you only need to post it once 
in any case, i doubt iTMS Windoze is going to be out before december
in any case, i doubt iTMS Windoze is going to be out before december
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iTMS Windows: October 15th?
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About freaking time! When I heard that Sony was planning on doing their own online music thing I just about wet myself. MS, Real, buymusic.com are fresh meat for iTMS. Sony has the money, the name, the hardware, and the drive to give Apple a massive headache. And since their name is so widely associated with any type of media it makes Sony a formidable company.
Sorry but dont let your hatred for Microsoft cloud the one simple fact that really nothing other then Apples iTunes and iPod support AAC.
People want flexibility with their music. And really you have only 2 options unless you are willing to spend a boat load on an iPod: 1. List to your music only on your computer. 2. Listen to it on burned CDs.I'm guessing what? 90% of Apple users are using the iPod The same can't be said for Windows. I cant count the number of people I know that have either higher capacity jukeboxes like the Nomad or a really cheap MP3 player.
Look at the top selling MP3 players:
4 out of the 5 devices support WMA. Because everyone knows that if music sales are going to take off its going to require a DRM system. Im no fan of MS DRM but there isnt much of an alternative right now. By not licensing WMA they would be seriously limiting the potential expansion of iTunes to Windows. What Apple should do is keep any AAC files downloaded off of iTMS in its native format. But if you hook up an external MP3 Player it can do on the fly conversion of AAC to WMA. Its a legit option. The problem is how much MS price gouges people for the right to use the WMA codec.
PS- ALmost forgot. What about my Pocket PC? I currently have a few hundred MP3's on it. It supports MP3's, OGG, and WMA. So any music I buy from iTMS would be useless to my PDA...any PDA. AAC is not a good option for Windows.
What did I say about hating Microsoft? Did you ever think about the fact that Apple wants to further expand it's user base of iPods in the Windows world? You make it sound like a necessity to use WMA and, not only is it not, but apple is not going to do it. Nor should they. If I was going to get an MP3 player I would definitely get the iPod because it's f-ing awesome. Unlike the other ones you mentioned. Who cares about PDAs anyway? You think Apple is freaking out about how to support music on PDAs when every indication is that PDAs are on there way to a museum? What if I wanna play downloaded music on my Commodore 64?Originally posted by SiliconAddict
Sorry but dont let your hatred for Microsoft cloud the one simple fact that really nothing other then Apples iTunes and iPod support AAC.
I'm guessing what? 90% of Apple users are using the iPod The same can't be said for Windows. I cant count the number of people I know that have either higher capacity jukeboxes like the Nomad or a really cheap MP3 player.
Yeah, obviously the iTMS will be great for Apple, but I just don't like the fact that Windows users will be able to use iTunes, one of the greatest Mac only apps ever. I think Apple should take away at least one cool feature in the Windows version, like maybe the Visualizer.
Adam
Adam
If they want to further expand their user base they need to do a heck of a lot better then $300 as their base price. Sorry but there are a lot of users that don't need or care to carry every song with them. They want a basic digital audio player. Would you rain on their parade simply because Apple wants to be an elitist with iTunes for Windows?
My point of my post was pretty simple. There will be plenty of users that will go with other music services because iTMS doesn't support their device. This can be remedied by supporting WMA. Apple needs to pick what product it wants to expand the most. iTMS or the iPod. iPod is going to continue to be a major player in the digital music realm but iTMS is just starting out and needs all the leverage it can get. Supporting multiple digital music players would be huge leverage. It would mean that Apple supports everything. (With the exception of MP3 only devices but there isnt anything to be done about that, thank you RIAA.)
As for PDA's and that they are dieing. Please. Get real. The article that caused this buzz was critically flawed. It was an opinion article.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3080652.stm
I can find you dozens of articles that state the contrary. Everyone has their own opinion so its basic guessing at this point. Whats causing this slowdown isnt the death of PDAs. Its that there is no killer app or reason to purchase the next model. The Clies, the Tungstons and Zires, the iPaqs, the X series by Dell all are highly functional devices and there is no reason to upgrade further but what do all of these devices have in common? They all support music. Now why would they possibly do that? Pocket PC devices started this trend. Palms CEO of the week at the time publicly stated that users dont want music, color. They want simplicity. Why would Sony and Palm follow unless there is a craving for such a thing?
I can tell you this. Smartphones arent going to take over. Just as PDAs havent taken over the laptop segment of the computer market. Have you ever played with a smartphone? They suck. No touchscreen so any data manipulation has to be done via a little cursor nub or tiny keyboard. The screen is tiny as heck, the amount of data that can be viewed at one time sucks. Forget about viewing pictures on a PDA. (I have some friends that are professional photographers that load up their pictures on their iPaqs to preview the images they just created. A smartphone is going to be limited by one thing. Its form factor. This is always going to keep it from having the functionality that can be found in a PDA. At least until you get flexible plastic displays that can roll up which is aprox 3-5 years from being introduced.
In addition do you have ANY idea how many PDAs are on the market right now? A good percentage of those devices can do audio playback and just about any device, be it Palm or MS, that you pick up at Best Buy supports MP3 and WMA. But Im sorry. You dont use a PDA for music so its automatically a stupid idea.
Way to be open-minded. Right now as I type this. I have 2 entire movies in my pocket. Matrix, and SpaceBalls. I also have 200MBs of MP3's (Say hi my 512MB SD card.) and my entire My Documents directory that auto syncs with my device so if I make any changes to my files, be it Acrobat, Word, PowerPoint, excel I have access to them on the road. Tell me how old and obsolete this is. I have a supplement for my desktop in the palm of my hand and have more available options then any smartphone could ever hope to have. This fall Im going to be upgrading to the attached pic.
So not only will I have the above options I will also have a phone that is directly connected to the net so I can browse as well. Oops another feature that Smartphones are lacking: A real browser.
Attachments
Actually, that is not true.
1. ITMS does support a very popular format called MP3. Look on peoples computers and you'll find 99% of the music files are MP3, not WMA. Apple isn't excluding a large audience by not including support for WMA. These other "services" DO NOT match itunes look, feel or simplicity. Actually, all of these other services have failed. There really aren't that many people that use them so the support isn't necessary.
2. Apple is using AAC because they don't want MS to have the "standard format". And this is what this is all about. Not letting MS have control over the music files as well.
I'll bet 100 clams that you'll never see wma support in itunes or the ipod for many, many years. The only way they'd do it is if wma wins the war.
By ITMS I think you meant IT, not ITMS. The music store sells AAC files, but itunes places MP3s.