OSNews

I have a feeling honestly, Apple is going to make a huge and awesome release out of Leopard

There's no doubt in my mind, but it'll make little difference. People will cling to Windows even if it gave them three BSOD's a day.

There's no doubt in my mind, but it'll make little difference. People will cling to Windows even if it gave them three BSOD's a day.

If i wouldn't know better i would say looks like they are addicted...

More like they can't leave. Like families in mining towns of yore. Sure, they were technically free to leave, but in practice, the company owned them.

You mean like back with Win98? I had 8 crashes a day with Win98+IE. With Win98+Mozilla it was one or two a day. With Win2k or better (which means Linux) almost none.

I use WinXP for the most part...and if you can believe it I dont remember the last tiem when I experienced a crash on Windows XP let alone a BSOD.

Yes, I know XP can be pretty stable, that's why I said 'even if'. I never implied that it crashes daily.

BSODs don't exists in WinXP! I sure as heck have never seen one, and I've been running it on several different machines since launch day.

Hmm I thought Ipods were their main breadwinners.

I thought the same thing.....
They do sell hardware, but they make money with the iPod...

You're wrong about that, they make the most money from the iPod product line. Also where does this "Apple is a hardware company not a software company" stuff come from? They sell tons of software too.

Edited 2006-06-24 18:22

Apple sees themselves as a hardware company, which is why Jobs killed the clones when he came back to Apple. One reason Apple's software works so well is that Apple controls the hardware, which makes getting the two to play nicely with each other all the more easy.

There is too much pride/ego involved for Apple to only produce software. For better or for worse, Apple will stay the course.

Lastly, the iPod cash cow is limited. These growth rates are not sustainable; soon everybody who wants an iPod will have one. The public can only be tricked into buying a new iPod on a year basis for so long. Apple needs to be proactive to find another product on which to hang their hat, be it software or hardware. The back to school season will put Apple's transition to Intel to the test. The same can be said of Leopard. If there is no favorable consumer response to these two products, Apple will loose all the momentum they have worked so hard to acquire.

Lastly, the iPod cash cow is limited. These growth rates are not sustainable; soon everybody who wants an iPod will have one. The public can only be tricked into buying a new iPod on a year basis for so long

True. Until they put in an FM tuner/transmitter. And after that, erm.. well, a touch screen. And then, umm.. recording? And then some other stuff

They'll be milking for a while longer is my guess

Edited 2006-06-24 19:06

Before, MP3 Players only progressed by their own functions. A new product was dictated by more functions, until they were a mess. iPod helped clean that up, and whilst the iPod is still rather feature filled, I believe the future of MP3 players (or more accurately PMPs) will be dictated by the advancements in the industry, and not always advancements in the functionality.

Movies in iTunes for example. They only need add a bigger screen and you have a new model.

Creative player have:
Fm tunner,
Recording,
and much more. Why iPod?

"They sell tons of software too. "

Example: Final Cut Pro....^_^

Perhaps you should check your facts....more of Apple's revenue and profit do in-fact come from their ipods.

http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/320193/000110465906031303/a0...

That is Apple's latest 10-Q, filed with the SEC. For the 3 months ending April 1st, Apple made almost $200 million more from their iPod division than their computer division, and their iPod division is growing much faster than their computer division (their iPod division grew $700 million in a year, their computer division less than $100 million).

Because they done it before! If recall correctely it was before the PPC-platform, but they done it before.

By bashing Apple products/users, you won't get more clicks here, that is for sure

But you fell for it again though.

He hates Apple so much that he supports them by using their products. Brilliant!

No! Stop! It's a conspiracy!!! Thom really buy's Dells and *PAINTS* them to look like Macs!! And then... THEN he theemes Windows XP to look like OS X!!! I'm not crazy!... *I'M NOT CRAZY*!! HE *HATES* APPLE!!!!!!11111

Hehe.

Happens every time OSNews has an article that isn't absolutely flattering of Apple.

Why not show us that pic of your desktop again Thom, so we can make sure there's really no painted Dells in there ;-)

While we're at it, lets see picks of all your desktops, anyone with a Mac to PC ratio lower than 1.5:1 gets labeled a Mac hater. Might as well have ourselves a good ol' fashioned witch hunt for fun ;-)


Did I overdo the joke, or was it good?

Someone would have to make scientific study of this...but here's what it looks like:

True, there is always a complaint (or 300) about OSNew's posting of Apple Articles. However, Eugenia had a very terrible practice of twisting even the most positive Apple article into something Satanic and evil. Just clikc on the blue Apple above and read throug ha few of them.

This presents a problem. When people read the blurb, it makes the article sound completely different from what it's really saying. The one positive thing that Thom does is he puts "My take:" on things. Which is much appreciated, because it shows the line of seperation between the article and the OSNews editor's opinion on it.

Apparently, Thom has taken over the reigns of bashing Apple in the blurbs.

Just to keep kicking this dead horse, I remember when Eugenia was an editor for BeNews. The same practice was held there regarding Apple. I mean benews was pretty specific to be, but if there was ever mention of Apple, there was probably a pentagram somewhere waiting to be placed.

To further keep kicking this dead horse, I've had some post deleted because Eugenia didn't agree with my criticism of her criicism of Apple - this was before I wised up and registered an account.

So, Governa has a point.

You can also own a product yet hate the company. There is nothing illogical about that. It's just a result of an unwise personal decision. The reply to Governa's comment made it sound like there was some ultimate logical fallacy in commiting such an act. Ever heard of buyer's remorse?

Maybe "hating Apple" is not the correct way of wording it, but OSNews does have Anti-Mac rhetoric in their blurbs. But that's not to say that they don't Anti-Whatever in there as well.

Maybe OSNews just hates everything. Maybe the editors here are really critics.

Please note the mild sarcasm in the post.

Edited 2006-06-24 20:03

Not always having praise for a company is not the same thing as hating them and doesn't make it some conspiracy. I see the same tone used by the editors for all stories. Generally, it's more negative than positive unless it's something new and exciting, but that's hardly a bias against a particular company or product.

You're right.

I just bought a 17" Imac so I'm slightly biased.

You know it's funny, when there is anti-Microsoft rhetoric my eyes just read it as if it's to be expected.

What's more alarming is that once you criticize a company your seen as the enemy. Corporations are not our lords or masters, we are still entitled to our opinions no matter what the PR-goons tell you.

Total control over the software ?

Since many of their products (ie Safari) are (based on) open source, please notice Apple doesn't have a total control over the software.
Other important difference: Apple uses standard protocols where Microsoft pushes his own proprietary all the time.

Total control over the hardware ?

For Mac OS X to become large (if that is what Apple wants) takes licensing to other hardware vendors over which Apple has no control either ...

The FOSS in Apple's system does not dictate their UI. Safari is _not_ Opensource. The rendering engine is, what widgets and buttons and chrome appear in Safari is _Apple's_ choice.

And 'many' of their products are far from Opensource.

How so? thats how companies competed 20 years ago; some people here are *REALLY* thick in thinking that Apple is the *ONLY* company in history who did the vertically integrated approach.

20 years ago, there was Apple, Atari, Amstrad and Amiga - all vertically integrated companies, all competeing viciously with each other to grab customers; whats so damn terrible about that? the fact that the vertically integrated model has been proven over and over again to be the superior deliverer of a tightly integrated solution for end users? the fact that companies can no longer play the blame game when things go wrong, "Windows XP crashes, its the hardware vendors fault; the hardware vendor claims its the operating systems fault, the operating system vendor blames the third party, the third party blames the hardware vendor and operating system vendor" etc. etc.

Apple's the only one still doing it (successfully) in the PC market, though. Things would certainly be more interesting if we had several competing platforms with healthy market shares. Microsoft wouldn't be so dominant in all likelihood.

"have you noticed how iTunes gets more and more restrictive every version"

I'm completely deterred from any online music store, be it iTunes or otherwise. Most of them already have a limit on streaming, burning and transfering to mp3 players or other computers. If I buy a song I should have the right to put it on as many of my devices and storage media as I want, *no* limits. People who buy from online music stores that use DRM are helping destroy freedom and couldn't care less.

See these links for example:

This article is on Apple reducing the streaming songs limit in iTunes.
Careful: the adds on BoingBoing are sometimes not safe for work [NSFW] or school:
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/03/16/apple_steals_itunes_.html

The EFF site is safe, and they're good people. Here's something on all the big DRM providers:
http://www.eff.org/IP/DRM/guide/

And here's some guy's blog on lost iTunes features, just because you mentioned that:
http://george.hotelling.net/90percent/digital_music/features_lost_i...

There's more to be found on Google.

People who buy from online music stores that use DRM are helping destroy freedom and couldn't care less.

This is true, but most of them don't even realize this. Most of them don't know that the music they bought on iTunes is DRMed. Most of them don't know that the usage of their music is in several ways limited.

Many of them wouldn't care even if they knew. And the problem is that in many cases, when you like a certain artist and wanna buy his albums, then you get to chose between a copy protected audio cd and a DRM-ed digital download from iTunes or another online music store. None of them is good and should be considered acceptable. There's 2 more choices left: you could get the album illegally or you could just stop listening to that artist. The former is clearly unfair regarding the artist. The latter is a bit sad, because this might be a very capable artist which is ignored because of something out of his control.

To be honest, lately I've been considering buying something at iTunes, because it's music I can't seem to find in regular shops anymore. And I think iTunes is a very nice online music shop. The only thing stopping me is the DRM. I normally use Linux, so if I buy it, I would need to remove the DRM some way or another to make it actually useful. Luckily, I've also noted that a couple of groups I like, are available on emusic.com.

I think also, part of the problem is that if someone creates a song that people want, said person has the right to the music/lyrics. They are his/hers. He wants to make as much $$$ on his music as he can so he wants EVERYONE to buy a copy. Now Joe comes along and buys the song, then lets Buddy borrow it (who then copies it), then lets Tina borrow it (who then copies it) and so on. Before long the guy has lost out on $20 by selling his song to Joe without restrictions.

I work for a copyright repermissioning company. We do NOT deal in music but in written copy, mostly news and scientific journals and stuff like that. Some of these rightsholders really want FINE control over who uses their work and HOW it is used. There are often restrictions as to quantity reproduced or to the number of pages used, and how they are reprinted or reused.

Copyright law is CONSTANTLY being infringed and not just by Joe, but by corporations, universities, gov'ts, etc. We tend to target corporations and educational institutions in our search for infringement and cooperate with libraries, publishers and rightsholder organizations (yes, we help enforce copyright law as well in the USA and are affiliated with our equivalent entities throughout the world).

That's all. My opinion on how music copyright law should be implemented, and the restrictions imposed are pretty vague... but as someone mentioned, it is most likely that Apple is complying with the requests of rightsholders who ALSO recognize that a) Apple is selling TONS of music and b) if they add TOO many restrictions it will eventually backfire.

Eh. That's all.

"He wants to make as much $$$ on his music as he can so he wants EVERYONE to buy a copy. Now Joe comes along and buys the song, then lets Buddy borrow it (who then copies it), then lets Tina borrow it (who then copies it) and so on. Before long the guy has lost out on $20 by selling his song to Joe without restrictions. "

Then a new album comes out, and Joe's friends don't want to wait to borrow a copy, so they go out and buy their own all because Joe let them listen to his copy of the first album. But the music industry is mad that Joe's friends didn't pay for that first copy without even being thankful that Joe introduced them to the music so they would buy the new album in larger quantities than possible before. So the music industry makes up fraudulent statistics about how much money they're loosing while pulling in record profits, and decide to instill restructions which not only limit illegal use, but also fair use. How about that! There's an opportunity here, not only to restrict "piracy" *caugh*free advetising*caugh*, but also to make the same people buy the same song over and over again, and while they're at it, why not change "owning" the song to renting the song under ever changing terms.

Of course with this newfound source of income the music industry is still going to keep all the extra money within the ranks of the leadership. So some CEOs make millions more while abusing customers, and we should all feel better because now instead of us comitting a few minor offenses which have been proven by honest sources to increase sales, we are instead treated like cow tits: having money sucked out of us whether we want it or not. Stop listening to the MAFIAAs lies! We are being treated like an abused resources instead of people, and we're liking it because some suits taking our money are telling us to.

If Joe lent the other people his music once. He will do it again. Your argument holds no water, while I know for a FACT, being in my position, that people DO "share" copyrighted material ALL OF THE TIME. Seriously. And I am not saying they do it to be malicious, Celerate, it's just human nature. No one thinks twice about it.

I wasn't trying to portray Joe and his friends as evil or even bad. But my little scenario is very very true and happens all of the time and no, it does NOT result in more or better sales. While your picture is a nice thought, it just does not happen that way.

"If Joe lent the other people his music once. He will do it again. Your argument holds no water, while I know for a FACT, being in my position, that people DO "share" copyrighted material ALL OF THE TIME."

Of course he will, but sharing music actually helps sell music. People do actually buy CDs because they've downloaded a song or borrowed a CD from a friend and like that song or album. P2P increases sales and the MAFIAA is hurting everyone (including themselves).
http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=p2p+sells+music&btnG=Google+Sea...

"I wasn't trying to portray Joe and his friends as evil or even bad. "

No, but I *was* trying to portray how the MAFIAA is purely just out to rake in more cash at everyone else's expense.

"it does NOT result in more or better sales"

According to who? Oh right, the RIAA and MPAA keep saying that, and they're the only ones who say that. Listen, first off they're lying so they can push crap through legislation. Secondly, their branch in Canada (the CRIA) itself said that people downloading music off P2P networks are more likely to buy CDs, it's the second result in that link I gave you and there's more references to it further down.

Now lets get that pair of sheers and see if there's a real person behind that wool you're wearing.

>Now lets get that pair of sheers and see if there's a real person behind that wool you're wearing.

I don't know what that is supposed to mean, but I have been with my current company for 6.5 years and have learned a lot about copyrighting and abuse issues (again, in the printed industry).

What do YOU do for a living? I guess I should take your sagely and industry knowledgeable advice to the president and board of directors of our company and tell them they have all been wrong for the past 20 years (age of our company) - and I never said that rightsholders do not want more money. We (our company) are not-for-profit (we cannot make profit enforcing and encouraging copyright compliance).

As I mentioned above, we work with printed copyright issues not music... I can only speak to that. But if it works the same way in the music industry, then I stand by what I said.

Here are some helpful links for you, too.

http://www.copyright.com/ccc/do/viewPage?pageCode=cr11-n

http://www.copyright.com/ccc/do/viewPage?pageCode=cr4-n

And here are some good articles as well regarding findings, etc.

http://www.copyright.com/ccc/do/viewPage?pageCode=cr7-n

but have you noticed how iTunes gets more and more restrictive every version

I think this has more to do with pressure from the music industry than with a policy from Apple. It is a bad thing of course, but it's still a lot less restrictive than currently in use restrictions on Microsoft-DRM-ed media (which is different from store to store). I mean it's one of the least restrictive DRM protections on the market currently.

(now that somehow reminds me about boiling a live frog.. bit by bit making it more restrictive without receiving complaints from the consumers, instead of making it very restricted in one step and run the risk of getting a huge protest)

I'm a happy apple user, but have you noticed how iTunes gets more and more restrictive every version, with more and more subtle advertising for the store? This is the thing that annoys me. I don't use the store, I don't want it encroaching on _my_ application space. How would you like it if MSWord inserted special links into your documents as you typed for keyword related ads?

And how is that any worse than the crap which AOL pulls with their Titan AOL client, or the advertisements and popups that exist with the MSN 7.5 Microsoft is shipping etc?

You think that Apple is bad, Apple will be NOTHING compared to the crap that you'll see in Vista, constant reminders that when you load a certain feature that 'you will have reduced functionality, however, if you wish to have full functionality, you can upgrade to ultimate, by simply calling this number: 0800 WANT YOU MONEY'

There is a ocean of difference between the subtle hints and prods which Apple include in their products, vs. the marching band, and fireworks approach which Microsoft take when promoting their value added services.

"I own a Mac because it's *NOT* a PC and it *DOESN'T* run Windows! I have a PC, I run Windows XP and BeOS and Haiku on. I don't need to have *two* PC's, one which just happens to run MacOS X."

But that's exactly what you have got. This is exactly what was always going to happen when they moved to Intel. They are just PCs that happen to run OSX, and Windows too if you like. What did you expect? They have Intel main boards, Intel processors, hard drives, opticals, memory and power supplies all of which you can source, separately or in a package, from lots of places. The only difference is the bios and some sort of DRM to stop you moving your copy of OSX to a non-branded but otherwise identical machine.

Don't know about the "integrated, unified, synergistic combination" of hardware and OSX, no idea what this could mean. Can I get this from a Mini, a Happy Hacking Keyboard and an NEC flat screen? It sounds rather nice, whatever it is.

"I don't need to have *two* PC's, one which just happens to run MacOS X."

I hate to disillusion you, but PC stands for "Personal Computer" which is exactly what the PPC based Macs are. The term PC is incorrectly used to signify the IBM compatible PC line. There were many other PC's before and even after the IBM hit the market. Technically all home computers are PC's regardless of architecture and manufacturer.

I know that. But the common understanding is that any X86-based computer is called a "PC" and Macintosh computers are called "Macs". So, unless you really, REALLY, R E A L L Y want to split hairs on all sorts of minute technical details... I think you know what I meant.

Macs have NEVER had X86 chips in them (not including those "PC-compatibility" cards, which are NOT the stock CPU). It's been 680x0 and PPC chip all the way.

This is the first time, that line has been crossed... and I'm hoping they don't turn into 100% "Apple PC's". I can learn to live with "Intel inside", so long as I'm not just paying extra for an Apple case, because... well...

"Homey don't play dat!" *WHAP!* <----- "In Living Color" reference

Luposian

Both systems fail to respect the rights of their users. Arguably, Apple would be worse than Microsoft because they make you use their hardware configuaration. At least Windows runs on a variety of hardware (if not a variety of CPU arch).

Hmmm... does a user have the right to demand that a piece of software from a company runs on every piece of hardware that he wishes to use? I don't think so. One can say that it sucks that Apple doesn't release OSX for non-Apple systems, but that has nothing to do with Apple not respecting the rights of their users.

Its pointless to get so excited about Apple's recent rise to stardom. Free Software does everything MacOS or Windows does, and grants users the freedom to control all aspects of their computer.

Do you actually believe the latter yourself? Free software does not yet do everything that MacOS or Windows do and it only gives you the freedom to control those aspects of your computer that either come with open specs or either have been reverse engineered. Slight difference.

Do not be mistaken, I have a lot of respect for Free Software and since I run Linux on powerpc, all the software I'm running is actually free software.

Users have a right to demand whatever they want. That's the role of "users" in the User/Vendor model. Whether the vendor considers the demand realistic and meets the demand is their right as a vendor.

Maybe its not realistic to expect your software to run on all hardware, but what Apple does is pretty extreme in the wrong direction.

As far as the functions of the OS are concerned, i honestly do believe a Gnu/Linux distribution like Ubuntu is feature-compatible with Windows or OSX. The main areas it is lacking are by choice to avoid legal issues.

We can argue about how much freedom users should expect, but the fact is not having the right to modify the source code means users are always at the mercy of the vendor to fix any defects in their code, let alone provide those fixes for free. And its pretty much accepted that any substantial project will have defects.

"Both systems fail to respect the rights of their users. Arguably, Apple would be worse than Microsoft because they make you use their hardware configuaration. At least Windows runs on a variety of hardware (if not a variety of CPU arch)."

I dont think Apple would be worse, if you buy from Dell, you will get Windows, Apple gives you THEIR hardware with THEIR software, why cant Dell, produce Dell OS or something like that?

Dont get me wrong, I wish I could run Mac OS X on my AMD based system, but I cant, SO I have to buy what Apple sells in order to get it...

The beautiful thing about choice is, you can buy what you want....

You want Windows, but you dont know how to build a computer yourself, buy a Dell...

You want Mac OS X, you are going to have to buy a Apple Computer, currently of course, who knows what will happen in the future....

but my point is unless you build it yourself, you will use one or the other....unless you learn Linux, you will use one or the other: Windows -or- Mac OS X.....

educating yourself gives you the Linux option...
without education you have no choice.....

What are you blathering about? OS X accepts binary drivers. It could gain driver support for as much hardware as linux far faster than linux has.

Just offering support for binary drivers is unlikely to do anything for OS X's driver support. By and large, its not the binary issue that holds back most drivers (except a few high-profile ones). The reason Linux has such good hardware support is because of its community. The community works very hard to ensure that hardware is supported with quality drivers. Theyw ork hard to ensure that hardware isn't randomly deprecated for no good reason. And by and large hardware manufacturers are willing to share their specs with the community.

Just supporting binary drivers won't magically offset those advantages and give OS X better hardware support, except maybe for those aforementioned high-profile devices.

What are you blathering about? OS X accepts binary drivers. It could gain driver support for as much hardware as linux far faster than linux has.

And babe, so does FreeBSD, Solaris and numerous others, and yet, their hardware support it shithouse; simply having the ability to load a binary driver does not make it a successful operating system.

OS X may support binary drivers, but they don't exist for it, and just because it supports it doesn't mean anyone is going to make one. In reality, most companies aren't going to waste their time to make Apple drivers anymore then they waste their time to make Linux drivers. Some drivers would be made, many wouldn't.

Pretty lame to whoever modded my previous comment ( http://osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=14987&comment_id=136867 ) down.

Further:

http://www.osxbook.com/

http://developer.apple.com/technotes/tn/tn2003.html

http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Porting/Conceptual/Porting...

http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Porting/Conceptual/Porting...

""They should change because I want OS X on my Dell" is not reasoning. It's daydreaming. "

Man, I couldnt agree more, I have been saying things along these lines for years and people just dont get it....

Apple Hardware and Mac OS X belong together...
for those who want Mac OS X, you gotta buy the hardware...

but, I wouldnt mind having the ability of loading OS X on my non-Mac hardware.... ^_^

They put the best of the open source world with the one of the best of the proprietary world, and nobody realizes exactly what they're doing.

Depending on who you ask, the "best of the open source world" is:

1) its development model;

2) the freedom users have regarding the software.

Apple doesn't get either. You can like what they're doing, but it's not that.

Jobs has to train on throwing chairs.

Yea, and he has to do a thing or two about them keynotes

http://www.tjhsst.edu/~crepetsk/ballmer_developers.mpeg