“I don’t remember most of the dreams I have, whether nice or nasty. But, man, did I remember one from last week. I was on this really long and rambling road being chased by millions of Ipods of every size and shape. Though none of their earbuds were plugged in, there were so many of the things I could hear the mother of all mixes, every song, podcast and TV show available on Itunes,” Barry Gerber writes for Mobiltiy Guru. “That’s not all; behind all the Ipods was a bunch of silent zombie-like humans led by Steve Jobs. All of them had tons of folding money falling out of their pockets and eye sockets. I recognized most of these celebs. Everyone was there from Job’s Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak to ex-Disney head Michael Eisner to a passel of entertainers including Britney Spears, rapper Ghostface Killa, Michael from NBC’s ‘The Office’ dragging a zombie birthday cake and Josef Suk, classical violinist.”
“As with most bad dreams, I awoke in a sweat of horror before the final reel. So I don’t know if I got caught or not. It was then that I realized I was not new to Ipod nightmares. It’s only that my previous nightmares were real,” Gerber writes. “So that you don’t get a nosebleed adjusting to the various parts of the Great Ipod Scam, I’m going to start with the least offensive sub-scam and end with the most egregious of all.”
Gerber’s list of “Ipod” scams:
• Scratches And Cases
• FairPlay DRM limitations
• The cutesy lower case “i” in “iPod” and “iTunes”
• Lack of built-in FM radio and user replaceable battery
“Apple has a very good thing going for it with Ipods and Itunes. So far the company has been able to hoodwink its customers with poorly or unfairly designed goods and services all in the name of that little “i”. I don’t expect things will change much, given the profit potential,” Gerber writes. “Some say the music died on February 3, 1959 when singer-songwriters ‘The Big Bopper’ (J.P. Richardson), Ritchie Valens and Buddy Holly were killed in a terrible airplane crash just outside of Mason City, Iowa. I disagree. The music really died the day Apple brought the Ipod and Itunes to market wrapped in a series of sub-scams that not only killed the music, but what was left of the soul of Apple itself.”
Full article, “Who Designed This Crap? The Great Ipod Scam,” here.
MacDailyNews Take: Gerber’s a genius! Now we can see it all so clearly. Thanks so much to Barry Gerber for awakening us from our zombie-like stupor. We’ll never look at a lower case “i” the same way again.
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it seems an oxymoron that g-zus would use a parody of a biblical quote to put down religion.
g-zus… do you even know the verse you’re using incorrectly?
MDN word is “foot” as in… that’s where g-zus usually finds mouth in the morning
I love religion and the iPod. Both have their ups and downs but the upside is huge on both.
They might not meet the needs for everybody but why put down those for whom it works.
Take care and God Bless.
In a word, Mr. Gerber: Horseshit!
More Bullshit
Argh… excuse me if I’m wrong, but from my vantage point it looks as if the record lables are killing music by insisting DRM. We wouldn’t have DRM if it wasn’t for their demands. Wether your player is based on iTunes or WMA, to get the content you have to bow to the will of the RIAA. sheesh… I get sick of hearing this crap.
“Who Wrote This Crap? The Not-So-Great Barry Gerber Scam,”
” rel=”nofollow”>here.
Try downloading a movie or TV show or music video and actully look at it’s properites. Apple purposfully posts inferior bit rate with high digital compression articats just to save space on their servers, your machines and bandwidth. Which would fine if the stuff was free, but for a pay service Itunes suxs. And when asked about it apple fails to respond.
See, people on drugs should not write anything.
He has it backwards. What was killing the music was the collusion between the big labels and the radio stations. They play only what they want you to hear, and pepper it with obnoxious advertising and DJs.
Now the internet, and iTunes, allow indie labels and unsigned artists to distribute music worldwide. The iPod gives you freedom from the idiot DJs and commercials.
Some people just can’t stand when others are successful.
Hee hee hee…
Gerber: I need hits for my crappy site that no one’s ever heard of. I know! I’ll dis Apple! That’ll bring out the zealots and get me hits like crazy!
MDN: Why, thank you, Barry! We’ll link to your crappy anti-Apple article on your crappy blog, and get more hits for ourselves!
Anti-Apple morons… paying the bills at MDN since forever.
Crap, FUD, whatever you want to call this article. Anyone who downloads a legal music has to deal with DRM, so get used to it. If it doesn’t have DRM included it’s pirated music and shouldn’t be sold. Buy a case and your iPod won’t get scratched. Why is an FM radio even on this list. Did you buy an mp3 player or an FM radio? I believe the iPod is an mp3 player and as it is described doesn’t include an FM radio. So if you bought it for an FM radio you are a moron to begin with. The “i” in iPod is the dumbest thing to complain about that I’ve ever heard! I think “B” and “G” equals stupidity.
Wow… I actually read the article. What a pile of crap.
He even gets his facts wrong- he says that you can only burn songs purchased on iTMS once, when in fact the limit is 10 last time I checked.
I dunno about the rest of y’all but the FM stations in the D.C. market have been doing a slow implode for the past three months. There isn’t anything on FM worth listening to. Now if Sirius would just work with Belkin or Griffin and make a iPod tuner and could make there streaming service iTunes compatible.
the amusing part of this “article” is the comments from iAlso-rans.
gee lets get the facts wrong, then see people go off on other equally useless rants.
whatever.
I especially like the comments about batteries, gee let’s see I got a new battery for my iPod for 25 bucks, installed it in less than 5 minutes, after i used it heavily for 3 years.
What a bunch of iTools.
John:
“Anyone who downloads a legal music has to deal with DRM, so get used to it. If it doesn’t have DRM included it’s pirated music and shouldn’t be sold.”
Although the RIAA would like for everyone to believe otherwise, this is a blanket statement that’s just not true. There is a lot of music available for legal download that has no DRM because that’s the way the artists are releasing it.
DRM isn’t a law of nature (nor man) and is really unnecssary if one is actually more interested in selling music than controling it.
MDN word: music. Irony strikes again.
SAME OLD THING!
Show me a BETTER player with a BETTER online service and I will buy THAT instead…so far there isn’t one.
Apple advertises iPods out the wahzoo, but have you ever actually SEEN an iPod?
I didn’t think so! They’ll take your money and run, there are no iPods!
Yeah, just stick a lowercase “i” on anything and I’ll buy it. What a maroon.
However, a user replaceable battery would be nice, but I don’t think Jobs would approve the aesthetics.
Clearly, this guy does not know the meaning of the word scam (but he does get a point for mentioning Ghostface).
The “i” is a scam? WTF?
DRM? Apple is doing this for the content providers and because current IP laws did not anticipate and does not, in my opinion, properly deal with downloading media online.
” You can’t rip a copy of an Itunes created CD using standard CD burning programs.”
Hmmm…let’s see…you could burn it with iTunes, dumbass.
“And, and this is a big AND, you can’t make more than one copy of an Itunes song to a CD using Itunes.”
That’s funny, I just did that. You can do it 7 times for a playlist. Not only that, but you can make a new playlist and burn that 7 times.
“Gone are pre-Itunes rights to …burn as many copies of a commercial CD as your little heart desires.” Blame the IP laws and content providers (I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he doesn’t mean that he can’t rip his commerical CDs with iTunes and burn as many copies as he wants).
“The nasty part is that most of those who download content from Itunes know nothing of DRM itself, let alone cracking it.”
Seriously, dumbass, everyone fucking knows this.
“If music vendors or Apple decide to put further restrictions on your use of the songs you’ve already downloaded, such as by allowing no copies to CD, there’s nothing legal you can do about it.”
I actually agree with this. Once again, though, this is the fault of content providers and IP laws that need to be adjusted to meet the advances in technology that have made what was once “fair use” into restricted use.
“I got so sick of messing with my Ipod and Itunes that I threw my Nano into some forgotten corner of the house. ” Well, given what a dumbass you are, no wonder you’re too fucking stupid to use iTunes.
“If I can’t replace the battery on my Nano, who will and at what price? I leave that to your imagination, but I’m sure “Apple Corp.”
OK, maybe there are some people that think the Beatles are linked to iTunes.
I do agree about the battery.
Screw the FM radio. I know some folks like them, but they seem like the ideal add on for the % of people that do want one.
My complaint about iTunes, which also is because of content providers, is that iTMS is seeling music with inferior sound quality to CDs.
Overall, he claims iPod and iTunes are “poorly designed”. Aside from the difficult to replace battery, none of the issues he brings up are related to design. No one likes dealing with DRM, but until Apple can convince them the DRM schemes are unncessary, it is the only way to get music from the major labels.
THE BIGGEST SCAM OF ALL IS THE INCOME TAX!!!!
http://www.fairtax.org/
The battery really should be replaceable, like cell phone batteries are. Pretty much a no-brainer, just like the need for a split trackpad button on MacBook Pros.
That’s Apple for you, putting form before function.
…I’m sure it’s no scam that Apple sells $99 leather cases for the iPod, since the iPod is at least as scratch-resistant as a chocolate bar. Maybe even more so.
…and I’m sure that Apple doesn’t intend any sort of scam by refusing to license Fairplay to anybody.
Competition would be bad for business – even ask Microsoft!
Gerber’s list of “Ipod” scams:
Scratches & cases – overblown FUD put about by Microsoft PR department, and you fell for it.
FairPlay DRM limitations – limitations? Compared to what – Windows DRM? If you don’t like the DRM, then remove it. If you don’t know how to remove then you do not deserve the title of ‘Investigative Journalist’
The cutesy lower case “i” in “iPod” and “iTunes” – pathetic. Cannot win the arguement through debate so resort to (so-called) humour.
Lack of built-in FM radio and user replaceable battery – Had my iPod mini for nearly 2 years. Battery is fine, don’t want or need FM tuner, but could get one if required.
Don’t visit the site, he’s after hits.
Oh yeah, he threw his Nano away? Can I have it then?