Whoever is writing these articles really needs to come up with another way to talk about Apple as a company. Every single article has ?Cupertino-based company? in it. I don?t know, but you could just say ?Apple? and be done with it.
They might want to stop writing BS about how Apple "saved" the music industry while they're at it:
Quote:
Steve Jobs helped save a sinking music industry by courting struggling record labels...
Right...Am I supposed to believe that Warner or Universal would have filed for bankruptcy by now if it wasn't for iTunes? Digital downloads STILL only account for 10% of all music sold. 10%.
Steve Jobs, Savior of the Music Industry. What utter nonsense.
And I may be fighting a tidal wave, but I don't want digital downloads to become the future especially when it comes video. We are decades away from video downloads meeting the quality of physical HD formats available today. I don't want to spend the whole day waiting for a 20GB movie to download. Nor do I want to spend more money on less than DVD-quality movies from iTunes. And worse, I don't want to be stuck using whatever device Apple deems good enough to watch my content on.
Quote:
Originally Posted by loloeroket
I stopped buying DVDs after I spent $20000 in furnitures to store them.
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Problem is if all that content was digital, it would be more complex as having to deal with physical media. Multiple hard drives, presumably managing backups in case of a hard drive failure, networking issues, cabling, content management, etc. That to me sounds more complex than scanning an alphabetically arranged collection of cases.
In the same way that music labels forget that their content is available on unprotected CDs, NBC forgets that most of their content can be recorded from FREE TV, and all of it from either free or cable/satellite TV, even HD. Which means that it can easily be gotten from torrents. Which means that content for iPods is assured without paying NBC another cent.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
They might want to stop writing BS about how Apple "saved" the music industry while they're at it:
Right...Am I supposed to believe that Warner or Universal would have filed for bankruptcy by now if it wasn't for iTunes? Digital downloads STILL only account for 10% of all music sold. 10%.
Steve Jobs, Savior of the Music Industry. What utter nonsense.
And I may be fighting a tidal wave, but I don't want digital downloads to become the future especially when it comes video. We are decades away from video downloads meeting the quality of physical HD formats available today. I don't want to spend the whole day waiting for a 20GB movie to download. Nor do I want to spend more money on less than DVD-quality movies from iTunes. And worse, I don't want to be stuck using whatever device Apple deems good enough to watch my content on.
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Problem is if all that content was digital, it would be more complex as having to deal with physical media. Multiple hard drives, presumably managing backups in case of a hard drive failure, networking issues, cabling, content management, etc. That to me sounds more complex than scanning an alphabetically arranged collection of cases.
Quote:
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Well it was acquired with time and no need to feel sorry at all for me. I don't think I asked for it. I wanted simply to illustrate that there is a limit of buying physical medias. And also I won't buy any HD/BLU RAY DVD even if quality is good because it is obsolete.
Now I am sorry to disapoint you but still extra hard drive is less complex to handle. And it exists now simple solutions for any size of medias. For $20K, you can purchase a nice XServe and a XRAID with a sweet Rack for 1/10th of the space with convenient and safe storing for your data.
Not to mention all virtual solutions offered on the web. No I don't see any problem with this.
In the same way that music labels forget that their content is available on unprotected CDs, NBC forgets that most of their content can be recorded from FREE TV, and all of it from either free or cable/satellite TV, even HD. Which means that it can easily be gotten from torrents. Which means that content for iPods is assured without paying NBC another cent.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
When are they going to realize this. Apple didn't "revolutionize the music industry." They just got people to pay for music. Before Apple and iTunes, there was Limewire and Kazaa and Bearshare and Napster(pre-legalized days). Free music for all. Then Apple came along with iTunes and all of a sudden people started paying for their music and movies. These companies keep seeing "oh, we are the reason people buy iPods. See how much they spend on OUR music! We can leave anytime we want to so better give in to our demands" when really its the other way around. Before iTunes, people were downloading these songs for free. iTunes actually helped these industries more than they helped Apple. Once they leave, people will just go back to illegaly downloading. It's so easy to open iTunes(which automatically opens when you plug in your iPod) and oh, I want a song. Click buy. Your done. Now how many people will goto amazon and such just to get that song they can get easily on Limewire?
But what may also be food-for-thought is that, as Apple only gets around 5% per item and the media company gets around 10x this, the media Company will be 'losing' more rapidly!
Of course, most of what they get also goes to pay expenses, so they lose about as much profit as Apple does.
But, they are thinking long term. lose some money now for long term profitabliity.
Mind you, I'm not saying that what they are doing will be successful, but it might be. Things aren't static forever.
And if they are wrong about what they want, Apple should let them try it. If it fails, they will stay with Apple, and not be frustrated that Apple didn't allow the experiment. Apple has its pride, but so do they.
So when exactly do you think we'll see the iTunes Music Label? They have the server farms already, they have the software to make the music already. They have the software to distribute the music already, and they already have the hardware most people use to listen to music.
The missing piece is the iTunes Music Label.
Personally, I'd love to see music stay at .99 a song and see musicians get more of a cut per song because there's no longer a middle man between artist and distributor (record companies).
I hope that never happens. That's the last thing Apople should do. Do people who advocate this actually understand the music business? Does anyone understand how different the business is today from what it was? How little profit they make? How variable it is? How much money those companies have to pour into an act to try to make a success, and just how few of them actually make any return on those investments?
I agree 100 percent. I should have mentioned that I was not alluding to the "choose-your-own price" stunt which Radiohead did rather than just the fact that they went on their own on the internet to sell music.
I too hope Apple starts dealing directly with big name artists.
Are you aware of the fact that despite the more than fair aspect of what they are trying, more than 500 thousand copies of that were already pirated?
Would losing content from iTunes Store hurt iPod (or iPhone) sales?
1. If the content from other places is still playable on iPods, then I think NO, because iPods are still considered by most to be the best players out there (Even without an iTunes Store, most would consider iPods the best players; iTunes just adds to the lead).
2. If the content from any one store is more than iTunes, AND the content from that store is not playable on iPods, AND there is a really really good (but not necessarily the best) player that syncs and plays the content from that store, then YES.
Would losing content from iTunes Store hurt Mac sales?
1. iTunes is available on a PC, so very few buy Macs just to use iTunes. (I believe iTunes works better on a Mac than on a PC, but I don't think most people know or care about this.)
2. PC users who have iPods usually use iTunes, and the iTunes Store is the most convenient, so these users will still be exposed to Mac-like software, so I doubt it will hurt Mac switch sales.
3. For PC users who don't have iPods BUT would've used iTunes Store because it had the MOST content, but now will no longer use iTunes, then yes, they will not be exposed to Mac-like software and will be more likely to not switch to Macs. However, I think most PC users who don't have iPods, don't use iTunes, so I don't think this is a large group.
Beating iTunes is not going to be easy. The music labels are free to reinvent the wheel if they want. Don't believe for a second that they are doing so because they want to give the customer more choice. As for DRM, I believe Apple was the first one to drop DRM. Had they not dropped it first, Amazon would not be selling DRM free music now. DRM was something that the music industry insisted on, not Apple. The reason that Amazon is able to sell music without DRM is that Universal and other labels want to compete against Apple and the iTunes store. They know that they are weak as long as iTunes is the market leader. They want to kill iTunes so they can charge more, not less. The music labels want to charge us more for the new stuff, something that Apple refused to do. NBC left iTunes because they wanted to charge more for shows and because they wanted to bundle some crappy shows with better ones. Apple told them to SIOOMA.
The music labels don't care about making things easier for the customer or about fair play. They care about one thing only, squeezing as much money out of each song as they can get away with. Apple is standing in their way and they know that if Apple beats them, they are done for. So buy from Amazon and from other vendors if you want to make more money for the music labels. I am going to buy the bulk of my music from iTunes. The time has come for the music labels to be put down. Every song you buy from iTunes, is one more nail in the coffin of the old music industry.
I'm not assuming anything about what's good for the customer. Apple certainly doesn't care about what's good for the customer either.
The fact is that no successful company cares about what's good for the customer.
What they care about is what the customer will pay for a certain product or service that the company can make the greatest return on.
If they are right, they do well, if they are wrong, they don't.
People are delusional if they think there is a war between good and evil here. Jobs figured that customers would be willing to pay 99 cents per song. He was right. He wasn't thinking that he's going to do right for his customers. He doesn't care about that. I hope he never cares about that, because if he does, there goes Apple's profits, and then the company follows.
The best companies think about what's best for them and their stockholders. If their guesses happen to coincide with what their customers think is also best for them, then Hallalujua! Everyone's happy.
In the same way that music labels forget that their content is available on unprotected CDs, NBC forgets that most of their content can be recorded from FREE TV, and all of it from either free or cable/satellite TV, even HD. Which means that it can easily be gotten from torrents. Which means that content for iPods is assured without paying NBC another cent.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
Ah, but you see, that's old thinking.
The reason why these companies are so concerned is because they can see the day when ALL content will be downloaded. When Jobs states that there are CD's that are unprotected, he's right. But what will be 10 years from now? 20?
These companies are looking to the future which APPLE is trying to bring forwards, the download only future. Then things will be different. That's why they are concerned with DRM. I DRM persists, there will be NO form of media that is not protected. That' been their long term goal.
Jobs has been very disingenuous about this.
I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with the idea about DRM, but that's been the point.
and we always pay for the content, one way or another. We have to.
I think the bigger trouble is video content. I don't think that alternative music download sources will affect iPod Sales, you can still just go and buy the CD and dump that on the iPod. After all there probably are more people with iPods then people who buy music from iTunes.
The problem with video is that DVD comes in MPEG-2, to get it to work on the iPod you have to encode it in MPEF-4 AVC, even if apple made it as easy as AIFF (CD) to AAC/MP3 it still takes a very long time compared to a CD. Even if NBC offered non DRM Video Downloads, yuo would still have to convert them to iPod format.
HD Video is more difficult because while MPEG-2 is simple to decode, MPEG-4 and VC-1 are more difficult. And even if they use the same codec iPod supports they do not use the same bitrate and resolution.
And btw. the technology used in HD Video has been used on the internet for pirated videos and fansubs for the past 10 years. Ever hear of DivX? Yeah, thats essentially what HD Video is based off of, which in turn was based off Microsoft MPEG-4 based off a specification that chose Apple's Quicktime format as the containter.
That's right, and the content on it can be downloaded for free.
Well, if that ever becomes true, then all other mp3 players will be as good as the ipod since you can download music for any mp3 player. I am not sure people in this forum know this but you do realize you are in a minority right?. When warner announces bilions in revenue, you are a very small part (and by you, i mean people who download for free).
Secondly, people who download for free are for the most part, still downloading for free.. NBC music removing their music from itunes is not gonna effect that number significantly.. yeah, sure, some people stopped downloading for free and used itunes but those people represent an extremely small percentage of the free downloaders.
Does he remember the ipod was a huge success BEFORE video came to it?
I still don't get how they can complain that Apple is giving them a new revenue stream that exists only because of Apple and their ipod.
Content implies music and video and whatever else is on the ipod. The statement is a general one and is not specific to video. He's right in a sense.. if ipod had no content, how useful can it be?. But apple would be right to say that the ipod helps music companies and music companies help the ipod.. it's a symbiotic relationship.
I think the media companies are resentful of apple acting as if this is a one way street.. the media companies either fall in line or suffer the consequences..
I think i've said this a million times (you can seach for all my post)... you cannot mess with the people who have the marbles. They can always pick up their marbles and go home (ie, they can chose to lose money).. how does this help apple?. They can spitefully decide to hurt the ipod and themselves just to prove a point. Also, since they own the content and it's in demand, they can always distribute it. Apple may think they are in a dominant position but they are not. It's the same with computers.. if microsoft had not made word for mac, where would apple be today?.. i don't get how owning the hardware gives you power. Hardware is useless without software.The ipod is hardware.
It sickens me that these content providers just dont give a @#$! about their customers. They are perfectly willing to essentially trash a great service like iTunes and offer NO viable alternative.
Case in point: Me and the wife watched Heros season one as downloads from iTunes. Tried watching season two from NBC site.....besides the really annoying forced commercials, the quality was crap and I couldnt put it on my TV. Had to watch it on my notebook.
Yeah but you watched it.. curious.. you didn't think apple crappy encoding was an issue but commercials were an issue?. Interesting. You watched video from itunes on a tv and thought it was quality?. wow.
Once they are used to a convenient service with good quality, people will not go back to services of worse quality even if you cut off the convenient one, because those will be perceived as ripoffs. When they're being inconvenienced anyway, they might as well take the time to search for the torrent. After they do, you need not only a more convenient service but a reasonably cheap one to lure them back.
When are they going to realize this. Apple didn't "revolutionize the music industry." They just got people to pay for music. Before Apple and iTunes, there was Limewire and Kazaa and Bearshare and Napster(pre-legalized days). Free music for all. Then Apple came along with iTunes and all of a sudden people started paying for their music and movies. These companies keep seeing "oh, we are the reason people buy iPods. See how much they spend on OUR music! We can leave anytime we want to so better give in to our demands" when really its the other way around. Before iTunes, people were downloading these songs for free. iTunes actually helped these industries more than they helped Apple. Once they leave, people will just go back to illegaly downloading. It's so easy to open iTunes(which automatically opens when you plug in your iPod) and oh, I want a song. Click buy. Your done. Now how many people will goto amazon and such just to get that song they can get easily on Limewire?
This is such a tired argument. How many Limewire/Kazaa/whatever P2P network users do you think actually switched from free downloads to paying iTunes customers? 10% maybe...being really generous perhaps 20%. Again, downloads only constitute 10% of music sales. What percentage of that 10% do you think the converted pirates represent? Maybe 1%. Why do you think someone would stop using a P2P network and suddenly go legit?
Digital movie sales are even less of a factor than music. Back in May, Disney announced they had sold over 2 million movies on iTunes. This past week, I believe it was reported that the Transformers DVD alone sold over 5 million copies. That's just one movie in one week. How low is digital movie purchasing compared to physical, maybe a generous 1% of total movie sales if that. Seems to me the studios were already making lots of money selling movies before iTunes came back and "saved" them. I'm sure the studios because all the studios have to do is create a file and just keep selling copies of that one file ad infinitum with no manufacturing costs, shipping expenses, return issues, etc.
How is using Amazon any harder than using iTunes?. You're at your computer, browsing the web and look over and see your iPod sitting there and remember that song you wanted to buy. You click your bookmark to Amazon. Find the song you you want. Click, buy, done. Not exactly that different than your iTunes scenario.
Regardless, if iTunes went away, why do people think piracy would just go through the roof? Most likely digital piracy involves many of the same people who would have previously borrowed the CD from a friend or coworker and made a copy for themselves. Different mechanism with the same end result. Now people just look for an anonymous stranger on the internet to get it from. In the end though, music sales aren't going to plummet if digital downloads ceased to exist.
Comments
Whoever is writing these articles really needs to come up with another way to talk about Apple as a company. Every single article has ?Cupertino-based company? in it. I don?t know, but you could just say ?Apple? and be done with it.
They might want to stop writing BS about how Apple "saved" the music industry while they're at it:
Steve Jobs helped save a sinking music industry by courting struggling record labels...
Right...Am I supposed to believe that Warner or Universal would have filed for bankruptcy by now if it wasn't for iTunes? Digital downloads STILL only account for 10% of all music sold. 10%.
Steve Jobs, Savior of the Music Industry. What utter nonsense.
And I may be fighting a tidal wave, but I don't want digital downloads to become the future especially when it comes video. We are decades away from video downloads meeting the quality of physical HD formats available today. I don't want to spend the whole day waiting for a 20GB movie to download. Nor do I want to spend more money on less than DVD-quality movies from iTunes. And worse, I don't want to be stuck using whatever device Apple deems good enough to watch my content on.
I stopped buying DVDs after I spent $20000 in furnitures to store them.
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Problem is if all that content was digital, it would be more complex as having to deal with physical media. Multiple hard drives, presumably managing backups in case of a hard drive failure, networking issues, cabling, content management, etc. That to me sounds more complex than scanning an alphabetically arranged collection of cases.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
They might want to stop writing BS about how Apple "saved" the music industry while they're at it:
Right...Am I supposed to believe that Warner or Universal would have filed for bankruptcy by now if it wasn't for iTunes? Digital downloads STILL only account for 10% of all music sold. 10%.
Steve Jobs, Savior of the Music Industry. What utter nonsense.
And I may be fighting a tidal wave, but I don't want digital downloads to become the future especially when it comes video. We are decades away from video downloads meeting the quality of physical HD formats available today. I don't want to spend the whole day waiting for a 20GB movie to download. Nor do I want to spend more money on less than DVD-quality movies from iTunes. And worse, I don't want to be stuck using whatever device Apple deems good enough to watch my content on.
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Problem is if all that content was digital, it would be more complex as having to deal with physical media. Multiple hard drives, presumably managing backups in case of a hard drive failure, networking issues, cabling, content management, etc. That to me sounds more complex than scanning an alphabetically arranged collection of cases.
Was that a typo or am I supposed to believe you spent $20K on shelving for DVDs? Sorry if I don't feel sorry about your storage issues if you can amass a 1000+ DVD collection, presumably a 1000+ CD collection, and then top it off with $20K in storage furniture.
Well it was acquired with time and no need to feel sorry at all for me. I don't think I asked for it. I wanted simply to illustrate that there is a limit of buying physical medias. And also I won't buy any HD/BLU RAY DVD even if quality is good because it is obsolete.
Now I am sorry to disapoint you but still extra hard drive is less complex to handle. And it exists now simple solutions for any size of medias. For $20K, you can purchase a nice XServe and a XRAID with a sweet Rack for 1/10th of the space with convenient and safe storing for your data.
Not to mention all virtual solutions offered on the web. No I don't see any problem with this.
In the same way that music labels forget that their content is available on unprotected CDs, NBC forgets that most of their content can be recorded from FREE TV, and all of it from either free or cable/satellite TV, even HD. Which means that it can easily be gotten from torrents. Which means that content for iPods is assured without paying NBC another cent.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
Very true. It meets my point!
thank you, but wasn't your point that losing content from the iTunes store
would cause Apple to lose computer sales?
From PC's to Macs. Not from Macs to PC's.
But what may also be food-for-thought is that, as Apple only gets around 5% per item and the media company gets around 10x this, the media Company will be 'losing' more rapidly!
Of course, most of what they get also goes to pay expenses, so they lose about as much profit as Apple does.
But, they are thinking long term. lose some money now for long term profitabliity.
Mind you, I'm not saying that what they are doing will be successful, but it might be. Things aren't static forever.
And if they are wrong about what they want, Apple should let them try it. If it fails, they will stay with Apple, and not be frustrated that Apple didn't allow the experiment. Apple has its pride, but so do they.
So when exactly do you think we'll see the iTunes Music Label? They have the server farms already, they have the software to make the music already. They have the software to distribute the music already, and they already have the hardware most people use to listen to music.
The missing piece is the iTunes Music Label.
Personally, I'd love to see music stay at .99 a song and see musicians get more of a cut per song because there's no longer a middle man between artist and distributor (record companies).
I hope that never happens. That's the last thing Apople should do. Do people who advocate this actually understand the music business? Does anyone understand how different the business is today from what it was? How little profit they make? How variable it is? How much money those companies have to pour into an act to try to make a success, and just how few of them actually make any return on those investments?
I don't think so.
I agree 100 percent. I should have mentioned that I was not alluding to the "choose-your-own price" stunt which Radiohead did rather than just the fact that they went on their own on the internet to sell music.
I too hope Apple starts dealing directly with big name artists.
Are you aware of the fact that despite the more than fair aspect of what they are trying, more than 500 thousand copies of that were already pirated?
It's not a methodology that's likely to work.
1. If the content from other places is still playable on iPods, then I think NO, because iPods are still considered by most to be the best players out there (Even without an iTunes Store, most would consider iPods the best players; iTunes just adds to the lead).
2. If the content from any one store is more than iTunes, AND the content from that store is not playable on iPods, AND there is a really really good (but not necessarily the best) player that syncs and plays the content from that store, then YES.
Would losing content from iTunes Store hurt Mac sales?
1. iTunes is available on a PC, so very few buy Macs just to use iTunes. (I believe iTunes works better on a Mac than on a PC, but I don't think most people know or care about this.)
2. PC users who have iPods usually use iTunes, and the iTunes Store is the most convenient, so these users will still be exposed to Mac-like software, so I doubt it will hurt Mac switch sales.
3. For PC users who don't have iPods BUT would've used iTunes Store because it had the MOST content, but now will no longer use iTunes, then yes, they will not be exposed to Mac-like software and will be more likely to not switch to Macs. However, I think most PC users who don't have iPods, don't use iTunes, so I don't think this is a large group.
Beating iTunes is not going to be easy. The music labels are free to reinvent the wheel if they want. Don't believe for a second that they are doing so because they want to give the customer more choice. As for DRM, I believe Apple was the first one to drop DRM. Had they not dropped it first, Amazon would not be selling DRM free music now. DRM was something that the music industry insisted on, not Apple. The reason that Amazon is able to sell music without DRM is that Universal and other labels want to compete against Apple and the iTunes store. They know that they are weak as long as iTunes is the market leader. They want to kill iTunes so they can charge more, not less. The music labels want to charge us more for the new stuff, something that Apple refused to do. NBC left iTunes because they wanted to charge more for shows and because they wanted to bundle some crappy shows with better ones. Apple told them to SIOOMA.
The music labels don't care about making things easier for the customer or about fair play. They care about one thing only, squeezing as much money out of each song as they can get away with. Apple is standing in their way and they know that if Apple beats them, they are done for. So buy from Amazon and from other vendors if you want to make more money for the music labels. I am going to buy the bulk of my music from iTunes. The time has come for the music labels to be put down. Every song you buy from iTunes, is one more nail in the coffin of the old music industry.
I'm not assuming anything about what's good for the customer. Apple certainly doesn't care about what's good for the customer either.
The fact is that no successful company cares about what's good for the customer.
What they care about is what the customer will pay for a certain product or service that the company can make the greatest return on.
If they are right, they do well, if they are wrong, they don't.
People are delusional if they think there is a war between good and evil here. Jobs figured that customers would be willing to pay 99 cents per song. He was right. He wasn't thinking that he's going to do right for his customers. He doesn't care about that. I hope he never cares about that, because if he does, there goes Apple's profits, and then the company follows.
The best companies think about what's best for them and their stockholders. If their guesses happen to coincide with what their customers think is also best for them, then Hallalujua! Everyone's happy.
In the same way that music labels forget that their content is available on unprotected CDs, NBC forgets that most of their content can be recorded from FREE TV, and all of it from either free or cable/satellite TV, even HD. Which means that it can easily be gotten from torrents. Which means that content for iPods is assured without paying NBC another cent.
NBC, like the labels, forget that people pay NOT for the digital CONTENT, but for the CONVENIENCE of getting the digital content.
So it wouldn't surprise me if Apple unveils their trump card, which is, add a very easy-to-use DVR to the AppleTV, or buy TiVo and integrate it with AppleTV and iTunes.
Ah, but you see, that's old thinking.
The reason why these companies are so concerned is because they can see the day when ALL content will be downloaded. When Jobs states that there are CD's that are unprotected, he's right. But what will be 10 years from now? 20?
These companies are looking to the future which APPLE is trying to bring forwards, the download only future. Then things will be different. That's why they are concerned with DRM. I DRM persists, there will be NO form of media that is not protected. That' been their long term goal.
Jobs has been very disingenuous about this.
I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with the idea about DRM, but that's been the point.
and we always pay for the content, one way or another. We have to.
We may pay more for convenience.
The problem with video is that DVD comes in MPEG-2, to get it to work on the iPod you have to encode it in MPEF-4 AVC, even if apple made it as easy as AIFF (CD) to AAC/MP3 it still takes a very long time compared to a CD. Even if NBC offered non DRM Video Downloads, yuo would still have to convert them to iPod format.
HD Video is more difficult because while MPEG-2 is simple to decode, MPEG-4 and VC-1 are more difficult. And even if they use the same codec iPod supports they do not use the same bitrate and resolution.
And btw. the technology used in HD Video has been used on the internet for pirated videos and fansubs for the past 10 years. Ever hear of DivX? Yeah, thats essentially what HD Video is based off of, which in turn was based off Microsoft MPEG-4 based off a specification that chose Apple's Quicktime format as the containter.
That's right, and the content on it can be downloaded for free.
Well, if that ever becomes true, then all other mp3 players will be as good as the ipod since you can download music for any mp3 player. I am not sure people in this forum know this but you do realize you are in a minority right?. When warner announces bilions in revenue, you are a very small part (and by you, i mean people who download for free).
Secondly, people who download for free are for the most part, still downloading for free.. NBC music removing their music from itunes is not gonna effect that number significantly.. yeah, sure, some people stopped downloading for free and used itunes but those people represent an extremely small percentage of the free downloaders.
Does he remember the ipod was a huge success BEFORE video came to it?
I still don't get how they can complain that Apple is giving them a new revenue stream that exists only because of Apple and their ipod.
Content implies music and video and whatever else is on the ipod. The statement is a general one and is not specific to video. He's right in a sense.. if ipod had no content, how useful can it be?. But apple would be right to say that the ipod helps music companies and music companies help the ipod.. it's a symbiotic relationship.
I think the media companies are resentful of apple acting as if this is a one way street.. the media companies either fall in line or suffer the consequences..
I think i've said this a million times (you can seach for all my post)... you cannot mess with the people who have the marbles. They can always pick up their marbles and go home (ie, they can chose to lose money).. how does this help apple?. They can spitefully decide to hurt the ipod and themselves just to prove a point. Also, since they own the content and it's in demand, they can always distribute it. Apple may think they are in a dominant position but they are not. It's the same with computers.. if microsoft had not made word for mac, where would apple be today?.. i don't get how owning the hardware gives you power. Hardware is useless without software.The ipod is hardware.
It sickens me that these content providers just dont give a @#$! about their customers. They are perfectly willing to essentially trash a great service like iTunes and offer NO viable alternative.
Case in point: Me and the wife watched Heros season one as downloads from iTunes. Tried watching season two from NBC site.....besides the really annoying forced commercials, the quality was crap and I couldnt put it on my TV. Had to watch it on my notebook.
Yeah but you watched it.. curious.. you didn't think apple crappy encoding was an issue but commercials were an issue?. Interesting. You watched video from itunes on a tv and thought it was quality?. wow.
When are they going to realize this. Apple didn't "revolutionize the music industry." They just got people to pay for music. Before Apple and iTunes, there was Limewire and Kazaa and Bearshare and Napster(pre-legalized days). Free music for all. Then Apple came along with iTunes and all of a sudden people started paying for their music and movies. These companies keep seeing "oh, we are the reason people buy iPods. See how much they spend on OUR music! We can leave anytime we want to so better give in to our demands" when really its the other way around. Before iTunes, people were downloading these songs for free. iTunes actually helped these industries more than they helped Apple. Once they leave, people will just go back to illegaly downloading. It's so easy to open iTunes(which automatically opens when you plug in your iPod) and oh, I want a song. Click buy. Your done. Now how many people will goto amazon and such just to get that song they can get easily on Limewire?
This is such a tired argument. How many Limewire/Kazaa/whatever P2P network users do you think actually switched from free downloads to paying iTunes customers? 10% maybe...being really generous perhaps 20%. Again, downloads only constitute 10% of music sales. What percentage of that 10% do you think the converted pirates represent? Maybe 1%. Why do you think someone would stop using a P2P network and suddenly go legit?
Digital movie sales are even less of a factor than music. Back in May, Disney announced they had sold over 2 million movies on iTunes. This past week, I believe it was reported that the Transformers DVD alone sold over 5 million copies. That's just one movie in one week. How low is digital movie purchasing compared to physical, maybe a generous 1% of total movie sales if that. Seems to me the studios were already making lots of money selling movies before iTunes came back and "saved" them. I'm sure the studios because all the studios have to do is create a file and just keep selling copies of that one file ad infinitum with no manufacturing costs, shipping expenses, return issues, etc.
How is using Amazon any harder than using iTunes?. You're at your computer, browsing the web and look over and see your iPod sitting there and remember that song you wanted to buy. You click your bookmark to Amazon. Find the song you you want. Click, buy, done. Not exactly that different than your iTunes scenario.
Regardless, if iTunes went away, why do people think piracy would just go through the roof? Most likely digital piracy involves many of the same people who would have previously borrowed the CD from a friend or coworker and made a copy for themselves. Different mechanism with the same end result. Now people just look for an anonymous stranger on the internet to get it from. In the end though, music sales aren't going to plummet if digital downloads ceased to exist.