Who would have known that that the death of DRM would come in the form of a
press release? While
MP3 stores are nothing new, with iTunes moving to a 100% DRM free catalog by the 31st of March this now cements a de facto standard of DRM free music in the marketplace. As a side effect it's now a near certainty that
AAC will become the successor of
MP3.
posted by Talez
on Jan 6, 2009 -
135 comments
The Day the Music Died The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) [...] has also been warning anyone who would listen that they should not “purchase” encrypted music from these services, since if these services go under then all that “purchased” music will no longer… what’s the word… “play”. But mostly people ignored them (and me), because, you know, Microsoft was at the center of it all, and nobody ever got fired for “buying” from Microsoft.
posted by desjardins
on May 7, 2008 -
67 comments
iTunes Plus has been released. Following
EMI's announcement that it would begin offering its entire catalog DRM-free (and a
barely-averted torpedoing of that plan), Apple has released an update to iTunes that offers DRM-free, 256kps AAC songs for $1.29. Entire albums are the same price as their DRM-laden counterparts. Those who have purchased EMI music can upgrade their files for $.30/song, $.60/album, or 30% of the album price.
Currently only EMI is on-board, but
Apple is perfectly happy to bring other labels into the DRM-free universe.
posted by mkultra
on May 30, 2007 -
99 comments
Thoughts on Music "...in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store." — Steve Jobs
posted by timeistight
on Feb 6, 2007 -
137 comments
iConcertCal - The most awesomest iTunes plugin ever--tells you when bands you have MP3s for are playing your town.
{via an email from this dude.}
posted by dobbs
on Feb 1, 2007 -
59 comments
Peter Gabriel has introduced a new iTunes plugin for Windows XP called
The Filter. Using the All Music Guide in a fashion similar to
Pandora, the software builds playlists from your library for you after you select a few tracks. Their marketing copy tells you that you should "Prepare to be reengaged and reinvigorated by your iTunes library."
OS X, WinAMP, and WMP versions are slated for the near future.
posted by beaucoupkevin
on Oct 16, 2006 -
55 comments
FairPlay is turned about. "DVD" Jon Lech Johansen, of
DeCSS fame, has reverse engineered Apple's
FairPlay DRM technology, which has thus far prevented 3rd-party digital music players from playing music purchased from the iTunes Store. RealNetworks did
something similar in 2004, but Johansen is licensing it to whomever wants it.
posted by mkultra
on Oct 2, 2006 -
41 comments
So, the US Army is having trouble meeting it's recruitment goals, and is
lowering the bar for admission to try and make up the shortfall. Another tactic they are apparently trying is sweetening the deal with
3 free (FREE!!!) iTunes downloads if you agree to talk to a recruiter. It'd be foolish NOT to sign up, frankly!
posted by jonson
on Oct 6, 2005 -
56 comments
While the
Grateful Dead were pioneers in the sharing of music, it wasn't too long ago that fans had to meet in-person with other DeadHeads at taping parties to grow their library of "bootlegs." In the late 1990s when CD burners became more prominent, The Dead again led the way. They went on record to say that fans were still welcome to
copy, share and trade their music as long as no money changing hands—including no advertising on web sites with downloads. Yesterday, the band again made history when they announced they are releasing the contents of their vast vault electronically (and simultaneouly) on iTunes Music Store and their very own
Grateful Dead online store, the latter making the songs available in mp3 (128 and 256kbps) and FLAC .
posted by terrapin
on Mar 2, 2005 -
74 comments
Real and France's Virgin claim that they deserve to be able to sell their music on Apple's iPod. To prove they're serious, Virgin Mega has filed a complaint against Apple to do so. Perhaps I'm missing something here, but last I checked it wasn't anybody's responsibility to open up their product or service to purposely allow the competition in. That is, of course, unless the government steps in. Are Real and Virgin Mega just being whiny little brats, angered that they're not invited to the party? What are legitimate reasons for the legal system to get involved and to rule in favor of such plaintiffs? While the obvious Microsoft may come to mind, are there other examples you can think of? As for me, I'd like to hand out copies of "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead" to both Real and Virgin Mega...
posted by tgrundke
on Aug 6, 2004 -
41 comments
Apple iTunes 4.5 was released yesterday, bringing with it several nice new features, such as a live-updating "Party Shuffle" playlist — as well as not-so-nice features like attaching Music Store links to every artist and album in your library (I turned this off immediately). As for the
iTunes Music Store itself, Apple has integrated its QuickTime features of music videos and movie trailers (this is related to music how?), shopper-created "iMixes" and for this month, a new "Free Track of the Day," a questionable asset being that today's artist is
Avril Lavigne. ...Perhaps you'd rather have an
album sung entirely with "meows".
posted by Down10
on Apr 29, 2004 -
39 comments
The hugely popular
iTunes is a success story. But not for Apple, which makes
virtually no revenue from the online download service.
"
When that 99 cents leaves your wallet, the RIAA monopoly swallows most of it, and the credit card companies swallow the rest. As the supplicant in this relationship, Apple is left holding the can." Steve Jobs -
"
We would like to break even/make a little bit of money but it's not a money maker,"
posted by Blue Stone
on Nov 7, 2003 -
57 comments
Apple's iTunes Music
Store sold over
1 million songs in its first week of operation, almost instantly making it the largest and most successful online music company in the world. Though we've already discussed at great length how it compares to free downloads
here, my question is: how is this going to affect the traditional (legal) distribution channels? With an ever growing library (3,200 songs added today to the 200,000 they started with), incredible convenience ($1, 1 click, and ~1 minute download to get that song you've been dying to hear), and the ease of use we've come to expect from Apple, I think that they're no longer competing with
Kazaa and
Limewire, they're starting to pose a serious threat to
Amazon,
Tower, etc.
posted by rorycberger
on May 6, 2003 -
60 comments
It's official - Apple today launched its' music service So now that it's 'beyond hype', the rumors of Apple's buyout of Universal Music unfounded (instead, sealing deals with each of the big five music firms), what does everyone think of this rather slick, easy to use and somewhat inexpensive alternative to illegal music swapping? $.99 per song seems pretty fair to me, not to mention the very generous licensing terms provided.
posted by tgrundke
on Apr 28, 2003 -
164 comments
An "insanely great" solution to MP3 piracy that users AND the recording industry will accept? While still only a rumor, Apple Computer may be developing a service in conjunction with all major recording studios to permit easy, inexpensive downloading of music through Apple's famed 'iTunes' music cataloging/burning software. Knowing Apple's penchant for ease-of-use and clean, solid design (combined with some hard-knuckle Steve Jobs negotiations with the recording industry), could a $.99 per song (or similar) service take off and bring legitimacy to downloaded music and acceptance from both the industry and users? If true, it's also good to see the consumer electronics industry taking some initiative and responsibility to provide solutions - not blame and accusations.
posted by tgrundke
on Mar 4, 2003 -
61 comments
iTunes 2 was released recently. Some poor OS X users
lost all their data after installing this seemingly innocuous software. (about a third of the way down)
Is being on the bleeding edge worth it? What responsibility does a software manufacturer have to prevent from damaging your data? Any other horror stories from installing just released software? Not bashing Apple, as I'm using a Mac myself.
posted by the biscuit man
on Nov 5, 2001 -
25 comments
Woah. Apple dropped the price of the Cube to $1300, released iTunes 1.1, and just started selling the strangest looking iMac you've ever seen.
Now I want a Cube, a G4 Powerbook, a G4 tower, *and* an iMac.
posted by jragon
on Feb 21, 2001 -
43 comments
Steve Jobs on selling apps based on life beyond the Net "I edited a digital movie of my children using our iMovie software," he said. "It took me about an hour, and when I showed it to my wife, she started crying. It was clearly the most emotional thing I've ever done on a computer in my life." ...
"The Internet is a wonderful thing and for a while it was such a blinding bright light that it obscured every other bright light," he said. "It's a wonderful thing, it's a magical thing, but there are other wonderful things too. Music is a wonderful thing. Movies are wonderful things."
posted by allaboutgeorge
on Jan 21, 2001 -
13 comments
