I think it's the "artificial vendor lock-in" thing that's being complained about, not "their own success". Whether you think that that should be attacked or not (I think it's a good reason to never buy anything off of iTMS, but I don't think legal action is justified), it's at least a valid complaint.
There's already a bunch of lawsuits against Microsoft in Europe, and that's not the same issue. I agree, though; they should at least be allowing some kind of licensing for other operating systems (I think that third-party apps can play the WMA DRM, but I could be wrong).
Well, yes, but it's as much the store as it is the player. The technology they're attacking is Fairplay, which is pretty much integral to both of them. The difference is that the store effectively won't operate without it, whereas iPods are still useful without.
I suppose it's quite depressing that people are attacking things in this way, but perhaps it's the way things just are. I'm interested to see if this "watermark" scheme that's been up on here recently as a "more open" alternative to DRM gathers any momentum. Even then, there's significant issues.
Apple:... Here is a sample of the contract with the various labels where they demand we use DRM. Here is a report detailing the lack of standards in DRM. Here is a report detailing how Apple did not create this fucking mess in the licensing and protection of Music.
Judge: Not Guilty. ( aside - what a complete fucking waste of time....)
Judge: Where in the contract does it say you cannot licence your DRM technology to competing music stores?
Apple: Nowhere, but you see we need to make mon...
Judge: Did it not occur to you that other music stores might have exactly the same restrictions placed upon them as regards providing content with DRM?
Apple: But..
Judge: So your position is that you, Apple, are being victimised by the music industry but no other online store is, so you alone need to be able to put DRM on the device?
Apple: Oh. I suppose it is.
Judge: Open your DRM tech so other companies can sell DRMed music for the device, or stop trading in our country. This is a ridiculous double-standard.
Personally, I think the whole thing is bogus, though. Seriously, just don't buy from iTMS if you don't want to be locked into an iPod. It's exactly like buying parts from Cuisinart for your KitchenAid appliances. In for a penny, in for a pound. I'm tired of people whining because they made a choice with obvious consequences.
This is as good advice as any, yeah. I don't have an iPod but I came close to buying one; it's not like they force you to use the DRM. It just seems a pity that many people who don't realise how these systems work could end up with music that they can no longer play for no better reason than the place where they bought it, down the line. Bothers me.
I'm not sure where this "they're after the iPod" thing comes in though; I mean, they have no desire to ban iPods outright (why would they?), just presumably make them more "open". Similarly to the European demands being made of Microsoft. I'm not sure I agree with their actions here, but a lot of the arguments people are making against them just don't hold any particular water.
In any case - Apple would not support an iPod with third party software. And most people want support. Most people buy iPods because they JUST WORK.
That's the point I was going for. Although they wouldn't support/warranty something with a non-standard firmware on it, you can always restore the official firmware if needs-be, so it's less of a serious issue. What is a serious issue is that it significantly changes the way that the iPod works, so it no longer "JUST WORK"s as people expect. It's a crappy, crappy solution, basically. Not one that even bears consideration, and certainly not one that will allow them to wrangle out of the effects of this move in Norway.
There's actually very little stopping you from licencing the XBox dev kit and writing a PS3 emulator for the Xbox360. Good luck with that though.
You're not comparing equal sides there. This is music. It's encoded in a well-known, open way. With consoles the processor, graphics, APIs, everything, change between platforms. With music, what changes? The encoding is the same. The protection scheme is the only thing which needs to be worked around. But when the company sues in court that one is not allowed to implement that scheme, it becomes an artificial limitation.
Vendor lock-in is one of the biggest possible problems with DRM. I don't, personally, think there should be laws prohibiting DRM software. But there should be laws preventing artificial lock-in like this. Look at what's happened to Microsoft in Europe for not opening their APIs to allow interoperability. How is this any different?
Ahem.....no. Apple cannot stop a third party developing a client for DRM that can be loaded onto the iPod. Linux runs on an iPod - why not third party DRM.
This at least voids your warranty, and is not necessarily a safe operation. It changes the way that the player works, effectively turning it into a different player which just looks the same. This is not a sensible or practical solution by any stretch of the imagination.
Apple have developed their own solution for DRM.
And it's the only one which works or can work on an unmodified iPod, the only device at-all relevant to this discussion. And that DRM cannot be licenced or reverse-engineered because of legal challenges posed by Apple.
So there is really NOTHING stopping a third party solution which can download any music from any store and sync to the iPod.
Except that with an unmodified iPod (which, remember, is the only device relevant to this discussion), the fact that one cannot load third-party DRMed content on is stopping them. Personally I don't want DRM, and the watermark system being discussed as the replacement for DRM currently might well help this, but at the moment, that's a definite show-stopper. Saying otherwise is just nonsense, really.
If Apple are forced to share their shop with competition ( after all their shop exists ONLY to enhance the iPod experience ) I want to be able to license the Walmart business process.
It's not about sharing the store, it's about sharing the market. If the shop exists only to "enhance the iPod experience", they should be able to easily licence the DRM tech out to other people. I mean it just means that people who wanted to could choose to go to other places. They don't need to advertise the other places. They don't need to change their store at all.
I'm not sure what the Walmart business process thing means in relation to this. Do they sell CDs that only play in Walmart CD players?
Because the iPod is a portable music player and the other things are x86 computers. They have said that the only portable music player which can play Fairplay music is the iPod. Just because you can use these things as portable music players, it is not their intended use, and they would not deal well with it.
The point is that these devices are not comparable to an iPod. They're a different class of device.
This is a stretch to breaking point. One would need a device considerably more powerful than a pocket music device to run the whole iTunes software product; for example, it could not be done on an iPod. And rival stores still can't sell DRMed music which plays on an iPod, simply because Apple won't let them.
So does that mean that Zune and Sony's Atrak and WMA are also banned?
Zune hasn't been released outside of the US, but it seems pretty definite that it'd be affected by the same rule. ATRAC is an encoding format, not a DRM system; the difference being that it's not designed to stop other people reading it, it's just not used by other people. Also, ATRAC is implemented by other manufacturers; Sony did not say "no, you may not licence or use this because we want to be the only ones to use it".
Well what about software that only runs on one operating system? After Ipods can run other operating system sso it's not the ipod that is doing the lock-in it's the operating system on the ipod.
It's not the iPod which is in trouble, it's the store, and its policy of only being compatible with iPods (and the converse; iPods only playing music from one DRMed store). This is an artificial constraint, the only reason other companies can't run iTMS music on their players or provide DRMed music that plays on an iPod is that Apple won't let them. By contrast, operating systems only run one type of executable because executables are complicated and can be implemented in a variety of ways. It's not like there's anything stopping people writing software which allows someone to run programs from another operating system, or licencing things which cause compatibility problems from their makers. By contrast, Apple have repeatedly sued those who have created systems allowing interoperability with iPods and iTMS.
By that reasoning all windows software is windows only and must be banned.
Yeah, I got the clarification (I don't like using the word "device" for non-portables but I suppose it's accurate). I think you're right about iTMS's original purpose, yes, but there is an obvious problem when Apple will not allow other DRM-using stores to produce files for iPods, given their ubiquity. It's all still DRM'd content, too, which people shouldn't be buying, but you know, people are people.
By "device" I meant portable device, clearly. In any case the "device" in that case might as well be the iTunes software. If you're going to count that the word "product" is probably better.
The majority of devices that can play DRM encumbered songs from the ITMS are not iPods.
There are devices that can play iTunes DRM-coded songs that Apple don't make? Last I heard Apple were suing anyone who tried to get non-iPods to play iTMS music, and iPods to play non-iTMS (DRMed) content?
"Pioneered" would generally tend to mean "they started it". It doesn't say anything about their opposition not doing the same thing (in fact, I think it implies that they followed?).
Some elements of the Linux kernel are limited by version number; that clause only applies if the code is licensed with no specific GPL version number named, or if the licence explicitly allows use of "any later version".
Yeah, I kinda glossed over that aspect, and it's a genuine concern. But I like to be optimistic; the really big backers of DRM are larger media companies, and although this doesn't help with video, more modern technologies are making things better for smaller producers who don't have such an obsession with DRM. It's pure optimism though, yes.
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I think it's the "artificial vendor lock-in" thing that's being complained about, not "their own success". Whether you think that that should be attacked or not (I think it's a good reason to never buy anything off of iTMS, but I don't think legal action is justified), it's at least a valid complaint.
Aha! Good point. That's the one example of Apple allowing such a thing, is it not? I don't think it worked out too well for Motorola, either.
There's already a bunch of lawsuits against Microsoft in Europe, and that's not the same issue. I agree, though; they should at least be allowing some kind of licensing for other operating systems (I think that third-party apps can play the WMA DRM, but I could be wrong).
Yeah, that's a great vision and everything. The point that I was responding to was a bit different though.
I'm not saying it's right or it's wrong, I'm just saying the arguments being put forth here in Apple's defence are pretty poor.
Well, yes, but it's as much the store as it is the player. The technology they're attacking is Fairplay, which is pretty much integral to both of them. The difference is that the store effectively won't operate without it, whereas iPods are still useful without.
I suppose it's quite depressing that people are attacking things in this way, but perhaps it's the way things just are. I'm interested to see if this "watermark" scheme that's been up on here recently as a "more open" alternative to DRM gathers any momentum. Even then, there's significant issues.
Judge: Where in the contract does it say you cannot licence your DRM technology to competing music stores?
Apple: Nowhere, but you see we need to make mon...
Judge: Did it not occur to you that other music stores might have exactly the same restrictions placed upon them as regards providing content with DRM?
Apple: But..
Judge: So your position is that you, Apple, are being victimised by the music industry but no other online store is, so you alone need to be able to put DRM on the device?
Apple: Oh. I suppose it is.
Judge: Open your DRM tech so other companies can sell DRMed music for the device, or stop trading in our country. This is a ridiculous double-standard.
This is as good advice as any, yeah. I don't have an iPod but I came close to buying one; it's not like they force you to use the DRM. It just seems a pity that many people who don't realise how these systems work could end up with music that they can no longer play for no better reason than the place where they bought it, down the line. Bothers me.
I'm not sure where this "they're after the iPod" thing comes in though; I mean, they have no desire to ban iPods outright (why would they?), just presumably make them more "open". Similarly to the European demands being made of Microsoft. I'm not sure I agree with their actions here, but a lot of the arguments people are making against them just don't hold any particular water.
That's the point I was going for. Although they wouldn't support/warranty something with a non-standard firmware on it, you can always restore the official firmware if needs-be, so it's less of a serious issue. What is a serious issue is that it significantly changes the way that the iPod works, so it no longer "JUST WORK"s as people expect. It's a crappy, crappy solution, basically. Not one that even bears consideration, and certainly not one that will allow them to wrangle out of the effects of this move in Norway.
There's actually very little stopping you from licencing the XBox dev kit and writing a PS3 emulator for the Xbox360. Good luck with that though.
You're not comparing equal sides there. This is music. It's encoded in a well-known, open way. With consoles the processor, graphics, APIs, everything, change between platforms. With music, what changes? The encoding is the same. The protection scheme is the only thing which needs to be worked around. But when the company sues in court that one is not allowed to implement that scheme, it becomes an artificial limitation.
Vendor lock-in is one of the biggest possible problems with DRM. I don't, personally, think there should be laws prohibiting DRM software. But there should be laws preventing artificial lock-in like this. Look at what's happened to Microsoft in Europe for not opening their APIs to allow interoperability. How is this any different?
This at least voids your warranty, and is not necessarily a safe operation. It changes the way that the player works, effectively turning it into a different player which just looks the same. This is not a sensible or practical solution by any stretch of the imagination.
And it's the only one which works or can work on an unmodified iPod, the only device at-all relevant to this discussion. And that DRM cannot be licenced or reverse-engineered because of legal challenges posed by Apple.
Because the iPod is a portable music player and the other things are x86 computers. They have said that the only portable music player which can play Fairplay music is the iPod. Just because you can use these things as portable music players, it is not their intended use, and they would not deal well with it.
The point is that these devices are not comparable to an iPod. They're a different class of device.
This is a stretch to breaking point. One would need a device considerably more powerful than a pocket music device to run the whole iTunes software product; for example, it could not be done on an iPod. And rival stores still can't sell DRMed music which plays on an iPod, simply because Apple won't let them.
Zune hasn't been released outside of the US, but it seems pretty definite that it'd be affected by the same rule. ATRAC is an encoding format, not a DRM system; the difference being that it's not designed to stop other people reading it, it's just not used by other people. Also, ATRAC is implemented by other manufacturers; Sony did not say "no, you may not licence or use this because we want to be the only ones to use it".
It's not the iPod which is in trouble, it's the store, and its policy of only being compatible with iPods (and the converse; iPods only playing music from one DRMed store). This is an artificial constraint, the only reason other companies can't run iTMS music on their players or provide DRMed music that plays on an iPod is that Apple won't let them. By contrast, operating systems only run one type of executable because executables are complicated and can be implemented in a variety of ways. It's not like there's anything stopping people writing software which allows someone to run programs from another operating system, or licencing things which cause compatibility problems from their makers. By contrast, Apple have repeatedly sued those who have created systems allowing interoperability with iPods and iTMS.
I'm afraid not.
Well, I thought it was funny. *sniffle*
Virtualisation? You could install hundreds of iTunes instances!
Many, many skateboards, on the other thing.
Alternatively you could just dump a mainframe on some skateboards or something. Hurrah.
Yeah, I got the clarification (I don't like using the word "device" for non-portables but I suppose it's accurate). I think you're right about iTMS's original purpose, yes, but there is an obvious problem when Apple will not allow other DRM-using stores to produce files for iPods, given their ubiquity. It's all still DRM'd content, too, which people shouldn't be buying, but you know, people are people.
By "device" I meant portable device, clearly. In any case the "device" in that case might as well be the iTunes software. If you're going to count that the word "product" is probably better.
There are devices that can play iTunes DRM-coded songs that Apple don't make? Last I heard Apple were suing anyone who tried to get non-iPods to play iTMS music, and iPods to play non-iTMS (DRMed) content?
"Pioneered" would generally tend to mean "they started it". It doesn't say anything about their opposition not doing the same thing (in fact, I think it implies that they followed?).
I'll be sure to remember that when I need a catchy gag the next time that Apple has something in common with Refridgerator Microsystems.
Most, but not all, of it, I think. There's a wee bit about it on Wikipedia. :)
Some elements of the Linux kernel are limited by version number; that clause only applies if the code is licensed with no specific GPL version number named, or if the licence explicitly allows use of "any later version".
Yeah, I kinda glossed over that aspect, and it's a genuine concern. But I like to be optimistic; the really big backers of DRM are larger media companies, and although this doesn't help with video, more modern technologies are making things better for smaller producers who don't have such an obsession with DRM. It's pure optimism though, yes.