Apple on front page of NYTimes.com
Apple Said to Be Entering E-Music Fray With Pay Service
user: appleinsider
password: appleinsider
highlights include:
"Unless Apple unveils something radically unexpected, its service will not represent a marked difference from some of the Internet services already in existence. The announcement, however, will bring a big-name company into the mix, presenting a potentially significant change in what has been a tense relationship between consumer electronics makers and the music industry.
"...Now, though, they seem comfortable with Apple's new strategy. Hilary B. Rosen, the chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America, said she believed Apple had struck an industry-friendly balance. Apple's music service "has compatibility with a hardware product that is elegant and easy to use," said Ms. Rosen, who said she planned to attend Apple's news conference. "The Apple system has the potential to do for music sales what the Walkman did for the cassette," she added.
"...But Philip Leigh, a digital media analyst with Raymond James & Associates, an investment banking firm in St. Petersburg, Fla., said the presence of Apple in the market could give a lift to digital music services beyond the confines of Apple's limited user base. The reason, he said, is that if Apple starts advertising the sale of music, "they'll be advertising to the whole world."
"...And he said the move could mean a long-term shift for Apple. "This signals a transformation of Apple into a digital media company," Mr. Leigh said. "Within 10 years, we'll look back and say this is when it mutated.""
user: appleinsider
password: appleinsider
highlights include:
"Unless Apple unveils something radically unexpected, its service will not represent a marked difference from some of the Internet services already in existence. The announcement, however, will bring a big-name company into the mix, presenting a potentially significant change in what has been a tense relationship between consumer electronics makers and the music industry.
"...Now, though, they seem comfortable with Apple's new strategy. Hilary B. Rosen, the chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America, said she believed Apple had struck an industry-friendly balance. Apple's music service "has compatibility with a hardware product that is elegant and easy to use," said Ms. Rosen, who said she planned to attend Apple's news conference. "The Apple system has the potential to do for music sales what the Walkman did for the cassette," she added.
"...But Philip Leigh, a digital media analyst with Raymond James & Associates, an investment banking firm in St. Petersburg, Fla., said the presence of Apple in the market could give a lift to digital music services beyond the confines of Apple's limited user base. The reason, he said, is that if Apple starts advertising the sale of music, "they'll be advertising to the whole world."
"...And he said the move could mean a long-term shift for Apple. "This signals a transformation of Apple into a digital media company," Mr. Leigh said. "Within 10 years, we'll look back and say this is when it mutated.""
Comments
Apple to Unveil Music Service
But online offering faces a greater marketing task due to court decision in favor of free networks.
By Jon Healey, Times Staff Writer
Apple Computer Inc. unveils its online music service today ? an initiative that can either give a much-needed boost to the beleaguered record industry or become immediately irrelevant.
Cloaked in secrecy, Apple's highly anticipated service has generated a healthy buzz among record label executives and music fans. Industry officials who have seen Apple's fee-based service believe it is good enough to lure consumers away from free sources of music online, which recording companies have tried to shut down with lawsuits.
But a federal judge in Los Angeles dealt the entertainment industry a stunning blow ? and stole Apple's thunder ? by unexpectedly ruling Friday that two leading online networks that let users copy music and movies for free aren't violating copyright laws.
Although U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson held that making unauthorized copies of songs and movies on file-sharing networks is illegal, he ruled that the companies behind the Morpheus and Grokster networks were not liable for their users' piracy because they do not monitor or control what people do.
The decision could send the wrong message to consumers, said analyst P.J. McNealy of research firm GartnerG2, and that spells trouble for Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs as he tries to get his new service off the ground.
"The ruling could completely undermine any momentum Apple hoped to have coming out of [today's] announcement," McNealy said. "It makes it monumentally more difficult" to compete with file-sharing systems "than it was last week."
Full article here.
Originally posted by MacsRGood4U
Although U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson held that making unauthorized copies of songs and movies on file-sharing networks is illegal, he ruled that the companies behind the Morpheus and Grokster networks were not liable for their users' piracy because they do not monitor or control what people do.
The decision could send the wrong message to consumers, said analyst P.J. McNealy of research firm GartnerG2, and that spells trouble for Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs as he tries to get his new service off the ground.
"The ruling could completely undermine any momentum Apple hoped to have coming out of [today's] announcement," McNealy said. "It makes it monumentally more difficult" to compete with file-sharing systems "than it was last week."
Full article here.
Analysts are so clueless.
First of all, the judge handed down the right decision. His reasoning is sound. It basically sends the same message to consumers that the Supreme Court's Sony v. Universal (the "Betamax case") sent, and that decision didn't kill the movie industry. The analyst, like the music industry, treats the consumer as guilty and greedy; copyright law, historically, has not. Historically, copyright law has been right.
McNealy ignores the importance of ease of use to the consumer (hint: you could make movies and burn DVDs on your computer before iMovie and iDVD, but who did?). He brushes off the consistency and quality problems. He ignores the fact that the people doing the filesharing are overwhelmingly people who taped each others CDs - and before that, LPs - before Shawn Fanning was a gleam in his mother's eye. I won't even mention books and software. He ignores the very real appeal of concrete things, and the value-adds of covers, lyrics and liner notes (although, of course, it remains to be seen how Apple will deal with these things).
And, of course, he ignores the fact that although students have been doing this sort of thing for centuries (back when books were rare and expensive, rich students would loan their books to poor students, who would buy blank books and copy them by hand), no IP industry has ever suffered materially for this, and students have been greatly enriched by it. Alias|Wavefront got the right idea when they found out that the winner of their student contest had used a cracked copy of their software: They gave him a license. They're still in business.
So I don't think the ruling above will have any impact whatsoever on Apple's service.
Originally posted by Amorph
Analysts are so clueless.
So I don't think the ruling above will have any impact whatsoever on Apple's service.
Agreed...
I'm not gonna lie, I have downloaded some (not alot mind you) music in the past because I wanted to hear that song at the time I thought about it... I hunted for anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes downloaded and played it. If I couldn't find it in 5 to 30 minutes I usually just got bored and gave up.
At my age (mid 30's) I'm just now beginning to understand that time is worth far too much to waste. Had I been able to pay a buck and download that song in a few seconds no-fuss-no-muss then hell yea I woulda. Life is just too damn short...
Doing the right thing: Apple's service is gonna give me the ablity to do something that until now I couldn't do. Apple wont get rich on me, music just isn't THAT major to me anymore. I think it happened somewhere between 29 and 32
Free isn't ALWAYS the bottom line, sometimes EASE/SPEED is far more important.
Dave
My list would begin with:
music services need...
- more music
- better ways to find music
- better quality files
- better portability
- better "box" experience i.e., art, lyrics, links, etc.
and maybe
- ways to find related music
- fair use sharing with friends/family
- bulk discounts (albums vs singles)
Originally posted by MacsRGood4U
Loop rumors is reported that the new iPods are in "black and white". They have buttons below the screen and are thinner.
Remember this image from a few weeks ago? Maybe it really is the next iPod.