iTunes update out. version 7.4

[SvenSvenson]

You are out of your ever-loving mind. If I buy, say, a lithograph you sell of one of your original works, I scan that and use it as a computer desktop background on my personal laptop, I am not stealing from you. I bought it, if I want to scan it and put it on my personal computer as a background, I certainly can.

You *sold* it to me. I *own* that lithograph. I can repurpose it for *personal* use all I want. (Like right now I'm thinking about using it as toilet paper.) It's called fair use. Fair use! FAIR USE!!!! FAIR USE!!!! FAIR USE!!!!

You can indeed use the lithograph itself for anything you like. However, what you can't do is COPY IT! (Not legally, anyway).

I've done the same myself (copied pictures for wallpaper) butI know it's illegal and I also know that no-one's going to bother pursuing me for the crime; but that doesn't change the fact that you're not really allowed to do it.

Steve

 

[Jocko]

No, I'm not wrong. One, I'm talking about American law as its the only law I know, so I have to discount any Australian laws. Second, in the States you can sue anyone for anything. It's so lovely. Really it is. But as far as I know, that "Happy Birthday" case is hypothetical and has never been filed let alone tested in the justice system. It's very likely it would be called fair use, even in a public place. Same for playing CDs at the beach. Then a precedent would be established and all future very similar cases would be subject to summary dismissal shortly after they are filed.

Fair use is malleable and was intended to be that way: so as to protect against profiteering copyright violators but to allow the common man to use legally owned copyrighted material for personal use as he sees fit.

There's really two issues here. One is whether or not people agree with the record industry's ideas of what constitutes a public performance. Obviously most do NOT agree with them on this.

HOWEVER, their interpretation is not really up for debate. We can hope to change it, but at the moment it is what it is. As it stands right now, ringtones are considered a public performance. Playing your CD at the beach is considered a public performance. They do not prosecute you for playing your CD at the beach because that would be nearly impossible to do. If they had some way to make you pay separately for the same song to play with headphones vs. speakers, believe me they would!

 

[slffl]

Don't worry! Two months from now Apple will allow you to make ringtones out of your own songs for only $0.60 each!

 

[GotPro]

Interesting. But is this a blanket permission to defeat Apple's DRM in any form, for any reason?

No, I don't think so.

Here is where MY personal opine lies:

1) Apple ships tracks with DRM.

2) Part of DRM says I can rip a music CD for my own personal use from DRM'ed files.

3) I am free to use that music CD for my own "fair use" personal use. This may include deleting any music I've purchased, and importing it from the CD that I legally burned PER Apple's DRM.

4) Any ring-tones I make from this DRM-FREE music is no longer circumventing DRM to "create" the ringtone.

5) I'm all good with Fair Use.

That said, my entire purchased library has been deleted and re-imported DRM-FREE.

That said, I still believe in supporting the artists, and do NOT share my music or give it away or distribute it to anyone. I was an artist, and believe they should be paid and justly so...

However... all the above is fair use and allowed by Apple DRM.

Now... if I were to upload all those to a file sharing service... THEN I have just breached the fair use agreement. As long as all this intellectual property stays on MY devices or my Families devices, I can sleep well at night.

Hopefully the artists can too!

 

[johnmcboston]

I wouldn't steal a pack of gum from a store, so why should I steal the use of a song?

OK. You buy a pack of gum from the store. Then you give a piece to your friend. Then wrigly's brings you to court because your friend would have bought gum,but you took business away from them by giving away their product.

 

[sanford]

You can indeed use the lithograph itself for anything you like. However, what you can't do is COPY IT! (Not legally, anyway).

I've done the same myself (copied pictures for wallpaper) butI know it's illegal and I also know that no-one's going to bother pursuing me for the crime; but that doesn't change the fact that you're not really allowed to do it.

Steve

What's it with you people? Under fair use yes *you can copy* all kinds of copyrighted material for personal use, even some commercial uses such as research, criticism, satire, etc.

If mambodancer made good on his threat and sued somebody for making a computer wallpaper for personal use only by scanning a piece of art, or legal reproduction of that art, that he *sold* them, he'd not only be laughed out of court, I suspect the judge would make him compensate the defendant for all legal fees and throw in something for lost wages and time, etc., dealing with the case.

I think that the giant media empires have actually managed to get inside a lot of people's heads and make them think they can't do what they certainly can.

 

[Sam0r]

This update is wreaking havoc with my system.

Still haven't fixed the problems with Vista. Also as an added bonus its been making my pc BSOD all day.

My god, I love you Apple, I really do

 

[D*I*S_Frontman]

You get a huge slap on the back for admitting your position was wrong. Quite nice of mambodancer to completely dismantle his own argument by posting an excerpt from a legal decision he thought supported him, wasn't it?

I must not have been reading MamboDancer's post correctly. After reading the ruling, it seemed to me to be obvious that ringtone ripping of a legally owned song is "fair use." It would seem quite odd to argue the contrary and then post the definitive proof destroying one's own position.

I would hope anyone who is proven incontrovertably wrong would be willing to admit it. No "back-slaping" should be necessary. Intellectual honesty should be a common virute we all share.

 

[hollerz]

You can now rate albums - or is that an old feature?

I wrote to Apple about a year ago asking for this feature but not so sure about the implementation here and the feasibility in terms of using those ratings in smart playlists.

I'll have to play around with it a bit when I get home after work. Any experience anyone else had with this?

Class! I also wrote to Apple ages ago asking for the ability to rate albums, described how I would like it done, and they've done it exactly how I wanted it! I like to think they listened to me

 

[ninethirty]

Charging folks to make ringtones out of tracks they purchased legally is downright criminal. It's the same as saying that although I bought a CD from iTunes, I must pay an extra dollar per track to be able to play those songs out loud at a dinner party I host.

 

[sanford]

It most certainly is up for debate. By the courts. And the reason they don't pursue playing CDs at the beach as public performance violations is not because it would be impossible to prove -- it would be *easy* to prove; send someone to the beach with a video camera -- it's because they know it would be called fair use, they'd lose and lose badly, and then the entire content of the licenses would be called into question and individuals and companies would not feel compelled to follow them by rote.

There's really two issues here. One is whether or not people agree with the record industry's ideas of what constitutes a public performance. Obviously most do NOT agree with them on this.

HOWEVER, their interpretation is not really up for debate. We can hope to change it, but at the moment it is what it is. As it stands right now, ringtones are considered a public performance. Playing your CD at the beach is considered a public performance. They do not prosecute you for playing your CD at the beach because that would be nearly impossible to do. If they had some way to make you pay separately for the same song to play with headphones vs. speakers, believe me they would!

 

[agentkow]

Despite my iTunes auth problems, one good, though minor, change is that you can choose folders of playlists to sync in iPod preferences. Before, I'm sure you could only select playlists individually.

This is fantastic, especially if I'm going to have to squeeze all my music into 16GB of iPod Touch goodness.

So in theory, does this mean you could make new playlists within a folder and they would always be updated to your iPod if that folder is checked to synchronize, no matter if they are individually checked or not?

 

[~J~]

Ya know... I love(d) Apple as a company, they always seemed to take care of the customer, and listen to what the consumer wanted in new products. This makes for great products from a great company. But after the ramming all 8GB iPhone early purchasers received yesterday, and how they locked-down the ringtones to ONLY songs purchased through iTunes, I refuse to further support them in this. As soon as I heard all this, I went and downloaded iToner for my MBP. And, of course, I will NOT be updating to iTunes 7.4 now, as I will lose all my ringtones I currently have on my iPhone.

The move yesterday puts Apple in the category of "the lesser of two evils", as opposed to my previous view of the company as a great supporter of the consumer who provided great products. I'm very disappointed Apple, I will NOT be purchasing songs from iTunes anymore... and yes, that means I will be procuring ALL of my ringtones for my 8GB iPhone from "other means".

I'm reminded of a well-quoted saying from a very intelligent American...

"Every action has an equal, and opposite, reaction". I'm not going to allow big company to push me around... I'm pushing back.

 

[sanford]

It was odd, but easily explained. Mambo just didn't understand the language of the decision. He's a painter; he's likely not accustomed to interpreting documents written by attorneys.

I must not have been reading MamboDancer's post correctly. After reading the ruling, it seemed to me to be obvious that ringtone ripping of a legally owned song is "fair use." It would seem quite odd to argue the contrary and then post the definitive proof destroying one's own position.

I would hope anyone who is proven incontrovertably wrong would be willing to admit it. No "back-slaping" should be necessary. Intellectual honesty should be a common virute we all share.

 

[skellener]

This ringtone scam is the lamest thing Apple has ever introduced (well right up there with the hockey puck mouse and the iPod HiFi). Paying again to use the music you already own to play when you get a phone call is a joke. While Apple may have implemented it rather elegantly, this has got to be an AT&T request. I can't imagine Steve wanting this at all. My guess is that they had the ringtone feature all ready to go for ANY song you have on your iPhone for free, then AT&T said no way! - We make tons of money on that stuff and you want people to be able to do that for free? So Apple had to implement the limits of only certain songs and the $0.99 charge. Very UN-Apple to do that.

 

[sanford]

I'm reminded of a well-quoted saying from a very intelligent American...

"Every action has an equal, and opposite, reaction". I'm not going to allow big company to push me around... I'm pushing back.

You've slipped and fallen into the wrong dimension again. Newton was English. And that's Newton's Third Law, not a "saying".

(Is the sky brown and the land blue over there? I've always wondered.)

 

[zorinlynx]

Actually - pay ring tones are for people who choose to follow copyright law.

It's called "fair use".

You're only using a tiny portion of the song, and you're not making money off of it. You legally own the song.

Stop playing up to the record companies' distortion of copyright law and stand up for yourself.

It's a money grab, that's all it is. I'm very disappointed in Apple.

 

[~J~]

You've slipped and fallen into the wrong dimension again. Newton was English. And that's Newton's Third Law, not a "saying".

(Is the sky brown and the land blue over there? I've always wondered.)

Yes, thank you for correcting me... regardless... my point stands, we cannot allow ourselves to be pushed around like this. It will only get worse in the future. I, for one, will not be purchasing anything in the iTunes store now, nor will I ever be a first adopter with an Apple product again. Customer loyalty should be rewarded, not penalized to make a quick buck. This is not Apple's style... well... wasnt in the past. If this is the new Apple philosophy, I'm extremely disappointed.

 

[timothyjay2004]

This update is wreaking havoc with my system.

Still haven't fixed the problems with Vista. Also as an added bonus its been making my pc BSOD all day.

My god, I love you Apple, I really do

It's not Apple's fault that iTunes isn't working that great with Vista. It's Microsoft's. Microsoft even admitted that there were things they had to patch and fix, and they did, in a half a**ed attempt.

 

[jjs1138]

I don't think that Apple charging for ringtones is a Fair Use issue in the end. Actually, I'm sure Apple would much rather use "make ringtones from any of your music" as a selling point for the phone.
I suspect that the fact that iTunes is a music distribution service is the real issue here. I would think that by incorporating ringtones into iTunes the RIAA sees that as a second line of distribution by Apple - albeit by technicality. But if distribution is taking place, the RIAA is entitled and obligated to collect royalties.

 

[CADer]

If you uncheck sync Ringtones before you sync your iPhone,
it will not take away your current ringtones you put on via 3rd party.
Hope this helps someone

Not that I am eager it update Itunes but It will be inevitable someday, so with that said can anyone Confirm this works?

 

[D*I*S_Frontman]

Charging folks to make ringtones out of tracks they purchased legally is downright criminal. It's the same as saying that although I bought a CD from iTunes, I must pay an extra dollar per track to be able to play those songs out loud at a dinner party I host.

Actually, one of the legal definitions of "public display" in US Copyright Law is as follows:

To perform or display a work “publicly” means—
(1) to perform or display it at a place open to the public or at any place where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered...

So if your dinner party was populated by people "outside" your "normal circle of family and its social acquaintances" would be considered a public performance, and you would be outside the bounds of "fair use" and in violation of the artist/copyright holder's rights, if I am reading this correctly.

Illegal, but seldom if ever enforced.

 

[klb028]

Are there any people who are willing to wait to install the new version once Software Update picks it up?

 

[Malamutt]

Not that I am eager it update Itunes but It will be inevitable someday, so with that said can anyone Confirm this works?

CADer it would appear people have had mixed experiences regarding this. I know that the files I copied to my iPhone via ssh work just fine and are not removed after a sync.

Malamutt

 

[bartelby]

Software update is picking it up: