Little and Big Music Disagree On 'iTunes Match'

[chris975d]

Here's how this is going to work <<bookmarks post for future told-ya-so-ing>>

Imagine a brand new user of iTunes with a brand new Mac and a brand new empty iPod Touch. He hears about this iTunes Match which puts "all his music on all his devices all the time." Sounds good.

He wants some Beatles music. He gets an Apple ID on his computer and buys "Abbey Road" from the iTunes Store. He is asked if he wants purchased items to automatically download to his other registered devices. He says yes. Then he rips his "Magical Mystery Tour" CD at 128kpbs AAC and enters all the metadata. Finally he goes out to the internet and torrents "Let It Be" and "Beatles Bootlegs" at varying MP3 bitrates, and cleans up their metadata.

He now has a Beatles playlist with 30 songs and 4 albums in it in iTunes. He signs up for iTunes Match and is charged $24.95 for the year. iTunes Match scans his library, in all likelihood using a combination of the iTunes Library.xml file and metadata from the songs, and a few moments later throws him a dialog

iTunes Match was not able to match 10 songs in your library. Do you want to upload them to your 5GB iCloud account?
<<clicks Yes - these would be the Beatles Bootleg collection - everything else matched>>​

Now he turns on his iPod Touch with iOS5 - no need to plug into the computer, it's PC free . He logs into the Music app with his Apple ID and BOOM magic...there is already a Beatles playlist there with 30 songs and 4 albums in it. He puts it in shuffle mode and presses play. Here's what happens....

• iPod comes to a song from Abbey Road (purchased iTunes content): Since he said he wanted to automatically download purchased content to his other devices, these songs files are in fact stored locally and taking up flash drive space on his iPod, assuming enough time has passed for them to have downloaded (this happens presently with the iTunes in the Cloud beta).
• iPod comes to a song from the Beatles Bootlegs (unmatched content): Since he chose to upload these songs to the iCloud, they will also download to his device and the song files are there, taking up flash drive space on his iPod, stored locally.
• iPod comes to a song from the Magical Mystery Tour or Let It Be: iPod plays/streams/downloads (whatever you want to call it) the full iTunes Store version of the song in 256kbps AAC glory, indistinguishable from the above 2 scenarios, indistinguishable from the 90-second previews currently offered by the iTunes Store. In all likelihood will have a BUY button visible in the playlist and maybe even on the Now Playing screen. Once the song is finished playing there is no stored file taking up flash drive space on the iPod locally. The song has played, one way or another, directly from the iTunes Store.

When this hypothetical fellow goes back to his computer, he sees the same 30 songs and 4 albums in his iTunes playlist with play counts updated and so on. If he digs around in his ~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Media/Music folder, he will find subfolders for the 4 albums, Abbey Road with his purchased AACs, Magical Mystery Tour with his ripped 128kbps AACs, along with Let It Be and Beatles Bootlegs with all the various MP3s. He will NOT suddenly be the proud owner of full 256kpbs AAC iTunes Store versions of Magical Mystery Tour and Let It Be.

This will all be seamless with no discernible buffering or hiccups, and feel exactly like all the music is on the iPod. Over the years he keeps paying his $24,95/yr and increases his iTunes Library up to the max of 25,000 matched songs, another 25,000 songs he purchased from iTunes, and another 1000 unmatched stored on his 5GB of iCloud. He now has iTunes and an iPod Touch with 51,000 songs "on it" although the reality is that none of those songs have to take up any flash drive space, they are all on "the cloud" one way or another and available on all devices all the time (as long as he has an internet connection). If he drops his iTunes Match account, all his music is still on his computer, and purchased songs can be re-downloaded and pushed all around device to device (exactly like now) wireless or with USB. But he loses the seamlessliy integrated cloud access to the matched songs and the unmatched uploaded songs. That's what the $24.95 is paying for.

If you know how LaLa worked, or understand how Spotify or Pandora work, or even some of the currently available iOS apps that stream your iTunes Library from your always-on computer using your home internet connection, you should see that this is Apple's typically elegant entry in this same sort of service. They are marketing it as YOUR music on all YOUR devices wherever YOU are. But really it's Pandora using your iTunes Library.xml for the playlists and Apple's copies of the songs. The "same benefit" given to matched songs or unmatched but uploaded songs is that they appear in the cloud and can be played anywhere anytime (that you have an internet connection).

Is your scenario taking into consideration the bandwidth caps that are becoming commonplace with wireless carriers though? Or the fact that iPod touches aren't always in range of wifi? If the scenario you spelled out above (and the example) is true, then that person with "51,000 songs" loses access to most, if not all of those the minute he goes out for a jog with his touch if this is a streaming only service. Or, if he's reached his monthly bandwidth cap on his iPhone, he can't stream anymore of "his" music without paying ridiculous overage fees for the rest of the month. Apple seems like this is the type of thing they don't want their customers worrying about, and I doubt they'd implement it this way and have the customer "hate" the service (and ultimately Apple) because of it.

 

[tdream]

They do become legal because apple scans your illegally sourced song, knows what song it is and uses their version of that song at high quality. So it appears in your itunes as a legal version of the song, not your ripped or downloaded version. The history of whether you paid 99c or it was part of the music match service, does not matter. It's legal and it's yours. So yeah $10,000 worth of music CAN be purchased legally for $25.

Technically record labels were never going to get anything from the pirates but this way they get something.

The songs do not become legal. What happens is that any evidence of illegality is destroyed. But in many cases there is no evidence of illegality anyway; if I put a CD into my Mac and rip it into iTunes, nobody can possibly know if the CD is one that I bought, or one that I borrowed from a friend, or one that I stole from a shop.

But let's say that the music in my library falls into various categories: Purchased from iTunes, ripped from my own CDs/LPs, bought elsewhere (Amazon etc. ), legal free downloads, and others (that would include illegal downloads). Apple would detect the first category. Apple could allow me to mark which category something belongs to. Then they could allow upgrades which _do_ change the legal status, for a small payment that goes to a label. Upgrade one would upgrade everything that I say is legal, for < 10 cents per song; my legallly owned stuff would then be treated as if it was purchased from iTunes. Upgrade two would upgrade anything, for say half the price of an original purchase. Wherever it comes from, it is now legally owned. So anyone with illegal downloads could turn them legal, at a cost.

This record company guy said they have albums with 10,000 legal and 80,000 illegal copies. If half of those 80,000 illegal copies used iTunes to legalize them, at half the usual price, the record company would triple its income.

 

[Necross]

Apple will take the songs you've stolen, and turn them into legit files, with big music's blessing.

What about ... "Apple will take the songs you've copied off of the 400+ CDs you own, and turn them into legit files"

I can honestly say I've never, ever downloaded a single song illegally, but I have over 40 gigs worth of MP3s all from albums I own that are still sitting there on my shelf. Why shouldn't I be allowed to stream them to my own work mac or ipod? I paid for em.

 

[blybug]

Is your scenario taking into consideration the bandwidth caps that are becoming commonplace with wireless carriers though? Or the fact that iPod touches aren't always in range of wifi? If the scenario you spelled out above (and the example) is true, then that person with "51,000 songs" loses access to most, if not all of those the minute he goes out for a jog with his touch if this is a streaming only service. Or, if he's reached his monthly bandwidth cap on his iPhone, he can't stream anymore of "his" music without paying ridiculous overage fees for the rest of the month. Apple seems like this is the type of thing they don't want their customers worrying about, and I doubt they'd implement it this way and have the customer "hate" the service (and ultimately Apple) because of it.

People seem to like Netflix and it has similar issues. People understand Pandora stops working when they're out of WiFi range on their Touch. This is a different kind of service and like anything else, it will have its limitations. They way people on this thread are talking it's a panacea of perfection and unlimited upgrades on all songs for "free" (well, $24.95/yr).

If people are not happy with what it does for them, they are free not to use it. But as music libraries grow and fast outpace the local storage space of portable devices, this is one way to have "everything everywhere." But obviously assumes you have an internet connection and are aware of your bandwidth limitations. Downloading every song as a local copy on every device every time you want to play it hogs bandwidth too...

It's a cloud service...by it's very name it depends on the cloud being available.

 

[ericinboston]

Not that it makes it right...but I would argue that there is a high percentage of pirated music that rarely gets played.

For example, there are consumers out there that copy/pirate all sorts of songs and never play them again...but keep them for a rainy day. I think a lot of the pirated music is stuff people pirated to PREVIEW in the first place.

Besides, just because you downloaded/pirated it (as they claim X times more than sales), DOES NOT MEAN the consumer kept the music.

I tend to believe that most people who truly want to own a particular album/song will buy it legitimately. In the pre-MP3 days it was about owning the physical medium, the liner notes, the pictures, and whatever else may come with the "album"...it was something to treasure and hold onto as part of your history...much like a book.

Lastly, I also believe that songs/albums that are no longer available should be free from any copyright disputes. If the Labels are going to no longer sell the Madonna cd single from 1991, then I should be able to COPY that cd single from a friend/stranger. There is no money being lost since the Labels no longer sell it.

 

[chris975d]

People seem to like Netflix and it has similar issues. People understand Pandora stops working when they're out of WiFi range on their Touch. This is a different kind of service and like anything else, it will have its limitations. They way people on this thread are talking it's a panacea of perfection and unlimited upgrades on all songs for "free" (well, $24.95/yr).

If people are not happy with what it does for them, they are free not to use it. But as music libraries grow and fast outpace the local storage space of portable devices, this is one way to have "everything everywhere." But obviously assumes you have an internet connection and are aware of your bandwidth limitations. Downloading every song as a local copy on every device every time you want to play it hogs bandwidth too...

It's a cloud service...by it's very name it depends on the cloud being available.

Yes, but those are standalone apps, and people know that they need an internet connection to use them. You're talking about integrating things "seamlessly" into iTunes itself. That's where the potential confusion would come into place. On a library as big as the one you gave in your example (51,000 songs), all appearing to be the same in iTunes, I can guarantee you that customers will forget which ones they actually "own", and which ones they are allowed to "just stream". Way too much confusion here for the people with iPod touches to try and remember which music they have access to when they are away from wifi versus when they have a connection. Especially if, as you stated in your scenario, all the "streaming" music files will "feel exactly like all the music is on the iPod". And again, as a few posters have said now, if this was streaming only, it's automatically useless to all the Shuffle, Nano, Classic owners out there. That's a lot of iPods for Apple to cut out, especially when they are saying these uploaded songs get the "same benefits as music purchased from iTunes". Your scenario presents too many potential confusion points for the customer, when Apple is known for making things so simple a toddler can use them.

 

[iScott428]

In a business sence the small record lables really are making a terrible plea to withdrawl their music. One its some money or none, for music that has been pirated or not maybe! Two your music is gonna get uploaded regardless even if you do not want to be a part of the match service. So again some money or none.

Have better artists that actually can make money running a concert series, because we all know that you dont make that much on albums sales anyway. Artists just need those ego's blown up with multi Platnum albums sales numbers, so that they can sleep well at night on their mink bed spreads.

 

[jazzmsngr]

I LOVE Numero Group....but this guy does not get it!

First off, I can't stand the, "If you have a large music library, 99% of it stolen" argument. Its lame and lazy, and a way to justify labels who rip off musicians anyway.

With that said, Numero Group is A GREAT LABEL....I am a huge vinyl addict and I have bought a ton of their re-releases, especially the Twinight 45s and I also have bought almost all of their compilations. You know how I found about Numero Group???? P2P FILE SHARING (5 years ago)!! You know how many records and how much money i have spent on them? Hundreds of dollars (and counting) and you know how much I would have spent, if I didnt download a couple of those albums illegally?? 0!!!! Thats, right, NOTHING! because I never would have heard of THEM! Now they have an issue because I can now move these songs freely between my devices? even though I am PAYING for the right to do so??? I'm sorry but, if you have an issue here, you need to seriously look at how A LOT of people find out about your music....THE INTERNET!

 

[blackpond]

The argument is trotted out again that "pirated downloads were X times higher than legitimate sales", with the implication being that if there were no piracy, then our sales would have been X (or some significant fraction thereof) times higher. There is no rational way to estimate this. If there were no piracy, sales might have been X times higher; sales might not have been any higher at all. There is no way to tell. There is no way to perform the experiment to find out, either. Also what about people who have NO pirated music on their computers. Should they be punished (by having to buy a fresh digital copy of music they already own) because of some people who do not respect copyright?

Great points. It's also possible that sales are higher due to free promotion (piracy).

 

[blybug]

Yes, but those are standalone apps, and people know that they need an internet connection to use them. You're talking about integrating things "seamlessly" into iTunes itself. That's where the potential confusion would come into place. On a library as big as the one you gave in your example (51,000 songs), all appearing to be the same in iTunes, I can guarantee you that customers will forget which ones they actually "own", and which ones they are allowed to "just stream". Way too much confusion here for the people with iPod touches to try and remember which music they have access to when they are away from wifi versus when they have a connection. Especially if, as you stated in your scenario, all the "streaming" music files will "feel exactly like all the music is on the iPod". And again, as a few posters have said now, if this was streaming only, it's automatically useless to all the Shuffle, Nano, Classic owners out there. That's a lot of iPods for Apple to cut out, especially when they are saying these uploaded songs get the "same benefits as music purchased from iTunes". Your scenario presents too many potential confusion points for the customer, when Apple is known for making things so simple a toddler can use them.

People will understand that a paid cloud service needs cloud access to work. How is it different from Documents in the iCloud or email or calendar syncing? All the features don't work away from a connection. The system requirements on Apple's page require an iOS device so yeah, shuffles, classics, nanos are excluded.

Likely there will be little cloud icons next to these songs and they will be skipped if there's no cloud. People currently understand a song is not available if they haven't synced it via USB to their iPod, they'll come to understand a cloud song is not available with no internet. In order to truly have "everything everywhere" you either need a device with an infinite hard drive, or cloud storage with internet always on. In 2011 neither exists so iTunes Match is an option that moves us where the puck is going, ubiquitous cloud storage, rather than the old world paradigm of more local GB.

Downloading all these songs for keeps continues to fill up the local GB and chews up bandwidth. Streaming only does the latter. People are already streaming Pandora in their cars and all day at work, this is just Appledora with "your own" list of music.

 

[milo]

Though I thought Steve said that you got DRM free tracks after you used Match. That doesn't really bode well for people sticking around to keep subscribing. It seems to me that you can clean up your library then pack up shop.

True, but at a price that low I suspect many people will be happy to stick with it to add future additions to their library, legal or not. At less than fifty cents a week it will likely be a no brainer for many.

Not sure who iTunes for iCloud is really for. Pirates won't pay even the $24.99. They're PIRATES!!! People with legit files don't need it either. They have their songs already. It also doesn't stream any tracks. So who is going to use this service?

I'll likely use it. It's mobile syncing of your entire library, it's nice to not have to have a huge library taking up all the space on a mobile device yet be able to get any song at any time. I suspect it will do quite well.

(2) Obtained elsewhere but iTunes Matched. Can stream from the iCloud as long as you pay your subscription.

Where did you get "stream"? It's not mentioned at all on the page you linked. And why would Jobs specifically mention "DRM free" if it was streams only?

But if it's just steaming, then it's useless for people who don't have an iPhone or iPod Touch because you can't stream to a Nano or a Classic or a Shuffle.

I agree with you that it's syncing, not streaming. But for people with a classic or shuffle the service isn't going to be useful either way since those are always going to be synced from your computer at home. For iOS users, the benefit is being able to sync on the road.

 

[fluffylion]

Not that it makes it right...but I would argue that there is a high percentage of pirated music that rarely gets played.

For example, there are consumers out there that copy/pirate all sorts of songs and never play them again...but keep them for a rainy day. I think a lot of the pirated music is stuff people pirated to PREVIEW in the first place.

Besides, just because you downloaded/pirated it (as they claim X times more than sales), DOES NOT MEAN the consumer kept the music.

I tend to believe that most people who truly want to own a particular album/song will buy it legitimately. In the pre-MP3 days it was about owning the physical medium, the liner notes, the pictures, and whatever else may come with the "album"...it was something to treasure and hold onto as part of your history...much like a book.

Lastly, I also believe that songs/albums that are no longer available should be free from any copyright disputes. If the Labels are going to no longer sell the Madonna cd single from 1991, then I should be able to COPY that cd single from a friend/stranger. There is no money being lost since the Labels no longer sell it.

In one way you are correct. There are many people like that, it becomes an addiction type syndrome.

They download it for the sake of downloading it. It is the same with games, I have met many people that had hundreds of PS1 games, Dreamcast games etc. Many of the stuff in their their library of crap, they didn't even play.

Same with music, and especially pornography addicts. They will downloads gigs of the stuff, but continue to browse the web for more, never really looking at what they collected. They have severe mental problem which they can't admit to, and I consider most to lack social ability or having an actual relationship. It becomes routine for them, which they feel comfortable doing, and try to justify it because it is all they do in life.

It is really sad what the internet has done to many people, they live in a weird fantasy world, making lies and thinking it is all real.

 

[blybug]

Where did you get "stream"? It's not mentioned at all on the page you linked. And why would Jobs specifically mention "DRM free" if it was streams only?

The page does not specifically mention "download" either, the verbiage is the carefully chosen "plays back." To me this is clear marketing-speak double talk as Apple and Jobs backpedal on their previous disdain for subscription streaming services.

Jobs did not specifically mention "DRM free" when discussing iTunes Match. I posted a transcript earlier in this thread.

 

[chris975d]

People will understand that a paid cloud service needs cloud access to work. How is it different from Documents in the iCloud or email or calendar syncing? All the features don't work away from a connection. The system requirements on Apple's page require an iOS device so yeah, shuffles, classics, nanos are excluded.

Likely there will be little cloud icons next to these songs and they will be skipped if there's no cloud. People currently understand a song is not available if they haven't synced it via USB to their iPod, they'll come to understand a cloud song is not available with no internet. In order to truly have "everything everywhere" you either need a device with an infinite hard drive, or cloud storage with internet always on. In 2011 neither exists so iTunes Match is an option that moves us where the puck is going, ubiquitous cloud storage, rather than the old world paradigm of more local GB.

Downloading all these songs for keeps continues to fill up the local GB and chews up bandwidth. Streaming only does the latter.

The page does not specifically mention "download" either, the verbiage is the carefully chosen "plays back." To me this is clear marketing-speak double talk as Apple and Jobs backpedal on their previous disdain for subscription streaming services.

Jobs did not specifically mention "DRM free" when discussing iTunes Match. I posted a transcript earlier in this thread.

I also still don't get where you get the idea of "streaming" from. Most, if not all articles written about iTunes match since the announcement state that it's not streaming, and many of these writers were present at WWDC. Such as the links below:

https://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/07/wheres-the-itunes-streaming-it-would-have-crushed-the-carriers/
http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/06/editorial-engadget-on-icloud-and-itunes-match/
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/26854/

These are just a few sites/editorials talking about why it's not a streaming service. I guess they all could be wrong, but that's an awful lot of people "in the know" saying that it's not a streaming service.

Added: Also, if it's not meant for you to be able to download songs from iTunes in the Cloud, as opposed to streaming it, why is Apple putting in place the ability to manage individual songs on in iOS just now? A new feature in iOS 5 is that in the iPod (Music) app, I can left swipe on an individual song title and "Delete" it. If Apple is moving to "everything in the cloud"/less dependency on local storage, why is this a feature in the OS supporting your model?

 

[edwurtle]

If iTunes Match actually allows you to DOWNLOAD a 256kbps AAC rather than STREAMING, then...

1. Won't this open up a whole new era of pirating, with the neoNapsters of the world sharing/stealing crappy small 16kbps files for iTunes to upgrade? A bunch of friends cobble together the $24.99 and they all receive unlimted downloads of the high quality versions of all their songs? I say no, because the files will not be downloaded, only streamed.
   
2. What happens to someone who downloads all the upgraded versions, then stops their iTunes Match subscription? Do the files explode? Is Apple going back to a DRM scheme with some sort of lockdown for cancelled subscriptions? I say no, because they will not be downloaded, only streamed. Stop subscription, stop streaming access.
   
3. Why does Apple continue to ask me for $0.30 to upgrade all the old 128kbps DRM'd AACs I purchased years back? Wouldn't they just discontinue that program right now if they were about to let me download them all for free anyhow? I say no, because they will not be downloaded, only streamed.

Carefully read the description of iTunes Match here.

"18 million songs for matching. iCloud scans and matches your music with the 18 million songs in iTunes. So chances are your music is already in iCloud."​

Implies to me your matched music will be played from the iCloud, just like the 90-second previews in the iTunes store, but the whole song. Imagine the current iCloud icon next to your song in a playlist with a little play button instead of the little download arrow.

"And all the music iTunes matches plays back at 256-Kbps iTunes Plus quality — even if your original copy was of lower quality."​

Plays back. Not downloads. Plays back.

Mark my words, iTunes Match is a streaming/syncing service. The writing is on the wall folks.

Your devilish plan won't work as you expect on non-jailbroke iDevices. The matched content will only be downloadable into your iDevices. When the songs are "matched" from your mac/pc library the iTune Versions won't be downloaded back into your mac/pc, they will only be downloaded into your iDevice. Once they are in your iDevice they will be walled off and controlled (in other words you won't be able to move the songs back into your mac/pc).

Unless you and your friends are all sharing the same itunes account, then your plan fails.

 

[milo]

So if iCloud won't let you stream songs and requires you to download them instead to each device, what the hell is the point? I can just connect my ipod or whatever to the computer and sync up any music.

So if your full library is too big to fit on your device, how do you access the rest of it when you're away from home. I can see not being interested in it, but is it really that hard to understand?

It's not if your device is already full and you can't download anything more on to it. Plus having to download means that Android and other devices won't be able to use iCloud. (I use a N1).

If your device can download on the road there's less need for it to be full in the first place. And of course they're not going to support android - if it were a streaming service, you think THEN it would support android?

I see how the wording about "same benefits as music purchased from iTunes" could be interpreted as download of the 256kbps AAC file

A song purchased from iTunes can be synced to a nano. Or burned to CD. How would a streamed song have those same benefits? Or are you saying that Jobs was flat out lying?

Not to mention that every last bit of coverage described Match as syncing, not streaming. You think that if they all got it wrong, Apple would just let the public misconception stand instead of making a public statement to correct it?

We get it, you're convinced it's streaming (and the basis for your assumption is nothing more than it seeming too good to be true). The rest of us are convinced you're wrong. At this point it seems like you're just beating a dead horse.

 

[blybug]

Your devilish plan won't work as you expect on non-jailbroke iDevices. The matched content will only be downloadable into your iDevices. When the songs are "matched" from your mac/pc library the iTune Versions won't be downloaded back into your mac/pc, they will only be downloaded into your iDevice. Once they are in your iDevice they will be walled off and controlled (in other words you won't be able to move the songs back into your mac/pc).

Unless you and your friends are all sharing the same itunes account, then your plan fails.

Not sure what you think my devilish plan is (I was pointing out why iTunes Match couldn't possibly be replacing ripped/stolen content with legit versions), but you're one of the first people here to agree with what I am saying about how this will work. The iTunes Match songs will "play" on your iDevice, either by streaming or download (starting to think there's no real difference) but you will NOT be given a 256kbps AAC file to keep forever and copy infinitely to your computer.

 

[edwurtle]

Not sure what you think my devilish plan is (I was pointing out why iTunes Match couldn't possibly be replacing ripped/stolen content with legit versions), but you're one of the first people here to agree with what I am saying about how this will work. The iTunes Match songs will "play" on your iDevice, either by streaming or download (starting to think there's no real difference) but you will NOT be given a 256kbps AAC file to keep and copy to your computer.

I do agree that it won't be easy to share the "matched versions" with others, however I do not agree that it will be streaming. The main difference between streaming and downloading: once a song is downloaded then it can be played over and over without the need to be "re-downloaded". Also you can download a bulk of songs all at once and listen to them at a much later time.

This is all speculation, the details will come later. I'm personally more concerned about how easy/hard it will be to manage sync settings when my iPhone can't possibly store my entire library. I don't want to have to manually remove song/add song over and over. I hope I can manage all these sync settings directly on the iPhone without any need to connect to macbook.

 

[blybug]

So if your full library is too big to fit on your device, how do you access the rest of it when you're away from home. I can see not being interested in it, but is it really that hard to understand?



If your device can download on the road there's less need for it to be full in the first place. And of course they're not going to support android - if it were a streaming service, you think THEN it would support android?



A song purchased from iTunes can be synced to a nano. Or burned to CD. How would a streamed song have those same benefits? Or are you saying that Jobs was flat out lying?

Not to mention that every last bit of coverage described Match as syncing, not streaming. You think that if they all got it wrong, Apple would just let the public misconception stand instead of making a public statement to correct it?

We get it, you're convinced it's streaming (and the basis for your assumption is nothing more than it seeming too good to be true). The rest of us are convinced you're wrong. At this point it seems like you're just beating a dead horse.

Jobs wasn't lying, he was using carefully parsed language and referring to the "benefits" songs have within the context of iCloud services.

Some of the above comments demonstrate exactly how a streamishing service dovetails with the type of syncing we've been used to up to this point. You can still do a local USB (or soon wifi sync) at your house, and ideally should. But would it really be advantageous, as you suggest, to leave to house with your device half full then "download" the rest on the road? Still need internet to get that song, what's the advantage over streaming then? And when you have filled your device by downloading your library from the road, you could still keep playing more songs if they are just streaming. The experience is the same as far as the song "playing" but you DO NOT get to keep and own a legit copy of the song unless you buy it the traditional $1.29 way.

Lots of those post-WWDC reviews are responsible for the spreading of misinformation. Watch the keynote or read the transcript I posted earlier. Jobs never said you get to download a DRM free copy for keeps, but rather that iTunes Match cross-checks iTunes 18 million songs and plays the ones in your library that match at full 256kbps quality.

 

[blybug]

They do become legal because apple scans your illegally sourced song, knows what song it is and uses their version of that song at high quality. So it appears in your itunes as a legal version of the song, not your ripped or downloaded version. The history of whether you paid 99c or it was part of the music match service, does not matter. It's legal and it's yours.

So yeah $10,000 worth of music CAN be purchased legally for $25

I would love this to be true, but the very fact that people believe this makes me wonder what world you are living in where rainbows and unicorns fly out of Steve Jobs' rear.

Guess we'll see in September.

 

[milo]

Why can't you accept what is written as plainly as plain can be. 'Play back' is a synonym for 'streaming'. It is not a synonym for 'download'. I can't believe how many people are hoping against hope that this is a download service. This is a streaming service as a few people have rightly pointed out.

But that contradicts what was said in the keynote. Specifically no DRM and "same benefits as music purchased from iTunes". How would a streamed file that I can't put on my nano have the same benefits?

It's really pretty simple - apple never said it is streaming, yet a few people still insist it's streaming. You really think they would make an announcement that would completely hide the way the service works.

Besides that, if it was going to be streaming, why wouldn't they provide the option of streaming NOW with the current iCloud feature in itunes for purchased music? They specifically said that Match handles purchases and matched songs the same way.

I am also assuming that iOS 5 will allow you to delete songs from your device, which you can't do at the moment. Perhaps some dev will tell us if this is possible in the preview release currently in testing? Update: I've just seen that you will be able to delete songs from an iOS5 device.

In the case of songs downloaded from the cloud, you can already delete them from an iOS device. The feature appeared along with the new beta cloud features.

 

[chris975d]

In the case of songs downloaded from the cloud, you can already delete them from an iOS device. The feature appeared along with the new beta cloud features.

Yep. It's a new feature to be able to delete any song on an iOS device in iOS 5 (I just posted a screenshot in another thread). To me, this shows me that Apple is going to allow you to pick and choose what you need on your device (due to possible storage constraints) at will, and download (not stream) and delete at will from what you have available in the iTunes "locker", if you will. If it was full streaming, there'd be zero reason to make this a new feature, as local storage limits wouldn't be an issue anyway when it comes to music.

 

[morespce54]

...

1. ...
2. ...
3. Why does Apple continue to ask me for $0.30 to upgrade all the old 128kbps DRM'd AACs I purchased years back? Wouldn't they just discontinue that program right now if they were about to let me download them all for free anyhow? I say no, because they will not be downloaded, only streamed.

...

Don't forget that the iCloud/sync/re-download option for music is only available in the US... for now

 

[milo]

Jobs did not specifically mention "DRM free" when discussing iTunes Match. I posted a transcript earlier in this thread.

"Matched songs upgraded to 256 kbps AAC DRM-free"

Jobs wasn't lying, he was using carefully parsed language and referring to the "benefits" songs have within the context of iCloud services.

Sorry, that just doesn't fly. He specifically said "Same benefits as music purchased from iTunes". Purchased music can be loaded to a nano or burned to CD. Or even loaded to a device and played where network connection isn't available. If it's a streaming service and those aren't possible, that statement isn't "carefully parsed", it's flat out false. So you're saying Jobs made intentionally false statements as part of the introduction?

And again, why say "drm free" for a streamed song or a file that has limitations? Limitations that would seem an awful lot like DRM.

Some of the above comments demonstrate exactly how a streamishing service dovetails with the type of syncing we've been used to up to this point. You can still do a local USB (or soon wifi sync) at your house, and ideally should. But would it really be advantageous, as you suggest, to leave to house with your device half full then "download" the rest on the road?

Most advantageous would be to leave with your device full then delete material you've heard and replace it with fresh stuff on the road. Hopefully apple will include some smart functionality that allows syncing playlists and not having to manually manage individual songs.

Still need internet to get that song, what's the advantage over streaming then?

You can get the songs and then continue to play them even when a network connection is not available.

And when you have filled your device by downloading your library from the road, you could still keep playing more songs if they are just streaming.

As above, just delete the material you no longer want on there.

The experience is the same as far as the song "playing" but you DO NOT get to keep and own a legit copy of the song unless you buy it the traditional $1.29 way.

Which has no basis in any evidence, just your personal theory with no facts to back it up. If that were the case, how am I able to load that song to a nano or burn it to CD?

Watch the keynote

Oh, you mean the one where Jobs doesn't say "Matched songs upgraded to 256 kbps AAC DRM-free"?

 

[morespce54]

I just hope they'll do a better job matching songs than they do matching the album artwork. Geez, right now, this function is such a hit and miss...

No, really, it is.
Plus, I don't want to end up with an "unmatched" album just because they added "The" in front of Greatest Hits (instead of just plain old Greatest Hits)