Scoble wrote a piece on the iPod the other day. I couldn’t help myself but write back.
Dear Scoble.
I read your post about why iPod is about giving up choice. My first impression was that this is a hilarious thing for someone from Microsoft to say, given everything Microsoft does only works with Windows (except for vary rare exceptions). I had a read of the comments, and noted that most people disagreed with you, and then realised I should reread your post and pay attention to what you were actually saying.
What you actually mean is that AAC/FairPlay and iTunes Music Store is about giving up choice. I say this because you base your “choice” argument on the AAC/FairPlay format when you talk about the iPod. Given that iPods play the de-facto industry standard of MP3 there are plenty of other sources for iPod music. Any search on a Peer to Peer network will show it as the leader in music encoding formats. MP3 is currently the best choice, given it works on many more platforms than any other music media (look at the latest selection of DVD players), and almost every player on all OSs can rip CDs in that format, including iTunes.
I live in Australia, so can not use the iTunes Music Store. Due to legalities I just can’t buy anything from them. I have an iPod, and most of my music is in MP3 format, of which I can get music from anywhere. As you can see, the two can live happily apart.
So, to boil your argument down further your issue is therefor with AAC/FairPlay. No, not really, because AAC is not Apples, and not a lock in or restriction of choice either. AAC was developed by the MPEG group (MPEG-2 Advanced Audio Coding (AAC)). Like MP3 it’s an open standard that anyone can use. Its use in platforms will come down to how popular its acceptance is in the market, not because it is imposed by Apple. In fact Microsoft could easily implement it in Window Media Player if it chose.
Finally, the root of the argument. What you meant to say was that the iTunes Music Store limits choice because they’re the only users of the FairPlay DRM. It really isn’t to do with the iPod, though it seems by your passion that perhaps you want it to be. iPod does not mean giving up choice. It runs with Windows, Mac OS X and for those Linux purists it’ll run with that to (see Using an iPod with Linux). A grand total of most of the OS market.
So I agree with you. iTunes Music Store’s use of the FairPlay DRM limits choice. Of course it does, so does the Windows Media DRM. It only works with Windows Media. In fact Napster and Walmart’s music currently only play on Windows. That’s limiting choice even more. At least iTunes works on Windows and OS X.
As for what 2006 holds, I think as far as DRM use with legal online music stores goes, which is your real argument, it’s way too early to predict. Whichever DRM becomes more pervasive will rule, and you’ll find the stores adopting this new standard. You may as well chuck out DRM 9 Series and FairPlay as they’ll both be obsolete. So for the time being, if you do buy from an online music store your best converting it to MP3, or some other none-DRM file format if you want it to play on something you buy in a couple of years.
So please Scoble. Before you rip into another piece of technology that happens to be lapping up market share, sit down and have a close look at what it is you don’t like. Anytime you’re prepared to admit that it’s not the iPod that you’re against, we’ll all listen.
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