bacterial_pus writes "First the music industry wanted more money, by changing Apple's 99 cents per song policy. Now one exec isthreatening to pull the plug on Apple if Steve Jobs doesn't change the iTunes Music Store pricing." From the article: "Nash's comments echoes those made last week by Warner CEO Edgar Bronfman, who called for Apple to adopt variable pricing and share out revenues from iPod sales. The record companies' position is based on the dubious argument that digital downloads sell iPods. In fact all the evidence points to the opposite: that iPod sales have driven demand for downloads. The vast majority of digital music sales are made by iPod owners. Cut off Apple and the labels digital sales will slump." More recently Jobs resisted their pressure, and the execs snarked back. Looks like they're getting more serious. Music Industry Threatens to Pull Plug on Apple Log in/Create an Account | Top | 730 comments (Spill at 50!) | Index Only | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 730 comments 0: 726 comments 1: 605 comments 2: 411 comments 3: 134 comments 4: 66 comments 5: 47 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. (1) | 2 | 3 record industry hold back by freddej (Score:1)Friday September 30, @05:17PM I like STEALING THINGS (Score:5, Funny) by Thud457 (234763) on Friday September 30, @05:37PM (#13689041) (http://127.0.0.1:82/ | Last Journal: Monday September 26, @02:53PM) Fine with me, I'll just go back to stealing music. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:I like STEALING THINGS by tivoKlr (Score:1)Friday September 30, @05:44PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by Anonymous Coward (Score:1)Monday October 03, @04:11PMAmazon.com by Merdalors (Score:1)Tuesday October 04, @04:14PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold. This just in... (Score:5, Insightful) by meadandale (605319) on Friday September 30, @07:04PM (#13689845) Having just bought an iPod in the last week and bought my first music in well over 3 years via iTunes I have only this to say to the RIAA and these Music Industry morons:Force iTunes out of business and I'll revert to stealing your music.Downloads on iTunes aren't cheap. On the contrary, at a buck a song, it is only marginally cheaper to buy music on iTunes (though arguably more convenient). So, with no physical product to produce and distribute, we are being charged almost the same amount as if we go into a store and buy a CD? And you want to charge more?What part of 'greedy fscking assholes' don't you understand? [ Reply to This | ParentCopyright by simpl3x (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @01:41AM Re:This just in... (Score:4, Insightful) by EntropyEngine (890880) on Saturday October 01, @06:08AM (#13692390) Well over here in England, it's quite a lot cheaper to buy music from iTunes than it is to buy from the high street.The greed of the music labels really does know no bounds.It's just pure greed that they want a slice of iPod sales.These people are just parasites feeding off the very entity that saved their collective margins from a razor-thin oblivion.Will they ever learn? Of course not.I don't see any other alternative than for piracy to rise again and their sales to fall for them to realize the error of their ways. But with their totally blinkered attitude, all that they would do is put on yet more spin on the economics and blame some other nameless / faceless force for their own idiocy... [ Reply to This | ParentRe:This just in... by timbloom (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @08:42PMRe:This just in... by TheoMurpse (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @11:59PMRe:This just in... by tsa (Score:2)Monday October 03, @01:41AM Step it Up! (Score:4, Interesting) by ripismoney (898599) on Friday September 30, @07:53PM (#13690252) (http://ripismoney.blogspot.com/) The music industry better step it up! If they want to stay afloat, they should allow the 99 for all policy to stay! What is better, getting a little under a dollar per song ($10 for an album), or having everyone just pirate and take it all for free? Actually, if they played their cards right, it would be more profitable to lower the price. I would buy a lot more music if it were less than a dollar. In fact, anything 75 or lower, if I heard it, and didn't think it was terrible, I'd buy it. It's time they started realizing that they work for us. We pay them for entertainment. Well, you know what? Screw them. I can live without legal music. I can live with what I've got, or just acquire music from others. By the way, I do not in any way condone or approve of stealing music. Remember that every time you download a song, God (or Buddha, or whatever) kills a kitten! [ Reply to This | Parent2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:I like STEALING THINGS by big_groo (Score:3)Friday September 30, @08:10PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by arminw (Score:3)Friday September 30, @09:51PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by cdrdude (Score:1)Friday September 30, @09:53PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by rob_squared (Score:3)Saturday October 01, @01:23AMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by aichpvee (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @05:35AMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by lordofthechia (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @10:19AMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by TheoMurpse (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @12:13AMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by Golias (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @01:05PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by KarmaMB84 (Score:2)Sunday October 09, @05:27PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by TheoMurpse (Score:2)Sunday October 09, @08:40PM Re:I like STEALING THINGS (Score:5, Insightful) by Lussarn (105276) on Saturday October 01, @01:40AM (#13691849) Speaking of wrong terms. You don't buy things from iTunes. You licence the media to be played on max 5 authorized computers at a time. As soon as you licence the media the economic value of the media is zero since it's illegal to resell the licence to any other part. The licence for your old media sometimes changes retroactively as Apple makes new deals with the record companies. If Apple should decide for whatever reason to take away their licence servers your music is gone forever.No, that doesn't sound like the old school term "buy" we use when we go to the candy store.I don't really care if Apple (and the other music stores) change their ways of doing business but I think it's VERY dishonest to call someting "buy" when in fact it's more like renting. I want to really own stuff I buy, as it is now it's "you own it just as much as you need to listen to the music they way we say you are allowed to".The subscription models is better in this regard since they don't confuse you to think you own the media when in fact you don't. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:I like STEALING THINGS by arminw (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @09:58AMRenting music by Caldair (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @04:35PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by JudgeFurious (Score:2)Tuesday October 04, @05:09PMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by cookiej (Score:1)Sunday October 02, @10:53AM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:I like STEALING THINGS by kubevubin (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @01:47AMRe:I like STEALING THINGS by James_Aguilar (Score:2)Tuesday October 04, @05:18PM3 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:record industry hold back by macdaddy357 (Score:3)Friday September 30, @05:52PM A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:5, Insightful) by sgant (178166) <ksgantNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Friday September 30, @06:05PM (#13689315) (http://skewedreview.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday September 21, @01:50PM) Kenneth Hertz, partner at Goldring Hertz and Lichtenstein LLP, a law firm representing major recording industry artists said "What if Jobs says 39 cents or 29 cents per download - what then? The industry can say, OK we'll cut him of - very few people buy music from digital downloads... [Jobs] will figure out another model ... The industry got together and said 'We don't want another MTV'. Well, now we've got another MTV, in Apple. And we have to deal with it."So, I have to ask...if very few people buy music from digital downloads according to this suit, then what the FUCK do these guys care what price Apple sells their music at? This is greed. Pure greed. The recording industry is so used to making reams of cash without doing any of the actual work that they're lashing out when someone tries to take that away from them.And then to turn around and say they want a cut of the profits from the physical iPods themselves shows they have HUGE balls too. I mean, do they get a cut from every CD player sold that plays their music?Yes, I'd rather blatantly steal all the music from here to the end of my life then have to pay anything to the bastards that run these companies. I'm sorry to the artists but lets face it, they only see a 10th of the actual cash these companies are actually raking in.Or better yet, I won't even listen to music anymore. I'm so pissed off and disenchanted with the whole industry I'll just sit and listen to the birds outside my window...or laugh like a brook as it trips and falls over stones on it's way. Sorry, was channeling "Sound of Music" there....DAMN! [ Reply to This | ParentRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Overly Critical Guy (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:17PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by jcr (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:07PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Golias (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @01:10PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by angelasmark (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:29PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by arose (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:30PM Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:5, Insightful) by User 956 (568564) on Friday September 30, @06:44PM (#13689663) (http://law.about.com.../?002-2295993-425043) So, I have to ask...if very few people buy music from digital downloads according to this suit, then what the FUCK do these guys care what price Apple sells their music at? This is greed. Pure greed.The only thing I can think is that these fuckwits heard the fable about the goose with the golden eggs and didn't get the moral of the story. [ Reply to This | Parent Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:5, Insightful) by tsm_sf (545316) * on Friday September 30, @07:59PM (#13690297) (Last Journal: Thursday August 05, @11:39PM) Oh they got the moral, but for them it was "kill the goose and get the next egg faster." I have to totally agree with the GP. This will drive me back to p2p and the used record stores. Actually, you know what? Fuck this. I like stealing from corporations. I'm tired of trying to do the right thing when I see the wrong thing being rewarded on a macro level every day. How the hell did we get shamed into being "good citizens" by these bastards? It's like listening to Tony Soprano give a "crime doesn't pay" speech. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Fear the Clam (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:01PM Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:5, Interesting) by mr_shifty (202071) on Friday September 30, @11:33PM (#13691407) (http://www.lp.org/) Damn skippy.I pay on average $3-$8 for used CDs in "like new" condition, via Amazon.com [amazon.com].No low-quality downloads, no DRM, no overpriced songs I can't play where I want, on whatever device I want. No bullshit.Why in the world would I ever even consider paying a dollar per TRACK of the same music, only to have harsh restrictions placed on me as to where I can play it, and how many times I can copy it to other devices?Screw that. As long as I can still buy CDs used, that's the route I'll take. If iTunes Music Store goes the way of the dodo, I guess it won't bother me.Between you, me, and the dodo, though, the RIAA's dumber than a sack of hammers to let a potential cash cow like this die.Free money. For a product they already have. Being sold by someone giving them a cut. For something they otherwise wouldn't be selling at all.What collossally stupid people must they be, those in charge of the major labels. These are potentially the best years to get in on the ground floor of the internet music revolution, and here they are, trying to stamp it out and drive themselves out of business.Heh.And I thought music execs liked money. I guess they don't. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by istartedi (Score:2)Tuesday October 04, @07:18PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Phreakiture (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @09:58AMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by mr_shifty (Score:1)Tuesday October 04, @07:36PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by mr_shifty (Score:1)Wednesday October 05, @10:36AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by dnoyeb (Score:3)Friday September 30, @08:13PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Well actually... by boomgopher (Score:3)Friday September 30, @07:01PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Anonymous Coward (Score:1)Friday September 30, @07:33PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Zasten (Score:1)Friday September 30, @08:49PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Zasten (Score:1)Friday September 30, @09:18PMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by fbsderr0r (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @12:38PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF (Score:2)Monday October 03, @11:43AMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by chumpboy (Score:2)Friday September 30, @07:35PM Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:4, Informative) by rtb61 (674572) on Friday September 30, @09:50PM (#13690930) Never argue greed with logic. Technically speaking apple via the ipod is now the song publisher. They are actually threatening the revenue of current RIAA members and in the future will undoubtably provide an alternate publishing point for independent artists as well as copyleft artists (the people that really believe in music as an art form to be shared, rather than as a profit centre). The current crop of RIAA members are fully aware of this and are now taking the initial steps to basically knock apple out of the music publishing business. Variable price point is about charging apple more than they charge other preffered manufacturers (RIAA members in long standing) and licencing on hardware is an extention on that policy. Most modern music is basically the same with some slight variations for marketing purposes (music development has always been based on the development of the supporting musical instrument technology). Even the rebellion aspect of music is over fifty years old (excluding of course any hint of rebelling against the publishers profits). Recorded music has always been and will always be "dead" music, when it is live and shared it comes to life as part of a shared community celebration, whatever that community may be (create your own music don't buy it because your are just buying advertising 3 minutes at a time). [ Reply to This | ParentObligatory Pink Floyd quote by Phreakiture (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @10:05AMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: MY EARS by catmistake (Score:2)Friday September 30, @10:04PMWhat this is about. by Doktor Memory (Score:2)Friday September 30, @10:46PMTHATS IT!!! by rolandog (Score:1)Friday September 30, @11:50PMOnline Radios? by DimGeo (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @02:06AMRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by SheeEttin (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @03:58PM Re:A lawyer working for Warner said this: (Score:5, Insightful) by sgant (178166) <ksgantNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Saturday October 01, @11:09AM (#13693284) (http://skewedreview.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday September 21, @01:50PM) This isn't the case and you know it. I don't spew vitriolic hatred for companies...just the RIAA ones.I'm not sure how much you know about the recording industry, but these people do NOT work incredibly hard. What they did was create the "company store" atmosphere that the mining companies did with the miners. The actual artists are pretty much slaves to these companies after they sign their contracts. Do you know how much the average recording artist makes off of a average CD? It's the ARTISTS that work incredibly hard and face the pressures day, day out and they usually end up owing the company money for their CD.Case in point, remember a girl group called TLC? They had a number one hit a few years ago with "Don't Go Chasing Waterfalls". The song was everywhere, won awards, millions of CDs were sold. Care to take a guess on how much money they made for those millions of CD's sold? After paying off the company for recording time, the actual printing and distribution of the CD's etc etc(yes, the artists pay for all this) they were left with 50,000 dollars each that year. In TLC's case, nearly a year after the group sold 10 million copies of "CrazySexyCool," they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Their record company didn't lift a finger and they were on to their next conquest.Also, do I work for free? No. Have I changed jobs to make more money? No, actually the opposite, I moved to a different part of the country and took a substantial cut in pay. I'm actually below the poverty line and yes, I'm barely subsisting...though not in a cave. I still manage to donate my time and what little cash I have left over after bills (bills meaning electricity, heat and food...no car payments, no cable tv, no credit cards) to the community. Yet, I'm very happy.Also, I said I'd rather steal than line the pockets of these guys...but I never said I'd actually do that. I'd rather make my own music...though some would question if it were indeed music.And I don't eat Doritos. Any other assumptions you'd like to make about me? [ Reply to This | ParentRe:A lawyer working for Warner said this: by Directrix1 (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @11:21AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold. Quotable quotes (Score:5, Insightful) by M00NIE (605235) <jdahling.comcast@net> on Friday September 30, @05:17PM (#13688817) Quoted from the article: 'What if Jobs says 39 cents or 29 cents per download - what then?' *gasp* MORE people might actually BUY your music... NO the humanity, the HUGE MANATEE! [ Reply to ThisRe:Quotable quotes by Anonymous Coward (Score:1)Friday September 30, @05:36PMRe:Quotable quotes by vought (Score:2)Friday September 30, @05:53PMRe:Quotable quotes by gregoryc (Score:1)Friday September 30, @09:21PMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:36PMRe:Quotable quotes by tricorn (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @03:25AMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @04:03PMRe:Quotable quotes by tricorn (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @08:57PMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @10:37PMRe:Quotable quotes by tricorn (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @03:11AMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @08:35AMRe:Quotable quotes by tricorn (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @05:45PMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Sunday October 02, @07:39PMRe:Quotable quotes by tricorn (Score:2)Monday October 03, @07:16AMRe:Quotable quotes by Pharmboy (Score:2)Monday October 03, @07:11PMRe:Quotable quotes by Scudsucker (Score:1)Friday September 30, @10:38PMRe:Quotable quotes by gregoryc (Score:1)Friday September 30, @11:55PMRe:Quotable quotes by slash-tard (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @01:09AMRe:Quotable quotes by jabuzz (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @04:36AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Quotable quotes by zxnos (Score:2)Friday September 30, @05:40PM Re:Quotable quotes (Score:5, Informative) by zoobaby (583075) on Friday September 30, @05:44PM (#13689105) The artist get to keep the *most* money from the concerts, not the studios. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Quotable quotes by JordanL (Score:1)Friday September 30, @06:29PMRe:Quotable quotes by mmkkbb (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:42PMRe:Quotable quotes by kesuki (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @03:01AMRe:Quotable quotes by mmkkbb (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @10:50AMRe:Quotable quotes by shmlco (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @01:44PMRe:Quotable quotes by kesuki (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @03:40PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.alternatives by IndependentVik (Score:3)Friday September 30, @06:55PMRe:alternatives by gfody (Score:3)Friday September 30, @07:23PMRe:alternatives by Pharmboy (Score:3)Friday September 30, @09:24PMRe:alternatives by kaitou (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @03:32AMRe:alternatives by Pharmboy (Score:3)Saturday October 01, @10:40PMRe:alternatives by kaitou (Score:1)Sunday October 02, @12:07AMRe:alternatives by JourneymanMereel (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @08:14AMRe:alternatives by aaron_hill2 (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @05:34AMRe:alternatives by Pharmboy (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @10:49PMRe:alternatives by Anonymous Coward (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @12:15PMRe:alternatives by Anonymous Coward (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @03:47PMRe:alternatives by IndependentVik (Score:1)Sunday October 02, @12:55AM Re:Quotable quotes (Score:5, Funny) by Hugh Manatee (919348) on Friday September 30, @06:46PM (#13689680) NO the humanity, the HUGE MANATEE! The name's Hugh. Hugh Manatee [ Reply to This | Parent Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download (Score:5, Informative) by saha (615847) on Friday September 30, @06:56PM (#13689780) First I think Apple earning only 4 cents for every 99 cent download is very reasonable.Considering it is Apple who hosts the iTMS (servers, bandwidth and ...other over head), R&D for the iPod and they came up with an elegant solution for consumers to gain access to music from a wide variety of labels under one roof. The record industry is too anachronistic to have the foresight to create this solutionthemselves and are still obsessed with selling a solid medium (LPs, tapes, CDs), while treating its customers as criminals and artists as expendable commodities that can ignore paying royalties if they can help it A brief look at the practices of the record industry reveals that they are the dishonest lot: Apple earns less than a nickel per iTunes track [appleinsider.com] States settle CD price-fixing case [usatoday.com] RIAA Continues Distributing Dud CDs to Satisfy Settlement [slashdot.org] A music industry case study [nydailynews.com] Shows how little the artist makes thanks to middle men like the record industry Wal-Mart Wants $10 CDs [rollingstone.com]Remember when CDs first came out and people said it was too expensive and the record industry promised that it would go below $10 eventually. Never happenedHow Apple saved the music biz [guardian.co.uk] FTC: Labels charged with price-fixing - again [theregister.com] Music Firms to Look Harder For Artists Owed Royalties [washingtonpost.com]Spitzer announced a settlement in which the nation's five largest recording companies promised to do a better job of tracking down and paying $50 million in unclaimed royalties to thousands of performers. Finally, last night 2005-Sep-29 on Nightly Business Review (NBR) was a four part series on the music industry. It shows how iTMS allowed one relatively unknown electronica artist sell directly to her consumers with the iTMS . Her music was featured on NPR and then people all over the world wanted to download and listen to her music. Stores like iTMS are the great equalizer from years of abuse from the greedy record labels."The Business of Music,"-Part 4: The Down Low On Download Distribution [nbr.com] [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by Mac Degger (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:48PMRe:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by denominateur (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @04:55PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by wahsapa (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @12:13AMRe:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by hnjjz (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @01:26AMRe:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by xtracto (Score:2)Monday October 03, @12:31PMRe:Apple gets 4 cents on every 99 cent download by Paradise Pete (Score:1)Wednesday October 05, @01:57AMGracias by xtracto (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @08:34AMGracias! by xtracto (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @08:38AMRe:Gracias! by Paradise Pete (Score:1)Wednesday October 05, @01:02PMRe:Gracias! by xtracto (Score:2)Wednesday October 05, @03:50PMRe:Gracias! by Paradise Pete (Score:1)Thursday October 06, @09:03AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Ridiculous (Score:5, Insightful) by pen (7191) <slashdot@digdug.cx> on Friday September 30, @05:17PM (#13688818) (http://digdug.cx/) To echo comments in the previous article, asking Apple to share iPod profit is like an electric company asking Maytag to share their profits from selling washing machines. (Or like oil companies asking automobile manufacturers to share their profits.) And so on... [ Reply to This Re:Ridiculous (Score:5, Funny) by DaveFromChicago (915169) on Friday September 30, @05:20PM (#13688860) What? You mean the recording industry doesn't get a cut whenever a CD player or a set of speakers is sold?Clearly the music industry is floundering. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Don't laugh now but ... by canadianlinuxnerd (Score:1)Monday October 10, @12:20AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.But what if... by kweg (Score:3)Friday September 30, @05:23PMRe:But what if... by rollingcalf (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:52PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Ridiculous by soft_guy (Score:3)Friday September 30, @05:25PMRe:Ridiculous by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1)Friday September 30, @09:26PMBiting the hand that feeds it. by RayDude (Score:3)Friday September 30, @05:38PM Re:Biting the hand that feeds it. (Score:5, Insightful) by Midnight Thunder (17205) on Friday September 30, @06:09PM (#13689356) (http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Saturday February 05, @04:50AM) The record labels are biting the hand that feeds them.They bite the vendors, and they screw everyone else, including the artists and the buyers. If this is not monopoly abuse then I don't know what is. I think your average drugs dealers is a bit better than these guys - even they aren't, at least the law knows how deal with drugs dealers. [ Reply to This | Parent Re:Biting the hand that feeds it. (Score:5, Insightful) by ack154 (591432) on Friday September 30, @06:24PM (#13689493) I think your average drugs dealers is a bit better than these guys - even they aren't, at least the law knows how deal with drugs dealers.I think that should be "at least the law WILL deal with drug dealers."So far, no one really seems to care about what the music industry is doing. Because if someone says something to them, they will just scream "PIRACY! PIRACY!" and the government turns the other way... "oh, carry on then." [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by cgenman (Score:3)Friday September 30, @09:33PMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by Skynyrd (Score:3)Friday September 30, @10:06PMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by coolgeek (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @05:46AMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by thogard (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @06:22AMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by Midnight Thunder (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @10:33AMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by anonicon (Score:2)Friday September 30, @07:03PMRe:Biting the hand that feeds it. by Haeleth (Score:3)Friday September 30, @07:17PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Ridiculous by LeonGeeste (Score:1)Friday September 30, @05:41PM Re:Ridiculous (Score:5, Funny) by TCQuad (537187) on Friday September 30, @05:43PM (#13689092) I think you're being a little harsh. Let's allow the market decide if the RIAA deserves some of the proceeds from iPod sales. At the sale of each iPod in the Apple store, ask the customer to donate $1, $10 or $25 directly to the RIAA. Apple will collect the money and (after assessing appropriate handling charges) send them a check. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Ridiculous by Overly Critical Guy (Score:3)Friday September 30, @06:10PMRe:Ridiculous by Steve Cowan (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:16PMRe:Ridiculous by way2trivial (Score:2)Friday September 30, @10:06PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. 4th option (Score:5, Funny) by ifwm (687373) on Friday September 30, @07:22PM (#13690029) (Last Journal: Wednesday September 14, @11:17AM) The finger [ Reply to This | Parent1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Ridiculous by Anonymous Coward (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:09PMRe:Ridiculous by poopdeville (Score:1)Friday September 30, @07:23PMRe:Ridiculous by 91degrees (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @04:51AMRe:Ridiculous by jcr (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:11PMRe:Ridiculous by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1)Friday September 30, @09:32PMRe:Ridiculous by jcr (Score:2)Friday September 30, @10:19PMRe:Ridiculous by Dachannien (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:57PMRe:Ridiculous by mr i want to go home (Score:3)Friday September 30, @05:50PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Or like forcing computer makers bundle windows? by calbanese (Score:2)Friday September 30, @06:07PM Re:Or like forcing computer makers bundle windows? (Score:5, Insightful) by HTH NE1 (675604) on Friday September 30, @06:12PM (#13689376) I know there's a lot of love for Steve Jobs around here, but he's a monopolist at least as far as iPod goes.That's like complaining Gillette has a monopoly on Mach-3 razor blades, except that Apple's razor can also use generic blade cartridges. It just can't be used with the proprietary DRM'd WMA blades of the other razor makers.And further, I don't need to own an iPod to play DRM'd AAC files. They'll play on the iTunes application on the computer too.(I'm not analogizing the razor-and-blades marketing strategy to the iPod and AAC.) [ Reply to This | ParentClose... by Mr2001 (Score:2)Friday September 30, @09:01PMRe:Close... by Scudsucker (Score:1)Friday September 30, @10:32PMRe:Close... by Mr2001 (Score:2)Saturday October 01, @02:31AMRe:Close... by ioErr (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @01:54PMRe:Close... by Mr2001 (Score:1)Saturday October 01, @07:40PMRe:Close... by Scudsucker (Score:1)Sunday October 02, @06:30PM