“James Boyle in the Financial Times”:http://news.ft.com/cms/s/2c04d39e-ec5a-11d8-b35c-00000e2511c8.html on Apple’s claim that Real “broke into” the iPod:
bq. How exactly had Real “broken into” the iPod? It hadn’t broken into my iPod, which is after all my iPod. If I want to use Real’s service to download music to my own device, where’s the breaking and entering? What Real had done was make the iPod “interoperable” with another format. If Boyle’s word processing program can convert Microsoft Word files into Boyle’s format, allowing Word users to switch programs, am I “breaking into Word”? Well, Microsoft might think so, but most of us do not. So leaving aside the legal claim for a moment, where is the ethical foul? Apple was saying (and apparently believed) that Real had broken into something different from my iPod or your iPod. They had broken into the idea of an iPod. (I imagine a small, Platonic white rectangle, presumably imbued with the spirit of Steve Jobs.)
He also ponders whether what Real have done is any different from blade manufacturers making blades that fit branded razors.
{ 10 comments }
froz 08.17.04 at 10:41 am
Ha ha ha. It is not all that clear that anyone has broken into anything.
Choice is good. Everything else sucks.
froz 08.17.04 at 10:46 am
Yeah, I mean that bit about the loo.
Simon 08.17.04 at 5:48 pm
Interesting point with the blades though- Ever noticed that no blades are compatible with Mach-3? I remember reading that Gillette has so many patents on each part of the fastener that it was impossible to clone without breaking one of them. Could the same be the case for Apple?
Maynard Handley 08.17.04 at 6:51 pm
Come on, this is simply stupid.
Of course, like any sane human being, I am sympathetic to Jame Boyle’s point and to Real’s point (though Real, as one of the more incompetent companies out there will probably screw this up).
But this is not about morality or “natural property rights” or such; it is about those specific strange legal creations called intellectual property rights, and about what acts like the DMCA provide for. It’s all well and good to write supposedly amusing articles, but the issue here is not to simply ignore the legal issue (“So leaving aside the legal claim for a moment, where is the ethical foul?”) but to deal with it.
It doesn’t do the world any good to have Apple retreat to a position of saying “yeah, well, it may not be ethical but we’re still going to sue your ass blue using DMCA, and we’re going to win” does it? The point is that DMCA does exist, that on most readings of the law what Real has done is illegal according to DMCA, and that if you think that what Real has done SHOULD be legal, then you need to speak up against DMCA.
And presumably he doesn’t realize just how close to reality his razor-blade crack is. DMCA has been used to prevent you from using third party ink cartridges for your ink jet printer, or to use 3rd party garage door openers. Any day now I expect it to be used against 3rd party “smart” batteries (ie those, like laptop batteries, that include a silicon chip).
In principle, with their new motorized Mach3 razor, Gillette could probably put together some plausible story about how the blade has to communicate with the razor using some custom protocol, and use DMCA to lock things up; they presumably have not done that because
(a) they actually do have a superior product. Damn those Mach3 blades are good.
(b) the hassle this would entail (eg waterproofing everything, inductance coupling between blade and razor) is just not worth the monopoly payoff — better to compete just by selling really good blades.
Angry Bear 08.17.04 at 10:13 pm
Lotus v Borland (around 1986) protected the ability to develop interoperability. (Note: my memory on this is a bit vague, but the following is basically accurate). Lotus developed a feature that let its users import their macros from Borland’s software (Quattro? Some sort of spreadsheet that was dominant at the time). This dramatically lowered end-users’ switching costs and allowed Lotus to thrive. Naturally, Borland sued, but lost. And so the right to design interoperable software was safe.
But the DMCA forbids circumvention of technological measures used to protect copyrighted works, except under a limited set of conditions — none of which include creating interoperability.
So there seem to be two competing standards here, and it’s not clear which one will hold. So far, the DMCA has — surprisingly, at least to me — withstood every major legal challenge.
AB
Brey 08.17.04 at 10:56 pm
Apple should be happy about this. Remember the Apple IIs? they were once the dominant personal computer. But, Apple didn’t allow clones and pcs went through the roof when bunches of companies made computers that ran MS-DOS. Didn’t turn out all that well for Apple.
Maynard Handley 08.17.04 at 11:46 pm
Hmm, like I said about Real being so incompetent that they’ll screw this up regardless of what Apple does.
After hearing all the bype about their 49c limited time downloads, I figured I’d take a look at their catalog. So I type in http://www.realnetworks.com and get a page that, while butt-ugly, at least claims to point me to the “Consumer” page where I will find the music store. OK, I click the link and land up at http://www.real.com which consists of a full-page ad for Real Player 10, an ad which, by the way, does a fine job of reminding you of all the crapulence that attends Real’s products and why you vowed two years ago never to have anything to do with them again. But, I defy any CrookedTimber user to find a link on this page that takes you to the mythical Real Music store.
Damn, has their ever been a computer company quite as incompetent as Real; they’ve managed to get their world-wide publicity, and have done absolutely NOTHING to exploit it?
(Yeah, don’t answer that. The sad thing is that we can probably all think of two or three.)
So, for now, I still don’t know where this Real Music Store it. If someone has a URL please post it. Although it pains me to do so, I think we all have a duty to take one for the team, pay Real 49c, and download a tune. Establishing some facts on the ground in terms of a large group of Americans who have paid for (DRM’d) digital music and who stand to get screwed when Apple dicks around with iPod to make these tunes not work, or when they sue Real, has the potential to sway the court case or have congress revise DMCA.
Anticorium 08.18.04 at 2:35 am
John Gruber has already provided answers to most of the arguments raised in Boyle’s article, and for that matter responded to brey’s comment about licensing the Macintosh a full week before that comment was even written.
No, it’s not that Gruber is psychic; it’s just that the standard talking points are so predictable. If this were politics, right about now would be the time someone piped up with “and some people say Apple sounds French.”
bofh 08.18.04 at 3:32 am
So, for now, I still don’t know where this Real Music Store it. If someone has a URL please post it.
You haven’t googled it, have you?
Google _ Real Music Store site:real.com _
And it’s the second link.
You must be stuck in the dark ages of internet usage. (Or desperate to show that the real.com website is bad)
Maynard Handley 08.18.04 at 10:05 pm
Actually, bofh, I have learned that the answer is that apparently Real, in their infinite wisdom, have decided not to support the mac platform, and part of their strategy for doing this is that some of their links check the incoming user agent and, if it is Safari (which I use) (and heck, for all I know, other mac browsers as well), a totally different page is served up, one with no mention of the Real music store.
I imagine that, apart from everything else, this sort of marginalizing of mac would-be-customers has done little to endear them to the existing Apple fan base or Steve Jobs.
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