[quote]Kuz wrote:
Swivs,
I feel your pain, man. I am really not interested in just downloading music via Limewire and such (as I used to do a few years ago) and have made a conscious choice to actually pay for it.
I do sort of agree with the other poster that it is more the RIAA and DRM that is the issue than Apple, but I hate even using iTunes to play music on my computer or sync up with my iPod (which is why I now use the pretty fantastic Media Monkey).
What amazes me is how CD’s (despite not being a new technology and something that gets cheaper to manufacturer with each passing year) continue to go up in price. At that point, you are just paying for straight up greed. I cannot imagine paying $15.99 for a CD only to find out that half the songs are completely horrible.
If there is one thing I am grateful for iTunes and such for, it’s that there is at least a push for the ability to buy individual songs.[/quote]
i like limewire because i can find alot of stuff that i want to check out. the stuff that i like i want to own and will look for the disc, or even vinyl, because of the sound quality which is usually but not always a ton better, especially for a an old skool listener like me who owns a system capable of moving some air.
apple is genius for giving us the ipod which is a ton of freedom. but now they are complicit in removing those freedoms and trying to get us to pay tens of thousands of dollars to use them. we could argue about who’s driving these prices,it’s clearly the dying labels trying to hang on to a market that’s long gone… but apple is still in on it.
how else do you explain the fact that they WON’T show you both price points ?
everyone on earth believes that the new i-tunes plus offers you the CHOICE of purchasing the more expensive tracks, but when you get there you find they offer you ONLY the more expensive tracks which don’t sound any better and STILL come with drm in the form of enbedding your personal information, which is even worse !!
i understand that people, especially in my peer group, like apple because they make some great stuff that makes life better and this translates to liking them on an emotional level. but really… look @ what’s happening and you’ll see our “friends” @ apple are showing us some very shady bait and switch marketing along with some downright cheney-esque double-speak.