The whole thing is ridiculous. How many different-standard media players do we need in one marketplace? This is what nearly killed compact discs when they first came out lo these almost 25 years ago--two competing formats, one of whom had the good sense to just go away.
The problem we all have to understand here is, it's not like it was when we were growing up, where you had essentially a hardcopy of copyrighted material--print, recorded, stamped on a piece of plastic, etc.--and over time that copy could degrade and you'd need to replace it. Furthermore, if anybody wanted a copy of their own, the rendering they could get from you wouldn't be nearly as good as that which they would get were they to buy their own copy from the mass producer thereof. Of course, for printed material, it's more about the intellectual property than the performance, which is why you'll notice that not nearly as big a deal is made about copying printed matter as it is recorded performances. The entertainment indsutry has got to come up with ways in which, to a certain extent, backups can be made of performances purchased to play on a particular device and none other. How many times have I seen in this very forum discussions about IPod owners who bring their machines in for service, and get wiped ones in return? And what became of everything they paid for and had stored on them? They lost it, unless they kept a backup of it on their local computer, which lots of folks just don't do. So, we gotta change the culture and change the two communities--the consumers and the purveyors--to make it fair for everyone. Can you imagine in the future--way way in the future--where things like IPods and IRiver and Archos gadgets are being bought and sold at auction because they contain the only known copy of an old record from the early 2000's, and all they can do is play it, it cannot be extracted? That, of course, is the digital analog to buying old records at tag sales! _______________________________________________ PC-Audio List Help, Guidelines, Archives and more... http://www.pc-audio.org To unsubscribe from this list, send a blank email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This list is a service of MosenExplosion.com. To see what other lists we offer, visit us on the web at http://www.MosenExplosion.com
