jma

p.s. Yes, analog is better. Has anyone used a digital turntable to turn analog into digital? Does it trim the highs and lows the way commercial digital music seems to?

As of now, for as much as I know, the only service that is iPod compatible as the iTunes Music Store. I would prefer not to pay 99 cents for every song, and just pay a monthly fee.

Am i correct in saying that iTunes is the only iPod compatible service? And if thats true, would it be legal to use Tunebite to free that music so i could put it on my iPod?

P.S. I have no probelm buying all my movies and not downloading them but if I can’t enjoy what I buy on my own tv I do not see a problem downloading movies. In fact, I am downloading 15+ movies right now and then I will proceed to convert them to a !@#$%$# unprotected mpeg4 VF format and maybe I will even burn them and give them to my friends out of disgust towards these individuals.

Still, it seems like an awful lot of loops to jump through just for a couple of free albums.

I think you are both right in that “cracking” subscribed music as opposed to purchased music is probably a bit worse, but hey, it’s still cracking however you slice it.

I also wonder about the validity of the alleged e-mails from Jobs. They have apparently been confirmed by some music executives, but it really seems a bit beneath Steve to do that, don’t you think?

In order to obtain a song from iTunes, you must pay $0.99 for it. If you then un-DRM it, you at least have paid for it first. So, to un-DRM 1000 songs would cost you $999.

On the other hand, Napster is $15 per month (and free for the trial) for unlimited downloads. You pay your $15 and then you download 1000 songs — un-DRMing them cost you only $15. Effectively, you’ve “stolen” 885 songs.

Granted, both scenarios are illegal, but in the case of iTunes, we’re talking about small potatoes. We’re talking about stripping a very lose, unrestrictive DRM from a song after you’ve paid for it. In the case of Napster, we’re talking about stripping a very tight, restrictive DRM from a song you didn’t pay for. It is for this reason that I imagine the record companies will have a bigger concern with the Napster problem than with the iTunes, even though they are both technically “illegal.”

While I also doubt the validity of the claim the note was from Jobs, this is definitely a win for Apple in the record companies’ eyes. If, as you say, DRM is breakable and always will be, then it will be impearative to the labels that music is paid for before it is downloaded in any form.

And to answer your question — yes, you can pay an additional $0.99 to Napster (on top of your $15/mo fee) to be able to burn your song to CD. But, these is not really relevant. The finles that were being un-DRMed were non-burnable, $15/mo-only files.

The problem with this thinking, in my mind, is that there are so many examples of other models out there which people are already using. There is the Rhapsody/Napster paid subscription model. There is the XM/Sirius paid subscription model. There is IP-based internet radio. Whenever you send bits down the line, those bits can always be captured, saved, and un-DRMed if necessary. Heck, WireTap for OS X just captures the sound directly through the audio channel on your Mac… no hacking necessary. I understand that what makes this Napster case so bad is the on-demand nature of the music available, but what happens when you have 2000 channels of satellite radio or IP-based radio to choose from? Anything played on these channels can be automatically captured, saved, and shared, so the “problem” just becomes bigger as more music becomes available.

When you finally realize that the song you want to copy is on you have to launch the program and hit record. By then you’ve missed at least the first 10 seconds of the song. Once you’re recording you have to hope to hell that your computer doesn’t give you an alert sound or any other sound for that matter.

The major kick in the pants is when you get those really bad DJ’s cutting into the song. From then on when you want to listen to your stolen radio song you’re constantly reminded that you got it from the radio.

And from what I’ve heard women aren’t really into guys cruisin’ the streets with a pimped stereo, blasting the latest and greatest song that gets interrupted by some lame-ass internet DJ.