Here's the proof that Jobs' letter was not just some publicity stunt. During the question-and-answer at today's press conference, EMI CEO Eric Nicoli was asked this:
Q: It's a pretty radical step, Eric. How did you reach the decision to do it? Was it Steve Jobs' letter that convinced you? Was it the internal surveys you've done? What was the moment in which you said, "Damn it, we're gonna go DRM-free?" And will the extra sales be enough to compensate for the declining physical sales?
A: We've always known Steve's view on the subject, long before his open letter.
Jobs, it seems, has long been advocating this position to the labels behind closed doors. The letter just made these views public. I assume he was getting frustrated with all the complaints about Apple being the bad-guy on DRM and wanted to redraw the lines of responsibility.
The full transcript can be seen here: http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2624
If you've read any of the stories over the past several weeks about EMI, they've said that EMI has been trying to negotiate advance payments from the music download services in exchange for "taking on the risk" of offering DRM-free content. They've driven a hard bargain, however, and no deals were reached.
Reading between the lines, it appears that Apple was able to give EMI the increased compensation it wanted by breaking with Apple's longstanding commitment to 99 cent downloads. This is a significant move on Apple's part. Apple apparently also made higher-quality song files part of the deal, a big plus for consumers. Plus, albums still cost the same.
I believe that, contrary to what a lot of the complainers seem to think, Apple is actually pushing the labels a lot closer toward what consumers want. There is give and take, of course. Apple can't get everything, so they gave in on pricing.
Publicity stunt? Come off it. Jobs said that if the labels would agree to go with DRM-free music Apple would do it in a heartbeat. Then, he cuts a landmark deal with one of the big four do do precisely that! Some people just won't stop complaining. Apple is always the bad guy, no matter what they do. First, they get accused of trying to lock everybody into a propriety format. Then, they make music available with no copy restrictions, and people still complain.
You act like the record companies are blameless when it comes to DRM. Did you notice the reaction to Jobs's letter from Warner execs? They want DRM and Jobs was absolutely right to focus blame on them since Apple, rather than the labels, is getting the attention from Norwegian and other European consumer regulatory agencies.
Personally, I am very glad that they didn't use mp3 format. AAC is better. It's too bad more manufacturers players haven't bothered to adopt this open format. It's not like they haven't had YEARS to get on board. At the vary least, they should have seen millions of iTunes users import their CDs into AAC format and had the smarts to figure out that giving their players the ability to play this freely-available format might give them the ability to win some customers who didn't want to transcode all their files. Even Microsoft was able to figure this out with the Zune. Sony has done it too, finally, which only makes sense since they were part of the group that helped develop it.
This is huge. A stake to the heart of DRM on music. Applaud it. Press for the other big labels to do the same. Enjoy DRM-free and transcodable high-bit rate files.
Whatever works for you, but I can't imagine spending so much time organizing my music library that way. I also have a hard time believing that most people want to spend that much time on it either. iTunes makes it all very easy to import and organize a library, even though sometimes I change the genre info that comes from the Gracenotes database. The (smart) playlists feature is great, and it can be used creatively to create all kinds of playlists that change dynamically. Just as nice is that the iTunes library gets updated with info from one's iPod when syncing, like what songs have been played most recently. The music library is a database and I like to manipulate it as such.
If you just want to drag and drop, you can do that from within iTunes itself. There's little practical difference between doing this via the iTunes interface and any other navigational window.
Given that, I suppose your point is why can't it at least be optional? I assume it has to do with copy protection. Unlike most mp3 player manufacturers, Apple has deals with the record labels. The labels are very sensitive to people using their iPods as tools for easy transfer of music from one person to another. Of course, there are plenty of software tools out there to get around the restrictions that prevent uploading of songs from iPod to PC, but Apple has to play ball at some level.
infinitely less useful than a hacked xbox media center
For you, that's probably true at this point in time, but the very fact that you have a hacked xbox media center and are reading Slashdot puts you out on the fringe of the target market. Apple is very good at delivering products that non-techies can use, and it turns out that there are a lot of non-techies out there.
"But they should do it by creating a better product (we're talking about the hardware here), not by forcing people to choose their hardware through this artificial lock-in."
Apple is not forcing anybody to buy anything. You buy it if you want it. That's it. Although I can understand that someone might want the Mac OS but not to buy Apple hardware, there are a lot of things that I would like to buy from companies on terms that aren't available to me. Buying channels a la carte from my cable company, for example, is one of them. In Apple's case, the harware-OS combination is the product that Apple offers. It's not "artificial." Consumers can make their own choices. The ability to boot Windows as well as the Mac OS is a bonus, and Apple is smart use that as a selling point.
Obviously opinions differ, but I like Apple hardware. My first Mac was a Mac SE purchased in 1989. I retired it in 1998. It was still working perfectly. My next Mac was a Power Mac G3 desktop purchased in 1998. I retired that last year, still functoning fine, running Mac OS X despite its age. My current Mac is a G5 dual-processor machine, just about three years old. It's been great. Sure, I paid a little more up front, but I think that I have gotten plenty of value from these machines.
The point is that college is saving money compared to what had been their alternative prior to Boot Camp. Some people may not like the fact your hypothetical choice is not available (at least not at this point), but Apple has a right to create a differentiated product and try to sell it. It may be a great success, it may not, but I am sure that Apple is in a far better position to do the market analysis than I am.
Apple is not Microsoft. Apple makes its money from hardware, and it is able to generate higher margins on that hardware by writing its own operating system to go with it. As Dell struggles these days with its business model, it seems to me that Apple is doing a very smart thing. Making the Mac OS available for any random PC out there would be a huge headache for Apple. Think drivers. Take the variety of complaints from Vista owners about drivers not being available and magnifiy that many times for all the drivers that would need to be written for the Mac OS. I recently read that a Vista installation takes about 15 gigs of hard drive space, while the Mac OS takes about 2 to 4 gigs. Part of that must be due to the greater complexity of handling so many different plaforms.
People can complain, but Microsoft probably doesn't care that much. Their margins from selling Windows licenses to Boot Camp users are surely higher than what they get from the OEMs. The OEMs might not like it, but Apple is under no obligation to make the Mac OS available to them.
The Mac zealotry argument does not really fly in this case. If you read the original article, it says that the IT head of the college was "before the switch was a dyed-in-the-wool Windows user." He clearly states the reasons for switching in terms of cost savings ($150,000). One set of machines will be able to do what previously required two sets of machines. Set up one lab. Boot up in Windows or the Mac OS depending on what the professor wants. They save money by buying fewer machines overall, as the article states.
Besides, speaking overall, anti-Mac zealotry on the part of IT departments has been a huge barrier against more widespread adoption of Macs. IT people know Windows. They'd rather have to maintain only a single platform. In most business environments, and in many academic ones, there is no choice at all. It's just Windows. So what's the big deal if one institution decides to use machines that, gasp, can boot both Windows and the Mac OS? Must be zealotry. . .
I suppose they could save even more money by just refusing to buy Macs at all and forcing all courses to use Windows only. In that case, it would just be a smart financial decision, right? Happens all the time.
Boot camp will be out of beta as soon as Leopard arrives, which will be a few months at most. Not worth fretting about that at this point. Apple has to provide that disclaimer for the time being.
I await the promised publishing of the email exchanges with Apple on his blog. If he shows that he actually did provide Apple with details on the exploit, then he might restore some credibility. As it stands, however, his demo yesterday sounds like more of the same obfuscation that has characterized this whole incident.
1) In the original demo, he gained command-line access to the target machine (using a third-party wireless card). The claim was made to Brian Krebs in the Washington Post that the built-in wireless was similarly vulnerable (which would be far more relevant, since all MacBooks have built-in wireless). Yesterday's demo showed a crash of the target machine. That's bad, but he still has not demonstrated a takeover of the MacBook using the built-in wireless after all this time.
2) The fact that Apple's patch addresses the flaw that caused the crashing does not prove that Maynor engaged in responsible disclosure. Apple has said that Maynor provided them with no code or other details about the exploit, and that they did their own investigation. The investigation, according to Apple, revealed a flaw, leading to the patch. The issue is NOT whether a flaw existed. All Maynor demonstrated was that Apple's security patch works, which is really not that enlightening.
Stevie Jobs will not "let" me. What kind of crap is that?
You forget that Steve Jobs does not own the content and wrongly assume that the networks would allow Apple to sell their shows with this restriction removed. Jobs cannot force the networks to make iTMS shows burnable to DVD. They, the networks, make a pretty penny selling those DVDs themselves.
Just one of a series of article from people speculating out their arses about how bad iPhone sales will be. It is subject to many of the same logical flaws as other articles of this kind.
First, rather than assume the obvious -- that this is just the first version of a product for which Apple already has a long-term plan -- it assumes that the price and capabilities that Apple has stated thus far are basically fixed. The iPod provides a reasonable example of how Apple will likely proceed. Start at the top of the market and get those customers who are willing to pay top dollar, introduce newer models down the road to target other segments of the market, add capabilities, bring down prices over time as components become less expensive.
Second, it argues that competition is just too high in this market for Apple to make inroads. This argument usually comes from those who compare lists of functions. Plays mp3s? Check. Email? Check. These people miss the fact that the key is making these features a pleasure to use rather than the province of geeks who love to tinker with gadgets all day. Sure there are phones that have these functions, but the companies that make them do not have Apple's UI design capabilities nor will they likely to keep up with Apple in terms of writing good software to link with the phone. There are plenty of people like me who will not buy the first iteration but most likely will buy future versions, with cheaper prices and more features.
As for hubris, I'll say this. The fact that Apple only needs to announce this phone in order to generate months of online speculation and arguments about its success is proof enough that interest in this phone far exceeds than in any other phone out there. People can always find some reason to criticize one aspect of the phone or another, but they are still arguing about it. If the iPhone truly represented nothing significant compared to what is out there already, there would be nowhere near so much attention. But people have seen the demo and know that this represents the next big thing in phones. . .
Jobs' position is that making DRM work well is much easier if one has control over all the pieces. That undoubtedly is true.
If Microsoft's DRM were so excellent, the head of Yahoo Music would not be saying that it "doesn't work half the time." Now there's a ringing endorsement of a supposedly interoperable system from one of it's chief vendors. Players in the PlaysForSure paradigm had to be certified for use in the system, and there are still problems.
It is not clear to me exactly what people expect Apple to do, but making its DRM work across a range of existing players that were never designed to work with FairPlay does not seem likely. See the other poster on how Microsoft's DRM requires a certain decoder chip. Apple obviously can't go back in time and change other manufacturer's hardware. Most of those players can't even play the open AAC format. At best, it would seem that the system could be made to work with future mp3 players that were designed for that purpose. Another potential solution would be some sort of software package to convert DRM into another format, but who is to say that existing players will play that format either? Interoperable DRM sounds okay in the abstract, but the devil is in the details.
Jobs is right. The best solution for consumers is no DRM at all. Period. Please stop trying to defend the RIAA's position. If they get what they want, there will be a huge DRM mess.
Of course, no DRM is the ideal solution. However, IF this solution is not possible and DRM must be used to buy music from the big labels, then a universal DRM scheme is a better option than Apple's closed DRM scheme.
Agree on this point, but I would reassert two points. First, a universal DRM scheme should not be under the control of any one of the major players. A neutral body should design and maintain it. Second, we are presently at a critical juncture with respect to the future of DRM. If consumers are better off without it, we should advocate for that outcome. That means embracing what Jobs is saying and pushing for that outcome. We, the consumers, are in charge. If we refuse to buy music with DRM, then the labels can't sell it.
Jobs made this "commitment" knowing full well that the labels will not agree. In this same open letter, he argued against licensing FairPlay. This conveniently locks-in (to the iPod) all those suckers who bought iTunes Store m4p files.
I know a lot of people believe this, but it doesn't square with what is actually happening. eMusic's CEO, for instance, accused Jobs of trying to jump on the anti-DRM bandwagon since the industry is moving in that direction already. Yahoo Music's general manager said, "The labels understand that DRM has to go," he says. "It's nothing but a tax on digital consumers. There's good momentum behind DRM going away." And EMI is apparently inking deals with several online music stores to sell DRM music. So, while there will be holdouts like Bronfman, I don't think it's correct to say that DRM-free music is not a possibility. It definitely is, and we should try to keep the momentum going rather than parrot the same arguments made by idiots like Bronfman.
Here's the deal. The change in rights took place in conjunction with an update to the iTunes software. When installing the update, the user as usual had to click to agree to the licensing terms. Someone who chose not to install the software update lived under the older terms (10 burns of a playlist and 3 authorzed machines) and still could be doing so. Of course, Apple can provide strong reasons to upgrade by preventing old versions of iTunes from being used to buy iTMS music. Buyers of new iPods also must have new versions of iTunes.
Personallly, I am very glad for the change. It took loosened a restriction that affected me (the limit to three machines), and tightened one that has absolutely zero impact on me and never will. It is trivial to get around the seven-burn restriction, and after years of using iTunes I don't think I've ever burned the same playlist more than two or three times anyway.
We'd be better off without DRM, but I have to say that Apple's DRM has never actually prevented me from doing anything I wanted to do.
This line of argument is fairly common (even DVD Jon is spouting it), but I hope it goes away soon. Why? Consumers should be doing everything to promote the end of DRM, not try to come up with rationalizations for why a workable, universal DRM scheme might be devised. Jobs has publicly committed Apple to selling DRM-free music if the labels will agree. EMI, at least, seems somewhat open to the idea. eMusic is doing quite well selling DRM-free music. Momentum seems to be building, despite Bronfman's idiocy.
The implication of the argument that Apple could build a universal DRM scheme is that it *should*. Instead, consumers ought to capitalize on Jobs' statement and pile the pressure on. Encourage Apple to sell DRM-free music, now, from those labels that permit it. Buy DRM-free music whenever possible from those download services that offer it. Better yet, refuse to buy any music from Warner, Sony, or any other company that refuses to sell you DRM-free music.
More directly to your point, I am not sure that Microsoft has really "managed it." Reports are that trying to maintain the system has been cumbersome. When things don't work, who is to blame? The device manufacturer? The music service? Microsoft? The fact that the Zune has its own DRM is telling. Control over all pieces of the system solves a lot of problems.
PlaysForSure, moreover, was created when Microsoft was not in the business of manufacturing its own player. It could be a neutral party in working with device manufacturers to make players that met the specifications to be certified PlaysForSure by Microsoft. It seems highly problematic, on the other hand, to force the number one manufacturer of mp3 players to coordinate with its competitors concerning some aspects of how these players are designed and what features their operating systems must have to make the DRM work.
The incentives are always there to make things not work quite so well for competitors. For example, Microsoft's control over Windows gives it a competitive advantage over other companies that try to sell Windows applications. Competitors products "break" mysteriously. Competitors don't have access to hidden hooks into the operating system. Would an Apple-organized DRM system really work all that well for competitors and consumers in the end? I doubt it. If there is to be a universal DRM scheme, a neutral body should design it and maintain it.
With DRM-free music, it doesn't matter. As Jobs said, it the clearly the best solution for consumers.
Another endorsement for Quicksilver (or LaunchBar for another option). I can't imagine working without it! Every important app, file, web url, etc. that I use is accessible with just a few keys. Best of all, the program learns the user's own shorthand. Anybody who is frustrated with navigation on the Mac should give it a try.
Quibbling about statistics is missing the significance of the statement from Jobs: Apple is publicly committed to sell DRM-less music if the labels will agree. People can say what they want about Jobs' motives, but at a very fundamental level he is right. The vast majority of music sold is sold without DRM. Making DRM "work" is complicated, and it becomes more complicated the greater the number of players involved. Consumers would all be better off if there were no DRM.
Many of those carping at Jobs and nitpicking about statistics oppose DRM. So what if we don't have the ideal statistics to measure iTMS lock-in. There will be absolutely no lock-in if music can be sold without DRM. THAT is the point. Why quibble? Just embrace the goal and build pressure on the labels.
"So, what proportion of iTunes users have an iPod? What is the average number of songs per iTunes user. Should we be counting people who have only a couple of songs as iTunes users? Only a minority of iPod users are affected. Maybe a moinority of iTunes users are also affected. But is it enough to be concerned over?"
Good questions. I'd just point out that the higher the *average* number of songs per iTMS customer, the greater the proportion of iPod owners who either do not use iTMS at all or barely use it.
Right, but in this case the "extreme" is bounded by zero on the low end, so the extremes on the upper end push actually the average number of songs *higher* than what is the case for the typical iPod owner. The median number of songs would give a better picture of the typical iPod. In this case, the median number of songs is most certainly less than 22, so Jobs point is even stronger.
Think of it this way. Bill Gates walks into a stadium full of people who have no money, and each person is very wealthy according to the average level of wealth. The median person, however, has no money. On a less extreme scale, the average number of songs overstates the extent to which a typical person is locked into iTMS music.
Don't get me wrong, I would like to see them take on the labels and ban DRM, but I am not holding my breath.
Perhaps you misunderstand the point. It's a matter of interest group politics. Banning DRM would be contrary the desires of some domestic stakeholders within Norway. This constituency will lobby their own government to retain DRM. It is easier to impose restrictions on the operation of a foreign corporation.
I am skeptical that any "solutions" imposed by the Norwegian government will actually be intelligent ones. I think the two best solutions are very straightforward:
1) Outlaw DRM altogether, or require that DRM can be stripped without burning to a CD.
2) If we must have DRM, create a common DRM that all players can use.
Since a government is not able to perform #2, that leaves #1. Solution #1 requires that they take on the record labels. Unfortunately, it does not seem that this is the kind of solution they have in mind. Instead, they pick on one vendor that happens to have created the most commonly-used DRM.
When you say, "I think other players should be allowed to work with iTunes," I take you literally and strongly disagree. Apple should not be forced to deal with the manufacturers of every POS mp3 player out there just to be sure that iTunes works well with their player. iTunes works very well because Apple can control all pieces. In contrast, Microsoft found that a system like Plays-for-Sure is not easy, and that is why the Zune has it's own DRM.
We're are all talking about a device that is 6 months away from being available on the market. Very few details have been released. So, yeah, I am speculating. Isn't everyone? Only a few people at Apple really know how hard it will be for third-party developers to sell apps for the iPhone. Most people seem to assume Apple is closing everyone out entirely. I am betting not so closed, but who really knows? It's ALL speculation based on a few quotes from Jobs and others.
Your comments just cast judgment -- "unsubstantiated" . . . "unproven" . . . "arguably wrong" -- without any effort to defend or substantiate a position of your own. If you have a real argument to make, go for it.
That's a product killer, given that the most popular smartphones already on the market (especially those running PalmOS and Windows Mobile) are tremendously extensible via 3rd party offerings. . . . Apple should embrace 3rd party development, since it will sell many more iPhones, rather than the current strategy.
You might be right, but I'll venture to guess that Apple knows what it's doing. We'll see how sales actually go when the phone hits the market. It's an empirical question, after all.
Besides, at this point, we really don't know about just how many third-party apps will get through Apple's vetting process. There just isn't very much information yet, but my bet is that there will be a lot more third-party developer activity for the iPhone than people seem to think. I saw one post from a developer who attended a development forum on the iPhone at MacWorld who wrote that he/she was dropping all other projects to work on iPhone-related projects. He/she could not provide details due to a non-disclosure agreement. Apple is secretive, but it is not stupid.
In the abstract, I see nothing wrong with Apple making an effort to ensure compatibility and proper installation of non-Apple apps. Apple's tendency is to favor application quality over quantity. There is a trade-off at some level between wide-open access for third-party development and platform stability. In the end, there may not be quite as many little apps for the iPhone to do every last little function that some tiny part of the marketplace may want, but there will be robust, well-designed apps to handle all key functions. And, frankly, that's all Apple needs to secure a chunk of what is a huge market. Apple does not have to target the entire market in order to have a winning product. Trying to target the entire market, moreover, would probably be counterproductive.
Actually, I don't believe it requires an external drive. As the Apple site says in a little sidebar on the Time Machine page, "Backup Disk: Change the drive or volume you're backing up to. Or back up to a Mac OS X server computer." Since an internal drive can be partitioned into multiple volumes, Time Machine should work just fine with a single, internal drive. Of course, if that drive goes down, your backup goes down too, but that's another matter entirely! I suppose it remains possible that the backup volume would be ZFS formatted . . .
With respect to wanting multiple windows in sight at the same time, different people work in different ways. There's no right or wrong way. It's funny, though, because I often want to read from one window while typing on another and find it suprising that other's don't seem to find this useful. I suppose it's the kind of work I do. For example, I might want to quote from the scanned image of an article. Or, I want to enter data into a spreadsheet from the output of a statistical program.
As for browser windows, if I actually used all the horizontal space the window would be really disproportionate, but then I am using a 20-inch display. I find few sites that actually expand to take up all this space (mostly they just add a lot of white space), and if they do they look really ugly.
Slashdot Mirror
If you've read any of the stories over the past several weeks about EMI, they've said that EMI has been trying to negotiate advance payments from the music download services in exchange for "taking on the risk" of offering DRM-free content. They've driven a hard bargain, however, and no deals were reached.
Reading between the lines, it appears that Apple was able to give EMI the increased compensation it wanted by breaking with Apple's longstanding commitment to 99 cent downloads. This is a significant move on Apple's part. Apple apparently also made higher-quality song files part of the deal, a big plus for consumers. Plus, albums still cost the same.
I believe that, contrary to what a lot of the complainers seem to think, Apple is actually pushing the labels a lot closer toward what consumers want. There is give and take, of course. Apple can't get everything, so they gave in on pricing.
Publicity stunt? Come off it. Jobs said that if the labels would agree to go with DRM-free music Apple would do it in a heartbeat. Then, he cuts a landmark deal with one of the big four do do precisely that! Some people just won't stop complaining. Apple is always the bad guy, no matter what they do. First, they get accused of trying to lock everybody into a propriety format. Then, they make music available with no copy restrictions, and people still complain.
You act like the record companies are blameless when it comes to DRM. Did you notice the reaction to Jobs's letter from Warner execs? They want DRM and Jobs was absolutely right to focus blame on them since Apple, rather than the labels, is getting the attention from Norwegian and other European consumer regulatory agencies.
Personally, I am very glad that they didn't use mp3 format. AAC is better. It's too bad more manufacturers players haven't bothered to adopt this open format. It's not like they haven't had YEARS to get on board. At the vary least, they should have seen millions of iTunes users import their CDs into AAC format and had the smarts to figure out that giving their players the ability to play this freely-available format might give them the ability to win some customers who didn't want to transcode all their files. Even Microsoft was able to figure this out with the Zune. Sony has done it too, finally, which only makes sense since they were part of the group that helped develop it.
This is huge. A stake to the heart of DRM on music. Applaud it. Press for the other big labels to do the same. Enjoy DRM-free and transcodable high-bit rate files.
Whatever works for you, but I can't imagine spending so much time organizing my music library that way. I also have a hard time believing that most people want to spend that much time on it either. iTunes makes it all very easy to import and organize a library, even though sometimes I change the genre info that comes from the Gracenotes database. The (smart) playlists feature is great, and it can be used creatively to create all kinds of playlists that change dynamically. Just as nice is that the iTunes library gets updated with info from one's iPod when syncing, like what songs have been played most recently. The music library is a database and I like to manipulate it as such.
If you just want to drag and drop, you can do that from within iTunes itself. There's little practical difference between doing this via the iTunes interface and any other navigational window.
Given that, I suppose your point is why can't it at least be optional? I assume it has to do with copy protection. Unlike most mp3 player manufacturers, Apple has deals with the record labels. The labels are very sensitive to people using their iPods as tools for easy transfer of music from one person to another. Of course, there are plenty of software tools out there to get around the restrictions that prevent uploading of songs from iPod to PC, but Apple has to play ball at some level.
For you, that's probably true at this point in time, but the very fact that you have a hacked xbox media center and are reading Slashdot puts you out on the fringe of the target market. Apple is very good at delivering products that non-techies can use, and it turns out that there are a lot of non-techies out there.
"But they should do it by creating a better product (we're talking about the hardware here), not by forcing people to choose their hardware through this artificial lock-in."
Apple is not forcing anybody to buy anything. You buy it if you want it. That's it. Although I can understand that someone might want the Mac OS but not to buy Apple hardware, there are a lot of things that I would like to buy from companies on terms that aren't available to me. Buying channels a la carte from my cable company, for example, is one of them. In Apple's case, the harware-OS combination is the product that Apple offers. It's not "artificial." Consumers can make their own choices. The ability to boot Windows as well as the Mac OS is a bonus, and Apple is smart use that as a selling point.
Obviously opinions differ, but I like Apple hardware. My first Mac was a Mac SE purchased in 1989. I retired it in 1998. It was still working perfectly. My next Mac was a Power Mac G3 desktop purchased in 1998. I retired that last year, still functoning fine, running Mac OS X despite its age. My current Mac is a G5 dual-processor machine, just about three years old. It's been great. Sure, I paid a little more up front, but I think that I have gotten plenty of value from these machines.
The point is that college is saving money compared to what had been their alternative prior to Boot Camp. Some people may not like the fact your hypothetical choice is not available (at least not at this point), but Apple has a right to create a differentiated product and try to sell it. It may be a great success, it may not, but I am sure that Apple is in a far better position to do the market analysis than I am.
Apple is not Microsoft. Apple makes its money from hardware, and it is able to generate higher margins on that hardware by writing its own operating system to go with it. As Dell struggles these days with its business model, it seems to me that Apple is doing a very smart thing. Making the Mac OS available for any random PC out there would be a huge headache for Apple. Think drivers. Take the variety of complaints from Vista owners about drivers not being available and magnifiy that many times for all the drivers that would need to be written for the Mac OS. I recently read that a Vista installation takes about 15 gigs of hard drive space, while the Mac OS takes about 2 to 4 gigs. Part of that must be due to the greater complexity of handling so many different plaforms.
People can complain, but Microsoft probably doesn't care that much. Their margins from selling Windows licenses to Boot Camp users are surely higher than what they get from the OEMs. The OEMs might not like it, but Apple is under no obligation to make the Mac OS available to them.
The Mac zealotry argument does not really fly in this case. If you read the original article, it says that the IT head of the college was "before the switch was a dyed-in-the-wool Windows user." He clearly states the reasons for switching in terms of cost savings ($150,000). One set of machines will be able to do what previously required two sets of machines. Set up one lab. Boot up in Windows or the Mac OS depending on what the professor wants. They save money by buying fewer machines overall, as the article states.
Besides, speaking overall, anti-Mac zealotry on the part of IT departments has been a huge barrier against more widespread adoption of Macs. IT people know Windows. They'd rather have to maintain only a single platform. In most business environments, and in many academic ones, there is no choice at all. It's just Windows. So what's the big deal if one institution decides to use machines that, gasp, can boot both Windows and the Mac OS? Must be zealotry. . .
I suppose they could save even more money by just refusing to buy Macs at all and forcing all courses to use Windows only. In that case, it would just be a smart financial decision, right? Happens all the time.
Boot camp will be out of beta as soon as Leopard arrives, which will be a few months at most. Not worth fretting about that at this point. Apple has to provide that disclaimer for the time being.
I await the promised publishing of the email exchanges with Apple on his blog. If he shows that he actually did provide Apple with details on the exploit, then he might restore some credibility. As it stands, however, his demo yesterday sounds like more of the same obfuscation that has characterized this whole incident.
1) In the original demo, he gained command-line access to the target machine (using a third-party wireless card). The claim was made to Brian Krebs in the Washington Post that the built-in wireless was similarly vulnerable (which would be far more relevant, since all MacBooks have built-in wireless). Yesterday's demo showed a crash of the target machine. That's bad, but he still has not demonstrated a takeover of the MacBook using the built-in wireless after all this time.
2) The fact that Apple's patch addresses the flaw that caused the crashing does not prove that Maynor engaged in responsible disclosure. Apple has said that Maynor provided them with no code or other details about the exploit, and that they did their own investigation. The investigation, according to Apple, revealed a flaw, leading to the patch. The issue is NOT whether a flaw existed. All Maynor demonstrated was that Apple's security patch works, which is really not that enlightening.
You forget that Steve Jobs does not own the content and wrongly assume that the networks would allow Apple to sell their shows with this restriction removed. Jobs cannot force the networks to make iTMS shows burnable to DVD. They, the networks, make a pretty penny selling those DVDs themselves.
Just one of a series of article from people speculating out their arses about how bad iPhone sales will be. It is subject to many of the same logical flaws as other articles of this kind.
First, rather than assume the obvious -- that this is just the first version of a product for which Apple already has a long-term plan -- it assumes that the price and capabilities that Apple has stated thus far are basically fixed. The iPod provides a reasonable example of how Apple will likely proceed. Start at the top of the market and get those customers who are willing to pay top dollar, introduce newer models down the road to target other segments of the market, add capabilities, bring down prices over time as components become less expensive.
Second, it argues that competition is just too high in this market for Apple to make inroads. This argument usually comes from those who compare lists of functions. Plays mp3s? Check. Email? Check. These people miss the fact that the key is making these features a pleasure to use rather than the province of geeks who love to tinker with gadgets all day. Sure there are phones that have these functions, but the companies that make them do not have Apple's UI design capabilities nor will they likely to keep up with Apple in terms of writing good software to link with the phone. There are plenty of people like me who will not buy the first iteration but most likely will buy future versions, with cheaper prices and more features.
As for hubris, I'll say this. The fact that Apple only needs to announce this phone in order to generate months of online speculation and arguments about its success is proof enough that interest in this phone far exceeds than in any other phone out there. People can always find some reason to criticize one aspect of the phone or another, but they are still arguing about it. If the iPhone truly represented nothing significant compared to what is out there already, there would be nowhere near so much attention. But people have seen the demo and know that this represents the next big thing in phones. . .
Jobs' position is that making DRM work well is much easier if one has control over all the pieces. That undoubtedly is true.
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If Microsoft's DRM were so excellent, the head of Yahoo Music would not be saying that it "doesn't work half the time." Now there's a ringing endorsement of a supposedly interoperable system from one of it's chief vendors. Players in the PlaysForSure paradigm had to be certified for use in the system, and there are still problems.
http://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/mt/archives/2
It is not clear to me exactly what people expect Apple to do, but making its DRM work across a range of existing players that were never designed to work with FairPlay does not seem likely. See the other poster on how Microsoft's DRM requires a certain decoder chip. Apple obviously can't go back in time and change other manufacturer's hardware. Most of those players can't even play the open AAC format. At best, it would seem that the system could be made to work with future mp3 players that were designed for that purpose. Another potential solution would be some sort of software package to convert DRM into another format, but who is to say that existing players will play that format either? Interoperable DRM sounds okay in the abstract, but the devil is in the details.
Jobs is right. The best solution for consumers is no DRM at all. Period. Please stop trying to defend the RIAA's position. If they get what they want, there will be a huge DRM mess.
Agree on this point, but I would reassert two points. First, a universal DRM scheme should not be under the control of any one of the major players. A neutral body should design and maintain it. Second, we are presently at a critical juncture with respect to the future of DRM. If consumers are better off without it, we should advocate for that outcome. That means embracing what Jobs is saying and pushing for that outcome. We, the consumers, are in charge. If we refuse to buy music with DRM, then the labels can't sell it.
I know a lot of people believe this, but it doesn't square with what is actually happening. eMusic's CEO, for instance, accused Jobs of trying to jump on the anti-DRM bandwagon since the industry is moving in that direction already. Yahoo Music's general manager said, "The labels understand that DRM has to go," he says. "It's nothing but a tax on digital consumers. There's good momentum behind DRM going away." And EMI is apparently inking deals with several online music stores to sell DRM music. So, while there will be holdouts like Bronfman, I don't think it's correct to say that DRM-free music is not a possibility. It definitely is, and we should try to keep the momentum going rather than parrot the same arguments made by idiots like Bronfman.
Here's the deal. The change in rights took place in conjunction with an update to the iTunes software. When installing the update, the user as usual had to click to agree to the licensing terms. Someone who chose not to install the software update lived under the older terms (10 burns of a playlist and 3 authorzed machines) and still could be doing so. Of course, Apple can provide strong reasons to upgrade by preventing old versions of iTunes from being used to buy iTMS music. Buyers of new iPods also must have new versions of iTunes.
Personallly, I am very glad for the change. It took loosened a restriction that affected me (the limit to three machines), and tightened one that has absolutely zero impact on me and never will. It is trivial to get around the seven-burn restriction, and after years of using iTunes I don't think I've ever burned the same playlist more than two or three times anyway.
We'd be better off without DRM, but I have to say that Apple's DRM has never actually prevented me from doing anything I wanted to do.
This line of argument is fairly common (even DVD Jon is spouting it), but I hope it goes away soon. Why? Consumers should be doing everything to promote the end of DRM, not try to come up with rationalizations for why a workable, universal DRM scheme might be devised. Jobs has publicly committed Apple to selling DRM-free music if the labels will agree. EMI, at least, seems somewhat open to the idea. eMusic is doing quite well selling DRM-free music. Momentum seems to be building, despite Bronfman's idiocy.
The implication of the argument that Apple could build a universal DRM scheme is that it *should*. Instead, consumers ought to capitalize on Jobs' statement and pile the pressure on. Encourage Apple to sell DRM-free music, now, from those labels that permit it. Buy DRM-free music whenever possible from those download services that offer it. Better yet, refuse to buy any music from Warner, Sony, or any other company that refuses to sell you DRM-free music.
More directly to your point, I am not sure that Microsoft has really "managed it." Reports are that trying to maintain the system has been cumbersome. When things don't work, who is to blame? The device manufacturer? The music service? Microsoft? The fact that the Zune has its own DRM is telling. Control over all pieces of the system solves a lot of problems.
PlaysForSure, moreover, was created when Microsoft was not in the business of manufacturing its own player. It could be a neutral party in working with device manufacturers to make players that met the specifications to be certified PlaysForSure by Microsoft. It seems highly problematic, on the other hand, to force the number one manufacturer of mp3 players to coordinate with its competitors concerning some aspects of how these players are designed and what features their operating systems must have to make the DRM work.
The incentives are always there to make things not work quite so well for competitors. For example, Microsoft's control over Windows gives it a competitive advantage over other companies that try to sell Windows applications. Competitors products "break" mysteriously. Competitors don't have access to hidden hooks into the operating system. Would an Apple-organized DRM system really work all that well for competitors and consumers in the end? I doubt it. If there is to be a universal DRM scheme, a neutral body should design it and maintain it.
With DRM-free music, it doesn't matter. As Jobs said, it the clearly the best solution for consumers.
Another endorsement for Quicksilver (or LaunchBar for another option). I can't imagine working without it! Every important app, file, web url, etc. that I use is accessible with just a few keys. Best of all, the program learns the user's own shorthand. Anybody who is frustrated with navigation on the Mac should give it a try.
Quibbling about statistics is missing the significance of the statement from Jobs: Apple is publicly committed to sell DRM-less music if the labels will agree. People can say what they want about Jobs' motives, but at a very fundamental level he is right. The vast majority of music sold is sold without DRM. Making DRM "work" is complicated, and it becomes more complicated the greater the number of players involved. Consumers would all be better off if there were no DRM.
Many of those carping at Jobs and nitpicking about statistics oppose DRM. So what if we don't have the ideal statistics to measure iTMS lock-in. There will be absolutely no lock-in if music can be sold without DRM. THAT is the point. Why quibble? Just embrace the goal and build pressure on the labels.
"So, what proportion of iTunes users have an iPod? What is the average number of songs per iTunes user. Should we be counting people who have only a couple of songs as iTunes users? Only a minority of iPod users are affected. Maybe a moinority of iTunes users are also affected. But is it enough to be concerned over?"
Good questions. I'd just point out that the higher the *average* number of songs per iTMS customer, the greater the proportion of iPod owners who either do not use iTMS at all or barely use it.
Right, but in this case the "extreme" is bounded by zero on the low end, so the extremes on the upper end push actually the average number of songs *higher* than what is the case for the typical iPod owner. The median number of songs would give a better picture of the typical iPod. In this case, the median number of songs is most certainly less than 22, so Jobs point is even stronger.
Think of it this way. Bill Gates walks into a stadium full of people who have no money, and each person is very wealthy according to the average level of wealth. The median person, however, has no money. On a less extreme scale, the average number of songs overstates the extent to which a typical person is locked into iTMS music.
Don't get me wrong, I would like to see them take on the labels and ban DRM, but I am not holding my breath.
Perhaps you misunderstand the point. It's a matter of interest group politics. Banning DRM would be contrary the desires of some domestic stakeholders within Norway. This constituency will lobby their own government to retain DRM. It is easier to impose restrictions on the operation of a foreign corporation.
I am skeptical that any "solutions" imposed by the Norwegian government will actually be intelligent ones. I think the two best solutions are very straightforward:
1) Outlaw DRM altogether, or require that DRM can be stripped without burning to a CD.
2) If we must have DRM, create a common DRM that all players can use.
Since a government is not able to perform #2, that leaves #1. Solution #1 requires that they take on the record labels. Unfortunately, it does not seem that this is the kind of solution they have in mind. Instead, they pick on one vendor that happens to have created the most commonly-used DRM.
When you say, "I think other players should be allowed to work with iTunes," I take you literally and strongly disagree. Apple should not be forced to deal with the manufacturers of every POS mp3 player out there just to be sure that iTunes works well with their player. iTunes works very well because Apple can control all pieces. In contrast, Microsoft found that a system like Plays-for-Sure is not easy, and that is why the Zune has it's own DRM.
We're are all talking about a device that is 6 months away from being available on the market. Very few details have been released. So, yeah, I am speculating. Isn't everyone? Only a few people at Apple really know how hard it will be for third-party developers to sell apps for the iPhone. Most people seem to assume Apple is closing everyone out entirely. I am betting not so closed, but who really knows? It's ALL speculation based on a few quotes from Jobs and others.
Your comments just cast judgment -- "unsubstantiated" . . . "unproven" . . . "arguably wrong" -- without any effort to defend or substantiate a position of your own. If you have a real argument to make, go for it.
You might be right, but I'll venture to guess that Apple knows what it's doing. We'll see how sales actually go when the phone hits the market. It's an empirical question, after all.
Besides, at this point, we really don't know about just how many third-party apps will get through Apple's vetting process. There just isn't very much information yet, but my bet is that there will be a lot more third-party developer activity for the iPhone than people seem to think. I saw one post from a developer who attended a development forum on the iPhone at MacWorld who wrote that he/she was dropping all other projects to work on iPhone-related projects. He/she could not provide details due to a non-disclosure agreement. Apple is secretive, but it is not stupid.
In the abstract, I see nothing wrong with Apple making an effort to ensure compatibility and proper installation of non-Apple apps. Apple's tendency is to favor application quality over quantity. There is a trade-off at some level between wide-open access for third-party development and platform stability. In the end, there may not be quite as many little apps for the iPhone to do every last little function that some tiny part of the marketplace may want, but there will be robust, well-designed apps to handle all key functions. And, frankly, that's all Apple needs to secure a chunk of what is a huge market. Apple does not have to target the entire market in order to have a winning product. Trying to target the entire market, moreover, would probably be counterproductive.
Actually, I don't believe it requires an external drive. As the Apple site says in a little sidebar on the Time Machine page, "Backup Disk: Change the drive or volume you're backing up to. Or back up to a Mac OS X server computer." Since an internal drive can be partitioned into multiple volumes, Time Machine should work just fine with a single, internal drive. Of course, if that drive goes down, your backup goes down too, but that's another matter entirely! I suppose it remains possible that the backup volume would be ZFS formatted . . .
With respect to wanting multiple windows in sight at the same time, different people work in different ways. There's no right or wrong way. It's funny, though, because I often want to read from one window while typing on another and find it suprising that other's don't seem to find this useful. I suppose it's the kind of work I do. For example, I might want to quote from the scanned image of an article. Or, I want to enter data into a spreadsheet from the output of a statistical program.
As for browser windows, if I actually used all the horizontal space the window would be really disproportionate, but then I am using a 20-inch display. I find few sites that actually expand to take up all this space (mostly they just add a lot of white space), and if they do they look really ugly.