However, Apple doesn't stand alone in the digital music world. Today, dozens of competitors are foisting an ever-impressive array of portable audio players and online music services at consumers, hoping to wrest control away from the Cupertino-based company. Thus far, none has been successful, but two trends are emerging. First, many of the competitors are Windows-based, meaning they don't run on Macs and they use Microsoft's Windows Media Audio (WMA) technology instead of the Protected AAC format, which Apple alone uses and which limits playback to the iPod. Second, because of the confusing array of choices, consumers are rarely clear whether the portable device they want will work with the online music service they've chosen. This confusion has led, inevitably, to a stratification of the market, with Apple sitting pretty on the top and a slew of imitators clamoring to catch up.

Apple's strategy, then, has been successful: By offering a great experience with both its iPod device and iTunes service, on both Windows and the Mac, the company offers a one-stop shop for digital music fans. So what's the problem? Well, if you're into digital music, there's actually a big problem. It's a problem Apple didn't want its fans to admit even existed. And it goes right to the heart of one of the longest-running debates of this digital age.

It's All About Choice

Most people would agree that Apple's products are excellent, but the truth is that most people aren't buying Apple's products. The reason is simple, and it's the same reason that most people don't buy Mercedes Benz automobiles or Rolex watches. As good as Apple's products are, they're prohibitively expensive for a large portion of the population. In the case of the iPod, you can buy a comparable Dell DJ for a hundred dollars less, and that Dell device offers much better battery life and compatibility with a host of WMA-oriented music stores. Plus, hundreds of lower-price alternatives are on the market, all with a variety of capabilities. The problem is that none of these devices work with Apple's online music store. It's a classic case of lock-in. If you want an iPod, you're stuck with Apple's online music store. If you want to buy music from Apple's online music store, you have to buy an iPod.

This lock-in is a key part of Apple's strategy. It's also decidedly antichoice, which is what rankles me. Looking at Apple's financials, you can see pretty clearly that the company makes little or no money on its online music store, but the company is raking it in with the iPod. Why not open up the iPod so that users can purchase songs from other stores? That would benefit consumers, and it would arguably rejuvenate the music industry, since various online stores would be able to attract iPod owners. And it certainly wouldn't hurt Apple.

Apple, so far, has said that it wants no part of that plan, and it's a curious decision for a company that has touted its pro-consumer roots. Fortunately for consumers, however, another company has called Apple's bluff.

RealNetworks Fires the Shot Heard 'Round the Internet

Last week, streaming media giant RealNetworks announced that it's tired of waiting on Apple to open up its iPod. So the company released a beta version of its upcoming RealPlayer 10.5 media player for Windows, which includes something called Harmony Technology. This technology lets consumers use RealPlayer to interact with virtually any portable audio player on the market, including Apple's iPod and the WMA-based Dell DJ. That's interesting enough, but Real has taken another dramatic step: Like its predecessor, RealPlayer 10.5 can connect customers to the RealPlayer Music Store, which offers songs in an Advanced Audio Codec (AAC)-based format that's protected by Real's proprietary digital rights management (DRM) scheme. However, using Harmony Technology, RealPlayer 10.5 can also convert these purchased songs into Apple's Protected AAC format, for use on an iPod, and into DRM-encoded WMA songs, for use on the slew of available WMA-compatible devices, including the Dell DJ.

Suddenly, consumers have a new choice, and this is very good news, particularly because Real's online music store offers music in a much higher quality format that what Apple offers (192Kbps AAC vs. 128Kbps Protected AAC). For audiophiles, Real's store is now a much more compelling option, and it will arguably drive iPod sales as well. But Apple responded to the Real announcement with a petulant little statement in which it accused Real of "hacking" the iPod and potentially violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which has provisions against circumventing protection schemes. Also, Apple icily suggested that a future iPod software update would break Real's work. Real pragmatically issued a statement of its own, effectively staring down Apple: The DMCA, Real said, doesn't apply because Real isn't breaking Apple's DRM format—it's supporting it. And Real pledged to keep updating its software to fix any problems Apple caused. Open up the iPod, Real said, and support your customers.

The reaction online was immediate and loud, and is persisting to this day. Apple fanatics, naturally, backed Apple and decried Real's tactics. But a quieter group of people, including myself, sees things a bit differently. And not only do I support Real's actions, I'm calling on Apple to do what Real asks: Open up the iPod for the good of all music lovers. Lock-in, ultimately, benefits only companies, not consumers.

What Can You Do

Religious fervor aside, the Real/Apple tussle opens up interesting new possibilities. To see how Real's service works, I downloaded a copy of the RealPlayer 10.5 beta and began purchasing songs. Then, I transported them to both a new 20GB fourth-generation iPod (the new Scroll Wheel model) and a 20GB Dell DJ. My goal was to see whether the technology worked as promised, and whether the sound quality was any good.

First, the technology works. It works well. When you transfer purchased music from RealPlayer 10.5 to the iPod, it basically strips the 192Kbps AAC file of Real's DRM and applies Apple's Fairplay-based DRM to the song, effectively giving you a 192Kbps Protected AAC file that, to the iPod, works identically to an Apple-supplied song. On the Dell DJ, Real transcodes the song to WMA format and applies Microsoft's DRM protection to the file. In both cases, the songs remain protected, in the sense that you can't just copy them off a device and hand them to a friend, because they won't play on other people's PCs or devices. Therefore, Real is respecting the rights of both the consumer who purchased the music and the artist who originally made the music. Excellent.

Best of all, sound quality is fantastic. As expected, Real's 192Kbps songs sound much better than the 128Kbps songs that Apple offers. As for the Dell DJ, on which the music is essentially converted from one compressed format to another, the sound quality is still excellent, thanks to the high quality of the source material. I've had problems transcoding lower-quality songs, but all the music I've purchased from the RealPlayer Music Store has translated wonderfully.

But what if Apple somehow manages to prevent Real's purchased songs from working on your iPod? Well, you can consider a couple of solutions. First, you can also burn your purchased music to CD, then rip it back to the computer in an unprotected format—a task I frankly recommend anyway, if only for backup purposes. Again, Real's higher-quality encoding will pay off for you with higher-quality unprotected recordings. My advice, here, however, is to experiment. If you burn an audio CD from AAC songs, then rip that CD in a different format, say WMA, you're going to lose information, and the resulting songs won't sound as good. I haven't extensively tested this yet, but you'll have better results ripping those CDs to AAC, and not to WMA or MP3.

Second, you can look for an application that will let you convert a Protected AAC song to unprotected AAC, bypassing the time-consuming burn/rip steps outlined above. Here, you enter a bit of a gray area. Although I've always felt that consumers are legally protected by fair-use laws and are entitled to make personal backups of content they've purchased, there are few legitimate ways to do this right now with Harmony-created Protected AAC songs. (However, some tools, such as Hymn, let you strip DRM from songs purchased from the iTunes Music Store.) That might change if Real's technology becomes more popular.

Either way, I believe that iPod owners can safely explore Real's store now and see whether the higher-quality songs it offers are worthwhile to make the switch. For other computers users, however, the good news is more general: If Real's tactic is successful, the digital music market might soon benefit from the same choice-based situation that makes the PC market so dominant today. Regardless of your technology bent, choice is good.

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So Real's Harmony is all about Consumer Choice? Bull... Correct me if I'm wrong, but neither Real's Harmony, nor Protected WMA files, nor the new Sony ATRAC files, will play on a Mac. Yeah, it's all about consumer choice, Paul. These companies are scared _ _ _ _ less because this time around Apple came out with a better product that people are actually buying. Give me a break, Paul... David Lawless -August 3, 2004 This article shows the bias so obviously. It's only lacking in options for the consumer if Apple created the product, but nothing ever said about Microsoft having done this for so many years. What a wanker!!!!! Sal -August 3, 2004 The question still remains .. why would I want to buy songs from Real (apart from the increased bitrate) ? There would be a much smaller collection, less alternative music, no community features, no access to video/music trailers and generally a less polished feel. Real should die like the dog it is. It has NEVER in its history shown that it cares about ordinary computer users as RealPlayer is a spyware ladden, bug ridden pile of crap. Why should we believe them now ? Naden -August 3, 2004 "But what if Apple somehow manages to prevent Real's purchased songs from working on your iPod? Well, you can consider a couple of solutions." ... Then what's the problem in the first place? You are suggesting two (illegal) alternatives to preserve Real to iPod compatibility... Why bother with Harmony when you can burn a disc and rerip or use an illegal app to strip DRM from any DRMed solution? " In the case of the iPod, you can buy a comparable Dell DJ for a hundred dollars less, and that Dell device offers much better battery life and compatibility with a host of WMA-oriented music stores." And yet it is woefully less well received in the marketplace. Woefully. And it is equally woefully received by critics. Why are you such a fan? And I guess if it has all these "benefits", consumers just don't give a damn about store choice. DumbAss -August 3, 2004 I'm guessing the ad I'm seeing for Napster on the right hand side has NOTHING to do with his position on iTMS versus WMA based stores (like Napster). Naden -August 3, 2004 I think that apple is still gun shy when it comes to other people stealing their products. At one time, Steve Jobs let a young software company called Microsoft take a look at it's Macintosh operating system. More importantly, however, I think that if Apple opens up the ipod, it allows other vendors to sell what Apple feels is an inferior product that they have no control of. If I go to the Wal Mart's store, download their music and because of Wal Mart's inability to seamlessly integrate with my brand new $400 ipod, the music doesn't work, whose responsibility is that? Wal-Mart is just selling music, they don't care if the the Ipod doesn't play back their music properly. Now Apple is inundated with thousands of complaints that they can't solve because they don't have any control over how the Wal-Mart software works. "Oh, and why doesn't my WMA song sound as good as my MP4?" In the end, sound quality is a subjective attribute, but from a sales point of view, how do you keep customers happy when there are potentially 4 to 6 different compression codecs out there to choose from. I don't think it's an emotional decision by Apple as much as a sound business (sorry) decision. If you have a product, you make it the best you can make it, have control over its experience and be able to take responsibility for the product when the consumer complains. By opening the doors to others who don't have your best interests in mind, you diminish your ability to put forward the best product. pmd -August 4, 2004 Apple is not limiting choice in any way. It did not get exclusive distribution rights to the music. It did not patent the concept of digital playback devices. Every other manufacturer is free to compete with Apple on equal terms. It is just that after everybody else has failed so miserably, now their only option is to hack their way in to what Apple has built. So Microsoft. So loosers. JoseZ -August 4, 2004 I can't believe all you people (100+ million of you) who bought into DRM infected music for the absurd price of $1 each. That's the joke. Ricky B -August 4, 2004 The point I haven't seen brought up in the many discussions about this topic is that Real has now created a potential support nightmare for Apple. At some point, Apple may update FairPlay for reasons (update encryption, add new info to the wrapper, and so on) that aren't directly meant to screw Harmony users, but will do so anyways. Now you have a bunch of people whose current or future Real purchases won't work on the iPod. Guess who is going to get some, if not the bulk, of the support calls on this. I agree with others in that Apple is just waiting for the right partner to license FairPlay to, and Real isn't it. The other thing that strikes me is that I haven't heard an uprising from iPod owners demanding that they be offered choice. There are ways to get music onto the iPod that don't involve iTMS. At this point, iPod owners are voting with their dollars, and are doing just fine. This is creating a choice issue where none exists; if this was so important to iPod owners, they wouldn't buy the device. John F. Braun -August 4, 2004 So, would everyone applaud Sony if they had made the Discman work only with CDs purchased directly from Sony? Then Sony could control the quality, right? Nope. I purchased a Sony discman a long time ago and have yet to purchase a CD from a Sony store. Why does Apple care where you purchase the music? If it sounds bad, go back to where you got the song? If a CD sounds bad in my Discman, I don't go crying to Sony - I get the CD replaced from where I purchased it. I refuse to purchase an iPod that limits me to shopping only the Apple store. Incidentally, if companies are going to spend the big bucks to engineer something, get it out the door working with 90% or more of the market. Make it work with Windows. Later, roll it out to the 3% or less that use Mac. If you choose to use a Mac, know that you are in the minority and that you lose choice that way. I don't necessarily like the way Microsoft does business, but Apple is too stuck on itself for me. bats -August 4, 2004 I find it interesting at how bitter most Apple zealots really are. I have used both the Real Media Store and the iTunes store. They are both fine, but like Paul says, Apple is heading down the path of Sony with Beta Max...anybody remember that? Of course not, because it died a slow, quiet death because even though it was a superior quality technology, they wouldn't share it with other vendors, so the only format left was VHS... Apple has continuously tried to create a stovepiped vertical model with all their products and it has created SUCH a great market segment for themselves...they have a really impressive 2% or so... It's funny that all the apple-o-philes are jumping up and down, pulling their hair out, and turning bright purple over Paul's OBVIOUS bias. But, what would you call their opinion? Fair and balanced? Yeah, right, just like FOX news... If you had all read the article through non-apple colored glasses, what you would see it that Paul is suggesting that Apple try and increase their market share on the iPod (which they make money on) by making it possible to download music from sites other than theirs (which they DON'T make money on). But, why should Apple start using goof fiscal sense in making business decisions now, bad decisions have worked well for them in the past. SteveM -August 4, 2004 I see you are getting your just response: You lead off with a couple of complements and then blast Apple because they are making Microsoft look sick. I love my iPod and would never consider replacing it with something that locks me into a Microsoft proprietary format. ACC also gives me flexibility within the legal copyright world so I don't need to worry about being accused of ripping off the artists I love. If you want to be a reporter, report what is happening, not what your real masters tell you to print. John John -August 4, 2004 I use XP and Panther in equal amounts, managing my music solely on Panther. Real's definition of consumer choice thumbs it nose at Mac users. I have no interest in endorsing or supporting a vendor like Real who is only interested in supporting Windows users. Why should a Windows iPod owner have more choice than a Mac iPod owner? I'm sure that Apple will eventually license iPod vendor support, but on their own basis. It's Apple's control and seamless integration of iPod and software that makes all the difference. Brian Richardson -August 4, 2004 Check out Convergence Kills which is getting respectable chatter. I found it via slashdot, but if this guy is right everyone is barking up the wrong tree with the iPod. Apple is playing a very different game: http://www.drunkenblog.com/drunkenblog-archives/000313.html J Yelden -August 4, 2004 You ipod lovers are a strange breed, you have no concept of anything outside your little world. Yes, its very well designed, yes its cool, yes it holds a lot of songs, yes its easy to buy songs. But this is about codecs kids, and a hardware product that supports them (do you even know what a codec is? Most mp3 player purchasers don’t today). Ipods support a very limited amount of codecs, why would I as a consumer want to be locked into this limit? Because its easy? What if I want to hear that song (which I paid for) on another portable device? Think of it this way, you have the coolest designed car in the world, but you can only drive on limited amount of certain highways, would you still want buy it? RobS -August 4, 2004 Yikes, looks like that passion is out. I admit to being a Windows guy for many years who has always appreciated the relative strengths and weaknesses of Wintel and Mac. Without doubt, Apple makes some of the best products around and their styling and implementation is always top notch (except for the old PPC 7100 machines whose cases were awful, although I heard IBM designed them for Apple). Anyway, I just ordered a 40GB 4G iPod (my first) simply because it is a beautiful piece of equipment. Was it expensive, yes. Is it worth it, probably. However, I have 40+ GB of LEGAL .wma files that I have ripped from my CD collection (which took months) and I now have a quandry. Convert them to MP3/AAC so my iPod will play them OR rerip. I picked .wma because the sound quality at a given bit rate always sounded better than mp3 (I never compared against aac which is a bit newer). What's the point? Would I love the iPod to support other formats, YES. Even if Apple allowed the iPod to support .wma without supporting DRM from MS or others, the product would be more flexible and appeal to a wider audience, driving up sales (although admittedly maybe not a lot). Perhaps a next step after this is to encourage the sort of thing that Real is doing with Harmony (I admit to despising everything Real related) and encourage song download companies to offer conversion from MS DRM or other solutions to Fairplay AAC. That way the end result is more people using Fairplay and the onus to make things work falls on the song seller. My ideal is a machine that supports Fairplay DRM (with Apple supporting stores in converting to it) and more flexibility in playing non-DRM protected files, at least AAC, MP3 and WMA. Torn -August 4, 2004 Listen to the whining from the Apple camp! As much as Apple has innovated, the lock-in and high price has kept me in the MS and Linux camps for a long time. We Windoze and Linux users are less vocal than the Apple zealots, or maybe just spending most of our compute-time doing useful things. If Apple's stuff is that ding-dong superior, they should not fear a level playing field. And cries of imitators stealing their stuff, yup - this has happened. Both ways, though. Hey, did Jobs invent the electron? PS - this will disqualify me as being a rational human being with the Apple fanatics, but hey, guess what? I actually *prefer* Windows' interface to the Mac's... Datz All, Ronan RonanHyde -August 4, 2004 "what you would see it that Paul is suggesting that Apple try and increase their market share on the iPod (which they make money on)" Which is already the highest in the industry... of which demand already outpaces supply... "by making it possible to download music from sites other than theirs" Rio and iRiver and others can download from many other sites... It doesn't help their marketshare. Horizontal markets don't always win... Sometimes vertical markets are preferable "(which they DON'T make money on)." They have actually made small profits for 2 quarters straight. I suspect it's growing, but they are trying to keep quiet about that. "But, why should Apple start using goof fiscal sense in making business decisions now, bad decisions have worked well for them in the past." What's analogous about it? DRM could be licensed at any moment. We are not talking about an OS and a large OEM industry... We aren't even talking about a format... We are simply talking about DRM for an industry that Apple dominates even though it is at the infancy of its development. DumbAss -August 4, 2004 The one thing that always makes me laugh about these types of articles is the "experts" that write them always say the same thing - "If Apple doesn't do things the way I suggest, then they will die on the vine and be out of business". Why I find it funny is that this is the same line I have heard for the last 20 years - Apple is going out of business. Well - it is obvious that you "experts" have been totally and completely wrong. Apple has had its ups and downs, like all companies do, but they are STILL in business, STILL innovators, and STILL setting the tone (in many ways) for the computing/technology world. While I am far from a "zealot", I bought an iPod for one reaseon; it is the best player on the market, BAR NONE! As far as iTunes is concerned - I have a 40 gig iPod that is 87% filled. Of that 87% I have TWO songs that I have purchased from iTunes. The others are my music that I have ripped. what you "experts" fail to realize is that MOST people fill their iPods with music they already have - be they MP3 or AAC. The sad thing is that some people who read this rubbish are so easily duped by these "experts" opinions, even though those opinions are so obviously biased. But, hey, they are probably the same people that bought "Farenheit 9/11" hook, line, and sinker. Chris -August 4, 2004 to chris... really good point! Apple is here to stay! to add to that...the only ones I ever hear complaing about Apples 4% amrket share are the writers. I haven't heard Apple complain they only have 4% just like I don't hear Jaguar complaing they only have a 4% market share of the worlds automobiles. I like my Jaguar...cause it's a Panther :) Jimmy -August 4, 2004 You know, Paul and the other Apple Bashers, would have a good point if online music stores and FairPlay DRM protected AAC's were the only music you could use on an iPod, but that's just not the case at all. As Paul indicates, it's good to have your music backed up. He even says you can burn them to CD. Well, if that's what he is recommending, why not save a step and just buy all of your music on CDs in the first place. Then you have a built in backup and can transfer those songs to your iPod (or other music device) in the format that you prefer. The iPod's accepts files in AAC, AIF, Apple Lossless, MP3, Audible or WAV. I guess there are 3 format's it doesn't handle: WMA, ATRAC and the Unix/Linux standard with the funny name. Does any other player on the market give you that many choices? It's still all about the success of the iTunes Music Store and others trying to make money competing with Apple. Not any different than with any other industry... David Lawless -August 4, 2004 Well, being an apple biased user I did not find this article that biased, although I disagree totally in the positive evaluation of the dellPod (sux). I own an iPod - and I am very pleased with it - but I surely wouldn't mind being able to buy my music elsewhere. Well - there is (or was) always eMusic who has/had unprotected files that works just fine. Like the poster using the CD comparison, I certainly wouldn't tolerate that CDs I buy didn't work just because I own the wrong brand CD player (although it seems we are heading that way with dts Audio, DVD audio and SACD) Whatever format - enjoy the music - and support your favourite artists! Bugbear -August 4, 2004 Check out Convergence Kills which has a lot of respectable chatter going its way. I found it at Slashdot.org and MacDevCenter but sure it is other places by now. If this guy is right we are all barking up the wrong tree in wanting Apple to open the iPod, they are playing a different game: http://www.drunkenblog.com/drunkenblog-archives/000313.html Jay Yelden -August 4, 2004 I will NOT buy any device that does not support WMA. Mike -August 5, 2004 Not being an owner of an iPod or any other digital music device (except a USB/MP3 player), I can see both points of view put across in the posts. I beleive, if iTunes provides the same, if not better, service than all the other distributers, then what's the problem with iPod only interfacing with iTunes? Issues only arise if, as an iPod owner, 1) the iTunes store provides a deminished availablity of songs 2) songs are more expensive The above points being equal, I'm going to go with the product that's going to work 100% of the time, without any compatability issues, and at this point in time, it looks like that's iPod/iTunes. IMHO Darren Darren -August 5, 2004 Liquid.com was pioneering legal digital music downloading to the PC and the Mac with *.lqt (AAC) 2 years before Apple decided to take a crap-shot. Need proof visit http://www.liquidaudio.com/support/player/index.asp. Note: Liquid threw in the towel on it's own DRM'ed AAC format and Liquid Audio Player on 6/30/03, 3 months before Apple's. Once upon a time Liquid.com provided either WMA DRM's files and LQT AAC files, but now just sales WMA files... They came to the conclusion that while AAC files could be hacked WMA files couldn't... when I e-mail them about it. If you want to see what I mean, they still have their players on their FTP server @ ftp://ftp.liquid.com/pub. Craig -August 6, 2004 Hmmmm... now lets have Apple reverse engineer the Real streaming music/video formats to play on QuickTime. Let's see who threatens with a lawsuit. ;-) James -August 6, 2004 And why in the world would Apple do that? And give up on their open-standards...I THINK DIFFERENTLY... Craig -August 7, 2004 I am impressed with Apple's products but, their business model is weak. Sticking with Microsoft and WMA... Nunhgrader -August 18, 2004 I am impressed with Apple's products but, their business model is weak. Sticking with Microsoft and WMA... Nunhgrader -August 18, 2004 I am impressed with Apple's products but, their business model is weak. Sticking with Microsoft and WMA... As You Can See...blue screens are pretty... Nunhgrader -August 18, 2004 "Meanwhile, iTunes has also seen some high-profile successes, but the service continues to be a financial deadweight. Although Apple has sold 100 million songs through iTunes and now boasts a catalog of more than 1 million titles, iTunes either loses money or merely breaks even, depending on who you talk to." I get it, if you are selling a product that's making little money. You should let another company sell that product and take your sales. Which would mean a part of your business will continue to be dead weight. Here is some free advice Paul stick with web publishing and don't run any companies. Name -August 18, 2004 Being locked in to one format is just plain short-sighted. It's only a matter of time before a musician desides to sign an exclusive pact with a specific site. If it's not iTunes, iPod users will feel slighted. Yeah, I know you could always go out and buy the CD, but why should you have to? FeralBoy -August 18, 2004 Real supporting the "Windows only" crowd has nothing to do with being open, but is as proprietary in the same sense as Apple locking you into iTMS and the iPod. The only difference is Apple at least acknowledges that there is more than one computer platform out there and supports a cross-platform business model. Real on the other hand supports a single computer platform with their online music store, which does not fall under the banner of "Freedom of Choice", but rather falls under the banner of "Hypocrisy"! JuggerNaut -August 22, 2004 Your Comments (required): nathand -October 22, 2004 Your Comments (required): nathand -October 22, 2004 If I buy it, is mine to use however I choose. The iPod is great, no doubt. As a consumer I don't want any DRM on anything. MP3 for me, forever, anyway, anywhere. Its not Apple nor MS, nor Sony. It's just my music. Pay per song is the way it should have always been. I think it goes a long way to stop illegal downloading. $16+ for a cd to get 1-3 songs was a waste. I get nice e-stores to get good quality music without having to slum around the P2P networks. Support the artist. ItsMyMusic -October 28, 2004 AHHHHASUHFSJKDNBJKG Clarisa -December 3, 2004 Your Comments (required): nilanka -November 6, 2007 HOW TO MAKE HARMONY Name (required): -November 6, 2007 how to make harmony NILANKA -November 6, 2007 READER COMMENTS: We want to hear what you have to say about this article!     Acceptable Use Policy Your Comments (required): Your email is only used if our editors need to contact you. It is not used or stored for any other purpose, nor posted with your comments. Enter the text from the image below Please refresh the page if you have trouble reading this text.