The default function of the click wheel is to change the volume. No looking necessary.
And what if you want to seek within the song and then adjust the volume, one after another? How many non-tactile clicks is it to toggle between the two functions again?
I'm not being intentionally difficult here. I own an iPod, and it is a very pretty piece of hardware, but I'm annoyed by this pretty much every time I use it. A couple of additional buttons, if carefully designed, wouldn't have sacrificed its beauty and would have made it much more pleasant to use.
Also, the click wheel offers much better control over the volume setting than +/- buttons would.
On a home theatre, sure. But for a device you're listening to over headphones? Around 30 "steps" is ample to take you from silent to deafening, without noticeable "gaps". And you'll mostly be adjusting by just a few steps at a time.
Why go back to the root between songs? You can just keep selecting songs from any playlist to add to the On-the-Go list.
Hold down fast forward/rewind instead of using the scroll wheel to seek, and then you can still change volume with scroll wheel.
Good point, and I didn't even know about that. But, seeking through a song by holding down a button is naturally going to be more awkward than using the wheel, since there's no variability in seek speed. If buttons are to be used for one of the functions, volume adjustment would certainly be the better choice. They could have made the device much more usable just by surreptitiously nestling a pair of buttons, or even a slider, into its edge.
These are not often-used functions for most people (I turned on both shuffle and repeat, then never returned to those functions), so making them a little harder to get to in order to make the most-often-used functions easy, clean, and accessible is a conscious design decision. I happen to agree with their design; it sounds like you don't. Different products for different customer desires.
You never listen to, say, a live album or a concept album in track order? You never get a new album and want to listen to it, start to end, as the artist intended? Track order is still important to a lot of people in many situations, so being able to conveniently toggle shuffle mode doesn't seem terribly esoteric.
And trying to characterize the awful on-the-go playlist interface as driven by a "concious design decision" seems quite the stretch to me. More like a gigantic oversight in the original design of the device, no doubt in the name of "simplicity", that was awkwardly hacked on in software later on. Press and hold and flash-flash-flash? It's a usability disaster.
I would conjecture that the only reason more people don't loathe it is that they've never used anything better. So, they don't even bother with it: they just sit there, staring at the screen, waiting for the exact moment one track ends before selecting the next.
Shortage of buttons makes iPod difficult to use
on
Steve Jobs Hates Buttons
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Mr. Jobs' blind hatred of buttons is a mistake. Sure, appealing looking designs are important, but that has to be balanced against the function of the device. Inconspicuous looking buttons are nice, but lacking buttons altogether? Not so much.
A perfect example is cited in the article: an elevator that has no buttons and stops on every floor. It's far less fucntional than an elevator with buttons. I don't like waiting unnecessarily. And if I were going from the top floor to the bottom floor, with no one else on the elevator, I would be fuming by the time I arrived.
Another example is the iPod itself. The lack of an explicit power button, also mentioned in the article, isn't a big deal. But having no separate volume control really harms the usability of the device. While I'm listening to music, I don't want to have to look at the screen. But because volume and seeking within the track are loaded up on the same physical control, I have to watch the screen as I toggle between the two functions. It feels like a huge step back from my Rio Karma, where I could easily adjust the volume with a pair of buttons and use the thumb wheel to seek in the track. If I'm reading, walking, or watching the scenery while listening to music, it's a big inconvenience to have to move my eyes to the screen.
The amount of time you spend navigating those menus is just sick. Want to enable shuffle? Navigate up to the root, down to options, back up to the root, and back down to your songs.
Want to select a song and start playing it in a fresh on-the-go playlist and, while it's playing, add more songs to the queue? Navigate down to select the song, up to the root, down to play from the playlist, back up to the root, back down to select your next song. Fantastic!
Now, of course, they could have made a more usable interface even with limited number of "buttons" they have. But it's easy to see that a couple more buttons would have helped immensely.
You're objecting to FUD and not spreading it? Are you sure?
Could you please point out any published comment by RMS in which he describes non-GPL free software licenses as dishonorable? Any published comment to the effect that developers should not have the freedom to use a license of their choosing?
He believes that the user's freedom is paramount and that the GPL v3 is the best license to defend that freedom. He strongly advocates that position. Apparently, you disagree with it, and that's fine. But do you think you're doing yourself any favours by calling him a communist and claiming that he advocates laws that would obligate you to use his preferred license?
Oh, the Free Software Foundation has an extensive list of licenses, too. It lists 66 free software licenses (your OSI link lists a similar number, 60).
Notice how Sony didn't pull that stunt out of the gate in either Japan or the US? Why do you think that might have been?
Honestly, I think they had not intended to do software emulation until they had figured out what their price point was, and learned the prices of the competition. At that point, they started trying to figure out what they could cut to bring down the cost of the console. Having made the decision to try software emulation late in the game, it wouldn't have been ready when they began production for the launches in Japan and North America. So, they went ahead with the Emotion Engine in those markets.
It might even be that this was the real reason for delaying the launches elsewhere. They couldn't let 2006 pass without at least a partial launch, but they couldn't bleed like that worldwide. So, they delayed in order to get software emulation working well enough that they could go to market with the cheaper hardware in the rest of the world.
I've got no insider information. This is just speculation, but it makes good sense to me.
The list goes on and on, from railing about something he "heard Vista did" to complaining about how IBMs auto-restore function failed (as though Windows was somehow related to a pre-OS restore function).
I have to call you on that latter point.
His point was that you don't need crappy vendor-supplied restore solutions with Ubuntu because install CDs can be easily obtained for free.
After suffering a total hard drive failure, I tried to obtain a factory-restore CD from IBM (this was before they sold the PC business to Lenovo). They told me I couldn't have one without paying because *Microsoft* forbids them from giving them away.
And, don't forget to point out that Ubuntu is not a small commercial firm. Canonical is a small commercial firm. Ubuntu is a hugely popular GNU/Linux distribution.
Think about that. The head of Microsoft's Linux Labs isn't aware of this distinction. How does this clown have any credibility at all?
Hmm...would you care to offer any evidence for your claims about "leaning" and "rolling over"?
Ubuntu has *never* included wine by default, but has *always* made it available in universe. Just take a look at the repositories for any release from Warty to Feisty.
I see no sign of any back room conspiracy, just a clear explanation of the status quo from Mark.
I should clarify that I read "these are the systems and peripherals Michael is using right now" to imply that these are his, not his family members', personal machines.
I also chose the term "PC" intentionally, to indicate machines that sit on his desk or lap and with which he interacts *personally*. I see no sign of a file/print server there, just three laptops, a gaming desktop, and yet another desktop at work. Never mind the web host; none of those machines powers www.dell.com.;)
So, what I see is that you have *one* such machine, your Powerbook. Your potential second one is sitting in the basement waiting to be sold. And that's kinda my point.
Ripping it may make you feel like a total bad-ass who's really sticking it to the man, but think about it...how will Sony notice?
They won't, not unless you return it.
Returning it is the only way to demonstrate that this product is no good to you. Tell the store or service where you bought it that it is defective, and demand your money back. They may try to tell you that they don't offer refunds on opened media, and you can even humour them by accepting an exchange, taking it home, trying it out, and brining it back. Tell them that you've learned it's defective by design and it will never work in your DVD player. Don't take no for an answer. If they absolutely refuse to accept the return, pull out your cell phone, call the credit card company, and ask them to cancel the transaction.
Sony will notice returns.
Returns and bad publicity killed the record companies' attempts to add incompatible and malicious DRM to CDs after the fact, and there's no reason that it shouldn't work again.
Oh, speaking of bad publicity, if you really do have a Sony DVD player that won't play one of these discs, call up the consumer advocate at your local news. They'll love the irony. Don't forget to mention the rootkit debacle of the recent past. They'll dig that, too.
One of the many neat things about the way science is practiced, with numerous independent scientists continuously challenging each other's theories and discoveries, is that it doesn't tend to produce Big Lies.
It's conceivable, though highly unlikely, that one day evolution will be disproven completely. If that happens, it will be entirely to science's credit.
It doesn't mean that it forces people to buy an iPod in the first place. It means it imposes barriers to ever switching away from it.
It doesn't really matter whether the iPod or iTunes Music Store is more popular. Even if someone buys an iPod first and loads it up with MP3s before starting to use ITMS, once he is using both, he is forever locked into them. If, one day, he finds a superior portable music player made by someone else, he won't be able to switch to it without losing all the music he purchased (barring the tedious and quality-reducing escape mechanism of burning and re-ripping, of course).
Except that there are many different manufacturers of all the components that Dell uses, and for many of them there is already perfect in-kernel Linux support. So, Dell just needs to choose wisely.
Moreover, I'm sure Dell has incredible clout with those manufacturers. If the choice was take up the friendly offer by the kernel developers to get the component supported vs. lose Dell as a customer, what do you think they would choose?
So, when you say you had to research which printers worked well and which ones did not that should clue you into a big worry. Actually getting software that is the right mix of features/ease of use for a simple needs user is also a major concern. Selling a product which limits upsell potential for high-profit products is a really bad business decision.
Where you see a problem, I see a business opportunity. If you've selected a Linux distribution as your operating system, Dell could automatically offer you only printers that work well with CUPS. Fortunately, the printer situation has really improved of late: just about any HP or Epson you can find these days works great. But Dell could do the research for you, and make buying a Linux-based PC a painless experience.
4 years? Try 19 months. July 2004 to February 2006.
Not incidentally, that's just 6 months longer than the current Conservative government has been in power. How much progress do you think they will make by September?
In his 19 months, Dion created a plan. The Conservatives cancelled it. What did you expect would happen?
If IBM doesn't want you as a client, you sure as hell don't want IBM as a service contractor!
Who is the nebulous "you" in this statement?
The droves of businesses falling over themselves to switch to Oracle's RHEL clone?
As the article said, if there is customer demand, IBM will certify on it. Personally, I'd be much more interested in certification on Ubuntu or Debian. That would actually offer customers real, technology-based choice, not just "I want to give my money to Larry" choice.
It's early days yet, but here's a very interesting indication.
Last week, as reported here, Puretracks began offering DRM-free MP3s. They have 50,000 tracks, just 3.8% of their total catalog, available in this format. None of it is from the major labels.
Currently, a DRM-free album, Barenaked Ladies are Men, is at number 2 on Puretracks' top 100 chart (sorry, those last two links work in Canada only). It has been moving up steadily since Puretracks announced its MP3 offerings last week. By comparison, the album is at number 45 on the traditional Canadian albums charts. No other song in Puretracks' top 10 sits below number 15 on the SoundScan chart.
This Candada-Only store is offering _very_ few songs in a non-DRM format.
Their DRM'ed offerings may only represent 3.8% of their total catalog, but that's still 50,000 songs. That is not a small number.
Granted, they're not available to you if you're not in Canada, and that's not terribly helpful. I don't know why, but I would guess that it's related to the different industry composition in Canada. We have a good number of mainstream artists signed to larger independent labels (notably Nettwerk) that are eager to embrace DRM-free online distribution. I believe that many of these artists have redistribution deals with the major labels in the US, who are, of course, still insisting on DRM.
What percentage of those songs are any good? Are they the most purchased songs? I bet the non-DRM songs are among the least purchased. Seriously, how many people will buy a song by Uncle Goober singing I "widdled a piece of wood on the porch" just because it has no crappy DRM?
How do you want to objectively define "good" music?
Puretracks is not actively seeking out poor selling music to offer as MP3s. Rather, they are offering whatever the labels will allow them to. Right now, that pretty much means everything from the indie labels. Indie music is certainly not bad music; indeed, many people refuse to listen to anything else. And, as I said above, many mainstream artists in Canada are actually signed to indie labels.
Right now, the fifth best selling album at Puretracks (Barenaked Ladies are Men, sorry, Canada-only link) is in MP3 format for $7.99 Canadian (each track from it is 79 cents). The same album in DRM'ed WMA is at number 11 and dropping.
This is not an effort that's designed to fail. And, eventually, this will have an impact on everyone.
The summary: MP3s are available on the Canadian store only; US visitors are redirected to the US store which still sells only DRM'ed WMA. They use a crusty old download manager based on ActiveX technology, which is why the store isn't available to Mac users yet. There are actually two different downloaders: an ActiveX plug-in for IE and a standalone Windows executable (for users of other browsers). MP3 files are available through either downloader, but the latter renames them to have a.wma extension. The renaming problem will be fixed today and a solution for Mac users will be available in 30-60 days (I hope it will include all non-Windows platforms).
Hmmm...using the primary download method (the ActiveX downloader), I actually got files with a.mp3 extension.
Well, it seems there are still a few rough edges. But, I definitely give them credit for what they've done. They're not just talking the talk (ala Jobs), but really offering an open alternative. I'm pretty confident the technical problems will be worked out.
I did send them a message congratulating them on their move, describing the inconvenience of using their proprietary downloader, and encouraging them to move quickly to an open solution (preferably a simple in-browser HTTP transfer) for their MP3 downloads, at least.
It seems the Mac restriction stems from their use of some weird ActiveX-based downloader, instead of a normal HTTP download. I assume it's tied into a their MS DRM scheme somehow, and they haven't gotten around to replacing it for MP3 downloads yet.
But I can confirm that, once downloaded, the files are DRM-free, standard MP3s, as advertised. They're encoded at a constant rate of 192 kbps.
Wii doesn't have enough games yet, so it's a novelty that will be reduced to a niche market. PS3 doesn't have enough games yet, so it'll dominate the market once it gets some more games.
Get real. It's the PS3 that desperately needs to improve quickly. It's on very thin ice already. If it's not a hit by next Christmas, game over.
Slashdot Mirror
And what if you want to seek within the song and then adjust the volume, one after another? How many non-tactile clicks is it to toggle between the two functions again?
I'm not being intentionally difficult here. I own an iPod, and it is a very pretty piece of hardware, but I'm annoyed by this pretty much every time I use it. A couple of additional buttons, if carefully designed, wouldn't have sacrificed its beauty and would have made it much more pleasant to use.
On a home theatre, sure. But for a device you're listening to over headphones? Around 30 "steps" is ample to take you from silent to deafening, without noticeable "gaps". And you'll mostly be adjusting by just a few steps at a time.
Because they're not already in playlists?
Good point, and I didn't even know about that. But, seeking through a song by holding down a button is naturally going to be more awkward than using the wheel, since there's no variability in seek speed. If buttons are to be used for one of the functions, volume adjustment would certainly be the better choice. They could have made the device much more usable just by surreptitiously nestling a pair of buttons, or even a slider, into its edge.
You never listen to, say, a live album or a concept album in track order? You never get a new album and want to listen to it, start to end, as the artist intended? Track order is still important to a lot of people in many situations, so being able to conveniently toggle shuffle mode doesn't seem terribly esoteric.
And trying to characterize the awful on-the-go playlist interface as driven by a "concious design decision" seems quite the stretch to me. More like a gigantic oversight in the original design of the device, no doubt in the name of "simplicity", that was awkwardly hacked on in software later on. Press and hold and flash-flash-flash? It's a usability disaster.
I would conjecture that the only reason more people don't loathe it is that they've never used anything better. So, they don't even bother with it: they just sit there, staring at the screen, waiting for the exact moment one track ends before selecting the next.
Mr. Jobs' blind hatred of buttons is a mistake. Sure, appealing looking designs are important, but that has to be balanced against the function of the device. Inconspicuous looking buttons are nice, but lacking buttons altogether? Not so much.
A perfect example is cited in the article: an elevator that has no buttons and stops on every floor. It's far less fucntional than an elevator with buttons. I don't like waiting unnecessarily. And if I were going from the top floor to the bottom floor, with no one else on the elevator, I would be fuming by the time I arrived.
Another example is the iPod itself. The lack of an explicit power button, also mentioned in the article, isn't a big deal. But having no separate volume control really harms the usability of the device. While I'm listening to music, I don't want to have to look at the screen. But because volume and seeking within the track are loaded up on the same physical control, I have to watch the screen as I toggle between the two functions. It feels like a huge step back from my Rio Karma, where I could easily adjust the volume with a pair of buttons and use the thumb wheel to seek in the track. If I'm reading, walking, or watching the scenery while listening to music, it's a big inconvenience to have to move my eyes to the screen.
The amount of time you spend navigating those menus is just sick. Want to enable shuffle? Navigate up to the root, down to options, back up to the root, and back down to your songs.
Want to select a song and start playing it in a fresh on-the-go playlist and, while it's playing, add more songs to the queue? Navigate down to select the song, up to the root, down to play from the playlist, back up to the root, back down to select your next song. Fantastic!
Now, of course, they could have made a more usable interface even with limited number of "buttons" they have. But it's easy to see that a couple more buttons would have helped immensely.
You're objecting to FUD and not spreading it? Are you sure?
Could you please point out any published comment by RMS in which he describes non-GPL free software licenses as dishonorable? Any published comment to the effect that developers should not have the freedom to use a license of their choosing?
He believes that the user's freedom is paramount and that the GPL v3 is the best license to defend that freedom. He strongly advocates that position. Apparently, you disagree with it, and that's fine. But do you think you're doing yourself any favours by calling him a communist and claiming that he advocates laws that would obligate you to use his preferred license?
Oh, the Free Software Foundation has an extensive list of licenses, too. It lists 66 free software licenses (your OSI link lists a similar number, 60).
Notice how Sony didn't pull that stunt out of the gate in either Japan or the US? Why do you think that might have been?
Honestly, I think they had not intended to do software emulation until they had figured out what their price point was, and learned the prices of the competition. At that point, they started trying to figure out what they could cut to bring down the cost of the console. Having made the decision to try software emulation late in the game, it wouldn't have been ready when they began production for the launches in Japan and North America. So, they went ahead with the Emotion Engine in those markets.
It might even be that this was the real reason for delaying the launches elsewhere. They couldn't let 2006 pass without at least a partial launch, but they couldn't bleed like that worldwide. So, they delayed in order to get software emulation working well enough that they could go to market with the cheaper hardware in the rest of the world.
I've got no insider information. This is just speculation, but it makes good sense to me.
The list goes on and on, from railing about something he "heard Vista did" to complaining about how IBMs auto-restore function failed (as though Windows was somehow related to a pre-OS restore function).
I have to call you on that latter point.
His point was that you don't need crappy vendor-supplied restore solutions with Ubuntu because install CDs can be easily obtained for free.
After suffering a total hard drive failure, I tried to obtain a factory-restore CD from IBM (this was before they sold the PC business to Lenovo). They told me I couldn't have one without paying because *Microsoft* forbids them from giving them away.
I think his point is fair and legitimate.
And, don't forget to point out that Ubuntu is not a small commercial firm. Canonical is a small commercial firm. Ubuntu is a hugely popular GNU/Linux distribution.
Think about that. The head of Microsoft's Linux Labs isn't aware of this distinction. How does this clown have any credibility at all?
Hmm...would you care to offer any evidence for your claims about "leaning" and "rolling over"?
Ubuntu has *never* included wine by default, but has *always* made it available in universe. Just take a look at the repositories for any release from Warty to Feisty.
I see no sign of any back room conspiracy, just a clear explanation of the status quo from Mark.
I should clarify that I read "these are the systems and peripherals Michael is using right now" to imply that these are his, not his family members', personal machines.
;)
I also chose the term "PC" intentionally, to indicate machines that sit on his desk or lap and with which he interacts *personally*. I see no sign of a file/print server there, just three laptops, a gaming desktop, and yet another desktop at work. Never mind the web host; none of those machines powers www.dell.com.
So, what I see is that you have *one* such machine, your Powerbook. Your potential second one is sitting in the basement waiting to be sold. And that's kinda my point.
I can't even imagine why one person would want five PCs.
How much time does he spend applying patches and updating software? Transferring data?
THREE different laptops? Doesn't he realize that the whole appeal of a laptop is that you can take it with you wherever you go?
Return it!
Ripping it may make you feel like a total bad-ass who's really sticking it to the man, but think about it...how will Sony notice?
They won't, not unless you return it.
Returning it is the only way to demonstrate that this product is no good to you. Tell the store or service where you bought it that it is defective, and demand your money back. They may try to tell you that they don't offer refunds on opened media, and you can even humour them by accepting an exchange, taking it home, trying it out, and brining it back. Tell them that you've learned it's defective by design and it will never work in your DVD player. Don't take no for an answer. If they absolutely refuse to accept the return, pull out your cell phone, call the credit card company, and ask them to cancel the transaction.
Sony will notice returns.
Returns and bad publicity killed the record companies' attempts to add incompatible and malicious DRM to CDs after the fact, and there's no reason that it shouldn't work again.
Oh, speaking of bad publicity, if you really do have a Sony DVD player that won't play one of these discs, call up the consumer advocate at your local news. They'll love the irony. Don't forget to mention the rootkit debacle of the recent past. They'll dig that, too.
Hobo sapiens, meet science. Science, hobo sabiens.
One of the many neat things about the way science is practiced, with numerous independent scientists continuously challenging each other's theories and discoveries, is that it doesn't tend to produce Big Lies.
It's conceivable, though highly unlikely, that one day evolution will be disproven completely. If that happens, it will be entirely to science's credit.
"Lock in" doesn't mean what you think it does.
It doesn't mean that it forces people to buy an iPod in the first place. It means it imposes barriers to ever switching away from it.
It doesn't really matter whether the iPod or iTunes Music Store is more popular. Even if someone buys an iPod first and loads it up with MP3s before starting to use ITMS, once he is using both, he is forever locked into them. If, one day, he finds a superior portable music player made by someone else, he won't be able to switch to it without losing all the music he purchased (barring the tedious and quality-reducing escape mechanism of burning and re-ripping, of course).
Except that there are many different manufacturers of all the components that Dell uses, and for many of them there is already perfect in-kernel Linux support. So, Dell just needs to choose wisely.
Moreover, I'm sure Dell has incredible clout with those manufacturers. If the choice was take up the friendly offer by the kernel developers to get the component supported vs. lose Dell as a customer, what do you think they would choose?
Where you see a problem, I see a business opportunity. If you've selected a Linux distribution as your operating system, Dell could automatically offer you only printers that work well with CUPS. Fortunately, the printer situation has really improved of late: just about any HP or Epson you can find these days works great. But Dell could do the research for you, and make buying a Linux-based PC a painless experience.
The man can't even distinguish between the OSF and the FSF.
Why do we have to hear about him? Who even publishes him?
4 years? Try 19 months. July 2004 to February 2006.
Not incidentally, that's just 6 months longer than the current Conservative government has been in power. How much progress do you think they will make by September?
In his 19 months, Dion created a plan. The Conservatives cancelled it. What did you expect would happen?
If IBM doesn't want you as a client, you sure as hell don't want IBM as a service contractor!
Who is the nebulous "you" in this statement?
The droves of businesses falling over themselves to switch to Oracle's RHEL clone?
As the article said, if there is customer demand, IBM will certify on it. Personally, I'd be much more interested in certification on Ubuntu or Debian. That would actually offer customers real, technology-based choice, not just "I want to give my money to Larry" choice.
It's early days yet, but here's a very interesting indication.
Last week, as reported here, Puretracks began offering DRM-free MP3s. They have 50,000 tracks, just 3.8% of their total catalog, available in this format. None of it is from the major labels.
Currently, a DRM-free album, Barenaked Ladies are Men, is at number 2 on Puretracks' top 100 chart (sorry, those last two links work in Canada only). It has been moving up steadily since Puretracks announced its MP3 offerings last week. By comparison, the album is at number 45 on the traditional Canadian albums charts. No other song in Puretracks' top 10 sits below number 15 on the SoundScan chart.
This Candada-Only store is offering _very_ few songs in a non-DRM format.
Their DRM'ed offerings may only represent 3.8% of their total catalog, but that's still 50,000 songs. That is not a small number.
Granted, they're not available to you if you're not in Canada, and that's not terribly helpful. I don't know why, but I would guess that it's related to the different industry composition in Canada. We have a good number of mainstream artists signed to larger independent labels (notably Nettwerk) that are eager to embrace DRM-free online distribution. I believe that many of these artists have redistribution deals with the major labels in the US, who are, of course, still insisting on DRM.
What percentage of those songs are any good? Are they the most purchased songs? I bet the non-DRM songs are among the least purchased. Seriously, how many people will buy a song by Uncle Goober singing I "widdled a piece of wood on the porch" just because it has no crappy DRM?
How do you want to objectively define "good" music?
Puretracks is not actively seeking out poor selling music to offer as MP3s. Rather, they are offering whatever the labels will allow them to. Right now, that pretty much means everything from the indie labels. Indie music is certainly not bad music; indeed, many people refuse to listen to anything else. And, as I said above, many mainstream artists in Canada are actually signed to indie labels.
Right now, the fifth best selling album at Puretracks (Barenaked Ladies are Men, sorry, Canada-only link) is in MP3 format for $7.99 Canadian (each track from it is 79 cents). The same album in DRM'ed WMA is at number 11 and dropping.
This is not an effort that's designed to fail. And, eventually, this will have an impact on everyone.
The CBC has the full story now.
The summary: MP3s are available on the Canadian store only; US visitors are redirected to the US store which still sells only DRM'ed WMA. They use a crusty old download manager based on ActiveX technology, which is why the store isn't available to Mac users yet. There are actually two different downloaders: an ActiveX plug-in for IE and a standalone Windows executable (for users of other browsers). MP3 files are available through either downloader, but the latter renames them to have a .wma extension. The renaming problem will be fixed today and a solution for Mac users will be available in 30-60 days (I hope it will include all non-Windows platforms).
Hmmm...using the primary download method (the ActiveX downloader), I actually got files with a .mp3 extension.
Well, it seems there are still a few rough edges. But, I definitely give them credit for what they've done. They're not just talking the talk (ala Jobs), but really offering an open alternative. I'm pretty confident the technical problems will be worked out.
I did send them a message congratulating them on their move, describing the inconvenience of using their proprietary downloader, and encouraging them to move quickly to an open solution (preferably a simple in-browser HTTP transfer) for their MP3 downloads, at least.
It seems the Mac restriction stems from their use of some weird ActiveX-based downloader, instead of a normal HTTP download. I assume it's tied into a their MS DRM scheme somehow, and they haven't gotten around to replacing it for MP3 downloads yet.
But I can confirm that, once downloaded, the files are DRM-free, standard MP3s, as advertised. They're encoded at a constant rate of 192 kbps.
Wii doesn't have enough games yet, so it's a novelty that will be reduced to a niche market.
PS3 doesn't have enough games yet, so it'll dominate the market once it gets some more games.
Get real. It's the PS3 that desperately needs to improve quickly. It's on very thin ice already. If it's not a hit by next Christmas, game over.