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Why Copyright Holders Love iTunes Match And Pirates Hate It

15 points by bjonathan 15y ago

extension 15y ago
iCloud stores non-DRM copies of music on your devices, right? And iTunes Match songs get all the same privileges as stuff you buy from iTunes, right? So, how can Apple "control your music"? Can they delete files you store locally? Or prevent you from sharing them on The Pirate Bay?
- ryusage 15y ago
  No, the whole point of the iCloud service is that the music is stored on Apple's servers. It sounds like it is then synced from their servers to your devices. So presumably, if they wanted to, they could remove or block your access to particular files on their server, and have your local copies of those files deleted on the next sync. I'm not sure how likely that is to ever actually happen, though. That sounds a little sensationalistic to me.
  - isleyaardvark 15y ago
    It's entirely sensationalistic. What's the difference between "Apple could decide which iCloud music you can't have" and "Apple could decide which iTunes songs you can't redownload"? Or "Google could decide which emails in gmail you can't have anymore"? The only realistic danger with iCloud is the same as with any other cloud service: the company accidentally loses your data. Even in that case there's not much danger. You use iTunes match, you download copies of the matches to your local computer, you back them up.
    - revicon 15y ago
      It's not without precedent. Amazon blew away all local copies of 1984 from Kindles on it's network in 09... http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18ama...
gavingmiller 15y ago
One question I had - that I had hoped the article would touch - is what's stopping Apple from compiling a giant list of those that have downloaded illegal music and handing it over to the RIAA? Aside from the huge amount of ill will that an action like that would create.
- ryusage 15y ago
  Because there's no reliable way to identify which files were pirated and which were legitimately obtained from non-iTunes sources. The files all look the same, for the most part. I guess some do have tags that say who ripped them, which would certainly be a tip off. Even then, though, I'm not sure how easily you could automate it to differentiate between tags that indicate piracy and tags that do not.
  - kenjackson 15y ago
    The RIAA could actually now start to seed files that are pirated. Just populate the world with them, and sit on them for years. It's their nuclear option if nothing works out, they then have all of the MusicMatch data coupled with their fingerprints that uniquely indicate pirated music.
  - kemayo 15y ago
    You could hash the files and say that 50,000 people all had an identical mp3 of a track. Given tagging, subtle differences between CD drives, and the lossy encoding process it'd be fairly probable that they all got it from the same place. Of course, that's not the same thing as proving in each case that they really did pirate it, but it'd be a start as a way of building a list of people to look at.
    - hyperbovine 15y ago
      I have no qualms about downloading an MP3 of a track that I already physically own but am too lazy to unearth and rip. Hope they'll take that into account.
Locke1689 15y ago
The comparison to Spotify is misguided because Spotify isn't selling you music -- you have no legal ownership of any music you listen to on Spotify. Spotifiy is selling you a subscription to listen to as much music as you want through their service. Whether or not there's music stored on local drives any more is irrelevant for Spotify because you don't own what's stored there anyway. Personally, I'd much rather pay the monthly fee because I listen to much more music than I could ever buy in a conventional manner.
- grimen 15y ago
  Yes, I also found Apple's comparisons in the WWDC event to be fale claims. They seem to only compare themselves to Google and Amazon of PR reasons. THey know they can't compare to the streaming services...even though they are 1:1 competitors in my view. P.S. You can buy music on Spotify as well, but it's not the core idea and I don't know any people that have. Though almost every person I know in Sweden pay for Premium.
  - grimen 15y ago
    And worth to mention: Every user of Spotify I've talked to laugh at the iTunes move, they won't leave Spotify for sure. Even my mom consider "the new" iTunes a failure.
dasil003 15y ago
Pure linkbait. The article paints pirates as whiny little children decrying cloud-based streaming services impact on their ability to pirate in much the same impotent way that the music industry 10 years ago decried Napster's impact on their ability to sell CDs for $18.99. All the while ignoring the most basic of details: iTunes is not a streaming service, and the files aren't DRM'ed! The reality is that "pirate" is not a binary distinction. Painting this as some kind of partisan conflict doesn't serve anybody. What's going on here is that streaming companies like Spotify are finally offering a compelling service that precludes a lot of people's desire to pirate. They've finally figured out how to compete with free. You'd have to travel pretty far and wide to find a pirate who is wringing their hands over this the way the article portrays.
shinratdr 15y ago
Wow that was a terrible article. The author misunderstands iTunes Match so badly that the whole thing makes no sense. It's ALL local copies, idiot.

15 points by bjonathan 15y ago

iCloud stores non-DRM copies of music on your devices, right? And iTunes Match songs get all the same privileges as stuff you buy from iTunes, right? So, how can Apple "control your music"? Can they delete files you store locally? Or prevent you from sharing them on The Pirate Bay?

ryusage 15y ago
No, the whole point of the iCloud service is that the music is stored on Apple's servers. It sounds like it is then synced from their servers to your devices. So presumably, if they wanted to, they could remove or block your access to particular files on their server, and have your local copies of those files deleted on the next sync. I'm not sure how likely that is to ever actually happen, though. That sounds a little sensationalistic to me.
- isleyaardvark 15y ago
  It's entirely sensationalistic. What's the difference between "Apple could decide which iCloud music you can't have" and "Apple could decide which iTunes songs you can't redownload"? Or "Google could decide which emails in gmail you can't have anymore"? The only realistic danger with iCloud is the same as with any other cloud service: the company accidentally loses your data. Even in that case there's not much danger. You use iTunes match, you download copies of the matches to your local computer, you back them up.
  - revicon 15y ago
    It's not without precedent. Amazon blew away all local copies of 1984 from Kindles on it's network in 09... http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18ama...

gavingmiller 15y ago

One question I had - that I had hoped the article would touch - is what's stopping Apple from compiling a giant list of those that have downloaded illegal music and handing it over to the RIAA? Aside from the huge amount of ill will that an action like that would create.

ryusage 15y ago
Because there's no reliable way to identify which files were pirated and which were legitimately obtained from non-iTunes sources. The files all look the same, for the most part. I guess some do have tags that say who ripped them, which would certainly be a tip off. Even then, though, I'm not sure how easily you could automate it to differentiate between tags that indicate piracy and tags that do not.
- kenjackson 15y ago
  The RIAA could actually now start to seed files that are pirated. Just populate the world with them, and sit on them for years. It's their nuclear option if nothing works out, they then have all of the MusicMatch data coupled with their fingerprints that uniquely indicate pirated music.
- kemayo 15y ago
  You could hash the files and say that 50,000 people all had an identical mp3 of a track. Given tagging, subtle differences between CD drives, and the lossy encoding process it'd be fairly probable that they all got it from the same place. Of course, that's not the same thing as proving in each case that they really did pirate it, but it'd be a start as a way of building a list of people to look at.
  - hyperbovine 15y ago
    I have no qualms about downloading an MP3 of a track that I already physically own but am too lazy to unearth and rip. Hope they'll take that into account.

Locke1689 15y ago

The comparison to Spotify is misguided because Spotify isn't selling you music -- you have no legal ownership of any music you listen to on Spotify. Spotifiy is selling you a subscription to listen to as much music as you want through their service. Whether or not there's music stored on local drives any more is irrelevant for Spotify because you don't own what's stored there anyway. Personally, I'd much rather pay the monthly fee because I listen to much more music than I could ever buy in a conventional manner.

grimen 15y ago
Yes, I also found Apple's comparisons in the WWDC event to be fale claims. They seem to only compare themselves to Google and Amazon of PR reasons. THey know they can't compare to the streaming services...even though they are 1:1 competitors in my view. P.S. You can buy music on Spotify as well, but it's not the core idea and I don't know any people that have. Though almost every person I know in Sweden pay for Premium.
- grimen 15y ago
  And worth to mention: Every user of Spotify I've talked to laugh at the iTunes move, they won't leave Spotify for sure. Even my mom consider "the new" iTunes a failure.

dasil003 15y ago

Pure linkbait. The article paints pirates as whiny little children decrying cloud-based streaming services impact on their ability to pirate in much the same impotent way that the music industry 10 years ago decried Napster's impact on their ability to sell CDs for $18.99. All the while ignoring the most basic of details: iTunes is not a streaming service, and the files aren't DRM'ed! The reality is that "pirate" is not a binary distinction. Painting this as some kind of partisan conflict doesn't serve anybody. What's going on here is that streaming companies like Spotify are finally offering a compelling service that precludes a lot of people's desire to pirate. They've finally figured out how to compete with free. You'd have to travel pretty far and wide to find a pirate who is wringing their hands over this the way the article portrays.

shinratdr 15y ago

Wow that was a terrible article. The author misunderstands iTunes Match so badly that the whole thing makes no sense. It's ALL local copies, idiot.