Microsoft, Sony Announce iPod Competitors

Pfhreak writes "According to the Denver Post -- Las Vegas section, a little over halfway down the page -- Microsoft will begin selling a $50 music player that will 'look and feel as good as the iPod' later this year. Yusuf Mehdi, a Microsoft VP, is quoted as saying that the player will give customers more choices than Apple." In related news, Tetsugaku-San writes "The Register has the scoop on Sony's new portable audio/visual playback device. Impressively it plays MPEG2, MPEG4, BMP, GIF, PNG, TIFF and MP3 (finally they got the message Apple was gonna whoop em!) straight out of the box. Not as good battery life as I'd like to see, but real world tests remain to be seen."

Is there any way

[BizidyDizidy]

this is going to have a similar capacity? If so, IPOD should be out of business with that price difference.

No .ogg, no sale.

[Agent Green]

That's just the way it is. I want my open-source, patent-free, DRM-free codec.

Re:Is there any way

[hondo77]

Of course it's not going to have a similar capacity. All he said was it's going to look neat. More Microsoft FUD and vapor.

Whoop De Do.

[Anonymous Coward]

Loss leaders like this are illegal in Europe. Why the Xbox is allowed, I don't quite understand. I presume it's because they argue that they make money through the software.

How this argument will work with MP3s when there are multiple vendors, I don't quite get.

Re:Is there any way

[Anonymous Coward]

"this is going to have a similar capacity? If so, IPOD should be out of business with that price difference."

Wow, I don't think anyone could come up with a more succinct statement that summarizes why the Slashdot crowd has absolutely no clue about the portable music player market.

sony audio quality

[Anonymous Coward]

i hear the sony player has terrible audio quality. that's why it's cheap. also the sony music service is plagued by technical problems. just something to consider... you might want to check around a little before getting one of these.

Access to media

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope these players let us access the content normally through the filesystem, unlike the iPod :)

Typical

[BWJones]

In order to let folks know just how cool Microsoft is, they always seem to pre-announce products by several months to years and invariably when they come out, they always seem to be somehow less than they promised. The iPod is good.....damned good. So I am certainly going to take a wait and see approach, but one usually gets what they pay for.

I likely will be sticking with the iPod I suspect.

Price is too low?

[Sean80]

How can they possibly sustain a business selling a player for $50? Oh, I remember, kill the competition with your low-priced alternative, because your Windows and Office products are such cashcows, and then when everybody else is laid waste, jack up the price and add useless features for years and years to come. Oh, and by the way, you need Windows to download the music for your player. Funny that.

Not trying to flamebait or anything, but haven't we seen this type of strategy before?

Dejavu is such a wonderful thing.

look and feel?

[pedantic bore]

'look and feel as good as the iPod'

Look and feel are cheap. The question is whether it will work and sound as good. The principal attraction of the iPod is that it's intuitive and meshes well with iTunes. That's worth money to users.

I'm glad that iPod is getting some competition (it will make iPods better to) but I don't see that this is necessarily a death blow for them.

Is video really needed?

[antarctican]

Alright, how many people actually have the need for a mobile video device. I mean, audio I can understand, but how often have you sat on the subway going, "I'd really like to watch a movie right now." That must be one long commute....

I mean the only use I can think of is for mobile pr0n needs, and if that's the case, I sure as hell don't want to be sitting next to them wthhout a raincoat.

Re:sony audio quality

[senatorpjt]

$563 is cheap?

Re:look and feel?

[djsmiley]

The look and Feel of the Ipod is what makes it so popular, its now a item of STATUS and not of use to some. Why do you think the adverts dont actually play much music? Why do you think the posters only show its "looks" and not its audio propities...?

Value

[nfotxn]

I really fail to see what value is added with having a colour screen and video playback. I don't think many people have any need for video playback they'd be using a portable device. Unless they have other behaviours in mind like using it primarily as an audio player and a video player or data storage when you arrive at your destination. Just from the perspective of my own behaviours I'm definitely not sold on video playback as a must-have feature. For the same reason portable RF televisions or DVD players aren't terribly popular I see this Sony unit as being similar.

Re:Is there any way

[AKnightCowboy]

you get what you pay for

Wow, the gasoline I just bought must be super extra-special gasoline that's better than the stuff I bought 6 months ago cause I'm sure paying a lot more for it.

Now, don't be silly, just because something costs more doesn't make it a superior product. Take Macintoshes for instance. A $1000 Athlon system will wipe the floor with a top of the line G5 system costing over $3000.

MP3 Player? or WMF Player?

[TheCeltic]

I'll bet it only plays Windows Media...

Re:look and feel?

[Have Blue]

No, they aren't cheap. Apple spent a large amount on R&D for the iPod design and interface, that's why they sue to protect it.

Re:Is there any way

[The Only Druid]

To use your own phrase, "don't be silly". Only a fool would question the idiom 'you get what you pay for', since its not intended in the way you're deliberately misrepresenting it.

'You get what you pay for' simply means this: when a product/service involves any sort of quality, either in materials, labor, skills in construction, etc., you cannot expect an unreasonable amount of quality for a given amount of money. Rather, there is a reasonable exchange, as determined by the market: the conclusion then is that if everyone's selling their 30-40gig portable music device for a few hundred dollars, dont be surprised that the $50 device is a peice of shit.

Re:That's nice, but...

[jrockway]

Yup, you get what you pay for. Dell makes some cheap laptops, but they have this tendency to fall apart in about a week. That doesn't happen with powerbooks.

And as for their music player, it's rediculous. They make you pay extra for "enhanced" (i.e. non-crippled) software, and I'm sure the hardware isn't as good as Apple's. Apple, unfortunately (for their sales department), always adds features that are hard to market. For instance, read any review of MP3 players and you'll find that Apple's sound output hardware (DA converters, amp, etc.) is the best. But you can't really market that.

Oh well. The people who want a good music player will buy the Apple and the people who want a new toy will buy the M$ box. That's the way things have always been, and I don't see how it affects me if M$ makes a $50 music box. Whatever :P Apple has earned my loyalty by making a great product; Microsoft's business practices (and OS) make me want to blow up their headquarters on a daily basis. I'm sure others agree with me :)

Geeks don't understand fashion

[HonkyLips]

These articles shit me. The thing is, Apple is a fashionable company. They make fashionable computers and fashionable products and this puts them in a different league to Microsoft et al. Geeks do not, by their very nature, understand fashion. Microsoft's competing product may be cheaper, Sony's may have more features etc etc. That will mean nothing to a kid who wants an iPod. I doubt that Ferrari were worried when Kia/ Daewoo/ Hyundai popped onto the car scene; I don't think Armani is worried that you can buy shirts for $20 at Kmart, and so on. The Apple iPod is a fashion accessory. Paris Hilton ( or insert vacuous celebrity here) won't be caught dead using a cheap Microsoft rip off and millions of teenagers will feel the same way. Apple could double the price of their iPod range and they'd still sell them. Apples are desirable. They're cool. Microsoft has never been cool and never will be no matter what they do. Can you really imagine a company owned and run by Bill Gates producing something that teenagers everywhere go nuts for? Compare their interface designs to Apple's.... Sony are too sensibly Japanese to be cool. There is no iPod killer. When cool people start saying "Levis are dead - I can buy jeans for 1/5 the price at Target" then maybe, just maybe, Apple should start to worry.....

Another "iPod killer..."

[sillivalley]

Geez, not another one! I expect the Sony product to be well designed, a lot of attention to detail -- and high priced. And don't forget, Sony has built-in schizophrenia -- their music division -- MP3 is evil, remember? Sony could have owned the market with mini-disc, but their own paranoia crippled the product (no high-speed digital download, clunky proprietary software, etc.)

But a friend points me to the Sony announcement -- it plays movies, all these formats. Does it have a corkscrew, I ask? GPS?

What? Corkscrew? GPS? Yeah, if it's going to replace things, it should play my AV stuff, have a corkscrew, show me where I am, and be sturdy enough to pound nails...

Really -- what I want in a portable music player is to play music. I don't care about video, GPS, cell phone, or anything else.

As to the iPod killer? It's already on the market. It stores enough of my music, the battery lasts long enough, it drives my earphones (Etymotics ER4), and it's small enough to carry in a pocket.

It's the iPod mini. It does what I want, and I love it.

Re:Prediction ...

[jrockway]

There weren't really and HD-based MP3 players before the iPod. So the "Mac Zealots" are pretty close to the truth anyway. But BTW, I didn't see any zealots saying anything about this. You are putting words in their collective mouth.

Anyway, I think it's great that microsoft wants to sell me $200 hard drives for $50 in a nice shinny box. Me buying a new mini hard drive == M$ losing $150. What a deal :)

FUD

[Coward Anonymous]

Classic Microsoft. There is no way MS could or would want to release such a cheap device but it sure as hell is great to FUD everyone out of buying an iPOD.

So What about OGG?

[JustNiz]

There's no mention of the technical details of the MS player but it's a fair bet it will only do MS-proprietery formats, and theres no mention of OGG support on the Sony specs either. ..And thats reason enough for me not to buy either one.

Re:Is there any way

[sTalking_Goat]

Its cracks me up that what they're aiming for is to "...look and feel like the IPOD."

Whatever happened to outdoing your competitors?

Way to go MS. Aim low.

Look and Feel. Not size, weight, capacity

[Alcimedes]

Odds are it will be an iPod shaped flash player, holding 128 megs or so. the "advanced" micro drive version will cost a lot more than $50.

look at feel aren't really tech specs. when this thing is actually for sale then we'll be able to tell how good of a deal it is.

Re:Price is too low? This is ILLEGAL

[Rand310]

This is illegal!

MS cannot use funds from a separate section to flood the market in order to promote a standard for competition. Selling a product at a loss in order to undercut competition without relent for the purpose of creating a flooded standard is wrong. This is predatory pricing and is specifically and explicitly prohibited by the Sherman anti-trust act.

They've already done this with the X-Box which they sold at a loss in order to undercut and deprive smart companies (Sony & Nintendo) of their only source of income by using their deep pockets. Now they do the same thing in an attempt to push WMA over AAC as the standard DRM music file.

This is absurd. The DOJ has no balls if they let this pass. MS is getting out of hand.

Re:Geeks don't understand fashion

[justins]

The thing is, Apple is a fashionable company. They make fashionable computers and fashionable products and this puts them in a different league to Microsoft et al.

Doesn't the meaning of the word "fashion" imply that a lot of people ought to be using Apple computers, rather than a miniscule fraction of users?

Sony are too sensibly Japanese to be cool.

Right. That's why none of their consumer electronics designs like the Walkman or the Discman have ever been popular, trendsetting items.

Wow, this must be what happens when you stand in that Reality-Distortion Field for too long.

Re:iPod and UFS

[cheide]

UFS is not specifically a Linux filesystem; it was originally developed for one of the BSDs I believe and is used in Free/Open/NetBSD, SunOS, and others.

Now if you could prove that they were using the Linux *implementation* of it, then you'd be on to something...

more choice?

[The Lynxpro]

Yusuf Mehdi, a Microsoft VP, is quoted as saying that the player will give customers more choices than Apple."

How exactly is a Microsoft portable MP3 player going to give more choice to consumers than an iPod? Is he referencing that the end user can use all of the other commercial download services that are in competition with Apple's iTunes? (you know, all the ones that deal in WMA, and yes, I said "deal"). In that case, the "choice" is like Henry Ford saying the consumer could have his Model T "in any color, as long as it is black." I'm sorry, but unless the Microsoft player supports Ogg and "unencrypted" AAC, then again, its the illusion of choice on the part of Microsoft. In other words, more of the smoke and mirrors routine from Redmond. Considering this product will be another expense bankrolled by the ill-gotten gains of their operating system (and office applications) monopoly, they should (IMHO) instead invest the money spent on this ill-conceived project on further securing their bread-and-butter offerings. Or buyout Rockstar Games and break the exclusive PS2/3 contract they have for the next GTA title so the Xbox Next has a fighting chance against the PS3.

Regardless, I will lay down dollars or euros that Microsoft will include an (unencrypted) AAC to WMA conversion program, to answer Apple's tit-for-tat from last month's announcement. Just like I will bet green that Apple will be the first computer manufacturer to ship machines with Blue Ray drives as a way of spiting the DVD Forum for supporting WMP9 as the compression scheme for HD-DVD.

Re:Realistically

[nero4wolfe]

The actual statement in the article was "as low as $50". That suggests a range of products; the low end of the range wouild likely be flash memory based.

Death to Car Analogies

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt that Ferrari were worried when Kia/ Daewoo/ Hyundai popped onto the car scene;

Yeah, but a Ferrari is handbuilt, entirely custom engineered. iPods ain't.

iPods are more like Buicks -- a Chevy chassis (commodity hard drive) with lots of chrome and a digital dashboard.

Re:Look and Feel

[Prof.Phreak]

Don't worry. It will cost $50 just like iPod Mini cost $100.

Unless of course they force you to use a Microsoft online music service to get music (and not let you play your own MP3s). Then it makes sense for them to sell you a $400 item for $50, and make a killing on the actual songs... (kinda like they do with XBox).

Re:Typical

[Anonymous Coward]

they always seem to pre-announce products by several months to years and invariably when they come out, they always seem to be somehow less than they promised.

The technical term for this is vapourware, and the reason behind it is that if consumers think the latest and greatest is coming out from Microsoft in a couple of months, they'll put off buying an iPod at least until the Microsoft offering is available.

Re:Is there any way

[sTalking_Goat]

"Um, M$, this is nothing like the elegance of the iPod. Way to go MS, blow it again."

Thats just it, it doesn't have to be anything like iPod. As a geek (normal ppl will no doubt disagree) I want something functional. Something that works and does everything its supposed to do with no extraneous BS.

Barring that I would settle for something elegant. Elegant does not have to mean "...look and feel like the iPod". Why is it that Apple, a company of relatively small size and resources can make computers and electronics more aesthetically pleasing than atlest half the women I've dated and M$ can only put out bloated, overpriced crap. Look at the XBox.

The money that M$ is losing on this MP3 player project could be invested in market research and finding the next User Interface design geniuses that will put out something that'll make every M$ bashing geek on /. cream in his pants. Instead they'd rather put out cheap crap and spread all kinds of FUD just to kill off a competitor.

Re:Is there any way

[stephentyrone]

They clearly aren't overpriced; they sell like hotcakes. Apple has accurately judged the market's demand for the devices, and chosen the appropriate price point. If they actually *were* overpriced, a competitor would have long since come along and undercut them. There are cheaper players, yes, but none as small and/or well executed as the iPod (mini). What apple "should" be charging is what the market will support, looking also to make it difficult for a competitor to beat them on the combination of price/form/function. They've clearly hit the mark, as demand shows. I don't know, maybe you mean "should" in some weird moral sense? I mean, they "should" just give me one, in my ideal universe, but it ain't gonna happen. Other companies have been in the fray for quite some time, and they haven't forced down apple's prices yet; this is a good indication that they're right where they "should" be.

YAIW

[pherris]

Yet another iPod wannabe. Let's see what Apple and/or Jobs have created in the past:

Mac OS. Man, in some ways Mac OS 9 is still better than Windows XP.

NeXT Cube. What a sweet machine. There was nothing like it then and still respected today.

NeXTStep. IMO still the best OS made. So good Mac OS X uses huge chucks of it.

Newton. Bumpy at first but the last models released are still better IMO than any other pda.

Mac Cube. Very cool looking and quiet. They still get top dollar on ebay today.

iMac. The original iMac gave us style where style had been missing. Beige was dead and you were proud of your Bondi Blue machine.

... and of course the iPod.

I know I've missed a few other marvels and I'm sure there's some cool stuff they never released. With all that said don't you think that Apple already has a working video iPod prototype that could be in production in less than 30 days? The magic eight ball says "Yes".

I have yet to see someone scoop Apple in style and thunder, and IMO MS/Sony won't do it this time. I don't care how good it is, Apple will make their's better.

Re:Is video really needed?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that millions commute to work on trains for an hour or more each way in Japan.

Re:No .ogg, no sale.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm going to make a new Slashdot account and post a one line "What About Ogg?" comment to every goddamn digital music story in existence and see how much "Insightful" karma I can pull.

Re:Is there any way

[Babbster]

...M$ can only put out bloated, overpriced crap. Look at the XBox.

I know it's flamebait (using the dollar sign tipped me off) but I can't help myself. The Xbox is indeed bloated (in terms of size) but it is neither "overpriced" nor "crap." In fact, it offers more functionality (by nearly every measure) than Sony's PS2 for the same price. There are great games to play on the system, and cross-platform games usually look, and sometimes play, better than on competing machines.

Whatever the truth is about Microsoft's potential MP3 player (and we don't have "truth" yet since the linked article is a blurb that generates more questions than answers), there's nothing wrong with the Xbox that a table (and, for some people, a few Japanese-style RPGs) won't fix.

Re:Is there any way

[Halfbaked Plan]

Microsoft doesn't aim 'high' or 'low.' Microsoft aims wide.

Nobody uses Microsoft products has ever been called elitist. MS isn't into selling to narrow niche markets.

Re:Loss Leader

[mcc]

I would suspect that with a $50 pricetag, Micro$oft is losing some amount of money per unit. They want to make the money on the music sales. Like razors or cameras - make money on the blades/film.

I disagree. I think that if the pricetag is $50, then Microsoft intends to lose money on the units AND the music sales (similar to how the XBox, a current venture loses money overall).

Microsoft more likely than not intends to lose gobs of money overall on the entire music venture, with only two goals in mind:

1. Prevent Apple from making money.
2. Try to force WMA to take over the online music market and prevent an MPEG-4 based solution from doing so.

Re:Is there any way

[Cebu]

On the subject of iPod:
I agree that the Toshiba 1.8" hard drives are more expensive than the typical laptop hard drives that competitors with similar storage capacities typically use, but I question whether you actually are basing your argument on information availible to you, or simply guessing.

The Toshiba 1.8" drives used in iPods are not availible to consumers as far as I know. I have only seen them availible on a direct to manufacturer basis. Subsequently, how did you come about the prices for those particular drives, and if you do have the prices, what are they?

Also, the Toshiba 1.8" drives are used to some, granted very few, iPod competitors.

On iPod Mini:
The IBM Microdrives found in iPod minis are found in several non-Apple portable music players -- some that are similar in weight, though larger than the iPod mini (I would randomly guess that would be due to the use of larger Li-ion cells).

I would cite the Nomad MuVo 4.0GB device as an example. It's lighter than an iPod mini, smaller than an iPod, with longer playtime on a single charge, using exactly the same hard drive, and does have a decent interface -- all for significantly less than an iPod mini.

Rio Karma

[mnemonic_]

iPod
Cost: $400
Capacity: 20GB
Weight: 5.6 ounces
Formats: MP3 AAC AIFF WAV
Interfaces: Firewire 400
Battery Life: "Over 8 hours"
Extras: Games, Contacts, Calendar, Alarm, Sleep Timer, Clock, "20 equalizer settings"
LCD: 160x128 backlit

Karma
Cost: $260 on Amazon
Capacity: 20GB
Weight: 5.5 ounces
Formats: MP3 WMA OGG FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec making WAV not needed)
Interfaces: USB 2 and Ethernet
Battery Life: 15 hours
Extras: Dynamic playlists, Dual RCA Line-Outs, 5 band equalizer
LCD: 160x128 backlit

Re:Silicone Breast Implants

[laird]

"Microsoft will begin selling a $50 music player that will 'look and feel as good as the iPod' later this year."

Well, the reason that the iPod looks and feels so good is that the iPod has a fast interface (FireWire or USB2), tons of storage (i.e. a hard drive), and that fantastic scroll wheel.

If MS makes a $50 "iPod", that means that it'll have to cost $20 to manufacturer. For $20, it'll be hard to include a $60 hard drive, much less the controls and display, battery, audio circuitry, etc.

The only options I can see for MS to produce a "$50 iPod" is to either

1) produce a horribly limited device (i.e. minimal display, bad controls, minimal storage), or
2) to tie it to a subscription service that subsidizes the player.

I bet they could sell a $299 iPod for $50 if it only played music tied to their Janus DRM, which required you to pay $10 a month forever. They'll argue that all of the MS licensees that sell WMA (i.e. 20% of the digital download market) will provide ever so many more options than Apple's iTMS (that is 80% of the digital download market), and ignore that anybody using MS' DRM is stuck with a bad user experience, and that there are (to put it politely) many other ways to acquire music.

No -- read the article carefully

[jbellis]

it said MS will be introducing playerS. presumably some will be flash based; you already see those for $50.

Predatory

[sycodon]

It occurs to me that MS cannot make an iPod knock off for $50. If so, then they are losing money to build market share. It's been a while since my marketing classes, but it sounds to me like Predatory Pricing. And if I remember right, it is illegal.

Re:Is there any way

[FrYGuY101]

Feel free to prove to me that I'm talking out of my ass.

You ask, I deliver.

Firstly, In terms of sales, Xbox is second. Gamecube is third. PS2 is first, and not surprisingly, as they had a two year head start on the pair.

Secondly, in terms of capability, Xbox is the winner, hands down. It's simply a more powerful machine than the PS2, with better graphics, an internal hard-drive, an internal network adapter, 4 controler slots compared to PS2's 2, has the ability to rip your own music to the hard drive, et cetera, et al, ad infinitum. Again, not surprising, as the PS2 is a two year older design, and Gamecube went the budget route.

Thirdly, the reason you've only heard Halo included with 'good game' and 'Xbox' was because you're not a console gamer. Otherwise you'd have heard Splinter Cell, Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow, Knights of the Old Republic, Crimson Skies, as well as plenty of cross-platform games like Prince of Persia: Sands of Time and Grand Theft Auto 3/Vice City (The last three all have better graphics on the Xbox than the PS2 counterpart).

So yes. You're talking out of your ass.

Re:apple may spin off iPod

[Socket Scientist]

BusinessWeek are notorious for wrongly predicting Apple's next move. Job's 100 million goal was only announced after he'd been forced to raise the song download target several times since the conservative, pre-launch forecasts he supplied to RIAA members. Further, the 100 million target was announced during the intro of iTMS for Windows (when there was only 6 months left in the year it referenced) and was probably missed in large measure due to snafus with the Pepsi promotion (that led to disappointing results).

As BusinessWeek pointed out, Apple execs hadn't sold many shares in a long time, so why would it be surprising that they'd do so when the share price shot to a recent-year high? Finally, since that article was written Apple did create a separate operating division for iPod, claiming it would enhance their ability to simultaneously focus on iPod and Mac. Although it could be argued that the new division would make a spin-off easier, if that were the goal it's unlikely they'd have put one of their most senior people -- Jon Rubenstein (who like Avie Tevanian was with Jobs at Next) -- in charge.

Re:Predatory

[ZorinLynx]

The law has never stopped Microsoft before...

What makes you think it will now?

They're above the law. It's been proven time and time again. Unless our government grows some balls, MS will continue to stomp on them.

Funny how we can kick the asses of two middle eastern countries, but can't rope in an out of control company. Gotta love this country.

-Z

Re:Overpricing?

[glenalec]

'Overpriced' only applies to people who are not willing to pay that much money (duh ;-).

Any product that is selling well in a market with competition CANNOT be overpriced, in the market sense.

Overpriced for you - yes
Overpriced for me - yes
Overpriced for the market - no

Business isn't a charity. Public companies are legally required to price their products/services for maximum shareholder return. They have to find the balance point between raw profit, and how many people will buy at that price (volume). If pricing 80% of the market out makes more profit than selling to 80% of the market at a lower price, tough luck for the poorer 80% of the market. This, of course, assumes a competitive marketplace, which the iPod seems to be in.

Manufacturing capacity is also a factor - if your warehouse is constantly understocked and you cannot increase factory output, it means you are UNDERPRICED: increase the price to re-align demand with maximum supply.

'Overpriced' only occurs if you are making less money at current price/volume than you would by increased volume of sales at a lower price.

Re:Oh not again, Bill

[obeythefist]

Heh
In reality
It'll be clunky but it will work
It will be less user friendly but it will do
It will be cheaper
It will be leveraged like crazy.

The only uncertain part is whether it will be DRM'd to the gills, or if it will play most formats, or if it will be a nerds dream and will have room for new codecs.

The result of that question will determine the true success, assuming all the other postulations are correct

Re:Is there any way

[obeythefist]

What part of "embrace and extend" are we not clear on?

Phase 1: Embrace - Get your foot into the market, as deep as you can. Doesn't have to "outdo" the competitors. You can even sell at a loss if you like, the OS market will pay for it. Make your web browser "free". Sell your XBox/MS-IPod at a lower price than it costs you to make.
Phase 2: Extend - Use market penetration, leverage, hostile takeovers, anticompetetive practice and "innovation" to make that market yours.
Phase 3: Profit
Phase 4: Find new market. Repeat step 1.

Re:No .ogg, no sale. no problem. just ask.

[Twirlip of the Mists]

I did my part and formally requested iTunes and iPod support for both encoding and decoding Ogg Vorbis.

Apple's response: we've already got AAC, which is functionally equivalent to and AT LEAST as good as OGG.

Actually, shit. Now that I think about it, I should've requested FLAC and SHN support as well.

Apple's response: we introduced a lossless compressor with the last release of QuickTime.

I don't mean to shoot you down. It's just that asking for a feature isn't sufficient. You've gotta build a business case for it. Which means you've either got to get 500,000 of your closest friends to ask for the same thing, or you've got to tell them why.

Come to think of it... why? AAC is as good or better, and it's there already. Apple Lossless is exactly as good (because, duh, it's also lossless) and it's there already.

So why?

Re:Geeks don't understand fashion

[foniksonik]

How many Ferraris do you own? How about Armani suits? What about a Rolex or a pair of Ferragamo shoes?

Fashionable has never been equated with commodity. Fashion sets the trend, then the rest of the industry tries to match it while balancing supply and demand to the lowest common denominator.