Posted on 10/06/2004 2:49:05 PM PDT by Range Rover
iPod users are music thieves says Ballmer
October 04 2004
by Andy McCue
'Vested interest', say cynics...
Speaking to an exclusive gathering of press in London on a number of issues, such as security, Steve Ballmer didn't pass up the opportunity to take several digs at his company's arch rival Apple.
At the heart of the debate is Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology which will let content providers such as record labels and movie studios keep control of their intellectual property (IP) - or at least ensure all royalties are paid and copyright observed.
Billing Microsoft as the good guys and Apple the villains of the piece - at least as far as corporate America, rather than users, is concerned, Ballmer said: "We’ve had DRM in Windows for years. The most common format of music on an iPod is 'stolen'."
"Part of the reason people steal music is money, but some of it is that the DRM stuff out there has not been that easy to use. We are going to continue to improve our DRM, to make it harder to crack, and easier, easier, easier, easier, to use," he said.
However, Ballmer conceded it isn't going to be an easy battle to win. "Most people still steal music," he said. "We can build the technology but there are still ways for people to steal music."
The Microsoft boss also claimed some domestic familiarity with the issue.
"My 12-year-old at home doesn’t want to hear that he can’t put all the music that he wants in all of the places that he would like it," he joked.
ZDNet UK's Michael Parsons contributed to this story
Where the heck did you get THAT statement? What does being an Apple user have to do with being a thief?
You think an iPod is not a computer? It has input/output, memory, and logic. What's missing?
Bill Gates himself has said the future of computers is embedded dedicated use devices. Apple has taken the lead. MS has no answer to the ipod at this time, only unmarketed concepts.
I've been an Apple user since 1977, from Apple II through every generation to G5. And, although you might think me pretentious and preachy, I'm about as far from "liberal" as you can get. Why do I favor Apple? (1) it's consistently been leading-edge in user interface, (2) its products are more esthetically pleasing, and (3) I hate the idea of a wintel monopoly, with all that portends for the deadening of innovation.
Whenever Mac vs. Wintel appears on FreeRepublic, you can generally count on some religious zealots posting messages — anti-Mac or anti-Microsoft. How about just being tolerant to different competing platforms?
How can Companys make Recordable VCRs and Casstette recorders, and TiVos, and iPODs, and Napster,and everything else that can copy audio,and Video...Take our money, and even teach Us how to download the stuff, then blame us when we do? all the Companys who make this stuff, Are accomplices. Hey Tort Lawyers! Sic-Em boys!!!!
You should be careful about generalizing, RangeRover. I am with Sarastro, and have been a long time Mac user. I prefer Macs for their reliability, relative lack of virus problems, and the way the OS works as well as the software.
I enjoy my iPod, pay for the music I download from Apple's site, and load in from my old CDs. I also love to listen to audible books on it, and I pay for those via audible.com.
Those who prefer PCs are the majority, and that is fine with me. I am happy with my Mac(s).
Wait a minute..didnt Microsoft steal from Apple?
Whos the Thief?
I was just joking...
but apple stole from Digital first
and Sun stole Java from Kodak (who bought Wang)
Looks like he picked a bad day to quit using meth...
I am wondering just how Mr. Balmer knows this.
All the music on my iPod (11 GB and growing) is my property, either purchased from the iTunes website, or from compact discs that I legally ripped for my own use.
These people are getting nuts about this kind of thing. Before long, we won't be able to enjoy any interesting gadget without being taxed to death for the sake of protecting people from "stealing" music.
Then I keep waiting for an alien to rip it's way out of his chest when he stands huffing at the podium.
Then I have nightmares when I go to sleep...
How true.
What was that book that described what a Sh@t Bill Gates was in his early days both during and post MIT? "Hackers" I think. The book was also a great history of the early computer industry.
What two-faced liars. Hummm...who does that remind me of...it's on the tip of my tongue...
I wonder what Presidential candidate Ballmer supports....Could it beeeee SATAN! (Kerry!)
I tolerate Macs so much that I would really like to switch over, but unfortunately my investment in software makes that a difficult proposition at the moment.
For instance, my business buys all the software it can afford. We don't steal software, but however nice a feature a new piece of software provides - it goes unused and untested by us. I will bet that the total entertainment budget of 8-22 year olds, who I would guess do most of the music file swapping, is also pretty much fixed, as it was when I grew up.
When I grew up, a lot of groups got free advertising and publicity because we swapped recordings of records around. Some of those groups, out of nostalgia, we have bought on CD as we got older. At no time could they have charged us at the time for the "value" of the music they produced.
In fact, part of the value of a record in the marketplace was that you could make a couple of copies and share it with your friends and they made a couple of copies of something else and shared it with you. If the technology had existed to prevent any copies, the net result might not have been 3 sales in place of 1 sale, but NO sales in place of one sale. Regardless, total sales among my friends could not have gone up because we spent all the money we had.
Use Windows to stay pure.
Me too! I love my iBook, been using Apples since the //e, but I also have WinTel machine, a Linux box, and a Solaris server--not to mention gadgets that a few years ago would be considered SciFi material (iPod and Palm).
I'm pretty much a computer agnostic--each does something well, though I find myself using my Play Station more than my WinTel box (it was mostly for gaming anyway).
Sure.
I promise to be just as tolerant of the Microsoft platform as Microsoft is of Linux.
I'm a big Microsoft fan but such a move would have me buying an Apple computer just so that I can continue using my iPod and iTunes. This would be a PR disaster for Microsoft of the highest order, especially considering that millions of Windows users already own iPods and millions more will by the time Longhorn is released in 2006 (or 2007).
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