Hilary Rosen Gripes About iPod, iTMS

mijkal writes "Hilary Rosen, the former RIAA CEO and chairwoman, has spoken out against Apple's "lock-in" with iPod and the iTunes Music Store." From the article: "The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's." Ironically, she appeals to consumer rights and anti-monopoly tactics."

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think my brain just died. Hilary Rosen is complaining about anti-consumer monopolies? This is like bizzaro world. The comments for this story write themselves, much like that Microsoft + Ford article about the car that will never crash.

Jack Valenti made a similar about-face after he retired. Does the *AA install some kind of behavior modification chip in their employees that gets taken out when they leave? (can we get one for a couple of the Slashdot editors?)

Well, she did insert that line about pirate sites being full of viruses (I get viruses form my mp3's al lthe time, god bless her), and soart of backhandedly danced around the fact that DRM and lossy music are the reason we can't transfer, so I guess the party line is stil lsorta there. Oh well.

Irony? Dripping with molten iron!

[ackthpt]

Huffington Post? I knew that name rung a bell, some background [ojr.org].

She writes: "I've got a confession to make. I'm talking weak-in-the-knees infatuation. But it's not Brad or Orlando or Colin or any of the cinematic hunks du jour who have set my heart aflutter. No it's Atrios and Kos and Joshua Micah Marshall and Kausfiles and Kevin Drum and Wonkette. Bloggers all. Yes, when it comes to the blogosphere, I'm a regular cyberslut."

Ok, tell us something we can't guess. So you have a new rag and you've got Hilary Rosen writing thus:

I spent 17 years in the music business the last several of which were all about pushing and prodding the painful development of legitimate on-line music. Now, the music fan is on the cusp of riches in their options - free of the viruses of the pirate sites.

Oh my... Has anyone seen my unawarded Humanitarian of the Millenium trophy around? I've got someone to give it to at last.

There are lots of places you can go for great music at good deals and with a deep catalog of songs from over the last 20 or 30 years. MSN.com, Rhapsody.com, aolmusic.com, even walmart.com. There are little players to make your favorite music even more portable than ever starting at as little as 29 bucks. Most every player device works at every one of these "stores" and it is pretty easy to keep all the songs, no matter where you got them, in a single folder or "jukebox" on your computer.

Or all your favorite pirated mp3's seems we've been here before.

But not the iPod. Most agree it is the best quality player on the market even if the cheapest one costs a few hundred dollars. The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's.

!Cough! Surely you jest, Hilary! What next will you be pushing? Fair Use? You commie!

But those other music sites have lots of music that you can't get at the iTunes store. So, if you have an iPod, you are out of luck. If you are really a geek, you can figure out how to strip the songs you might have bought from another on-line store of all identifying information so that they will go into the iPod. But then you have also degraded the sound quality. How cruel.

Yeah, how cruel. Seems when the big labels were withholding everything from us consumers we were somehow evil to rip and make our own mp3's. Only able to get what the powers that be (RIAA) felt we were worthy of (mostly whatever manufactured band or act they were currently exploiting and wanted us to buy into like so many lemmings. "Puny mortal, you are only worthy of Britney Spears Greatest Dance Songs of Last Week, with CD-ROM destroying anti-copy-protection, now BUY!") Now the stiletto heel is on the other foot?

keeping the iTunes system a proprietary technology to prevent anyone from using multiple (read Microsoft) music systems is the most anti-consumer and user unfriendly thing any god can do.

UltraGasp! This just can't be the same Hilary Rosen! Impostor!!!

Why am I complaining about this?

I dunno. Maybe you're a consumer now. Or just another cyberslut.

This is so utterly amazing...

[Anonymous Coward]

... coming from the plaintiff of Diamond vs. RIAA, a lawsuit in which Ms. Rosen and her cronies tried to render the iPod illegal!

How can these people sleep at night?

"To Tell The Truth

[Paul Neubauer]

Will the real Hilary Rosen please stand up?

From TFA

[SithLordOfLanc]

"If you are really a geek, you can figure out how to strip the songs you might have bought from another on-line store of all identifying information so that they will go into the iPod."

The former head of the RIAA pointing out that the only way to listen to your legally purchased music on an iPod is to break the DRM. That's rich.

Re:Girlfriend

[The I Shing]

American women who are straight refer to female friends as "girlfriends," with no sexual connotation. An American straight man cannot have a "boyfriend," nor can he have a "girlfriend" without whom he's not in some way romantically or sexually involved. It's just a quirk of the American English language, I believe.

Re:or...

[0x461FAB0BD7D2]

Ah-ha. This is clearly a plot to get people to refute them by providing anecdotal evidence of getting non-DRM'd mp3s.

Would save them the trouble of hunting down pirates themselves. These people are clever.

Re:Pot to Kettle... Pot to Kettle...

[Anonymous Coward]

Pot to Kettle... Pot to Kettle...

You are Black.

Who the fuck talks like this anyhow? You need to get away from your computer and Slashdot for awhile and go interact with the rest of the world.

Source: Ariana Huffington's Celeblogs

[mrex]

I'd just like to take this opportunity to congratulate Ms. Huffington on giving a voice to the silently oppressed celebrities and powerbrokers out there, who have for so long struggled to get their valuable messages out to the anxious public.

Truly, it warms my heart to see come to fruition the hopeful idealism of a youth spent dreaming of a world where who a person is matters as much or more than what that person is saying!

Thank you, Ariana.

Because Walmart gives me a choice ....right.

[newdamage]

I own an iBook, I own an iPod, and I've never had any gripes about not being able to buy music online from anywhere else besides the iTMS. Why? Because Apple makes it easy for me to purchase a song and get it on my iPod with very little hassle.

But hey, I'll take Hilary's advice here and navigate over to walmart.com and see what I'm missing by not being able to buy music from there. But wait, what this? IE 5.5 required to buy music? Well, gee, I guess Walmart is the paragon of a quality music buying service, even though I can't use their service because they only support one browser!

This isn't about Apple's lockin with the iPod and the iTMS, this is about Apple's lockin vs. everybody else's lockin on Windows machines.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have to have an approved player right now just to use Napster as well.

Dumb bitch syndrome

[hackstraw]

when, oh when, will Steve Jobs let me buy music from somewhere other than the Apple iTunes store and put it on my iPod?

Any file that is supported by the iPod can be played on the iPod regardless of where the file came from.

The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD's

You forgot the ones that we "stole" over the net :)

You also forgot that all of the recording companies that fund the RIAA are welcome to distribute MP3's or other forms of digital music. Being that they are currently almost 10 years behind the digital music medium and are relying on a business model that is about 20 years old, I have no sympathy for them.

Look, I bowed at his feet when the iPod and iTunes was created because HE GOT THE BALL ROLLING.

And the music companies watched the ball roll past them and out of bounds and then argued with the ref wanting the ball back.

But keeping the iTunes system a proprietary technology to prevent anyone from using multiple (read Microsoft) music systems is the most anti-consumer and user unfriendly thing any god can do.

I don't know of any "Microsoft music systems", but the iTunes software runs on Windows and can import any of its known file formats (wav, mp3, aac, aif, etc) and sync them on the iPod.

Why am I complaining about this?

Your ignorant, and I guess now you are without a job.

Wow, what a dumbass.

Re:Who is kidding whom, Hilary?

[donutello]

Second, a monopoly means that no-one can buy or use a product or service type by anyone other than a specific company. Ma Bell had a monopoly on phone service. There wasn't an alternative. There are zillions of alternatives to the iPod. The iPod is just really, really popular. That doesn't make it a monopoly.

Sorry, that's not the Slashdot and Judge Jackson definition of a monopoly.

Re:Irony? Dripping with molten iron!

[The Angry Mick]

You mean...its not the same thing?

;-)

Re:Pot, meet Kettle

[Anonymous Coward]

Her own organization, the RIAA, hires people to create and distribute those viruses to deliberately infect P2P sites. I wonder if Hillary Rosen ever met the truth.

I know you don't hold "Hit Me Baby, One More Time" in high regard, but calling it a "virus" is not very fair to Ms. Spears. If she sees this it might hurt her feelings.

Re:Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[Spodlink05]

I think my brain just died.

Then you're perfectly qualified to work for the RIAA.

*ring ring* Mr. Kettle?

[scronline]

It's Mr. Pot on line 2 and wishes to speak with you.

Re:Girlfriend

[Anonymous Coward]

Forgive me for pointing this out, but given her record, Ms. Rosen is an insult to her own sexuality.

Re:Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[Rei]

In Future News today, the RIAA headquarters in sunny Washington, DC was completely destroyed when a large mass of irony accidentally fell off an aircraft and crashed into the building.

Rescue workers were quick to arrive at the scene, but surprisingly found no casualties.

"Apparently, the building was only staffed by vampires - bloodthirsty creatures who feed on the blood, sweat, and tears of the living - and they proved immune to the effects of such irony" said a broke-musician turned fireman that was among the first to arrive at the scene.

The irony broke free shortly after a Boeing-767 carrying lawyers to file papers against an entire sixth-grade class stopped at Ronald Reagan National Airport to take RIAA head Mitch Bainwol to a charity dinner for the school of the same children.

According to witnesses, the irony could be seen by bloody everyone; however, apparently it was not visible from within the RIAA headquarters itself. Washington DC mayor Anthony Williams has discussed potential legislation to force all employees of businesses within city limits to remove their blinders during working hours.

Re:"If you're a real geek"?

[1729]

Still making payments on those Monster cables, eh?

Re:Pot, meet Kettle

[Anonymous Coward]

If Britney Spears reads Slashdot, I'm eating my moccasins.

Bone Appetit.

Britney.

Oh come on...

[mehtajr]

My iPod also works perfectly fine with tracks I ripped from other people's CDs.

Cue RIAA lawyers in 5...4...

Re:Pot, meet Kettle

[ryusen]

good point, since it is a file that tricks you into DLing it onto your computer (thinkign it's good music) rather than a song that infects other songs, wouldn't it be more accuratly a Trojan?

Re:Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[rejecting]

I had modpoints, but this is the best comment ever on slashdot. EVER.

Re:Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[salesgeek]

n the RIAA's perfect world, you and I would pay every time we listen to a song, on every device that could possibly play the song.

And ASCAP would charge you and your landlord everytime you decided to sing while taking a crap.

Pot Calling the Kettle Black

[Matt Clare]

The part of the the article I didn't like was when she kept going on about the kettle being black.

Re:Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[dr bacardi]

I completely agree... and because simply laughing at it did not seem to do it proper justice, I actually went to the fridge and got a glass of milk, just to have something to snarf when I read it.

Thank you Rei.

This is straightfoward

[obeythefist]

Quite easily explained.

Rosen no longer works for the RIAA, therefore no longer gets all the free "demo" CD's.

Where then is Ms. Rosen to get her free music from?

P2P is the answer! But now she is upset that she can't play all of her "free" wma music on her iPod.

Is it April 1st again already?

[davmoo]

Hilary Rosen speaking out for consumer rights and anti-monopoly tactics is like Jerry Falwell coming out in support of tolerance, understanding, and gay rights. She has to have been misquoted. There is no other possible explanation.

Hi, I'm Hilary Rosen!

[dangitman]

I have to say this fucking article is hilarious. Hilary Rosen Blogs, gets up-close and personal with her fans!

The new iPod my girlfriend gave me is a trap.

Isn't everything a girlfriend gives you a trap in some way or another?

MSN.com, Rhapsody.com, aolmusic.com, even walmart.com. There are little players to make your favorite music even more portable than ever starting at as little as 29 bucks.

And I suppose you use one of these little $29 players and buy your music from Walmart.com, Hilary?

Most agree it is the best quality player on the market even if the cheapest one costs a few hundred dollars

Why, yes they do.

I know Steve Jobs is a god.

I've got an altar in my bedroom, at which I sacrifice virgins daily. If Jobs is a God (hey, it nearly rhymes!) then it seems somewhat blasphemous to crticicize His music store on small technical details. Shouldn't the papers be screaming headlines that an actual, honest-to-Jobs deity is currently gracing this great green-and-gray Earth?

The iPod: Designed by God. Priced for mere mortals. Dare you resist?

Look, I bowed at his feet when the iPod and iTunes was created because HE GOT THE BALL ROLLING. He is as laconically casually cool as Bono and makes really good cartoon movies too

Of course! How could I be so stupid? I thought Jobs was a founder/CEO of a computer/software/electronics company, and recently the CEO of an animation studio. But I've been so blind! What really matter is that Jobs = Bono in the coolness stakes. Although to be fair, Jobs is also Keanu Reeves. After all, if he can be CEO of two wildly successful companies, then why can't he be two iconoclastic alternate-reality pop-media personae simultaneously? Of course he can, because Jobs is omnipotent.

But keeping the iTunes system a proprietary technology to prevent anyone from using multiple (read Microsoft) music systems is the most anti-consumer and user unfriendly thing any god can do.

Yes, Hilary read Microsoft. I know you do. Get paid, too.

Is this the same Jobs that railed for years about the Microsoft monopoly? Is taking a page out of their playbook the only way to have a successful business? If he isn't careful Bill Gates might just Betamax him while the crowds cheer him on.

Is being Betamaxed something like getting an Atomic Wedgie? That sounds painful, especially if done by someone named Bill.

Come on Steve - open it up.

As soon as you open your legs, sweetie.