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http://www.macnn.com/articles/06/11/13/zune.marketplace.vs.itms/

MS addresses key iTMS complaint

updated 10:55 am EST, Mon November 13, 2006

Zune Marketplace vs. iTMS

Microsoft has announced that users will be able to re-download files from the Zune Marketplace -- its online store for digital media content -- to a certain extent at no extra cost. Users can download songs and videos up to five times past the initial point of purchase, according to Electronista, which should ensure that users are able to receive desired content in the event of a download failure or loss of an existing copy. Microsoft is addressing one of the key complaints customers have with Apple's iTunes Music Store, which allows one-time downloads with a few rare exceptions. Apple customers have historically resorted to speaking with Apple technical support to secure second copies of purchased content from iTunes, and Microsoft is hoping to gain ground on Apple by improving on this aspect of digital purchases.

by MacNN Staff

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bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 11:14am | report spam | close Reply |
I've lost 2 iPods worth..

...of lossless manually ripped music due to unclear & merciless iTunes software menu commands - don't assume you can get music off a manually loaded iPod easily - you MUST bow to Apple's UNINTUITIVE digital lifestyle hard drive oriented design...

I am NO LONGER RECOMMENDING ITUNES OR IPODS to anyone... It is in my opinion TOO RESTRICTIVE & UNITNTUITIVE beyond the simple music interface...

I sure as heck wouldn't trust Microsoft with my money either...

BUY CDs - it is the ONLY way I sense to support & maintain an easy & high fidelity end user music delivery ecosystem...

THINK AHEAD to what it would be like if downloads become the ONLY way to license music - I fear Big Brother is licking his chops just waiting for this day to come to pass...

jasonsRX7
Mac Elite

Joined: Jul 2003

0

11/13, 11:19am | report spam | close Reply |
Good idea...

...considering how often Windows users have to format and reinstall.

Sondjata
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Oct 2000

0

11/13, 11:24am | report spam | close Reply |
Unintuitive?

Funny. I have an iPod and Creative Zen video and let me tell you, though I have mastered both, I prefer the iPod interface way better than the Creative. That up/down middle button is ridiculous. Oh and about that software to load stuff onto the Zen with a Mac... Ohn that's right..doesn't exist...from Creative anyway.

On another note, I dare anyone walk into Best Buy and tell them you bought a CD there and then lost it and expect them to give you another copy for free. It is YOUR responsibility to back up YOUR purchased music. I have all my music in three places. External HD's are cheap relative to the asking price of an iPod.

Ben Lawson
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jul 2002

0

11/13, 11:25am | report spam | close Reply |
Point of differentiation?

A point of differentiation? Hardly. Apple can respond to this instantly if they choose. But it has been an irritant...

I wonder if Apple's policy is simply a cost of bandwidth issue, or a constraint by the labels? Sounds like the former now. I think that the limitations on copying song OFF an iPod are a compromise for the RIAA however. There are inexpensive software solutions to this though.

I still mostly buy CD's but mainly because I prefer a higher quality bit-rate than the 128 kbps ITMS uses. The disadvantage of course is that I'm usually "buying" eight songs I don't want in order to get the three songs I like.

whackjob
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Aug 2005

0

11/13, 11:27am | report spam | close Reply |
Wrong

"or loss of an existing copy"

iTunes actually allows you to download your lost music and I believe it's a one time per song and not 5.

And besides and half witted person should be backing up BOUGHT music downloads no matter where you get it.

I know people who after putting the music on their iPod (bought/download) delete the files on their drives and no back up (all so far have been windows users for what that's worth - mererly an observation).

jarod
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Apr 2005

0

11/13, 11:28am | report spam | close Reply |
To bobolicious

Your point about not trusting MS is fully justified.

Your other complaints though are not. Your experience is simply due to lack of know-how. There are many free tools that let you pull songs on or off your ipod. The restrictive c*** you're complaining about has nothing to do with Apple. Apple has to abide by the law. And this bullshit law is guided by the music industry. Without such restrictions, you wouldn't dream of seeing ANY online music distribution service.

iTunes / iPod is the gold standard. If you prefer CDs, thats also cool, but as for online, accept no alternatives. You'll simply be wasting your time and money.

mmirage
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jan 2005

0

11/13, 11:33am | report spam | close Reply |
*groan*

Too many all caps, and big brother conspiracy theories. Do you work for M$, bobolicious?

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 11:52am | report spam | close Reply |
no ms...

...I just want to put my lossless music on my ipod - not fill up my HD - the ipods all have hidden music files - to move music from a computer is drag n drop, but not the other way around - if you manually load an ipod Apple's software won't allow access & the backup feature appears to only work with the main HD based iTunes library - if you want to make your iPod the location of the music library - well gee your 80gb just got reduced to 40 because you will have hidden music AND the visible library - does that make sense...? Good design?

While iTunes maybe the best so far it still seems like there are '50 ways to lose your music' - crappy design - not recommended...

And yes I'm aware os Senuti, etc... Simply evidence of the problems!

CDs are far more intuitive, just less convenient...

Even worse is these companies can just 'decide' to change the DRM & we will be stuck with whatever comes our way... No thanks! I recommend buying CDs!

dynsight
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: May 2005

0

11/13, 11:55am | report spam | close Reply |
silly argument

I do think bobolicious must be a M$ guy. I just created a mac-mini media center, used eye-TV for a DVR, reading network movies etc. Point is, I had to de-authorize one computer and authorize the mini (I would have exceeded my limit). I had them both open, so I did a quick test. I deauthorized the one, and then authorized the other (which was denied at first).

It was instantaneous, and easy.

his second, silly point--- Avoid CD's- extra packaging and media are destroying the environment.

Sure ipods fill landfills too, but due the math. How much plastic and paper are we preventing going into our landfills (or energy saved if it is recycled) by using an iPod?

dawho9
Senior User

Joined: Mar 2001

0

11/13, 12:08pm | report spam | close Reply |
Backup tunes...

Hold on - how hard is File | Back Up to Disk??? Its been there for a while now. You even have options now that lets you only backup files that have changed since your last backup.

The file can't get to the iPod without it being on your machine, so why do you need to backup the iPod. Backup your machine (Mac or PC) and be done with it.

dw9

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 12:10pm | report spam | close Reply |
I've been a mac user

since 1988 & an AAPL shareholder - my ipod experiences have been at a user level wonderful & at a music management level exasperating...

I believe CD's are at least recyclable, whereas iPods are not...? Transport pollution would seem the main environmental issue with CDs, but could be mitigated with regional production...

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 12:17pm | report spam | close Reply |
re: backup itunes...

...and so how exactly does one load an 80gb iPod with a 60gb MacBook/Mini or an 80gb MacBook Pro...?

Get my drift...?

iTunes needs just a little work! (double doh!)

Toyin
Mac Elite

Joined: Nov 2000

0

11/13, 12:30pm | report spam | close Reply |
re: backup itunes

Buy a large external hard drive and put your entire iTunes collection on that. When you launch iTunes hold option and it asks you which library you would like to use.

Rezzz
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jan 2006

0

11/13, 12:40pm | report spam | close Reply |
what part of..

"This will replace all files on your iPod" don't you understand?

And wasn't syncing between different iTunes installations (home, work) allowed in the latest version?

PookJP
Mac Enthusiast

Joined: Jan 2001

0

11/13, 12:50pm | report spam | close Reply |
Good idea.

Hey, just because it's from MS doesn't mean it's a bad idea. Personally, one of the biggest reasons I don't buy from iTMS is because I dislike having full ownership over the digital content I buy. Included in that is the ability to easily restore, as one would an application or ripped CD.

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 01:06pm | report spam | close Reply |
re: re: backup itunes...

... really? I should be forced to buy an external hard drive because iTunes is designed to duplicate my music in hidden files on an iPod that one might expect could hold this music ?

At a certain point I have to say 'wait a minute, this design is just bad...' It wouldn't seem necessary for the ipod or itunes to work - merely a gimme to copyright, or a ploy to sell more hard drive...

The movie sync warning I found dubious - in the section on managing movies alone, ultimately changed a global setting for syncing without warning and could be strengthened to more clearly warn music, photos & other non-movie data will be erased - hardly intuitive from my point of view & certainly not user friendly in that it is an all or nothing option...

Everyone is of course welcome to their opinion - mine is that iTunes is terribly designed for use as a primary high quality music device or container - which would at 80gb seem to be at least one potential purpose of such a device - with many, many ways to lose your music & only TWO inflexible way to backup ie having a hard drive at least bigger than your ipod - one must 'backup to disc' including 80gb of DVDs - and that doesn't seem to include a manually loaded iPod as an option...

Very disappointing...

asoliman
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Nov 2006

0

11/13, 01:22pm | report spam | close Reply |
iTunes vs. MS

What MS is offering with this deal isn't bad, but it is way overshadowed by the the shady scheme they're running for buying music. Instead of your credit card being charged $.99, you buy "points." I.e., if you just want to buy one or two songs, you have to pay MORE than the actual worth of these songs and good ol' MS gets to hold on to the change (at least until you use it). So, I ain't that impressed.

As for iTunes, I have a 4th generation 20 gig and my wife has a 5th generation 60 gig. My is one manual since our music library is larger than 20 gigs; hers is on automatic. It has never been a problem for either of us, so I don't know what that complaint is about.

I've had the following happen, so I know it's a fact: if your download is interrupted for some reason, you can always pick it up right where you left off. If there is a problem with your download, usually an email to iTunes will suffice to fix it.

Just as you're responsible for keeping CDs in their jewel cases and stored in a decent place, you are responsible for maintaining the "health" of your digital files. Back them up to CDs, DVDs, external drives, etc., whatever suits you. To vociferously complain about having to back up the files on your computer frankly means that you don't care very much about the files on your computer.

The limitation on the iPod that doesn't allow you to copy music back to your computer comes from the RIAA--one of the world's most evil bodies. There are numerous apps, for both OS X and Windows, that will easily and painlessly take music from your iPod and put it on a computer. Most of these allow you to transfer your ID3 tags and your album artwork, and most of them are either under $10 or free. Try googling. To my knowledge, Apple has virtually done nothing to stop the proliferation of such apps.

In conclusion, MS is offering an inferior product for the same price, and one where MS, one the world's weatlthiest companies, gets to keep your "change" when you buy a song. hmmm...

horvatic
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Apr 2002

0

11/13, 01:28pm | report spam | close Reply |
Sure they charge 5 times

Sure they charge you 5 times what the song is worth with there stupid points system so I'm not surprised. I'll stick with iTunes and just make a backup on CD or use iTunes backup system.

testudo
Forum Regular

Joined: Aug 2001

0

11/13, 01:30pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: silly argument

I do think bobolicious must be a M$ guy.

Hey, I thought I was the only MS loving, Mac bashing troll here (regardless of mac usage and Apple stock ownership). bobolicious, go find your own mac forums to troll at, this is my place to complain about shortcomings in Apple's hardware/software and be labelled a troll for not sucking down the koolaid!

And it is funny how you need an external harddrive to back up your music which, in itself, is on an external harddrive.

dwoodruff
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jul 2006

0

11/13, 01:49pm | report spam | close Reply |
duh... backup

every song you have an any iPod is saved if you back up. It's really quite easy, and if you don't back up, you deserve to lose it.

Imagine going to a local record store and saying, "I lost my CD's, can I have new ones?"

Would you like some cheese with your whine?

whackjob
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Aug 2005

0

11/13, 02:03pm | report spam | close Reply |
ipod 2 itunes

"There are many free tools that let you pull songs on or off your ipod"

These tools are SO FREE that it's actually under the "File" menu in iTunes 7.

It says "transfer purchased music FROM ipod"! to you Mac/PC

juraiprince
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Feb 2006

0

11/13, 02:14pm | report spam | close Reply |
No Dealbreaker...

It's a nice idea, allowing one to re-download a song up to five times, but hardly a dealbreaker. Yes, it can be a bit annoying if for some reason a particular song was lost in the download process via iTunes, but it has been extremely rare (for me), and when it did happen, a quick e-mail to customer support allowed me to re-download the song with no problem. Microsoft is trying to find any angle it can to switch people except the only angle that matters: making a great product that people will want to buy. Zune 1.0 is not a great product that would make me or I suspect many others give up their iPods. There is just nothing significantly better about the device. It isn't sleek. It dosen't fit well in your hands, and looks awful.

moldyapples
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jul 2006

0

11/13, 02:22pm | report spam | close Reply |
Geez....

OK, so I have all my music on the HD of my Mac which sits safely under my desk at home. So unless someone breaks into my house & steals it (& my backup CDs) or my house burns down it is safe. But hey, I'd much rather have it all ONLY on my iPod. Yeah, there's no chance I could drop it, accidentaly leave it somewhere, have it stolen from my car, etc, etc. Everyone knows iPod drives never fail, right? Next I'll take all my money out of the bank and carry it around everywhere I go in a brown paper bag! Um, hi, Mr. banker, I left my money on the bus, will you replace it please?

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 02:24pm | report spam | close Reply |
re: iPod 2 iTunes...

...well many of the points expressed are correct, but not applicable (oops) - for example I have no 'purchases' to transfer because I ripped my songs from CDs into lossless format - not applicable - the equivalent AAC 'purchases' would have fit in 10gb & not required a high capacity iPod in the first place, nor in my opinion worth buying due to lossy quality & DRM...

I had been waiting for large capacity iPods just for such lossless music purposes...

In fact BY DESIGN the only way one can fully fill/use a large capacity iPod with the vast majority of laptops is in manual mode (requiring tedious & 3rd party hack backup options) or by having a hard drive large enough again to hold all one's non-ipod related work, etc in addition to the 80gb of media - so in most cases likely a 120 at least...

Or of course by tolerating the needless duplication of hidden & visible iPod library files effectively cutting the high capacity in half for no seemingly useful purpose...

Microsoft & others do perhaps have opportunity here, but might need to adopt a lossless codec & move into the audiophile rather than mass market...

testudo
Forum Regular

Joined: Aug 2001

0

11/13, 02:25pm | report spam | close Reply |
whiners

Man, can not anyone understand the point at hand???

every song you have an any iPod is saved if you back up. It's really quite easy, and if you don't back up, you deserve to lose it.

Imagine going to a local record store and saying, "I lost my CD's, can I have new ones?"

Would you like some cheese with your whine?

Except the point isn't that the ipod is lost, its that the music is locked onto the ipod, hidden away for fear you might want to copy it somewhere. The analogy would be more like "Hey, my CD player went legs up, so I got a new one, but it won't let me play any of my CDs!".

These tools are SO FREE that it's actually under the "File" menu in iTunes 7.

It says "transfer purchased music FROM ipod"! to you Mac/PC

Um, that only transfers you're iTMS purchased music, not music ripped from CDs, which Bobolicious stated was where his music comes from. Apple's protecting you from yourself, because if you could, we all know people would just transfer that to every computer out there!

Oh, and if you don't like any of those arguments, keep in mind that (a) Apple reserves the right to change the terms of the license at any point it wishes, and (b) if Apple ever just decided to kill the whole thing, or go under, or whatever, if their activation servers aren't working when you need them, you have no way of playing your music anyway.

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

0

11/13, 02:42pm | report spam | close Reply |
Dual codecs...

...another option might be to allow dual codecs - aac on a lappie & lossless on an ipod - syncing playlists, etc & perhaps burning mixes (ie for auto CDs) from the higher available source, however that may be asking too much...

firebird06
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Sep 2006

0

11/13, 03:15pm | report spam | close Reply |
Sure invitation to piracy

This 5 d/l limit on anything seems to be an invitation for piraters, or those that want to distribute music to others.

And granted, I may be paranoid, but I'm saying that in light of recently being told that a friend didn't buy groceries for a year by conning resturants into giving him free food because of a strategic hair placement, or whatever. I'll stick with my iPod + iTunes combo, something I can rely on and supports legality.

alansky
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Mar 2000

0

11/13, 03:17pm | report spam | close Reply |
iPod happiness

"I've lost 2 iPods worth of lossless manually ripped music due to unclear & merciless iTunes software menu commands - don't assume you can get music off a manually loaded iPod easily."

It is easy to do anything you want with your iTunes Music Library. You just have to know how to do it. The iPod can function as both a music player and a hard disk, but it can't be both at the same time and, for best results, there are clear protocols that should be followed. Spending a few minutes with the iPod manual generally leads to iPod happiness.

firebird06
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Sep 2006

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11/13, 03:24pm | report spam | close Reply |
RE: bobolicious

What are these hidden files you refer to?

I'm looking at the status window in iTunes 7, and the space used that isn't viewable in itunes is simply the iPod OS, and some calendars and contact pages. I see no evidence of any hidden files that have been created.

If you go into either the finder or my computer (depending on what OS you're running) and simply look at the files on the iPod thru that view, you should be able to see every single file that is on there.

Maybe these "hidden files" are actually duplicates of songs you have burned onto your HD?

alansky
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Mar 2000

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11/13, 03:25pm | report spam | close Reply |
another thing

As others have pointed out, it is possible to re-download music purchased from the iTMS. It is also possible to download and pay for a single $.99 song. Microsoft has a nice little scam going with their "points" system which forces customers to buy $5.00 worth of credits (points) in order to purchase one $.99 song.

Would you loan your money to the richest man in the world?

Raccoon
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Nov 2005

0

11/13, 09:20pm | report spam | close Reply |
Nutz

i-tunes I always thought to be a store, not a music locker service. (read Vivendi vs MP3.com)

Goto the Walmart store and get a replacement CD/DVD for the one you lost. They'll obviously give it to you for free.

Sondjata
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Oct 2000

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11/13, 09:24pm | report spam | close Reply |
For the Real Dense

If you rip a track from a CD it lands on your hard drive. Then you transfer it to the iPod.

Duh.

If you buy from the iTunes store it lands on your HD and then transfers to the iPod.

Duh.

Only a damn fool says: I want to put a backup of my music ON my portable music player. Said fool should not be posting in a forum full on non-fools.

Persons with internet connections have access to version tracker et. al and can get multiple tools to transfer data to and from their iPod.

Duh. That one needs a drive at least as big as the current size of your library is obvious.

Duh.

Why has this discussion gone so long?

Because dense fool(s) want's attention.

kw99
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Nov 2001

0

11/14, 01:47am | report spam | close Reply |
"key" iTMS complaint?

This is not a deal maker or a deal breaker.

Besides. Apple will allow a re-download (at least one time). I did it. You have to ask through tech support. I lost about 1/4 of my purchased songs because I had not backed up recently. They just reset my account so that EVERY song I purchased was downloaded again.

Simon
Posting Junkie

Joined: Nov 2000

0

11/14, 03:15am | report spam | close Reply |
there's no issue

really, there's no issue here: � lost cds don't get replaced for free � data has to be backed up, of course music as well � copy your itunes library folder to whatever storage you like and you're fine

that's it. we're done here.

Toyin
Mac Elite

Joined: Nov 2000

0

11/14, 08:43am | report spam | close Reply |
It's your choice

Thank you sondjata, My sentiments exactly. You've lost data from your iPod 3 times and you still don't have a back up.

Buy an EXTRA HARD DRIVE for $100 and save your high quality music. (Personally I find portable music and high quality music and oxymoron)

bobolicious
Junior Member

Joined: Aug 2002

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11/14, 10:02am | report spam | close Reply |
re: it's your choice...

toyin - firstly it's only twice & the second time was when I used iTunes backup feature...

sonjdata is obviously a desktop user with a big drive

the other point is that the music was wiped out by using the itunes software in routine ways - not disc failure - even with a backup it isn't a good design

and no I don't think I should need to buy a desktop hardrive at 50% again of the cost of the iPod when dvd's should do the trick, if one could use the backup feature on a manually loaded iPod, which it appears one cannot

why are bloggers so insulting to other bloggers & so defensive of such an obviously tedious design

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300173

hayesk
Professional Poster

Joined: Sep 1999

0

11/14, 10:48am | report spam | close Reply |
Re: bobolicious

"and no I don't think I should need to buy a desktop hardrive at 50% again of the cost of the iPod when dvd's should do the trick"

Uhm... where do you buy hard drives, because they're ripping you off. An 80GB drive can be found for under $100.

testudo
Forum Regular

Joined: Aug 2001

0

11/14, 12:17pm | report spam | close Reply |
RE: bobolicious

What are these hidden files you refer to?

He's referring to the hidden files in all the hidden folders, where Apple stores all your music. Maybe you've installed a hack to see them, but generally they aren't visible.

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MS addresses key iTMS complaint

updated 10:55 am EST, Mon November 13, 2006

Zune Marketplace vs. iTMS

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To bobolicious

*groan*

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re: backup itunes

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Dual codecs...

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RE: bobolicious

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there's no issue

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