Apple iPod Trial Circus Ping!
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Posted on 12/08/2014 10:40:29 PM PST by Swordmaker
Edited on 12/09/2014 12:12:17 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP)
(Excerpt) Read more at seattlepi.com ...
Well now at least the appeal is nailed.
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My guess is they've convinced themselves of their own "anti-Apple righteousness" -- the same tired saga of trying to take down an American capitalist company because it's profitable -- and they figured they didn't have to follow the rules.
Leftists -- I'd bet the rent on it.
So here is a question that Apple really should ask: “When did you first decide you were unhappy with your IPod purchase?”
Plantiff: “Yesterday, when the attorney told me I could make a lot of money by joining this case”
The plaintiffs LIED to bring this case to court. . . if they did not have an iPod capable of the so-called activity they are claiming at trial, and swore in depositions in discovery that THEY were somehow economically injured by, but we're now proved not to have and never owned to be injured, who else provided the evidence that got this ball rolling? It is supposed to be the injured party, not someone the lawyers ring in. Are they going to be allowed a pinch-plaintiff? Does truth no longer matter?
Well, I don't know about the attorney's for the now non-existent plaintiffs, but here's some really disturbing information on her dishonor, da judge. It, I think, may explain why she's willing to play fast and loose with the niceties of the rule of law:
Gonzalez Rogerswas appointed to the federal bench by President Obama in mid-2011. Her husband, Matthew Rogers, has served in various positions in the Obama administration, including the president’s transition team and as a top advisor in the Department of Energy (DOE). In fact, Rogers served as the DOE official overseeing Obama’s scandal-plagued green loan program that’s fleeced American taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars. Remember Solyndra?Judge Gonzalez Rogers also has an interesting résumé that illustrates activism in a number of leftwing causes, according to the Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire required of judicial candidates. She was vice president of the California La Raza Lawyers Association, on the board of directors of the San Francisco La Raza Lawyers Association and served on the board of the La Raza Centro Legal, a community organization dedicated to empowering Latino, immigrant and low-income communities. In 2010 Gonzalez Rogers was awarded judge of the year by the San Francisco La Raza Lawyers Association, whose mission is “promoting reform in the law.”
What about Kindle? They won’t handle epub or pdf files. Thing is you should research before you buy. I wanted to use OPEN LIBRARY so I bought a NOOK. No way can I afford all the books I read, and there are a lot more choices in epub format.
I said appeal because with a judge like this, I assume she’s going to rule against Apple no matter what. What you just said IS the appeal.
I think Bill Lerach went to jail for something similar in securities litigation. I don’t know how these guys are getting away with it.
Got my new mac mini installed. It’s so tiny.
“Does truth no longer matter?”
You expect too much from the CA court system.
Well, do you have a relative or good friend who is a lawyer and wants to get rich? Start a class action lawsuit against AMAZON for not letting you buy iBooks, PDFs and eBook formats on your Kindle. The iPod, iPhone, iPad ecosystem does. . . and Kindle books too.
I just discovered that the Seattle PI website, where this article originated, will not allow my iPad to edit or copy what I've entered in their comment section while I attempt to log on their site. While trying, they DELETED what I spent ten minutes composing, the GREAT AMERICAN POST! Now it's lost to the ages and no one will be able to read my profound thoughts and wisdom. That's worth far more than a recoverable song; its irreplaceable! Unique. All because their software just doesn't play nice with Apple iOS. They recommend only using Microsoft Internet Explorer and Microsoft Windows products (Seattle, you know). But I dont want to buy their products. I want to use MY choice! Perhaps I should sue them!
This one is Federal. . . but the principle is the same.
This is a class action lawsuit, and any member of the class can be a lead plaintiff representing the entire class.
Also, note artificially restricting the right of vendors and customers to engage in fair trade of dissimilar merchandise is unfair competition, especially when it involves monopolistic practices and cartels gaining unfair advantages over consumers. You cannot tell the consumer of your product they must buy an Acme brand loaf of bread to qualify for the right to purchase an Acme brand of milk in a quart bottle. This bread and milk example is old court precedent. Likewise, Apple would be engaging in unfair trade practices by selling you an Apple automobile designed with a fuel tank system which only allowed you to pump in Apple branded gasoline at substantially inflated prices with a proprietary pump nozzle. So it is with the music, using unfair restrictions to force music artists and music consumers to pay inflated prices for the privilege of using only the Apple product on another Apple product.
Freedom with fair competition in the marketplace is a Conservative’s virtue, and Apple is an anti-conservative organization opposed to such freedom.
The stupidity is astonishing. If the iPods were sold at inflated prices, it seems to me that a lower-priced equivalent, which would play lower-priced music would be a great big hit.
I tried one of those lower-priced devices, and it was a dog. Way to complex for the average person to understand or use. It was worth a lot less than I paid for it. Got a real iPod and everything was suddenly easy. It may have bee sold at an "inflated" price, but the thing worked.
I own the music on there but if you lose the hard drive or your computer, you've lost your itunes program and what is on your ipod is there but cannot be edited. The first time I bought a program that would copy from my ipod to my itunes on the new computer. When I went to use it the next time the hard drive went I would have had to buy the third-party software again since it is only a 1 year license. You cannot copy the files from one drive to another since the itunes must be a new install in windows. Not sure if I am making myself clear here, but my ipod content is exactly as it was 2 years ago and cannot be changed unless I buy third party software to do it. So I have a $250 ipod (yes, that is what I paid for it) that does not do what Apple promised it would do.
Don't try to teach an old Economist Economics, WhiskeyX. What you are trying to convey is called "Tying" but that is not what is occurring here. To establish such a tie requires the economic power to do it. In this instance Apple was not the only source of music and anyone could rip their own CDs for music for their iPods. If anyone had the economic power here it was the music publishing powers of the Big Four who had the power to tie sales of their music with DRM, which is at the heart of this mess.
You are only demonstrating a complete unfamiliarity with the facts of the iPod case and what's being claimed. . . and that causes you to see anti-competitive behavior where there is none.
Apple was not keeping out all other music. You could load music to your hearts content from other sources so long as it was NOT Digital Rights management (DRM) protected. Under contract with the big four labels that Apple sold, they could only play DRM MUSIC that was licensed under Apple's FairPlay DRM. If the music loaded was not licensed properly, it should not play. . . and that's the way DRM works. One CAN spoof the DRM into playing but that is a violation of copyright law.
Apple had a legitimate license on the iPod for one type of DRM, their own registered FairPlay. No other. All the music the Big Four made was available under FairPlay DRM, and there was no need for any other.
Under that license, if there was any risk that showed the DRM was being broken or compromised in ANY WAY, the music publishers WOULD pull all of their music, which represented 80% of all music on iTunes and cancel their contract.
By definition in the contract, the terms stated security of iTunes and the iPod device operating system were included in the DRM as they were integral to maintaining the security of the copyrights. If I recall correctly, Apple had a mere 45 days to correct and get updates out for iTunes and 90 days for iPod updates, for any breeches in those components of the DRM or the contracts would be considered voided.
RealNetworks did not "reverse engineer" Apple's DRM as did RIM to get iTunes to see Blackberry phones. They HACKED the iTunes software and iPod OS security to insert their own DRM code into Apple's proprietary software and operating system, so that the software and device would see RealNetworks proprietary DRM and accept it as OK. This is not legal music competition but actually an illegal modification of Apple's copyrighted intellectual property for Realnetwork's gain. I refer you to the Millenium Copyright Act of 1998, and also to various Federal and state statutes on computer hacking for fraudulent purposes for more information on that.
Incidentally, all contracts with the Big Four had the same security clauses. Consider the consequences if Apple had NOT closed RealNetwork's hack, and Real, a fierce competitor with their own player and store, willing to cut corners, brought the hole in Apple's security to the attention of the music publishers after the time limits had passed? Do you think they'd have cut any slack about exercising their rights and pulling the music, the people who sue eight year olds for downloading kids' nursery songs? . . . and that there wouldn't be a huge competitive advantage to RealNetwork?
The same hack that RealNetwork used to insert their executable codex into iTunes and then into the iPod OS could just as easily insert executable code to strip Apple's FairPlay DRM and the labels would NOT BE HAPPY. Apple updated the software and the iPod OS, patching the vulnerability. The new versions of both iTunes and the various iPod OS did not have the vulnerability, so the RealNetwork codex could not make their songs work on the iPod, nor could RealNetwork hackers illegally (and yes hacking and breaking computer security is a crime) reHack back in.
Apple closed a security door in their software that should never have been there or opened. You are seeing anti-competitiveness where there is none.
Think about it logically. Apple was keeping customers trapped in a more expensive player, with more expensive music, that is digitally locked, but that Apple makes easy for anyone to copy without DRM, with a more expensive store. . . by keeping out DRM FREE cheaper music that anyone could buy, from cheaper music stores, to play on cheaper players that anyone could buy. Tell me, WhiskeyX, how in hell did they find all those stupid, dumb people with so much money to waste. . . or maybe, just maybe, those customers chose the iPod becau it was just leaps and bounds better than the cheap junk of the competition?
The organization that was limiting sales was not Apple. It was the big four music producers who REQUIRED the DRM. For example, RealNetworks would NOT allow its customers to burn their purchased music to MP3 files, which would make it easy to load it on an iPod, opting instead to keep them in their proprietary Real file format.
Apple always has allowed its customers to do so. . . or a host of other file types, including AAC, MP4, Apple Lossless, and several others, if you wanted to migrate your music to some other purpose such as making a movie or video. If you kept it in its original iTunes DRM format there were certainly constraints. MP3 files can be migrated anywhere.
Well, as an economist, I can tell you that any good or service ALWAYS sells in an uncontrolled market for the "right and fair" price. That's the price where a willing buyer buys it from a willing seller. . . a where neither party has a gun pointed at his head.
This trial is an attempt by some whiners (crooked lawyers, working in cahoots with a corrupt judicial system) to get out a retroactive gun and point it at Apple's head and say "Lower your prices, or I'll shoot!"
What model iPod do you have? iPod touch? I am confused. The iTunes library is not part of iTunes. Didn't you back it up? Someone is telling you wrong. You should be able to backup all your music in your iTunes to another iTunes install with no problem. And there are scads of freeware apps to get your music off the iPod and depending on the model of ipod, you can edit content directly on the iPod.
I've pinged Martib_fierro to this question. He knows a lot more about iPods on Windows than I do.
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