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Bruce Willis Considering Lawsuit Against Apple Over iTunes Store Music Transferability [Updated]

NedBookPro said:
Story true or not, I think it has a lot of validity.

It should be the case that once you buy the music / media, it's yours.

The point is - back in the old days:
- If I bought a new or different brand turntable, I could still play my records.
- If I bought a new or different brand tape deck, I could still play my tapes.
- If I bought a new or different brand VCR, I could still watch my videos.
- If I died, I could pass all those assets to my next of kin.

It seems you can't do that now. If you move to another eco-system or die, you lose it all, or your next of kin loses it all.

I think it's a rip-off. Total rip-off. It would be great if someone with a lot of resources could fight this one.
Click to expand...
Records last longer but tapes really don't last forever. And how does Apple know that you have died? (If they link it to an expiring credit card just replace it with a iTunes gift card.)
 
manu chao said:
Records last longer but tapes really don't last forever. And how does Apple know that you have died? (If they link it to an expiring credit card just replace it with a iTunes gift card.)
Click to expand...

I have tapes that are still working from when I was a teenager. And believe me - that was a long time ago.

As for dying. Next of kin normally always gets your assets in one way or the other. The point is, once someone has bought something, it's not even apple's - or whatever company's - business what you do with it.

Renting is renting. Purchasing means you OWN it.

Instead of saying "buy app" maybe they should say "rent app" or "rent song". But that's a marketing nightmare isn't it?

The whole thing is a farce.
 
NedBookPro said:
People who make comment like this totally miss the point.

Once you buy something - the artist / company got their money.
Therefore it follows that it should be YOURS forever to do with it as you please so long as copies of the media have not been made.
I can't see how this could not be legal.

When you buy a car, and you're done with it, you can sell it, give it to your kin, etc. Yes?

The same should apply for music, video and apps.
It's a very basic principle.

.
Click to expand...

In principle, I agree with you. But the content owners will probably be hard to convince, because digital copies are so easy to make (doubly so without DRM).

I declare I have become an aesthetic and am giving up all music (I don't know of becoming an aesthetic would actually involve giving up music but I believe it so I will). I have a friend Joe with very similar music tastes and I want to give him all my music.

For CDs, it's simple. I give him the crates with the CDs. They are no longer mine, they are his.

For digital files, less so. I give him all the files and have informed Apple that the tracks are now owned by joeuser@me.com. But Apple has no way of knowing if I have in fact deleted every copy. I might even have meant to, but one night really miss a little New York State of Mind... to Time Machine! Yes, it has them backed up. Billy Joel is back in my life.

And now two copies have been created.

Apple probably doesn't care, but Billy Joel's music publisher does, maybe not too much, certainly not as much as if I upload it to a file sharing site and share it with a few million of my closest friends, but their principal of the thing is, no copies.

I wouldn't mind if there was enough pressure put on the publishers to make it happen, if you want to steal music or movies there are far easier ways. And it may not be that hard to convince them because it's not that big of a thing.

But you asked why, and that's why the publishers aren't just saying "sure, go for it, cool thing"
 
First of all: Whoever put this rumor into this world must have been extremely stupid. Not only that but I don't even know why macrumors featured this obvious hoax. I mean, not only do you have to except Apple's terms whenever you use their store, thus in my eyes rendering this whole "I sue you because I couldn't/didn't want to read your therms" arguments really moot.
Above all that ever since they rolled out iTunes plus you could share the music as you wished.
Oh and CDs do not stay around forever. I mean they inevitebly get scratched when you use them and they will definitely corrode under the normal working conditions a customers uses them.

I still keep buying my videos and music on disc, because of the higher quality they offer. First thing I do though is rip them to the format I need them. This is the thing that is really keeping me from switching to all digital. If the would offer loseless formats I would have no problems.
Actually I'm pretty close to switching all my video to iTunes as well and here is why. I love cooking dinner and then watch a movie while eating. Well with all the copyright stuff and previews and whatnot most of the time I'm done with dinner when I can actually watch the movie/tv-show I payed good money for. I mean all those big media idiots need to DIE. Just give me what I payed for and not what I didn't. Of course I'm not going to illegally copy your work, as I have the original in my hand...stupid...

Since I use an MacBook Air I switched to Steam quite a while ago. Many games on CD/DVD actually also only work with Steam as well (Fallout: New Vegas or Civilization V come to mind) so you are actually not better of having the physical copy at home. In fact I found it invaluable during my Navy time to have all my games on my notebook without requiring a CD/DVD.
 
Good Guy bruce is going to save us from the apple nightmare. I have never bought music from apple and never plan on it.


I am one of the few who had not remained ****ed because of DRM.

I pirate all of my music and guess what I can use it on any device i want. from my **** cell phone to my ipod to my pc to a android phone.

and guess what Im buying a android phone!
 
NedBookPro said:
Story true or not, I think it has a lot of validity.

It should be the case that once you buy the music / media, it's yours.

The point is - back in the old days:
- If I bought a new or different brand turntable, I could still play my records.
- If I bought a new or different brand tape deck, I could still play my tapes.
- If I bought a new or different brand VCR, I could still watch my videos.
- If I died, I could pass all those assets to my next of kin.

It seems you can't do that now. If you move to another eco-system or die, you lose it all, or your next of kin loses it all.

I think it's a rip-off. Total rip-off. It would be great if someone with a lot of resources could fight this one.
Click to expand...

Well, in point of fact, you are over simplifying. All that music that you have on 8-track wont play in your new(er) cassette deck, let alone your CD player. The videos that you bought on BetaMax won't play in a VHS player, let alone a DVD player. Only relatively recently has there been some effort toward backward compatibility (i.e. Bluray players that also play DVDs, because the technology was designed to allow for that).

In any event, in what way is the current situation so much worse? When you buy music from iTunes, you get it in mpeg4-audio format. While its true that it has been given a metatag with your account name, if that really bothers you it's not that hard to strip off. While newer audio codecs may come along over time, m4a isn't going to disappear any time soon, and it's currently supported by the vast majority of devices out there.

So, again, what's the problem?

gnasher729 said:
I think someone posted that they had six songs left with DRM, and one of those asked for the iTunes password...
Click to expand...

Actually, that way me. The comment I was referring to was this one:

Marcode said:
Without authorising my partner's iTunes to play tracks that I buy from Apple, they won't play...
Click to expand...
 
bedifferent said:
This isn't about "money" but principle. People used to own physical media, vinyls/8 tracks/tapes/CD's, and we could use that media as we pleased. Why has this changed for digital media?
Click to expand...

We do own the media. It's your hard drive. And thumb drive. Heck, you could print it out in hex if you wanted.

You also, thanks to Jobs' distaste for subscription services, have an open format, which reduces to nearly the same thing as before with tapes and albums. He said folks wanted to own the files. We do. At first, that meant DRM to appease dopey decisions at the record companies, but his thought process had a natural progression towards DRM-free, and I'm glad he followed through. Win.

Anybody you want can listen to your tunes now. You can give unfettered, relatively unsurveilled copies to whoever you want. (I would like to know more about the legal state of the files, DRM'd and not, but possession and utilization of iTMS music is possible, and still 9/10ths of what we care about here.) Things are better than when you only had tapes.

The cue this was bogus was the "music" in "music purchases". Sure, your movies and tv shows (now we've got an even better Willis connection) are DRM'd, but your music isn't.

All in all, a well written fake rumor by the FSF, just a few edits from perfect.

(sorry if this appears twice; net connection spotty)
 
I was unnecessarily harsh to Major.Robto, so I'm removing it.

But I will say I sometimes wonder how many people's "principled stand against Apple" is really something else.
 
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NedBookPro said:
I have tapes that are still working from when I was a teenager. And believe me - that was a long time ago.

As for dying. Next of kin normally always gets your assets in one way or the other. The point is, once someone has bought something, it's not even apple's - or whatever company's - business what you do with it.

Renting is renting. Purchasing means you OWN it.

Instead of saying "buy app" maybe they should say "rent app" or "rent song". But that's a marketing nightmare isn't it?

The whole thing is a farce.
Click to expand...
We have been 'renting' applications for quite a long time already. When you 'buy' a program, you just buy a license to use it under a set of conditions (eg, number of computers or users). Where have you been tearing your hair out about this for the last 20 years?

And with songs, the problem doesn't really exist anymore (unless you are principled cheapskate and did not upgrade your earlier DRM-ed songs to DRM-free versions).
 
not going to work out in court

Sorry Mr. Willis but you are going to lose this case if it ever gets to court. The agreement that he has with the iTunes store basically restricts him from giving his music library to anyone. He agreed to those rules when he used the iTunes store and can't decide to sue just because he did not like the rules.

You have to play by Apple rules so he will not have a leg to stand on.
 
Dear Bruce,

Assign responsibility for your music account to your trust which names one child as a specific beneficiary as a successor/trustee. Add your account name and password to the trust. DONE! Then the one child may continue to use your account legally as the successor/trustee and if Apple objects, then your trust can sue the company. If Apple refuses to change the name on the account, purchases and activity can still be handled by the s/t. I thought you Hollywood people had good lawyers. Don't advertise your intentions in the media. Just do a quiet legal workaround. Geez.

Of course, the trust may be sued by every record label which is a part of the collection but if it is set up correctly they can't recover anything.
 
Ok the story has been updated for quite some time now and people are still showing that they are incapable of reading the entire article by commenting on how stupid/good the think Bruce Willis is?
 
Umm Guys I own a cupple of hundred of albums. On record. Who cares if I pirate. I know The bands I download I know for a fact they are not making any more money.
 
It's a shame this story isn't true coz I think this is a genuine issue.

If I buy a CD I'm free to sell it on or give it away without any restrictions. As long as I don't copy it or let all my mates rip it to their iTunes library then I'm not infringing on the copyright. I don't see why iTunes should be any different. I should be able to pass on my collection to another user if I want. It's not like I would also have access to it.

I'm sorry but this just another reason why I don't buy any music through iTunes. It's still better to buy the CD and rip it into my iTunes library.

In so many ways technology like iTunes is taking us backward not forward. As a life long music lover I think it's such a shame.
 
manu chao said:
We have been 'renting' applications for quite a long time already. When you 'buy' a program, you just buy a license to use it under a set of conditions (eg, number of computers or users). Where have you been tearing your hair out about this for the last 20 years?

And with songs, the problem doesn't really exist anymore (unless you are principled cheapskate and did not upgrade your earlier DRM-ed songs to DRM-free versions).
Click to expand...

I don't buy music on-line. I'm actually not affected by this BS.

It's more about the principle I'm talking about.

I'm not talking about intellectual property or not-what, I'm talking about the end product -
I believe, and no one could ever convince me otherwise:

If you buy something - YOU OWN IT.

Case closed.

.
 
mankar4 said:
Can I gift a song that is already in my library? So that now the gift recipient has access to the song in their library and I no longer have it in my library?
Click to expand...

Would you gift a CD you already own? No, you buy the CD, wrap it, and give it to them. Unless you're cheap and gift used CD's from your own library.
 
Primejimbo said:
Would you gift a CD you already own? No, you buy the CD, wrap it, and give it to them. Unless you're cheap and gift used CD's from your own library.
Click to expand...

I take it that your answer is no? The difference is that after I buy a CD and unwrap it and open it and play it, its meaningfully different from a "new" CD. There's no difference between a song I've purchased and listened to and a song I have never listened to and purchased.
 
So Mr. Bruce Willis himself can't give his own children his iTunes password? Oh way...Should've purchased DRM-Free anyway.

Probably has a credit card attached to his iTunes account already, so you can just purchase songs all willy nilly like they probably already do.
 
NedBookPro said:
If you buy something - YOU OWN IT.

Case closed.

.
Click to expand...

Except that it's not quite as simple as that.

If you buy a book, do you have the right to book a theater and sell tickets for people to come and listen to you read it? No. Do you have the right to photocopy the content and give it to a friend? No.

Now, with digital media, the fundamental operation is copying, not transferring. As such, the industry is much more leery of making it too easy, hence the initial (and in video, the continued) use of DRM. Now, music is sold to us simply with a tag on it saying we are the ones who bought it. A tag, no less, that we can easily remove, if we so choose.

When we buy something, anything, it comes with certain limited rights as to what we can do with it, as well as things we cannot do with it. So, it's really not as simple as "If you buy something - YOU OWN IT.", no matter what "it" is.
 
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