - you can't listen to music from WalMart, Napster, BuyMusic, etc... With WMA, Hundreds of device manufacturers licenses, and it's used by nearly all services other than iTunes. This is closer to the CD experience - buy a CD from any store and it plays in any CD player. You can also choose which media player/jukebox to use - Musicmatch, WMP, WinAMP, etc... Very different from Apple.
Sadly, it's tough to provide a link because they're mostly done by device manufacturers. This is how Rio, Creative, and others do WMA playback on nonwindows OSs. It's also how the chip manufacturers are adding it to their DSPs. But nobody is giving out the IP or packaging it off of their device yet. There are several software projects currently in progress - I'll post when one finalizes.
Good point. So it can potentially be played back in multiple software tools on the platforms Apple chooses to support (win/mac). BUT WMA can be played back even without Microsoft's libraries - third parties can build their own implementations of WMA. So nobody is dependent on Microsoft bringing WMP libraries to a platform to be able to play WMA. The result is why WMA/WMDRM is available on many more platforms (RTOS, Linux, and dozens of chips) and devices than AAC/Fairplay. After all, listening to music on your PC isn't really the point. It's getting into the living room, car, gym, etc...
I hear you, and was super excited when wininfo said this. But now it appears to be untrue. http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61897,00 .html?tw=wn_tophead_1
Ironic to hear HP say that adding WMA to iPod would have *created* confusion.
I've read through this thread and have some overall responses and see some common misperceptions. First, Fester's comments are not about AAC or the iTunes app - they were about the Store, iPod, and iTunes in combination. Second, Fester is right that music purchased from iTunesMS can only be played in an iPod and iTunes because apple wraps AAC up in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM. Once you wrap a 'standard' codec up in such DRM, it's no longer a standard from the all-important interperability standpoint. third, WMA and WMDRM are freely licensable to ANY music store, device vendor, or software developer to use as they see fit on ANY platform. That's why both are supported in multiple vendor devices (Creative Labs, Rio, etc...), software tools (Adobe, Real, Musicmatch, Winamp), and music stores (Napster, Musicmatch, BestBuy). You may be opposed to WMA for other reasons, but it currently comes closest to replicating the world users currently enjoy, where CDs from any store can be played in CD players from any vendor.
Not quite. Apple wants everyone to use Fairplay-encrypted-AAC, developed by and only available to apple.
Yes. They don't license their DRM to anyone else.
This isn't actually true. WMA can be played back on dozens of OS's, from OSX, to OS9 to Linux to hundreds of real time OS's used in Creative, Rio, Panasonic, Onkyo, Denon, and other manufacturers. AAC locked in fairplay can only be played back using one piece of software (iTunes) and one device (iPod).
Apple fairplay *may* be based on this fairplay (apple won't say), but you can't license apple's version from veridisk. I have spoken to several Consumer Electronics and software firms that have asked Apple for the right to use fairplay and they have *all* been told no. Why would apple enable their competitors to build iPod replacements?
Supporting AAC is both expensive and won't get them access to iTunes Music store content since they can't license FairPlay DRM from Apple.
This is simply not true. Winamp, Musicmatch, RealPlayer, and hundreds of others license WMA and still support other codecs and DRM technology.
Those other AAC players can't play music from the iTunes music store because it's encrypted with the proprietary and unlicensable Fairplay DRM.
Keep in mind that AAC is being "proprietized" by these companies. Apple wraps it in a proprietary and unlicensable DRM. Real takes just the codec, puts it into a proprietary file format, and then wraps it in Helix DRM. These formats won't interop with each other or with the few devices that support the AAC standard. I don't believe HP CAN make devices that compete with iPods since the music their customers are buying from apple are in Fairplay DRM and thus can't be played in any other device.
It means that a use can buy tunes from Napster, Musicmatch, or BestBuy and use those tunes together in devices made by Dell, Creative, Rio, etc.... With the iTunes music store and ipod, you can only buy from one store, and those songs can only play in iPods (unless you burn and rerip, in which case quality suffers).
Speaking with some knowledge of Microsoft's perspective on this, it's not that consumers will find renting preferable over purchase, but rather that it's better to have the choice. Also that it's better for services of both kinds to be tested and hopefully to flourish.
You can also get a nifty driver and power toy that let's you mount the music partition of any creative nomad (including zen) as a normal hard drive, accessible from Windows Explorer. Totally circumvent playcenter. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/plus/dme/portable devices.asp#PTAudio
Remember, he was *AOL's* CEO. From an AOL shareholder's standpoint, the merger was a steal - literally. It's the Timewarner guys and shareholders who really got screwed.
Huh? Who calls mpeg-4 free? Alex St. John has called mpeg-4 a "technology cartel" in CPU. It's a group of companies who got together, wrote a spec, and are *selling* it for a price - mostly to themselves, so they can pass on the cost to you, the consumer of devices. You'd prefer everyone collude on price rather than have multiple parties compete, driving the price down, and making things less expensive for the customer?
How does one invest in the RIAA? It's not a company, it's a lobbying organization.
Ok, you're right...forgot the networking. I think the main point is the one we agree on...that it was a full pc disguised as a stereo component and thus cost waaaay too much. I think we'd disagree on the value of Ogg to saving the device - ogg hadn't shipped yet. And it's not clear to me what value it would add in *practical* terms. In religious terms, I understand.
Yes, but the $1000 box was a much sillier concept - full linux box running HD, no networking, RealAudio, etc. This is a Digital Audio Reciever. Much better. I'm glad to see increasing competition in this space.