[Spliff]

I'm surprised (and a bit concerned) that the AAC format isn't being included in any of these new iPod competitors. AAC is more of a standard than WMA, yet these manufacturers are more than willing to kiss Microsoft's ass and support WMA.

With iTunes on so many PCs now, why isn't AAC (non-DRM) more widely supported? Is there anything Apple can do to encourage them to add AAC support to their devices?

[Demonhood]

Apple hasn't licensed AAC so that other companies can include it in their players. that's why.
Real begged them a couple months back.

[Ghoser777]

Wouldn't that be that fairplay hasn't been licenesed, not AAC? I might be wrong on that though...

[FulcrumPilot]

Apple is up the creek with a paddle and there are aligators chasing!

[Spliff]

Originally posted by Demonhood:
Apple hasn't licensed AAC so that other companies can include it in their players. that's why.
Real begged them a couple months back.

Wait, I thought AAC is an open standard developed by Dolby, etc., and used for audio on DVDs. It's Apple's DRM scheme ("Fairplay") that hasn't been licensed. iTunes encodes by default to AAC, so you think AAC would be added to these various devices. They won't be able to play AAC files from the iTunes music store, but they would have no problems playing AAC files created in iTunes.

If that's the case, then what is stopping the other mp3-player makers from adding AAC support? Is it platform bias?

[Truepop]

can other companies make plugins for itunes to allow their devices to work?

because some use itunes with mp3 and drm-free aac files

[hayesk]

Spliff is right. Apple holds the exclusive rights to Fairplay, the DRM in AAC, not AAC itself.

But, Apple pays a license to encode to Dolby, if I'm not mistaken. Companies don't want to pay Dolby to play AAC for their ripping software when it will really only benefit the few Mac users who buy an MP3 player that isn't an iPod (i.e. not that many).

Although for something like a Palm Pilot or cell phone that only plays and doesn't include ripping software, they could use AAC.

[Demonhood]

oops, yes, fairplay, that's what i meant all along.

[Superchicken]

It's stupid AAC is better than WMA, and iTunes is kicking butt in the music software business. Essentially companies don't want to support AAC because Apple does it, and the main player that uses AAC is iTunes which is kinda a walking add for the music store and thus the iPod.

Sadly they don't realize that lots of people plain like iTunes and would love to use it with their MP3 player of choice.

[willed]

Time for Apple to open up.

[Link]

Nobody does, because apple won't let them!

I do get irritated no other music stores support OS X though

[Randman]

Who cares? Don't need other inferior digital music players. Don't need other inferior digital music stores.

Now, if only we could get aac at a higher rate from the iTMS, I'd be quite happy.

[Xeo]

If Apple shared fairplay with the world, there wouldn't be incentive to buy iPods. Apple doesn't care about the iTMS unless it sells them iPods.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Demonhood:
Apple hasn't licensed AAC so that other companies can include it in their players. that's why.
Real begged them a couple months back.

Not quite true.

AAC is an "open" standard. I quote it because there are still patent and royalty issues involved, but the same is true of MP3, WMA, and most other codecs out there (Ogg being the only exception of which I'm aware). So as far as that goes, there's nothing in the way of AAC that isn't also in the way of WMA.

What's actually closed is Fairplay, the DRM used by Apple. This is, in large part, due to Steve Jobs' shortsightedness. It killed the Mac's chances of getting high marketshare back in 1984, and it will kill iTunes if allowed to continue.

There was a short time back in The Beginning when Macs actually had the majority marketshare over the IBM PC (and, later, its clones). Steve squandered that advantage when he refused to open the platform. He will squander it again with FairPlay.

[Ghoser777]

My bet is, if marketshare starts to drop, they open it up. They're milking it for all its worth right now.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by Randman:
Who cares? Don't need other inferior digital music players.

Depends on your definition of inferior. There is currently no way to buy a device that can both play AAC files and record music, due to Apple's stupidity on both fronts.

iPod/iTunes may be a big cash cow now, but they're going to go down the drain eventually. Apple's refusal to license the FairPlay format has left AAC as being perceived as an Apple-only thing, whereas WMA looks more "standard" to people since you can use a variety of players with it. Rest assured, AAC will go the way that so many other proprietary Apple technologies have gone (even though AAC itself is not proprietary), and will eventually die out, being replaced with WMA. The iPod and iTMS will eventually be using WMA files and paying Microsoft royalties.

[Spliff]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Rest assured, AAC will go the way that so many other proprietary Apple technologies have gone (even though AAC itself is not proprietary), and will eventually die out, being replaced with WMA. The iPod and iTMS will eventually be using WMA files and paying Microsoft royalties.

That's my fear. You can see it already since no other players support non-DRM AAC files. They support MP3, WAV, AIFF, and even Ogg, but not AAC.

[Peter]

Originally posted by willed:
Time for Apple to open up.

agreed

[turtle777]

Which of the # 2465842157™®© iPod killers are you talking about ?

-t

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Ghoser777:
My bet is, if marketshare starts to drop, they open it up. They're milking it for all its worth right now.

They didn't before, and they won't do it this time either. Steve Jobs is an insane fool like that. He's got the devil's own luck, but he never manages to learn from his mistakes when that luck runs out.

[Superchicken]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Depends on your definition of inferior. There is currently no way to buy a device that can both play AAC files and record music, due to Apple's stupidity on both fronts.

You know... you're like a bloody broken record...

How the heck often do you walk by an audio source and say hey I need to record that!? Any situation that you'd need to do this in aside from voice memos you should be able to plan to bring an iBook or PowerBook. Or a freaking recording device.

Audio Player does NOT = Audio Recorder.

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

Originally posted by Superchicken:
It's stupid AAC is better than WMA, and iTunes is kicking butt in the music software business. Essentially companies don't want to support AAC because Apple does it, and the main player that uses AAC is iTunes which is kinda a walking add for the music store and thus the iPod.

Why is it better?

Oh and both AAC and WMA have both gone up 5% in the past year in popularity.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by Superchicken:
You know... you're like a bloody broken record...

Yeah, it's not like every other thread in here is about various iPod competitors these days. Not at all.

How the heck often do you walk by an audio source and say hey I need to record that!?

Quite often, since I'm a MUSIC STUDENT.

Any situation that you'd need to do this in aside from voice memos you should be able to plan to bring an iBook or PowerBook.

Laptops:

1. are huge.

2. give off a lot of light.

3. are disruptive in a concert setting.

4. are sometimes noisy, if the fan decides to turn on.

5. are way more expensive than any of the devices we're talking about.

6. are really not a serious candidate!

Or a freaking recording device.

Audio Player does NOT = Audio Recorder.

1. That's my point - many of the iPod killers that these numerous threads are about have audio recording of some kind built in. People keep saying "oh, these are inferior," "why would anyone want these," etc. Well, here's your answer. Complacency is a wonderful thing as long as it's your opponent who has it. It can cause someone who should have easily won to lose everything. It irritates me to no end to see Apple about to squander its lead again. If you go say "well, just go buy that instead," and then everyone does, well, there goes your lead.

2. The iPod is an audio recorder which has been intentionally crippled so as to have pathetic audio quality. Its hardware is fully capable of recording high-quality audio, and the Linux on iPod people were able to get CD-quality recording working with the 3rd generation iPod, with Linux. That's why this is so frustrating - everything is there, except that Apple is hobbling it for some mysterious reason.

3. Due to Apple's stubbornness, if I get a device that can record audio, I have to deal with crappy formats for music playback. It's impossible to get something that can record and also play audio from the iTMS, which is frustrating.

Audio recording is a basic feature which could be added to the iPod with a minimum of effort (even just removing the software block would work, since some third party like Griffin would step in to provide a mic port). The lack of this feature is a huge flaw in a device that costs $300+. If Apple doesn't realize this, they're going to lose market share once the iPod's ooh and ah factor wears off (as it eventually will, just like the iMac did).

Furthermore, I don't see why you guys keep lambasting the iPod's competition - many of them are better, feature-wise, than the iPod. They can record, they have FM/AM tuners, most have longer battery lives, some have larger hard drives. Yeah, they're not as good looking, but that only matters so much when you're talking about a device that sits in your pocket most of the time where you can't see it! The things that suck about the non-Apple music players is that they don't support FireWire or AAC, and the latter isn't their fault since Apple won't let them. The former is due to another huge mistake Apple made with the original iMac which was very similar to the mistakes they're making now, but that's an argument for another thread.

[Mastrap]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Yeah, they're not as good looking, but that only matters so much when you're talking about a device that sits in your pocket most of the time where you can't see it! The things that suck about the non-Apple music players is that they don't support FireWire or AAC, and the latter isn't their fault since Apple won't let them.

1. The iPod's interface (patented scroll-wheel) is one of the reasons it is so successful.
2. As stated numerous times in this thread, AAC is an open format. Apple is certainly not stopping anybody from using it.
3. I too would like to see high end recording abilities in the iPod. As a sound recorder for videos creation the iPod could rock.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Yeah, it's not like every other thread in here is about various iPod competitors these days. Not at all.
Audio recording is a basic feature which could be added to the iPod with a minimum of effort (even just removing the software block would work, since some third party like Griffin would step in to provide a mic port). The lack of this feature is a huge flaw in a device that costs $300+. If Apple doesn't realize this, they're going to lose market share once the iPod's ooh and ah factor wears off (as it eventually will, just like the iMac did).

I agree with just about everything in your post (including the part about being a music student), but I have to ask, here:

If Apple is indeed INTENTIONALLY crippling the iPod's capabilities by blocking recording ability, how the hell do you figure that they don't realize exactly what they're doing?

Or, asked in a different way: What exactly do you think would happen with the label contracts on iTMS if Apple were to introduce a mobile recording unit?

I don't know that that's the hang-up, of course, but if it is, we won't be seeing audio-in on the iPod for a LONG time.

-s*

[TETENAL]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Laptops [...] give off a lot of light.

http://www.adpartnership.net/DarkAdapted/index.html

[Spliffdaddy]

Originally posted by Superchicken:
You know... you're like a bloody broken record...

How the heck often do you walk by an audio source and say hey I need to record that!? Any situation that you'd need to do this in aside from voice memos you should be able to plan to bring an iBook or PowerBook. Or a freaking recording device.

Audio Player does NOT = Audio Recorder.

pair of concert tickets - $550

Sneak Sony MiniDisc player into concert

Clip stereo microphone into girlfriend's hair - tell her to keep quiet.

I've done that dozens of times.

And, even today, there is nothing that replaces a 5 year old MiniDisc player for portable digital recording.

[Angus_D]

I don't think there's any demand for AAC support on the Windows platform. The only people who use AAC are Mac users, because iTunes supports it and claims it's "better".

It's the same reason there's no Vorbis on the iPod.

[Drakino]

I wrote a lengthy reason to Rio why they need to add AAC support a few months back, and they did hand it up the tree to the people who make the licensing decisions.

My primary point in it was that iTunes is getting popular (not the store, the program), and HP ships it on every consumer computer they make now. Default encoder for iTunes 4 is AAC, thus owners of an HP system, or people who downloaded iTunes may have all their CDs in AAC format. The general populous doesn't care about what format exists, as long as it works. I pointed out it would cost Rio money from support calls coming in from customers unable to load their music onto their player, so the licensing fee for AAC might be worth paying.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by Mastrap:
2. As stated numerous times in this thread, AAC is an open format. Apple is certainly not stopping anybody from using it.

That is a technicality. The FairPlay DRMed version of AAC, the only version of AAC currently in wide use, is not an open format. There's no way anyone is going to build AAC support into a device if 99% of the AAC files the device ever encounters will be unplayable anyway. And as long as nothing supports AAC, people will continue not ever using it for anything else other than downloading from the iTMS. It's a vicious cycle that is going to lead to WMA being the "standard" and people thinking the A in AAC stands for "Apple."

Originally posted by Spheric Harlot:
If Apple is indeed INTENTIONALLY crippling the iPod's capabilities by blocking recording ability, how the hell do you figure that they don't realize exactly what they're doing?

I'm sure they do. There has been speculation that this is some idiotic "protection" scheme for some time. This would be ridiculous, though, since tons of other players already have support for recording, and since any DRM can always be worked around simply by burning a CD and re-ripping it anyway, or by running an audio cable from the line-out on the iPod to the line-in on the Mac/PC, and that's just as easy as going the other way. Or you could run something like WireTap while playing the sound file in iTunes... I just don't see how lacking a recording feature makes it any harder to circumvent DRM as it is without it. More likely, I see this as Apple being worried about people taping concerts. And in that case, they should just get over it. People had the same worries about the VCR, and it didn't kill the video industry. Cassette and MiniDisc haven't killed the music industry, either. The benefits outweigh the risk of piracy, IMO.

[ambush]

I saw an iPod Mini today... quite possibly the sexiest gadget ever made

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally posted by Angus_D:
I don't think there's any demand for AAC support on the Windows platform. The only people who use AAC are Mac users, because iTunes supports it and claims it's "better".

It's the same reason there's no Vorbis on the iPod.

*ahem*

iTunes is available for Windows, and the iTunes Music Store's 70% market share is not likely to be ALL from Mac users.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
This would be ridiculous, though, since tons of other players already have support for recording, and since any DRM can always be worked around simply by burning a CD and re-ripping it anyway, or by running an audio cable from the line-out on the iPod to the line-in on the Mac/PC, and that's just as easy as going the other way. Or you could run something like WireTap while playing the sound file in iTunes... I just don't see how lacking a recording feature makes it any harder to circumvent DRM as it is without it. More likely, I see this as Apple being worried about people taping concerts. And in that case, they should just get over it. People had the same worries about the VCR, and it didn't kill the video industry. Cassette and MiniDisc haven't killed the music industry, either. The benefits outweigh the risk of piracy, IMO.

Recordable CD and mp3, however, in contrast to cassette and MiniDisc, very nearly HAS killed the music industry - at least in its previous form.

Regardless, I think you missed the relevant point of my post:

None of those other recording-enabled competitors are manufactured by a company that also operates a large music distribution business - except Sony. Notice something about the Sony recorder? That's right: You can't transfer your recordings to a computer.

I wonder why.

Do you not think that part of the label deals with the iTMS is the clear-cut promise never to add direct recording capabilities to the iPod? Knowing the record companies, this is quite likely.

If so, Apple CAN'T add an audio line-in.

-s*

[TETENAL]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
The FairPlay DRMed version of AAC, the only version of AAC currently in wide use, is not an open format.

The Fairplay AAC is used for the iTMS music store only. I claim that more DRM-free AAC have been ripped from CD than music has been purchased on the iTMS. I have ripped maybe 300 songs in AAC and purchased a dozen or so songs from iTMS. I think that's typical.

Therefore the DRM-free AAC is at least as wide in use as the Fairplay AAC. And the DRM-free AAC is an open format that is not under control of Apple.

[Eug Wanker]

Agreed. Fairplay must be opened up. Non-iPod AAC players already exist, but none work with the iTMS.

Interestingly, iTunes (at least on the Mac) already supports 3rd party music players.

[Angus_D]

Originally posted by Spheric Harlot:
iTunes is available for Windows, and the iTunes Music Store's 70% market share is not likely to be ALL from Mac users.

Yeah. But as a general music jukebox, how much market share does iTunes have on Windows? Sure, it's in creased a lot recently, but this is a recent development.

Originally posted by CharlesS:

The Fairplay AAC is used for the iTMS music store only. I claim that more DRM-free AAC have been ripped from CD than music has been purchased on the iTMS.

I'm not sure if that claim is necessarily true. I tend to just rip my stuff at at least 192kbit/s MP3 for portability's sake. I don't want to be tied to iTunes.

And how many PC users use iTunes anyway? On the grand scale of things, I'd say it's not an awful lot. Sure, people are using it now because they have iPods, but from purely anecdotal evidence I'd say a lot of people aren't... And if it's only iPod users that use AAC, they're not your target market if you're making iPod alternatives.

Anyway, I just mean that historically there hasn't been the demand for it. I'd love to see that demand increase, and it certainly seems to be, so I'd expect to see more devices supporting it in the future. But I could be wrong.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by Angus_D:
And how many PC users use iTunes anyway? On the grand scale of things, I'd say it's not an awful lot. Sure, people are using it now because they have iPods, but from purely anecdotal evidence I'd say a lot of people aren't...

I'd say quite a lot, based on anecdotal evidence. It's the top rated jukebox on the Windows side, and after it was released I started seeing articles about universities having to shut down iTunes use because it was clogging up their networks with all the songs being streamed. Similarly, one of my friends here is a network admin for a large company, and he noticed iTunes streaming eating into his network bandwidth too.

Plus companies such as HP put iTunes on every computer it sells.

[Superchicken]

Hehe we use iTunes to eat up our network bandwidth internally, though we don't have that many users on it, though we have a fair number of iTunes users sharing and more who aren't sharing but coming up to me, "Hey you have TFK's first album? Can I rip a copy off you... what you don't want to help me pirate?!"
hehe

iTunes and AAC have a big following. my 1200+ songs are all AAC files, I have no fair play files. For those of us who rip our CDs instead of pirating or buying from the iTMS (can't now anyway) it makes a lot of sense.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by Angus_D:

Originally posted by CharlesS:
The Fairplay AAC is used for the iTMS music store only. I claim that more DRM-free AAC have been ripped from CD than music has been purchased on the iTMS.

This quote was from TETENAL, not me.

All the PC users I know don't use AAC to rip anything. Most of them don't even know what AAC is. Sure, we Mac users use it (some of us, anyway - MP3 is still more portable), but we're a small minority. For most people, ripping CDs == MP3. In the future, they will think ripping CDs == WMA. Why? WMA has a lot of momentum due to being the default for Microsoft's media stuff. iTunes may come with all HP PCs, but Windows Media Player et al are bundled with every copy of Windows. Plus, every music store other than iTunes and every media player other than the iPod uses WMA. In order to overcome this, Apple should be getting AAC everywhere, and they should be doing it now. Instead, they're locking people out with the FairPlay thing, ensuring that no one else will want to use it. Music stores that require a DRMed format have to use WMA, and other people don't understand why they should use something other than MP3. So MP3 will remain dominant until WMA eventually edges it out as Microsoft inevitably will gradually make it easier to rip WMA than MP3 over time.

[TETENAL]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
All the PC users I know don't use AAC to rip anything. Most of them don't even know what AAC is. Sure, we Mac users use it (some of us, anyway - MP3 is still more portable), but we're a small minority. For most people, ripping CDs == MP3.

You probably people who are computer literate. Most people however are computer illiterate. Such people don't change application preferences if they don't have to. AAC is the default format iTunes rips to. It is save to assume that the majority of iPod users rips CDs into AAC format (knowingly or not). And people who are interested in music enough to purchase an expensive iPod should have a CD collection already. It's pretty safe to assume there are more DRM-free than Fairplay AACs.

I'm not saying the format is popular. But it's not that mostly Fairplay AACs exist as you claim.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
You probably people who are computer literate.

Heh, not exactly. See below:

Most people however are computer illiterate. Such people don't change application preferences if they don't have to. AAC is the default format iTunes rips to. It is save to assume that the majority of iPod users rips CDs into AAC format (knowingly or not). And people who are interested in music enough to purchase an expensive iPod should have a CD collection already. It's pretty safe to assume there are more DRM-free than Fairplay AACs.

I'm not saying the format is popular. But it's not that mostly Fairplay AACs exist as you claim.

The people I've known, who are not particularly skilled with computers, think computer + music = MP3. Case in point - I saw a girl who was working with some AIFF files with Peak (remember, music student) and asked for help. Why was that? She wanted to burn them onto a CD, and since computer stuff + music = MP3, she figured she needed to convert it to MP3 first before running them through iTunes. Now, by default, Peak has an option to save as MP3, but it is dimmed unless you install the LAME codec manually, so she was getting frustrated. I had to explain to her that it's not necessary to use MP3 and she could just burn the AIFF files.

Non-computer people equate music with MP3. If they want to do something, they will find a way to convert it to MP3. If they can't figure it out, they'll ask someone who does know. I was about to go convert her files into MP3 with iTunes until she eventually told me she just wanted to burn them, since at first she was just asking how to convert to MP3.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Non-computer people equate music with MP3. If they want to do something, they will find a way to convert it to MP3. If they can't figure it out, they'll ask someone who does know. I was about to go convert her files into MP3 with iTunes until she eventually told me she just wanted to burn them, since at first she was just asking how to convert to MP3.

To be fair, it's fairly specific to music-related work to be dealing at all with AIFF data.

I doubt that "most" users will ever bother giving formats any thought at all, since they will rarely, if ever, come into contact with the actual files. If they use iTunes, everything will "just work" and sound fine - end of story.

-s*