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Gates: We will challenge iPod
news.com ^ | February 11, 2006 | Reuters

Posted on 02/13/2006 7:08:46 AM PST by stainlessbanner

REDMOND, Wash.--Microsoft and its hardware partners will continue to develop new digital media devices aimed at challenging the dominance of Apple Computer's ubiquitous iPod music player, Chairman Bill Gates said on Friday.

"I don't think what's out on the market today is the final answer," Gates said, speaking to a group of minority students. "Between us and our partners, you can expect some pretty hot products coming out over the next few years."

The Microsoft founder praised Apple's iTunes music store and said the software giant was talking with hardware partners to create media devices that can be less expensive and easier to connect and can handle pictures and video better.

Gates said the market share for digital music players compatible with Microsoft software is around 20 percent, a figure that is lower than he would like.

Microsoft's strategy has been to allow various device manufacturers to create players that would be compatible with its software, arguing that it offered consumers more options.

However, BusinessWeek reported last week that Microsoft is mulling its own media device in an effort to cut into Apple's nearly 70 percent U.S. market share. The company declined to comment on the article at the time.

Gates did not disclose any plans for a Microsoft-branded device on Friday and alluded often to working together with partners for future media devices.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: apple; convictedmonopoly; gates; ipod; lowqualitycrap; microsoft; mp3; player
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To: Cincinatus

bump


41 posted on 02/13/2006 7:50:01 AM PST by Centurion2000 ("If you're going to shoot somebody, Shoot! Don't talk!")
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To: stainlessbanner; ShadowAce
There's also a method to install the popular Slax distro on an iPod Nano:

Click Here

Whoops! Gotta head to class...

42 posted on 02/13/2006 7:50:44 AM PST by rzeznikj at stout (This is a darkroom. Keep the door closed or you'll let all the dark out...)
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To: rzeznikj at stout; ShadowAce
I recently did the IPL installation. It leaves you with a dual boot iPod. The IPL has packages for games like Doom and Halo; also plays video clips (uncompressed).

I will have to check out SLAX. Even after the conversion, I was still tied to iTunes to move files on/off the iPod.

43 posted on 02/13/2006 7:54:01 AM PST by stainlessbanner (^W^)
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To: stainlessbanner

Better make it cheap and better make it cute.


44 posted on 02/13/2006 7:54:28 AM PST by lawgirl (Cake is a powerful food!)
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To: BunnySlippers

People dont wear Walkmans nearly as much as you see Ipods being worn. I see it in NYC and ama mazed at people using Ipods to screen out street noise or subways.


45 posted on 02/13/2006 7:55:01 AM PST by finnman69 (cum puella incedit minore medio corpore sub quo manifestu s globus, inflammare animos)
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To: ARA
The lawsuit would have to happen with Sony first, since they are the inventors of the portable music device... the sone walkman... I think any lawsuit against Apple is a non-starter...


http://informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=178601009

Apple Hit With iPod Hearing Loss Lawsuit

The suit asks for unspecified damages, and demands that Apple Computer update the iPod software so its portable music players can't blast tunes at more than 100 decibels.

A Louisiana man filed a lawsuit this week claiming that Apple's iPod can cause hearing loss.

The suit, submitted to a San Jose, Calif. federal court on behalf of John Kiel Patterson of Louisiana, seeks class-action status, asks for unspecified damages, and demands that Apple Computer update the iPod software so the portable music players can't blast tunes at more than 100 decibels.

Hard on the heels of experts saying that the use of earbud-style headphone like those bundled with iPods can lead to hearing loss, Patterson's suit charges Apple with not advising users of a safe listening volume, nor including a meter on the devices to monitor decibel levels.

"The ear buds are small and are placed in the listener's ear canal, close to the cochlea,'' the lawsuit read. "The close proximity to the ear canal directly impacts the amount of hearing loss caused by the MPs [music players], simply because there is less chance of dilution of the sound.''

Apple's practice is to not comment on pending legal action, but it has made some adjustments to iPod volume in the past. In 2002, for instance, it had to restrict the devices' output to 100 decibels to sell them in France.

The last time Apple was hit with a class action was in October 2005, when disgruntled buyers of the iPod nano complained that the gizmo's screen scratched too easily.

The company's iPod line has a stranglehold on the portable digital player market, and holds an estimated 70 percent of the business globally. In January, Apple said that it sold 14 million iPods in the last three months of 2005.
46 posted on 02/13/2006 7:57:48 AM PST by finnman69 (cum puella incedit minore medio corpore sub quo manifestu s globus, inflammare animos)
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To: stainlessbanner

Oh for the days when the world wasn't watching, and you could just rip off the product and call it your own, eh Bill?


47 posted on 02/13/2006 7:58:49 AM PST by Wolfie
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To: x5452

I think the xbox runs on a stripped-down w2k kernel ;)


48 posted on 02/13/2006 7:59:18 AM PST by cinives (On some planets what I do is considered normal.)
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To: dfwgator
Microsoft's business strategy corresponds to a corollary of the cliche you ere going for. They strive to be the "bird" in:

"The early worm gets eaten by the bird"
49 posted on 02/13/2006 7:59:47 AM PST by tx_eggman (Islamofascism ... bringing you the best of the 7th century for the past 1300 years.)
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To: stainlessbanner
Cynical predictions about Microsoft's digital music player:

(Feel free to add your own)


50 posted on 02/13/2006 8:02:53 AM PST by TChris ("Unless you act, you're going to lose your world." - Mark Steyn)
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To: TChris

Innovative: Most overused in Corporate America today.


51 posted on 02/13/2006 8:04:48 AM PST by stainlessbanner (^W^)
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To: TChris
Cynical predictions about Microsoft's digital music player:

(Feel free to add your own)

Users will learn what a Blue Screech of Death sounds like.

52 posted on 02/13/2006 8:12:51 AM PST by KarlInOhio (During wartime, some whistles should not be blown. - Orson Scott Card)
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To: finnman69

GREAT Profile's page...


53 posted on 02/13/2006 8:13:50 AM PST by harpu ( "...it's better to be hated for who you are than loved for someone you're not!")
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To: finnman69
Ipod and Apple will be subject to one of the biggest class action suits in history as tens of thousands suffer permanent hearing loss.

Microsoft should market their version as a safe Ipod.

.

.

Guess you weren't around during the 1980s when everybody had a Sony Walkman on their head...

54 posted on 02/13/2006 8:24:05 AM PST by D-Chivas
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To: xsrdx
"Between us and our partners, you can expect some pretty hot products coming out over the next few years."

Translated: We have found some small companies doing good work in compression. We think we can steal their products and then bully them into settling, slap our logos on it, and market it as innovative.

55 posted on 02/13/2006 8:26:30 AM PST by When_Penguins_Attack (Smashing Windows, Breaking down Gates. Proud Mepis User!!!!)
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To: stainlessbanner

Won't be able to do it with a model that is basically build a device that runs a stripped down CE with Media Player... Which I am sure is what MS wants.


56 posted on 02/13/2006 8:27:12 AM PST by HamiltonJay
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To: finnman69
Ipod and Apple will be subject to one of the biggest class action suits in history as tens of thousands suffer permanent hearing loss.

Ipod has a built in hearing loss protection device - its called the volume control.

57 posted on 02/13/2006 8:31:03 AM PST by Godzilla (Free men do not ask permission to bear arms.)
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To: stainlessbanner
"Between us and our partners, you can expect some pretty hot products coming out over the next few years."

Microsoft's problem is that it doesn't realize that we can expect some "pretty hot products" from Apple too. Microsoft: always shooting at where Apple is standing now, not where Apple will be when they shoot.

Methinks we need to send Bill duck hunting so he can learn about leading the target.

58 posted on 02/13/2006 8:32:51 AM PST by antiRepublicrat
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To: stainlessbanner

I helped my father-in-law get his new mp3 player working with his wintel machine this weekend. The user interface with Windows Media *(whatever the last word is) used to burn CDs, create playlists, sync the MP3 players was soo cumbersome and nonintuitive that it literally made me angry. The in-laws stoped by on Sunday and I showed him iTunes on my Mac and how amazingly simply things were.

This might the final nail in the coffin of his wintel experience. I kid you not, he spent two days straight trying to get music onto his MP3 player.


59 posted on 02/13/2006 8:34:42 AM PST by SengirV
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To: TChris

All you're music will cease to function if you haven't phoned home in the last 24 hours.


60 posted on 02/13/2006 8:36:51 AM PST by x5452
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