You’d think we had started a war. Cory Doctorow, who I respect for his EFF work, has gone off the deep end calling iTunes 7.2 a “downgrade”. CNET quotes:
Songs available on iTunes Plus reveal users’ personal information. Privacy group suspects Apple goofed.
First off, did anyone think Apple was going to just sell plain raw bit unencrypted files? Come on!
Secondly, this is not an invasion of privacy at all. Songs don’t reveal any personal information. Giving those songs to others and having them hack out the data reveals your personal information. Keep your songs to yourself!
I am sick and tired of people who think they should be able to freely give purchased content away to others. Apple and EMI have gone out on a big limb and an even larger experiment. If sales plummet, guess what? The RIAA will be in SEE! PIRACY! mode and we’ll all go back to the dark ages.
I believe in privacy, I really do. However, Apple embedded your personal information in content that only you should have is no different than them saving your email address in a Mail application preferences.
So they didn’t tell people they were doing it? So what? Don’t pirate music and you won’t get burned.
Now you can back up this wonderful new iTunes Plus music and if the iTunes Music Store ever dies, it will still play. This is a huge benefit to users and those bitching about this are like little kids who got their Star Wars vehicle for XMAS but didn’t get each and every action figure. Its childish and this is exactly the kind of rigidness the RIAA and MPAA use to slap us with ridiculous restrictions.
Cory – Thanks for your work in pressuring companies to ditch DRM. Now back off. Have a drink. Take a nap. Go on vacation.
Update
From Wired:
“There’s absolutely no reason that it had to be embedded, unencrypted and in the clear,” said Fred von Lohmann, a senior intellectual property attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Some of the privacy problems, in light of this, is that anyone who steals an iPod that includes purchased iTunes music will now have the name and e-mail address of its rightful owner.”
Good! They’ll know where to return it. I know people who engrave their email address on the back. Now when the stolen iPod is recovered, I can prove its mine. Its not like the meth addict who stole it is going to need my email address, they already have it.
Gosh these guys.
At the end of the day, whether a music company is greedy or not, you are breaking the law by stealing music. We live in capitalism, so, suck it up and buy what’s not yours and quit stealing it. Just because Wal-Mart for example is a money hungry corporation, does that mean I can walk in and steal whatever I want? No.. If you don’t support the music companies, stop listening to music. Fact is, we like music and a lot of money is put into promoting and recording bands that go no where. When a music company finds a gem of a band, the market the shit out of them to make money to not only recoupe losses from the other useless bands, but, to actually turn a profit and employee music engineers, producers, distributers etc etc and then make a profit at the end of the day (why else would you be in business??) ..
What about if someone steals the ipod and then decides to take the music off and put it up on P2P networks? Am I going to be held responsible for the music being pirated when it wasn’t my fault?
“What about if someone steals the ipod and then decides to take the music off and put it up on P2P networks? Am I going to be held responsible for the music being pirated when it wasn’t my fault?”
That is a legal issue – just because your information is in the song doesn’t mean you pirated it. They still have to prove you uploaded it.
Its no different than if someone steals your car and uses it in a hit and run. The License/VIN is tied to you through government agencies – they still have to prove you were behind the wheel.
“The Apple iTunes Music Store EULA (End User License Agreement) states that you cannot give/sell the songs away. You agreed to that by clicking “I Agree—
That’s why you don’t fucking buy from Apple. That’s also why so many people don’t buy at all! We don’t want some asshole telling us how we can use something that we buy and how we can’t. If we pay for it, it is ours!!
Fuck DRM!!!
Dan,
“That’s why you don’t fucking buy from Apple. That’s also why so many people don’t buy at all! We don’t want some asshole telling us how we can use something that we buy and how we can’t. If we pay for it, it is ours!!”
So if you go to a baseball game, the game is yours? No. If you watch a game on TV, that you paid for, and paid the cable company, do you own the rights to re-transmit the game? No.
Should I go on?
Steve,
What we are talking about is the difference between something physical, and something not, an experience. When you pay for a baseball game, you are paying for the experience. You might argue that a music file is not physical, but it is. It is an object, which I can buy, and which I can keep. Buying music digitally is much more comparable to buying a CD, IMO, than to going to a baseball game. Now, if you want to compare it to watching a baseball game on TV, than I would say it’s much more comparable to buying an old vhs tape of a baseball, produced, and sold by the MLB, its self.
I agree with you that if you watch a game on Cable or go to a ball game, the game is not yours. But what you are arguing is that if I purchase media of a baseball game, such as a VHS tape, whatever… That it also does not belong to me.
I don’t condone people stealing music. I just said that because I understand why they do.
OK… woa, wait a minute: to the stealing scenario, where someone steals your music.
(1), It doesn’t matter if the thief finds out your name and/or email address. What could they do to it? Your name could be any other name from the 3 billion people in the world, and the worse they could do with your email address is spam you.
(2) They could post it on LimeWire, etc. Sure, so what? Not only is it unlikely that the RIAA (or whatever the organization’s name is) comes knocking on your door (again, how would they get your address from only your name and email), but if they do, your innocent. They can search your computer for a copy of the song, they could search your computer for a copy of LimeWire, they could see your web history, they won’t find anything. Innoccent until proven guilty.