M$'s new catch for their media player

[Newby]

http://www.engadget.com/2006/07/06/microsoft-planning-wifi-enabled-portable-media-player-working-o/

Not even negative. It'll scan iTunes for tracks you've purchased, and allow you to download them for free via the M$ music tracks store (whatever that is now...)

Sounds like an awesome way to kill off Apple, although I don't think it'll be very successful unless they'll allow people to trade in their iPod for a free media player...

[Blaze]

So... it'll let you get songs you already have?  Great.

[wires]

So... it'll let you get songs you already have?  Great.

My thoughts exactly.

[CrAz3D]

That thing better have some sort of cold fusion reactor........otherwise I bet the battery dies quick

[deadly7]

So... it'll let you get songs you already have?  Great.

Yeah, but with DRM!

[Hitmen]

So... it'll let you get songs you already have?  Great.

Yeah, but with DRM!

That quote implied that itunes songs are not already DRM'd to hell. Fail.

[deadly7]

I skipped Newby's post [and the article].  So sue me.

[dark_drake]

This little battle should be interesting.  It might even end up something like the console war with Microsoft fighting for its share against a company that has a much larger user base already.

However, I do find it amusing that Microsoft is going to pay the rights-holders for the songs.

[Warrior]

So... it'll let you get songs you already have?  Great.

Yeah, but with DRM!

That quote implied that itunes songs are not already DRM'd to hell. Fail.

I was about to say that. I really don't see the catch MS is doing here, I mean if they're still DRM'ed then there is no point. It'd maybe be more convincing if they recognized the iPod as a device and allowed integration with WMP. Then they would be on to something.

[Newby]

It'd maybe be more convincing if they recognized the iPod as a device and allowed integration with WMP.

Bad move on behalf of M$. This would mean:

• Pretty much kills their chance of selling their own media player. I mean, if you can use your iPod in WMP, why download iTunes? It's a killer for iTunes, but not for the iPod.
• Their music store would have to be compatible with the iPod (i.e. no downloading wma files, only aac) which means they have to drop another one of their products; in this case, wma (which would be good, since it sucks).

[Warrior]

Well not exclusively supporting the iPod but supporting it as a device along with their own line of portable devices. It shouldn't be the Lock-In tactic MS uses but a geniuine Product vs Product quality battle.

If Microsoft makes the game field clear I believe they can win out either way. Microsoft can make something better than the iPod if they stopped trying to win through vendor lock ins.

[Newby]

Well not exclusively supporting the iPod but supporting it as a device along with their own line of portable devices. It shouldn't be the Lock-In tactic MS uses but a geniuine Product vs Product quality battle.

If Microsoft makes the game field clear I believe they can win out either way. Microsoft can make something better than the iPod if they stopped trying to win through vendor lock ins.

Their lock-in tactic seems to work pretty well. Look at the XBox. Look at Internet Explorer. Both came into the game pretty late and absolutely crushed the competition, with IE destroying Netscape and the XBox (what seems in my opinion) being better overall than the PS2/Lamecube.

Haha, I butchered the subject. Oops. Damn this laptop.

Anyway, there are so many iPods that have been sold (at $300 average) that people aren't just gonna want to give them up and buy a new media device, especially when their iPod works just fine.

The good news is that if people start giving up iPods left and right, I can pick up some damn cheap iPods.

[Warrior]

Well of course it works better, but in the longrun they won't be able to beat the competition for long using that tactic. I'd rather them beat them by sheer superiority in their products.

If they allowed iPod into WMP they're saying "Yea we'll let iPod in the scene, but try out this [INSERT PORTABLE THING HERE], it totally rocks and allows you to use our products to the max!"

[Newby]

Well of course it works better, but in the longrun they won't be able to beat the competition for long using that tactic. I'd rather them beat them by sheer superiority in their products.

If they allowed iPod into WMP they're saying "Yea we'll let iPod in the scene, but try out this [INSERT PORTABLE THING HERE], it totally rocks and allows you to use our products to the max!"

That's like saying iTunes runs better on OS X. Why bother buying the extra crap for a little bit of increased performance with a product? It wokrs fine on Windows, so why bother?

They're going to have to convince people to give up their $250-350 iPods for the new M$ media player if they want to do any damage to the iPod market. Internet Explorer was a bang because it was free. The XBox did so well because it came out around Christmas and the same time that the Gamecube / PS2 had just come out, and Halo totally pushed its sales to the limit early on.

The media player is coming out around Christmas iirc, but in my opinion they should start selling them earlier (ala XBox 360 in terms of number of units sold) around October/November. Hype them up, then produce them like crazy for Christmas sales.

And actually, yah, they can beat the competition using that vendor lockout strategy. It hasn't failed in the past before. Well, hasn't failed very often anyway.

[Warrior]

I agree however allowing interop would get Antitrust off they're back. Think about it, WMP ships with windows and if they make a music store and enter the Portable MP3 Market then they will have Antitrust on their ass.

Either that or make the doc for extending WMP open so others can do it.

I'm going to laugh when Leapord flops on Intel..the anti MS commercials are really stupid. They happen to think their little OS is invulnerable..we'll see.

[rabbit]

I'm going to laugh when Maccers start getting virii cause they don't have anti-virus because they think "I'm on a Mac" and then their computer explodes.

[Newby]

They may have antitrust, but it won't be that big a problem if they include other media players but the iPod. If it's just exclusively their media player I could see it, but they could support a bunch of crappy media players and just not support the iPod.

I don't quite understand how antitrust works, but eh? I mean, it's their product, they can do what the fuck they want with it. If they don't support the iPod, it's because the iPod has virtually no documentation (that I know of) so how could M$ support it? Reverse engineer it? That's illegal.

As for vendor lock-in, Microsoft has basically done that already with Windows. Corporations really don't want to switch over to Unix because the API is so totally different that it would cost a bundle of money to migrate their programs over. And the Unix/Linux's are so fragmented over so many distros that they're all different in some way (libraries, headers, etc.) whereas Windows is centralized, so Unix -> Windows (what my dad does for a living) is simple versus Windows -> Unix, which is a lot more difficult. M$ also provides tech support for 10 years on their products, where in Linux you're forced to use the internet to search for answers.

God damnit, I butchered the topic again? :|

[Warrior]

You make good points on Linux/Unix vs Windows lock ins.
I also agree with the poor iPod doc thing, perhaps they could just open up an extensible format or something if they really wanted.

In the end, all MS would need to do is remove DRM to own iTunes. I dont see that happening either though .

[Newby]

DRM would not be enough really; it ain't that big an issue for the average home/corporate user. Its benefits (preventing piracy, pissing off pirates and your above-average home user) outweigh its detriments.

Plus DRM is easy enough to remove if you're determined. The rather simple method: Burn to a CD-RW, rip as mp3 in 128kbps (since it has no quality anyway), and you're good. Blank the CD-RW, and you're rockin'.

[rabbit]

You don't even need to do that.  Do a virtual mount+burn+rip.  No CD's wasted, DRM removed.

[deadly7]

DRM would not be enough really; it ain't that big an issue for the average home/corporate user. Its benefits (preventing piracy, pissing off pirates and your above-average home user) outweigh its detriments.

Plus DRM is easy enough to remove if you're determined. The rather simple method: Burn to a CD-RW, rip as mp3 in 128kbps (since it has no quality anyway), and you're good. Blank the CD-RW, and you're rockin'.

Or just decode to WAV and then encode to MP3 at whatever bitrate you want.

[Newby]

DRM would not be enough really; it ain't that big an issue for the average home/corporate user. Its benefits (preventing piracy, pissing off pirates and your above-average home user) outweigh its detriments.

Plus DRM is easy enough to remove if you're determined. The rather simple method: Burn to a CD-RW, rip as mp3 in 128kbps (since it has no quality anyway), and you're good. Blank the CD-RW, and you're rockin'.

Or just decode to WAV and then encode to MP3 at whatever bitrate you want.

IIRC you can't.

rabbit: I wish (wish) I knew how to do that. How do you do that? My dad could have saved a bolt load of CD-R's if he knew how... now all those CDs have bad music on them!

And the reason I specified CD-RW is so that you didn't waste any CDs.

[Hitmen]

Or just decode to WAV and then encode to MP3 at whatever bitrate you want.

Unless it's in a lossless format I wouldn't waste the space encoding it to anything at a higher bitrate than it was at. That would just be wasting hard drive space.

[deadly7]

DRM would not be enough really; it ain't that big an issue for the average home/corporate user. Its benefits (preventing piracy, pissing off pirates and your above-average home user) outweigh its detriments.

Plus DRM is easy enough to remove if you're determined. The rather simple method: Burn to a CD-RW, rip as mp3 in 128kbps (since it has no quality anyway), and you're good. Blank the CD-RW, and you're rockin'.

Or just decode to WAV and then encode to MP3 at whatever bitrate you want.

IIRC you can't.

rabbit: I wish (wish) I knew how to do that. How do you do that? My dad could have saved a bolt load of CD-R's if he knew how... now all those CDs have bad music on them!

And the reason I specified CD-RW is so that you didn't waste any CDs.

No.. I've taken music from people who downloaded it off of iTunes (mp3 files) and re-ripped it without burning.  I <3 my AltoMP3 Maker program.

[rabbit]

DRM would not be enough really; it ain't that big an issue for the average home/corporate user. Its benefits (preventing piracy, pissing off pirates and your above-average home user) outweigh its detriments.

Plus DRM is easy enough to remove if you're determined. The rather simple method: Burn to a CD-RW, rip as mp3 in 128kbps (since it has no quality anyway), and you're good. Blank the CD-RW, and you're rockin'.

Or just decode to WAV and then encode to MP3 at whatever bitrate you want.

IIRC you can't.

rabbit: I wish (wish) I knew how to do that. How do you do that? My dad could have saved a bolt load of CD-R's if he knew how... now all those CDs have bad music on them!

And the reason I specified CD-RW is so that you didn't waste any CDs.

I read about it somewhere.  It's got something to do with getting an ISO of a blank CD-R (okay?) and mounting it on Alcohol 120%, and then burning.  I tried, but it wouldn't let me burn to the virtual, which leads me to believe it was A) a crack/mod or B) fake.  Either way, interesting proposition.

[Newby]

No.. I've taken music from people who downloaded it off of iTunes (mp3 files) and re-ripped it without burning.  I <3 my AltoMP3 Maker program.

The problem with your statement is that iTunes downloads are.m4p files. Not .mp3. You can't really protect an .mp3 file just short of encrypting the filesystem that it's on, which is practically useless for protection anyway.

I read about it somewhere.  It's got something to do with getting an ISO of a blank CD-R (okay?) and mounting it on Alcohol 120%, and then burning.  I tried, but it wouldn't let me burn to the virtual, which leads me to believe it was A) a crack/mod or B) fake.  Either way, interesting proposition.

IIRC, the virtual drives are just DVD/CD-R, not -RW. Even if they were CD-RW, you would have to specify a location to write all the new data (said "ISO of a blank CD-R"), and since the ISO already has data on it (700 mb of crap) it would be confused as to how exactly it is going to fit 700mb of data on a CD that is already 700mb...

At least, that's how I've seen it thus far.

[deadly7]

No.. I've taken music from people who downloaded it off of iTunes (mp3 files) and re-ripped it without burning.  I <3 my AltoMP3 Maker program.

The problem with your statement is that iTunes downloads are.m4p files. Not .mp3. You can't really protect an .mp3 file just short of encrypting the filesystem that it's on, which is practically useless for protection anyway.

I read about it somewhere.  It's got something to do with getting an ISO of a blank CD-R (okay?) and mounting it on Alcohol 120%, and then burning.  I tried, but it wouldn't let me burn to the virtual, which leads me to believe it was A) a crack/mod or B) fake.  Either way, interesting proposition.

IIRC, the virtual drives are just DVD/CD-R, not -RW. Even if they were CD-RW, you would have to specify a location to write all the new data (said "ISO of a blank CD-R"), and since the ISO already has data on it (700 mb of crap) it would be confused as to how exactly it is going to fit 700mb of data on a CD that is already 700mb...

At least, that's how I've seen it thus far.

Hm.  I thought they naturally came off of iTunes as protected MP3's (I've encountered some before.. you have no idea how annoying it is when you're trying to edit an ID3 tag and it just won't edit).  I guess the person I got the music from already changed it to MP3 for me.