Apple Responds To iTunes "First Sale" Question 323
atallah writes "It looks like Apple has come out and explained its position on resale of songs. It is interesting that they didn't flat-out reject the idea.
Check out this Business Week article."
Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:2)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Interesting)
So if a song gets sold 3 times in 2 years, they have had to authorize/reauthorize it 4 times and only getting paid one time, less than one dollar (and pay royalties). Unless they charge a handling fee for transfering (say 25 cents) so you to make it a deal, you have to sell for 25 cents, so it is half price. Then again, even IF they made the same money to sell first, or help resell, the music producers are going to pressure them to push new tunes, so THEY make money. Remember the lawsuits with Garth Brooks, trying to get royalties for reselling music?
There really are some problems. It IS unreasonable to ask Apple to subsidize everyone's auctions by doing the changeover for free, but almost any fee is alot of money compared to the whole price. So they are correct, there are technical problems given how cheap the 99 cents is to download.
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:3, Informative)
They still have a way to go on the store yet, even for Mac users. Last night I tried to buy some Warren Zevon (RIP) and all they had was one album, and several partial albums. The annoying "partial album" results from the patchwork of rights -- they have permission for thi
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Interesting)
This was the theoretically legal basis for pirating on BBSes in the 80s (a few anyway). They had one legal copy, and they let other borrow it. Of course, MS software has EULAs that say you can't do that anymore. This of course has its own problems, because when I go to Kinkos and rent a box, am I not borrowing or renting the software as well as the hardware?
That is why they have DRM, which takes us full circle if it denies them the legal right to resell it....got a headache now...
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:2)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:3)
Though sympathetic to your general view, this is wrong. Doesn't matter whether you are distributing a copy of a copyright work "non-commercially" or selling it; it's still a violation of copyright. The governing principle is (AFAIK, IANAL) not whether YOU are making money or not, but whether your distribution could adversely affect the rights and income of the copyright owner.
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:4, Informative)
Fiction? (Score:3, Interesting)
And is still used on some rom-swapping sites these days. But it's more of an urban legend than anything else since - correct me if I'm wrong - it has no legal weight at all. Instead this '24 hours and delete' has become a particularly hard to kill meme which a great many people seem to believe but in actual fact is pretty much untrue.
Transfer Between Accounts (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. They will by no means be required to facilitate a free transfer function. Just because you have the right to do something doesn't mean that they have to help you do it---and certainly not for free. That would be like saying that a record company should pay your postage if you sell your CD over eBay.
Having said that, I think it would be great if Apple would provide this facility.
Oh, I don't know... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you could do a pretty good case when you show that Apple is refusing to acknowledge a change of ownership in their DRM, and so directly ignore the doctrine of First Sale. If you want the physical analogy, it would be having the right to sell your propery - only it is biometrically locked to you. And you have a company that can modify that lock, only they refuse to do so stating they have no legal obligation to help. Do you think that would be acceptable?
Kjella
Re:Oh, I don't know... (Score:5, Insightful)
In your lock case, what if the company able to modify the lock was NOT the company that sold you the product? Would you expect them to do it for free?
Because apple did not reject the legality issue outright, citing either
[If you wanted to transfer say.....500 songs, There should be some nominal fee to be able to do that....]
And as always, I heart Kjella.
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, what happens to my music library when I am dead? How can I leave my music to my loved ones?
more than one reason to copy an iTunes song (Score:5, Interesting)
I often download iTunes songs, burn them to CD, and then rip them. The quality sounds fine to me. I don't personally do it for resale or illegal copying; I'm a jazz musician, and when I want to practice and memorize a new song, I make versions of it that are electronically sped up and slowed down so that it's in 6 or 7 different keys, so that I can practice playing along with it in all those different keys. This of course falls under the personal use exception to copyright, not the doctine of first sale.
The cool thing is that when you have a digital technology that doesn't have a bunch of plastic padlocks built into it, different people can do different things with it, and they don't have to say "Mother may I."
It was interesting that the article claims there are legal decisions from the copyright office saying first sale doesn't apply to digital stuff -- that's the first I'd of heard that. Can't say I really care, though: Congress gave me the right of first sale, the personal use exception, and the fair use doctrine, so a bunch of unelected bureaucrats can take them away from me when they pry them from my cold, dead hands.
RE: right of first sale questions (Score:5, Interesting)
If this is, indeed, the case - and the courts do decide that digital works aren't covered by it, that really opens up a whole can of worms.
Among other things, it means Microsoft is right after all, when they want to stop you from reselling unopened/unused OEM versions of their operating systems that were originally bundled with new PCs. (First Sale doctrine is the main argument people had in their favor, when trying to recoup money lost when they were forced to buy their new laptop or desktop system with Windows pre-loaded on it.)
Even the "personal use" exception seems to be under fire these days, as the publishers of digital works keep trying to find more ways to milk extra $'s from people (DMCA, etc.).
Unless things change, one of these days, you just might find it has become illegal to practice existing music without paying for a "musician's license" from the recording industry. (We're sorry, but without a license issued by the original copyright holder - you're simply engaging in attempted illegal reproduction of our copyrighted works, Mr. Musician!)
Re:Much agreed with Apple (Score:3, Informative)
Ripping off of a CD should not cause any sound degradation at all if done propertly. It's the process of encoding it as some lossy format that degrades the quality.
testing the waters (Score:5, Funny)
Quite a crafty response... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Quite a crafty response... (Score:3, Insightful)
Code is law.
They've eliminated the doctrine of first sale for all practical purposes with their copyright monopoly and the ever present threat of DMCA enforcement.
Apple makes pretty computers and music players but I know I didn't elect them.
In a way it's good that they've tried to weasel out of this- they are at least acknowledging that in theory the right of first sale might apply to digital bits. That means it's not a license, it's actually a sale. In the words often attributed to
First sale. (Score:5, Interesting)
The doctrine of first sale doesn't apply just to copyright.. it applies to everything. You can only sell something once.. then it's not yours anymore.. the same goes for a book.
Apple isn't weaseling out of anything.. they are merely showing that something is not their problem to solve.. they were up front about what you were paying them for. The rest is up to you.
Around...how? (Score:5, Insightful)
And why would you charge less than 99 cents for it? It's a dollar. Most people aren't so scroogish about their money that they will try to get a dollar back. And most on-line money transfer places don't make it economical to sell something for a buck. The fees are too high. With PayPal you'd only end up with 66 cents on that dollar. And it's quite a hassle to mail you a dollar in which case I'm paying an additional 37 cents at least.
Apple got it right. The technical restrictions and the low cost make it a waste of effort to try to resell to regain the cost of the product, much less make a profit. They quite literally made it impossible to be undersold.
If songs ever stop being offered by Apple then one may have a business opportunity. But that would require buying numerous licenses of each song to make it worth it and require some foresight into what's going "out of print" that people will still want years from now in order to avoid wasting money on songs you'll never be able to sell once the market swings your way to check out what you have.
Instead of fighting Apple in this worthless pursuit of pennies, you'd be better off forming an allience with indie bands and set up a business being the first time sellers of their music. There's a huge market for that.
Ben
Re:Around...how? (Score:3, Interesting)
Good point, but what about selling albums? In that case it gets big enough to be worthwhile.
Re:Around...how? (Score:4, Insightful)
The point is to see if the First Sale doctrine applies to digital media. It's a big question and it's worth being approached.
Re:Around...how? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re-selling individual songs might not be cost effective, but selling collections is.
Re:Quite a crafty response... (Score:3, Insightful)
But this could be an opportuntiy to prove, once-and-for-all, to the RIAA and MPAA, that DRM can be used in a way that is acceptable to them.
Assuming that Apple keeps a database of all the computers authorized for a given copy of a song, have all those computers relinquish control of the song, so the DB shows all blanks.
Not just selling (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not just selling (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not just selling (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not just selling (Score:4, Insightful)
I would really like to see the first sale doctrine reaffirmed for digital works, because it is an important principle to uphold and the copyright office apparently doesn't see it as such.
Re:Not just selling (Score:5, Insightful)
Not quite true.
Duplication of physical goods requires raw materials (paper & toner, or blank disks/tapes) and has an inherent cost in both time and money.
Why don't people photocopy the latest best seller? Because of the cost inherent with the process.
Further restraints aren't necessary in the analog world because the nature of the media is itself a restraint.
In the digital world it is just bits. I can make 10,000 copies of a music file for a net 0 cost -- my cable modem is a flat rate and my PC can serve files in the background without interfering with what I am doing.
What would 10,000 copies of a physical CD cost in duplication, time and distribution? How about the latest Harry Potter book?
In the digital world, the media itself no longer acts as a restraint.
Now, whether this is good or bad, enivitable or not is beside the point. There ARE differences between physical items and digital ones and pretending there aren't is an argument that won't fly.
Let's see here... (Score:3, Insightful)
I have, in my hand, a copy of a Harry Potter book.
In my other hand, I have a digital camera. Watch, as I take a photo of page 52.
Oh my, it appears the text is readable. Here, let me just share this out on Kazaa... (As a matter of fact, most popular books are shared right now)
What was the difference again?
Reality check here. Copyright applies to patterns of information. ALL patterns of information can be digitized and copied at (practically) zero cost.
The real difference here
Re:Let's see here... (Score:4, Interesting)
I have, in my hand, a copy of a Harry Potter book.
In my other hand, I have a digital camera. Watch, as I take a photo of page 52.
Oh my, it appears the text is readable. Here, let me just share this out on Kazaa... (As a matter of fact, most popular books are shared right now)
Right. Now do that 500 more times and exactly how many people are going to flip thru 500 JPEGs instead of spending $20? "Oh, shit. I didn't get pages 241-247 off of KaZaA!"
The ones I've seen online aren't done like that. They are done by teams of people who each scan and OCR a chapter, then release it as PDF after correcting it by hand.
I'm not disputing the traditional media companies are fighting tooth and nail to preserve their existing profit model. Not am I disputing that they will eventually lose -- it is like trying to hold back the tide.
What I'm saying is that there is a distinct difference in both cost and mechanism for duplicating and distributing andlog and digital media. YOU were talking about digitizing -- converting analog to digital then distributing the digital.
The new digital era really makes the publishers -- the middlemen -- mreo and more marginal. It becomes possible for the artist/author to distribute their work without the publisher.
The main reason digital books haven't taken off more is because there is no decent digital display as good as a book. PDA screens are too small. PCs & PDAs are too fragile, too heavy and too expensive. Most people don't want to sit in front of a monitor to read a book. Once a decent device for this is created, the publishers are going to really start their death screams...
Re:Let's see here... (Score:4, Insightful)
The new digital era really makes the publishers -- the middlemen -- mreo and more marginal. It becomes possible for the artist/author to distribute their work without the publisher.
First, I will grant you that it is a helluva lot easier to copy and distribute shit with computers over the internet. However,
HARD DRIVE SPACE AIN'T FREE.
It is cheap. However, I needed to spend $120 to get a 60GB hard drive (a year ago or so) to store my movies on my computer so that I could put the DVDs away from the kids. For music, hard drive space is really cheap. It's going about $1/GB last time I checked, and 1 GB will hold 204.8 5MB files (mp3s or oggs). That's about 20 albums worth of space, for $1. I'll bet that's close to what CDs cost wholesale, or on large print runs. You can buy blank CDRs at about $1/10, at Costco (probably other places, Costco isn't cheapest on computer stuff). Now I'm burning the .avi files off onto CDRs because I don't have enough room on the hard drive, and the kids have learned that if they play with the CDs, they will destroy the movies (lost two already like that).
The main reason digital books haven't taken off more is because there is no decent digital display as good as a book. PDA screens are too small. PCs & PDAs are too fragile, too heavy and too expensive. Most people don't want to sit in front of a monitor to read a book. Once a decent device for this is created, the publishers are going to really start their death screams...
I have to disagree with this. I think there are many contributing factors to digital books not taking off. One of them is that when you have a digital book, you expect to be able to read it on ay computer you own. This is not so, however. You give the publisher a unique identifier and they use it to generate a key to unlock your copy, and that's the end of the transaction. Also, digital book formats are not standardized, there are several. I've had 3 separate programs on my Clie just to read books. Buying an eBook is not a simple process. If they really want to make money, they'd make it as simple as buying a book. Give someone $5, take home a book, read it anywhere. But software developers have to all agree on a file format that the publishers like, and support it. How about plain text? :)
Finally, Baen is one publisher that is doing its job to lead the publishing industry into the next generation, and I fully intend to purchase more books from them, as soon as I've read the free library to filter out the good authors from the rest. I look forward to other publishers following Baen's example, or dying. HOpefully Del Rey won't die, last I checked they were still one of the best sci-fi publishers.
Re:Not just selling (Score:2)
Think about it this way. Most people own a lot of music that they're not listening to right now. Imagine if they lent it out to people who wanted it, with the ability to claim it back if they decided to listen to it. People could buy a lot less music, and still listen to just as much.
Now scale this to the internet and automate all the searching, and hardly anyone will buy music again (some people will have to for each new album, and real fans wi
Not a Market?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not a Market?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not a Market?? (Score:4, Insightful)
Blind man and elephant (Score:2)
Giving a listener a 30 second segemnt of a 6 minute long song is like offering an elephant for sale to a blind man, but handing him the trunk for evaluation. The blind man isn't going to be very happy when he gets his new python home only to find out that it is somewhat different than he expected.
Re:Not a Market?? (Score:2)
Re:Not a Market?? (Score:2)
Some smart soul should setup a website with the sole purpose of buying and selling used legit music files.
Maybe I should send that into the appropiate office, so none of you bastards steal it
Re:Not a Market?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Clever! (Score:3, Insightful)
Thus, it neatly avoids entangling itself in the 'first sale' right issue by making it entirely an issue of 'practicality'; without offering a mechanism to transfer the Apple ID, Apple locks you into ownership.
-Alex
Re:Clever! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Clever! (Score:5, Insightful)
under the dmca (Score:2)
Therefore, while you may not reverse engineer Apple's format for the sake of generating high-quality mp3 rips, you may reverse engineer it for the purpose of selling your music or playing it on a better OS.
Apple is not as moronic as the RIAA, MPAA, and SCO. They won't jump to piss off customers and/or die in a blaze of bitching glory. That said, they are still as business that will break the law or piss off customer
Re:Clever! (Score:5, Interesting)
Just as a bookseller in no way has to help you sell the book when you are done with it.
How the song you bought would be delivered, and waht mechanisms apple provided for you to do things with it were CLEARLY spelled out by Apple beforehand, as this is a logical question to anyone who wants to download stuff.
Apple is entirely right.. they are not getting in the middle of it.. why should they? They were clear about what they offered, and what it cost.. and you took it.
Re:Clever! (Score:3, Insightful)
Apple is entirely right.. they are not getting in the middle of it.. why should they? They were clear about what they offered, and what it cost.. and you took it.
Thank god you didn't write US contract law. Not all mutually consensual agreements are legal.
For instance, to take an extreme example, even if Apple clearly states that your firstborn child will be a slave in their iPod factory, and even if you then agree to those terms, the terms are illegal. I'm sure you've seen unenforceable EULA's and emp
Re:Clever! (Score:2)
It seems you and others here have cast Apple in the role of RIAA puppet. A company that desperately wants to kill your fun and prevent you from doing what you want with what you bought. I don't believe that at all. I believe Apple thought about making illegal copying and distribution difficult, and probably not at all about reselling. They probably don't care, beyond the fact that it's impractical to a degree that probably not many people will bother, thus making it
market for resold music (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong! Many many people will buy mp3s if its only 10 cents an mp3 and they would not mind a "used copy". Someone reselling can put the price so low if he has rights to the song after he is done listening to it.
Re:market for resold music (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:market for resold music (Score:2, Insightful)
You will pay someone because they provide you the music you want, when you want.. and that is that. It will be so convenient to let htem do this, you won't bother hoarding a collection.
Or something.
Apple is being quite clear.. they got into this to sell some tunes online.. and it worked, they made some money, and paid for the cost of rolling out ITMS. If it goes under, it's not like they'll end up a billion
Re:market for resold music (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:market for resold music (Score:2)
Re:market for resold music (Score:4, Insightful)
Not too impractical (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not too impractical (Score:2)
I think Apple has a right to charge a small service fee for updating your rights. If it's a matter of a key sent to the client, I think it's reasonable to require them to charge no more than ten cents to somehow retire your old key and issue a new one.
Re:Not too impractical (Score:2)
Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
They aren't giving an absolutely firm answer to make it easier to take whatever position helps them most when it does become an issue.
Re:Translation (Score:2)
Either that, or their response means "This sounds legal and acceptable to us, but we aren't going to come right out and say that, because we're afraid later that Universal will decide they don't think it should be legal and sue us for explitly and publicly giving consumers permission to exercise their right of first sale."
Or it means "I, Peter Lowe,
Re:Translation (Score:2)
It's not Apple's job to tell you whether something is legal; that's for the courts to do. Apple was compelled only to explain why they objected to a particular auction.
That said, the First Sale Doctrine doesn't apply to digital goods without some thought. It's founded on the notion that selling something in its entirety means you no longer own it; this property is not
If in doubt... (Score:4, Insightful)
[0] They don't (yet) seem to claim this legal dilemma would apply if the music was on a CD, only if it's downloaded... This, to me, seems nuts - why does the medium in which you obtained the content make a difference?
99cents a song with restrictions? (Score:2, Insightful)
Technical and legal issues... (Score:5, Insightful)
Of couse, you could get around this by using a program that grabs the audio stream during playback and acheive the same end result.
I understand Apple's position. Even if it isn't the greatest solution, they have stated that they believe in the "first sale" right, even though it isn't practical to implement. Their stance can be noted when the time comes that support for those rights is needed.
Re:Technical and legal issues... (Score:5, Interesting)
The obvious question then being, why should you require verification? If I've purchased a game, ripped to ISOs and resell it's illegal. If I photocopy a book before selling it it's illegal. If I borrow a CD at the library and copy it it's illegal.
The system doesn't have to be perfect. Just deauthorize any song that is sold, and make it synch it to other devices when possible, like when using iTunes to synch music collection. And let those that want to break the copyright to so, they already can in lots of other ways.
Even if you knew it was burned to a CD - what prevents someone from taking that CD to another machine, and make a copy of the copy? Whoops. It's simply not possible to verify that only X copies exist, no matter what kind of uber-DRM you add.
Kjella
Re:Technical and legal issues... (Score:2, Interesting)
Apple looks good here (Score:5, Insightful)
-dbc
Archives (Score:4, Insightful)
But in any case, iTunes is a doomed venture. Unrestricted MP3s/OGGs are the way to go. Eventually it will become obvious, although Apple might get a fair profit alongway.
Estate Sales (Score:5, Interesting)
The Apple spokesman dismissed the resale potential of a 99 cent download. He overlooked the value of a 1000 song collection, where transfering the license keys would be well worth the effort.
What about copies for personal use (Score:2)
So if I'm allowed to do that, I can hand over the portable copy that I was allowed to make by law (along with the player) to the buyer, as long as I destroy all other copies I made.
I don't see the technical problems behind selling a song,
OK, folks, RoFS... (Score:2)
This includes digital media.
So its not technically feasible? People may have said that about DRM a few years ago. If its not technically feasible at the moment get your smart guys together, get the thinking caps on, and make it so.
Heck, if you want, charge 5 or 10 cents per song for the added feature.
In Other Words (Score:3, Insightful)
Thank you,
Apple
If apple was smart (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:If apple was smart (Score:3, Insightful)
If Apple was smart, they'd avoid auctions (Score:3, Insightful)
Creating such a marketplace and policing it would take considerable time and effort. Just figuring out how to track how many times a song had been sold (and making that count hack-resistant) would be a big task. The margins would be lower than the iTunes Music Store, and there would be all kinds of litigation just waiting to be sprung on their ass.
Plus, there's already an 800-lb gorilla in the
Do you really own it? (Score:5, Interesting)
$0.99 a song impratical (Score:5, Insightful)
(40gigs / 5mb a song * $.99 a song) + $500.00 ipod = ~$8,500.00
Typical Press Release (Score:2)
No. No, it isn't interesting. What's interesting is that press-releases like this, manage to say absolutely nothing, and it's just accepted that press releases are pointless these days...
If you aren't going to say anything, don't say anything. Don't avoid the issue with major abiguities, and pointless jabber.
MM beer (Score:2)
Not sure people understand what he was saying (Score:3, Insightful)
What Apple is saying is "we don't want to get into that."
The reason Apple is saying that should be obvious to anyone who bothers to think about it. For those of you that don't, the reason is this:
They want to sell you music.
In the legal system, there are fictions that are there so things can get done.
In technical terms, there are hacks in place that everyone knows are skanky, but nobody wants to look to closely at them because they make stuff work. The technical equivalents are things like DNS, SMTP, etc. They suck, but what can you do?
In the same vein, Apple wants to keep selling music. It does this by playing both sides of the fence - negotiating licenses with publishers, and allowing loose licensing by the users.
As long as nobody looks too closely, well, everything's OK.
Users can do whatever the hell they want, but Apple has to play a game, and play it well.
No market for resold music??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Gee, tell that to the used CD stores I've bought dozens and dozens of CDs from over the years.
How about giving away the song? (Score:4, Interesting)
Fresh air (Score:3, Insightful)
iTMS is selling both a product and a service (Score:4, Insightful)
That service is the key. (pardon the pun)
Apple is providing the means to manage the unlocking of the file - presumably for as long as you own the AAC file. But Apple's service is limited. Their service does not include the management of your license. Their service does not include a utility to transfer ownership or will AACs to your heirs. One much booed but accepted limitation is that it doesn't include the ability to re-download the songs you purchased, so you have to archive them yourself.
There are lots of alternatives out there. Apple has bundeled the product and service they feel is most compelling to the marketplace. 10,000,000 songs have been purchased so some people are compelled. Yet there will always be the OGG zelot or the eBay seller who really needs to push the limits of the license. To both groups as it turns out, I recommend they but the CD, rip it to OGG, and when they are done, delete the OGGs and eBay the CD for half what you paid. You might even come out only paying $0.99 a song that way.
As for me, I'll stick with iTMS which gives me more than I could ask for, and all they ask is $0.99 (plus tax).
This is why I still buy CD's (Score:3, Insightful)
Issues like this is why I still buy a CD whenever the impulse strikes. I just don't buy as many as I used to; I'm much choosier about who I'm supporting.
You see, as far I as I'm concerned, CD's are future-proof. I can rip them into whatever format I want to use. Right now I'm using AAC in iTunes, but that could change. I may want to sell the music, or let my partner listen to it on his office computer. Digital files are definitely the future -- who can doubt it -- but for right now, the CD (or other physical media) is the safest investment.
The End of Pop Crap as we Know it? (Score:3, Interesting)
Assuming that resale of online music becomes legalized, practicalized, and widespread, this could mean the end, or at least reasonable limits to the mass-consumption pop crap that floods the music market.
With resale available at the press of a button, after the initial catchiness has worn off and the latest Britney song has become just as sickening as the rest, the User A can release his copy for a resale at the going market rate. This rate would depend on the original track price, number of copies for sale and the number of potential buyers.
User B, who hasn't become sick of the song yet, can pick up A's used copy instead of buying another new copy. This curbs the sale of a song to the number of unique users actually interested in the song at one time.
Instead of releasing lowest-common-denominator slop to try to appeal to all people at once, recording artists will be forced to make solid works aimed at specific listeners, who will want to hold onto it for a long time. Or at least it will even the field between those who do and the slop-shovellers at Sony.
It could even start a futures market -- people buying thousands of copies of a song at a cheap point, hoping that it will regain popularity at some future point. This could redefine the term "entertainment industry" as we know it.
Of course, this is all based on the above (false) assumption that companies have their consumer's interests at heart. Since they want to sell as many songs at as high of a price as possible, Apple will design iTunes to make sure that this never becomes possible.
hypocrisy? (Score:5, Insightful)
We accuse the RIAA, MPAA, and other big special interest groups of not adapting to the internet and clinging to outdated paradigms. Aren't you doing the exact same thing, applying a paradigm that easily applies to physical property but can't be applied (or is technically unfeasible) in the digitial realm?
Common Sense, not crafty marketting (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of slashdotters are probably gonna complain that Apple needs to create a method for transfering ownership, and all I can say is, no they don't. I have every right to sell my DVD collection to a friend in England. (I live in Japan.) He has every right to go out and buy a DVD player that can play them, or modify his own, since it's a different region DVD. Yeah, it's a pain in the ass and almost evil to have region coding, but that has nothing to do with the copyright of the DVD in question.
The only difference with the DVD and iTunes file is that with DVD's, the "impracticality" was put there on purpose, which in my mind means the organization(s) responsible for the region coding are a bunch of assholes. As for the iTunes file, the copy protection method was put there so that Apple could manage to
1) strike a deal with the labels,
3) deliver what the consumer wants (downloadable legal music), and
2) still manage to maximize consumer rights. (CD-R burning.)
(And yes, 4: profit!, but there's nothing inherently wrong with that.)
I'd say Apple did a damn good job at it, even if it's not perfect. Truth is, the reason it isn't perfect is more or less the record label/RIAA's fault and not Apple's. If you don't like it, don't buy it.
I'm speculating a lot here, but I get this feeling that if you made a CD from the iTunes file, and sold the iTunes file AND the CD together, Apple could care less. Apple is merely providing a SERVICE in exchange for a small percentage of the sales. It may be legal grey zone, but it isn't damaging Apple's sales (as long as you're honest and delete your own copy after sale). Hell, it probably isn't even damaging the RIAA member's that much either, and is within the owner's rights. (And if it's within the owner's right, then it isn't even "damage" any longer.) But for some reason they make a fuss over it.
So what we have here is a very odd scene, really. "Holy shit, a large corporation using common sense! It must be a conspiracy!!" And it just as well may be, except it's a conspiracy that is backfiring on the RIAA and in return making Apple look pretty slick.
C'mon guys/gals, it's just common sense.
good! (Score:3, Insightful)
Business and ethics can mix; but don't in modern times. Its nice to see some companies still doing things right. All these corporate terrorist lawyers are messing up the world ("civilally.")
Where did the old saying go?
"Its not wether you win or lose, its how you play the game."
Apple is 1 of a few who remember this. This is just another example of Job's influence; and also why apple will never win.
This is DeCSS II (Score:3, Interesting)
1) Some would argue that it is a useful tool that facilitates the legal owner of a digital work in their right to re-sell the work. Much like DeCSS was a tool that facilitates a legal owner of a digital work in their right to access it.
2) Others would argue it's an illegal violation of the DMCA that enables piracy by allowing someone who may be the legal owner of a digital work to then distribute copies of that work. Much like DeCSS was a tool that allowed a legal owner of a digital work to distribute copies of it.
The big question: Will the result be different when we are talking about music instead of movies? Would people see the logic in being able to have full access to their digital library?
When iTunes Music Store was announced, it would have been a complete flop except for one thing: Apple had successfully negotiated what seemed like very generous DRM terms for their customers. Compared to the other options, most people were happy to plunk down their dollars and reward Apple. But no one bothered to ask what happens when someone wants out and looks to offload their collection.
If Apple were to continue its example, it would provide users with a mechanism to transfer songs. If Apple does not or cannot provide this...then really it's terms are not as generous as they advertise. There might be a compelling class-action lawsuit in this. Apple never said they prohibit the transfer, but they are the only ones capable of performing a transfer without encouraging their customers to use DeCSS-type tools that violate the law.
What would happen if everyone who purchased music on iTMS told their credit card companies to dispute the charge because they didn't actually get the legal copy they expected? Maybe someone should try it as a test case like this resale.
- JoeShmoe
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One thing that shouldn't be overlooked... (Score:4, Insightful)
Biggest problem in account transfer (Score:4, Interesting)
On the bright side, let's say you want to unload your whole collection of music. You could literally SELL your whole account with all your music after removing your credit info. Now that seems like a realistic sale. Selling just one song 99 makes little sense. Selling hundreds to someone who likes your taste just might work very well. The buyer of your account would know if you were still holding on to an authorization key because iTunes would tell them so.
Break through! (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the most important thing that has every been said by a company on this issue. It basically admits that the way to fight piracy is to create a market environment where there is little incentive for piracy. And how do we do that kids? By lowering the freaking prices and making the product more accessible to the consumer. Thank you Apple.
Details Withheld but the DRM in iTunes is... (Score:3, Interesting)
If you open an iTune with a particular piece of editing software on the Mac, and click save-as, no more DRM.
I would tell you the name of the product, but I don't remember it (not being an audio nor Mac geek myself). It costs in the $800 range but you *can* find it fairly easily in a semi-pbulic lab at, say, a school has a good audio engineering program.
And no, the arangement doesn't require that you buy the iTune for the computer running the software.
(I really wish I could say that I was withholding the name of the program because of the DMCA, but I am just a big dummy and I cant remember.)
Then again, said "big" corporation making and marketing the "cimcumvention tool" which is also "one of the big names in Digital Audio Production" would make for interesting conflict of interests.
Do you think Lars be happy to know he is using the same software to master his music as the random college hippies are using to steal it?
And no, my roommate is not using this discovery to violate anybodies copyrights, he just mentioned that he'd found the flaw by accident and that it was funny...
Re:Apple is WRONG. A market for reselling does exi (Score:2)
Re:the lisence agreement (Score:3, Informative)
has anyone read it?
Yep.
i wonder if this is "handled" by the contract you agree to.
The agreement doesn't specifically get into personal resale, but it does stress repeatedly that the product is for "personal, noncommercial use." That language is vague enough to leave the question open :/