Jack Lacy, President of the Coral Consortium, has posted an open letter to Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Here it is verbatim:
Dear Mr. Jobs,
The directors of Coral Consortium were pleased to hear about your interest in interoperability. We agree with you that this is a big problem for consumers. They should be able to acquire content from a wide variety of competitive service providers and play their purchased content on a range of devices and platforms from different manufacturers. This is an issue that is very important to our membership.
It would appear from your “Thoughts on Music” that you may not be familiar with our organization so we would like to take this opportunity to brief you.
We have been wrestling with the issues around interoperability for some years and have concluded that it is not so much a technology problem as a business problem. We have completed the development of a suite of technical specifications for interoperability and these can be downloaded from our website (http://www.coral-interop.org/). We think that your engineers will find it very straightforward to integrate this framework into your iTunes service. This technology would enable you to interoperate immediately with Microsoft based Janus devices and services, and with OMA (Open Mobile Alliance) based devices and services. Of course the secrets in Fairplay remain safe – adopting the Coral technology does not require you to share them with anyone else.
This does not just address music. The Coral Interoperability Framework works for video as well. We know that, as a major shareholder in a very successful film studio, it is important for you both to protect your film assets, and to provide for their widest possible distribution. Coral can enable that.
Finally, if you are worried about the content industry being comfortable with the Coral solution you should know that many parts of that industry have been involved in the development of these specifications. Though most of Coral’s membership comes from technology companies and service providers, the members from the content community include:
• EMI Music
• International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI)
• Motion Picture Association of America
• NBC Universal, Inc.
• Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)
• Sony BMG Music
• Sony Pictures Entertainment
• Starz Entertainment Group LLC
• Time Warner Cable
• Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.
• Universal Music Group
• Warner Bros. Technical Operations Inc.
• Warner Music Group
We offer Apple, Inc. a warm invitation to join Coral’s ranks and help provide interoperability and the increased choice that will bring to all of our customers.
Yours sincerely,
Jack Lacy
President, Coral Consortium
On behalf of the Coral Board of Directors
http://www.coral-interop.org/20070209_Coral_Letter.html
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Bizarro Ballmer” for the heads up.]
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From:Artists Everywhere
To: Steve Jobs and The Record industry.
Steve we greatly appreciate the products you and Apple bring to market. They help us create art and enjoy the art of others.
I have yet to meet an artist who is happy with their relationship with the record companies.
Record companies take a ridiculous premium of what an artist makes for them.
What artists dream of doing is being able to sell their music directly to their fans.
Artists would rather give that money to a company that knows how to create truly innovative technology fulfilling that dream. Both Apple and Artists would gain from this relationship.
I hope that Apple allows artists to take the song I make in Garage band and upload it for sale on itunes.
This is the message.
Give us the platform.
Say goodbye to the old ways. Embrace this future.
It seems people out there think ‘Interoperability’ is a one-way street.
All I hear know (including Norway, etc.) that everything has to operate with Microsoft products!
What about the opposite?
Like Apple products and other operating systems (OSX)?
This is so screwed up.
SO if I use other music/movie systems and have an iPod, no one cares if it doesn’t interoperate with each other, everyone cares only if it doesn’t operate with Microsoft?!?!
What crap!
I think the day is coming very soon when record companies are bypassed by artists. The artists have to be smart enough to do it.
Now why would this guy ‘post’ the letter? Why not just send it to Steve directly? To make Apple look bad If Steve tells him to take a long walk off a short pier?
I think the day is coming very soon when record companies are bypassed by artists. The artists have to be smart enough to do it.
—————-
In theory, it seems like a good idea.. But in reality, without labels spending millions on recording, videos and promotion, most artists would never be exposed. In other words, the big labels money is needed to bring artists to the masses.
Perhaps the recent settlement with Apple Corps will allow Apple, Inc. to play a larger role in the music industry. Artist should enjoy more control and profits without the hassle of record label politics.
Who and what the hell is the Coral Consortium and why should I care what it says?
Seems their concern is only with the technical aspects of DRM not with the philisophical and social aspects that are important to the consumer
This letter helped remind me that since Jobs is on the Disney board, and in charge of Pixar, he should lead the way by getting those films, that are on ITMS already, available without DRM. That would put his money where his mouth is. This iss the opportunity to prove all the naysayers wrong.
If Microsoft had anything to do with it, I don’t want it on my iPod. The thing I love about Apple is the fact that they allow me to live MS-free.
Yea. Why do be keep reading about “Microsoft-based” this, “Microsoft-based” that? Microsoft is an irrelevance in the music download business. You all need to read Gruber’s latest take on this: http://daringfireball.net/2007/02/command_option_control
OK is it just me or does this not exactly qualify as an “open” letter like Steve’s? His what not to anyone specifically but rather addressed “Openly” to the music community at large. I am missing how you can post a letter which is addressed directly to someone and call it open….
…fuck them, and fuck their DRM with interoperability.
We are supposed to move away from DRM, not build a giant network of DRM.
Going back and re-reading my post, I realized that I made the longest run on sentence. Ever. Sorry about that.
I also didn’t make it clear. They should release Pixar and Disney films without Fairplay.
Imagion if you could:
play Xbox 360 games on you PS3
Use Gilette Razors with Schick blades
Use AIM to talk to GAIM to talk to Yahoo to talk to iChat
Have fully compatible document format supported by all office suites
use GM’s OnStar system in Toyota cars and trucks
Use an iPod Nano to watch movies (not that you would want to)
use Lexmark Printers with HP ink cartridges
Use Windows Live Maps on a Mac or Linux
Use AMD chips with an Intel Motherboard
Drive your car on train tracks
no technical reason why you can’t. interoperability is a lie.
Apple has already released AIRPORT Extreme that works to an international standard of interoperability that everyone agrees to use.
Same could be true of music if MS, Apple and the music companies agree to an open standard.
Simple.
( but it won’t be Coral or any single entity company that would gain advantage by it) Apple will likely complain about the quality of service delivered if they are asked to adopt a poor ‘standard’
I liked it better when circling the wagons involved horses, Sooners, and cowboys.
It was a lot more honest.
When I went to school in Alabama there was a congressional candidate who claimed that according to the bible slaves should of been happy to be slaves……. This is a true story.
Now we have to have listen to a bunch of talentless lawyers tell us how they are the only ones contractually obliged to rip off actors, directors and musicians.
Just my $0.02.
Steve got pwned.
mw: social… Welcome to the social
Dear Steve,
You own this market. We need money. It took us years to figure out the obvious. Now that we have a solution to the obvious, please use our version and pay us for it.
Love,
Lacy
P.S. We can’t guarantee anyone else will use what we’re charging you for! XOXOXO
> It would appear from your “Thoughts on Music” that you may not be familiar with our organization…
The “Coral Consortium”? I thought it was was another environmental group bashing Apple for publicity…
Sounds like there would be no need for this organization if DRM went away.
I really don’t think this phrase, “We offer Apple, Inc. a warm invitation to join Coral’s ranks…” would sit well with Jobs. Frm Apple’s POV, Coral should be joining Apple’s ranks.
My 2¢ worth minus taxes means MDN owes me $1.20
Open letter to the Coral Consortium:
Fuck you and the Micrsoft troll you rode in on.
SIgned,
the AntiGates
P.S. Bill Gates is ugly and his wife dresses him funny.
Funny how Lacy never brings up dropping DRM altogether, which is the best option.
@Astterisk:
“In theory, it seems like a good idea.. But in reality, without labels spending millions on recording, videos and promotion, most artists would never be exposed. In other words, the big labels money is needed to bring artists to the masses.”
You’re right, however, you left out the part where, if the artist makes enough money to cover the expense of recording, videos, and promotions, they have to pay the record company back. What I find funny today is, why do they even bother making videos anymore?
Hedgehog, don’t muddy the issue. DVDs already have copy-protection on them. The issue with music is that CDs do NOT, so why not let the music be sold online without it. You can’t stretch that to movie downloads…
Isn’t coral an endangered species?