There is nothing illegal in that
Matter of opinion. It seems anticompetitive to me.
It's not a matter of opinion. Apple doesn't have to share their DRM scheme. Much like Ford does not have to license their engine design, or Boeing doesn't have to license their wing design. If the other companies want to compete Apple is not stopping them from building a better mousetrap to compete. Apple can't legally stifle competition , but they certainly are not obligated to help competitors build a better product.
MS had to use some API, just as Apple had to use some DRM. MS chose to not make their API available to anyone else to stifle competition, just as Apple chose to not make their DRM available to anyone else to stifle competition. (Contrary to the popular myth, Apple makes a substantial profit from iTMS - just look at their shareholder statements).
The problem with that analogy is the secret MS APIs hindered others ability to run as fast (or not at all) on the OS itself, but Apple refusing to license their DRM doesn't prohibit a vendor from building their own app and media store that runs on the OS. Or, they did not hinder other media files from playing in iTunes. It's an apples to oranges comparison.
It also seems the part you conveniently ignored is the part where Jobs explained why they don't license the DRM.
There is nothing illegal in that, and this was already addressed by Jobs at one time when someone asked him about licensing it. He said that if they license it then they would have to consult with ALL of their license partners before they made a change to it. Suddenly they can't change their own product without the permission of everyone else, and on everyone else's timelines.
Let's just remember the DRM is mandated by the content providers in order for iTunes to have content to sell to consumers. No DRM, no content. Now they have DRM free music, but the foolish studios still want video locked down. Your analogy of MS using secret APIs isn't valid because no one forced MS to use the APIs, MS did it themselves to stifle competition. Content providers are forcing Apple to use DRM, it isn't Apple's choice.
I think you're confusing things a bit here. There is no law against a monopoly. None. There are only laws against activity designed to stifle competition to maintain or grow the monopoly. Like them or not, Apple EARNED their current market share with iTunes, and there is nothing illegal about it. Palm can sue if Apple does something to illegally stifle competition, but they can't sue just because Apple has a dominant market share in online music distribution.
I would agree that this probably doesn't really violate any patents, it's just reverse engineering (look to the Lexmark printer ink cartridges as an example). The downside is that this foolishly ties the Palms success to third party updates by Apple to iTunes, and that is a dangerous line to walk. I don't see why Apple would get wound up about this. There is plenty of marketshare for both of them and one doesn't have to fail for the other to succeed. From a consumer standpoint (disclosure: I'm a Mac and iPhone lover and user) I think genuine competition by Palm will be good for us all because we'll get better products. That being said, Palm is risking their whole existence iTunes compatability, and sooner or later something will break and their customers will be pissed. They really have no choice, they have no media ecosystem to tap into, but over the long term they should invest in their own application to manage media/synching.
I kind of thought that was an exagerration myself. Considering Amazon won't tell anyone how many Kindles have sold we can't tell whether it's "enormously popular" at all. Common sense tells me not that many have been sold, because if Amazon had sold a lot they would be shouting it from the tree tops.
Easy there champ. The simple fact is they are right in that netbooks, iPhones and the iPod Touch can all serve this function. I've been reading ebooks on my iPhone since November and I doubt I'll ever go back. I like the old books but the convenience of having my books with me in my pocket is priceless. If your only advantage is battery life (and you happen to live weeks away from a power outlet) then go for the Kindle. The rest of the world is easily served by the alternatives you listed, which cost much less and do "oh-so-much more".
"that would have Americans screaming if the reverse was true."
- I doubt that. As an American I think we're just as gullible to this BS as anyone else, and we're rapidly becoming sheep who accept anything that is dumped on us.
Well stated, on both the statistical example (whether the numbers were accurate or not) and the observation on our government's historical record of incompetence in foreign policy.
Yeah! Like, what if the terrorists got their hands on a mind control ray and turned your children into suicide bombers who will try to kill you? Yeah! What about THAT? Maybe we should take the preventative measures of imprisoning the children so they can't be taken over by the terrorists?
Whew, problem solved!
I actually like his point that in the big scheme this was a tragedy, but not something that justifies the big brother nonsense being used by the US gov't. The government has used cheesy scare tactics to herd the sheep into accepting these bad laws and now we'll be lucky if we can ever get them overturned. If terrorism's goal is to negatively effect the lives of their enemies then they have succeeded. And they have succeeded with the help of the US gov't and people such as yourself you choose to make decisions based on fear rather than reality and courage.
"But still, our Swedish government are just as any other government, whores slaving for the US industries."
- Wow! Feel free to put the blame on the USA. I think a more accurate statement might be "whores slaving for big business". It doesn't matter where the business is based.
You can feel free to pull your head out of your backside. The Catholic Church is NON-biblical organization that forbids priests from marrying (again, a non-biblical principal) and then the clergy ends up molesting innocent children and then hiding the evidence so they don't have to pay out. The Catholic Church is about money and masquerades as a religion. You have to pay to have a mass for someone, pay to light a candle, pay to get a marriage annulled, etc. The reason they don't come clean on the molestation stuff is they have no interest in being morally right, it's about the money. Admitting they did wrong amounts to a huge financial settlement so they'll always engage in some form of subterfuge to avoid that payout.
Good point. The obvious reason is money. Macs are a rising market, and an untapped one by the scare peddlers. So, they routinely send our some prognostication in the form of a press release saying that any day now a deadly Mac virus will be released that will kill all your loved ones. How else are they going to scare up business on a platform that has no need of their snake oil?
These are all trojans. The problem is not the OS, it's the user giving EXPLICIT PERMISSION to install the malware. No OS can protect against that. Talk about making mountains out of molehills. Nice list of FUD you compiled there.
Does your MSI Wind have OS X or the great integration of hardware and the OS? You can keep the cheap MSI Wind and the cheap experience that goes with it. I admittedly pay a extra for a Mac because I get more for my money. I just can't go back to the horrible experience of Winblows or the extra work involved with maintaining Linux. Winblows. ..well blows, and Linux, while powerful, isn't ready for the home market yet.
I understand if you just look at the price tag that you can get a cheaper machine, but a cheaper machine is usually cheaper for a reason.
I agree. If he's not doing editing then FCP is not an issue. Instead get a Mac so you don't have malware issues, it's easy to learn, and it JUST WORKS.
Hate to tell you Linux lovers out there, but this post is right on the money. Linux may be very powerful, but outside of the 1% of geeks out there it won't work for mainstream customers. They want it to just work, no research or trouble involved. Linux is NOT there yet. I hope some day it is, but right now it is not.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not a matter of opinion. Apple doesn't have to share their DRM scheme. Much like Ford does not have to license their engine design, or Boeing doesn't have to license their wing design. If the other companies want to compete Apple is not stopping them from building a better mousetrap to compete. Apple can't legally stifle competition , but they certainly are not obligated to help competitors build a better product.
The problem with that analogy is the secret MS APIs hindered others ability to run as fast (or not at all) on the OS itself, but Apple refusing to license their DRM doesn't prohibit a vendor from building their own app and media store that runs on the OS. Or, they did not hinder other media files from playing in iTunes. It's an apples to oranges comparison.
It also seems the part you conveniently ignored is the part where Jobs explained why they don't license the DRM.
There is nothing illegal in that, and this was already addressed by Jobs at one time when someone asked him about licensing it. He said that if they license it then they would have to consult with ALL of their license partners before they made a change to it. Suddenly they can't change their own product without the permission of everyone else, and on everyone else's timelines.
Let's just remember the DRM is mandated by the content providers in order for iTunes to have content to sell to consumers. No DRM, no content. Now they have DRM free music, but the foolish studios still want video locked down. Your analogy of MS using secret APIs isn't valid because no one forced MS to use the APIs, MS did it themselves to stifle competition. Content providers are forcing Apple to use DRM, it isn't Apple's choice.
I think you're confusing things a bit here. There is no law against a monopoly. None. There are only laws against activity designed to stifle competition to maintain or grow the monopoly. Like them or not, Apple EARNED their current market share with iTunes, and there is nothing illegal about it. Palm can sue if Apple does something to illegally stifle competition, but they can't sue just because Apple has a dominant market share in online music distribution.
I would agree that this probably doesn't really violate any patents, it's just reverse engineering (look to the Lexmark printer ink cartridges as an example). The downside is that this foolishly ties the Palms success to third party updates by Apple to iTunes, and that is a dangerous line to walk. I don't see why Apple would get wound up about this. There is plenty of marketshare for both of them and one doesn't have to fail for the other to succeed. From a consumer standpoint (disclosure: I'm a Mac and iPhone lover and user) I think genuine competition by Palm will be good for us all because we'll get better products. That being said, Palm is risking their whole existence iTunes compatability, and sooner or later something will break and their customers will be pissed. They really have no choice, they have no media ecosystem to tap into, but over the long term they should invest in their own application to manage media/synching.
I kind of thought that was an exagerration myself. Considering Amazon won't tell anyone how many Kindles have sold we can't tell whether it's "enormously popular" at all. Common sense tells me not that many have been sold, because if Amazon had sold a lot they would be shouting it from the tree tops.
Easy there champ. The simple fact is they are right in that netbooks, iPhones and the iPod Touch can all serve this function. I've been reading ebooks on my iPhone since November and I doubt I'll ever go back. I like the old books but the convenience of having my books with me in my pocket is priceless. If your only advantage is battery life (and you happen to live weeks away from a power outlet) then go for the Kindle. The rest of the world is easily served by the alternatives you listed, which cost much less and do "oh-so-much more".
"that would have Americans screaming if the reverse was true."
- I doubt that. As an American I think we're just as gullible to this BS as anyone else, and we're rapidly becoming sheep who accept anything that is dumped on us.
How is the post cowardly? I'm an American and I would say the post was completely accurate. We've become the new East Germany.
DAMN YOU and your unassailable logic!!
Well stated, on both the statistical example (whether the numbers were accurate or not) and the observation on our government's historical record of incompetence in foreign policy.
Yeah! Like, what if the terrorists got their hands on a mind control ray and turned your children into suicide bombers who will try to kill you? Yeah! What about THAT? Maybe we should take the preventative measures of imprisoning the children so they can't be taken over by the terrorists?
Whew, problem solved!
I actually like his point that in the big scheme this was a tragedy, but not something that justifies the big brother nonsense being used by the US gov't. The government has used cheesy scare tactics to herd the sheep into accepting these bad laws and now we'll be lucky if we can ever get them overturned. If terrorism's goal is to negatively effect the lives of their enemies then they have succeeded. And they have succeeded with the help of the US gov't and people such as yourself you choose to make decisions based on fear rather than reality and courage.
"But still, our Swedish government are just as any other government, whores slaving for the US industries."
- Wow! Feel free to put the blame on the USA. I think a more accurate statement might be "whores slaving for big business". It doesn't matter where the business is based.
You can feel free to pull your head out of your backside. The Catholic Church is NON-biblical organization that forbids priests from marrying (again, a non-biblical principal) and then the clergy ends up molesting innocent children and then hiding the evidence so they don't have to pay out. The Catholic Church is about money and masquerades as a religion. You have to pay to have a mass for someone, pay to light a candle, pay to get a marriage annulled, etc. The reason they don't come clean on the molestation stuff is they have no interest in being morally right, it's about the money. Admitting they did wrong amounts to a huge financial settlement so they'll always engage in some form of subterfuge to avoid that payout.
Yeah, let's blame it on Iowa! ALL the world's woes are the fault of Iowa.
Please stop posting until you can say something sensible.
-Not from a reporter, but from someone with more common sense then you obviously have.
Good point. The obvious reason is money. Macs are a rising market, and an untapped one by the scare peddlers. So, they routinely send our some prognostication in the form of a press release saying that any day now a deadly Mac virus will be released that will kill all your loved ones. How else are they going to scare up business on a platform that has no need of their snake oil?
Malware? Yes. Viruses or worms? No.
These are all trojans. The problem is not the OS, it's the user giving EXPLICIT PERMISSION to install the malware. No OS can protect against that. Talk about making mountains out of molehills. Nice list of FUD you compiled there.
Does your MSI Wind have OS X or the great integration of hardware and the OS? You can keep the cheap MSI Wind and the cheap experience that goes with it. I admittedly pay a extra for a Mac because I get more for my money. I just can't go back to the horrible experience of Winblows or the extra work involved with maintaining Linux. Winblows. . .well blows, and Linux, while powerful, isn't ready for the home market yet.
I understand if you just look at the price tag that you can get a cheaper machine, but a cheaper machine is usually cheaper for a reason.
How dare you point out that the Mac will allow them to do work, and Windows will waste their time taking care of . . . Windows.
"you can get a new Windows-based PC quickly and easily"
- And why would it be hard to get a Mac replacement? You know they deliver, don't you?
"Final Cut Pro can't take advantage of multicore processing . . . . That makes editing -slow-."
-What a load of BS. I use FCP all the time and it NEVER blinks. It never acts slow, and that is on a laptop.
And the award for the most FUD filled post belongs to . . . . . boyko.at.netqos!!!
I just said the same thing, but I said it succinctly, and yet poured gas on the fire at the same time!
http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1238131&threshold=1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=28012139#28014289
I agree. If he's not doing editing then FCP is not an issue. Instead get a Mac so you don't have malware issues, it's easy to learn, and it JUST WORKS.
Flame on!!
OR, he could just shut down the project and send me the money. . . . Use Linux? Not for this project, no.
Hate to tell you Linux lovers out there, but this post is right on the money. Linux may be very powerful, but outside of the 1% of geeks out there it won't work for mainstream customers. They want it to just work, no research or trouble involved. Linux is NOT there yet. I hope some day it is, but right now it is not.
On iPhone compatible video there is, yes.
What monopoly do they have again, because I missed it?
Instead of trying to play the FOSS card, why don't you just post that you hate Apple for no good reason and leave it at that.
Bullshit, there damn well is a way to do that because I do it on a lot of videos.
Step down, next case!