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> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely

> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely Remember this sentence to change your mind for the next time you see some movie to buy online.

dmitryminkovsky 6y ago
Really surprised to see Apple taking this approach. You'd think they could have come up with something less offensive to their users. This is the exact same line Sidney Powell is using in her defense against Dominion: "'No Reasonable Person' Thought Her Election Fraud Claims Were Fact" [0]. Amused but not surprised to see this from her, I am quite aghast to see this from Apple. The fact is, just like any reasonable person would believe that claims of election fraud are claims of election fraud, any reasonable person would certainly believe that when Apple says "buy" they mean to purchase and to own outright in perpetuity without the possibility of repossession. I wonder what effect this will have on the App Store, where apps are "sold" using the same language. [0] https://www.law.com/nationallawjournal/2021/03/22/facing-defamation-sidney-powell-says-no-reasonable-person-thought-her-election-fraud-claims-were-fact/ https://www.law.com/nationallawjournal/2021/03/22/facing-def...
- lettergram 6y ago
  Not sure why Sidney Powell was brought up here, but that’s ongoing litigation and neither side has emerged victorious. Further, the claims in that article were odd and don’t seem to match the filing Sydney Powell actually made: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699.22.2_3.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699/... So I don’t think that’s necessarily a great source to cite. EDIT: In either case, these are lawsuits. There’s a few things that have to occur in the Powell (and Apple) case: 1. Is it reasonable to believe the people making said statements or taking actions believe they are correct / the truth 2. Was there malicious intent (predicated on point 1). Those suing have to prove the statements are both (a) convincing to a 3rd party and (b) show the defendant was trying to take action contrary to their beliefs Because of the setup, it makes sense to basically say “prove a reasonable person believes the claims and prove the defended intended to cause harm, using evidence contrary to their beliefs” That’s equivalent to saying “prove it.” This is standard in a motion to dismiss, which is step one in the legal battle.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - kemayo 6y ago
    This is a bit of a tangent from the actual article we're nominally discussing, of course, but... > Further, the claims in that article were odd and don’t seem to match the filing Sydney Powell actually made So, the bit of the article I can read says "Attorneys for Sidney Powell are asking a federal judge to dismiss a defamation lawsuit filed against her, claiming that “no reasonable person” thought the pro-Trump lawyer’s statements about the 2020 election results were factual." This is directly referring to a claim in the document Powell's lawyers filed. If you scroll through to page 32 of the PDF you linked, you'll find this: "Such characterizations of the allegedly defamatory statements further support Defendants’ position that reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact but view them only as claims that await testing by the courts through the adversary process." It's literally arguing that "no reasonable person" would ever believe that anything anyone says about an upcoming court case is meant as a fact. It's an argument that would mean it's absolutely impossible to defame someone who's in any way related to a person you're suing, no matter how meritless that lawsuit might be. (Particularly, it argues, if your lawsuit is related to politics.)
    - jcranmer 6y ago
      What Sidney Powell is trying to do in the proceedings is to argue that the allegedly defamatory statements are part of legal proceedings. Legal pleadings are by definition protected speech and cannot be defamatory. The problem she faces is that, while the lawsuits themselves are protected, she held several press conferences and made the same speech in other venues where it is not so protected. Furthermore, by making essentially the same speech in legal pleadings, portraying the speech as opinion or hyperbole and not factual statements (the usual defense in a defamation lawsuit) would mean admitting to committing sanctionable offenses in filing those pleadings. But they're trying to still play that defense as well, which leads to the awkward conclusion "it's so outlandlishly false that no one would believe it to be fact, merely a fact we're arguing is true in a court case," which kind of makes it more likely they get slapped both with the sanctions for making false statements before the court and being the rare defendant to lose a defamation suit.
- mrweasel 6y ago
  You’re right that’s honestly a shitty way for Apple to make a counter argument. I suspect that a large number of Apple customers would see a purchase of a movie on iTunes as equivalent to buying a BluRay or DVD (the price would certainly indicate it), and now Apple is calling them unreasonable. Apples legal team also seems forget that their customers expect them to behave better than the industry in general. No reasonable person would expect Apple to deny a loyal customer access to previous purchases.
  - FridayoLeary 6y ago
    Apples legal team have obviously lost the forest for the trees. In fact, i imagine some high up execs are tearing out their hair.
- baryphonic 6y ago
  > This is the exact same line Sidney Powell is using in her defense against Dominion: "'No Reasonable Person' Thought Her Election Fraud Claims Were Fact" [0]. Amused but not surprised to see this from her, I am quite aghast to see this from Apple. The sentence in the filing is true: no reasonable person would see her opinion about an event as a fact. Opinions are not facts. Powell's problem is that her "facts" used to support her opinion are flaming dumpster-fire ridiculous and Loony Toons level crazy. (My opinion, also not a fact, is that she had a really bad filter for technical information, and so ended up filing complete trash in court.) Apple is also making an opinion claim here: "buy" in an Apple context does not mean "buy" in the colloquial context. I think it's a dumb argument mostly unsupported by facts (don't know how well supported it is by law), but, again, it's their opinion. Only the judge's opinion really matters, as well as the customer's when she decides not to "buy" this crap from hostile streaming services.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - dylan604 6y ago
    So if I "buy" an Apple M1 series computer, am I renting it or buying it? The only thing Apple can do to hardware is to quit supporting it via software updates, but I am still free to use it with the last supported software as long as it runs. (Depending on make/model/build quality, that may actually stop before software support ends like the 2016-2017 MBPs.)
    - fencepost 6y ago
      There's pretty convincing evidence that you own that computer. Your ability to use it in some fashion (e.g. as a hammer) is not dependent on Apple permitting that use.
- alisonkisk 6y ago
  "no reasonable person" defense is used when the defendant knows they were caught in a lie and have no other defense. It's the legal version of "just a prank bro" or "I was kidding", and just as despicable.
  - dane-pgp 6y ago
    And, as we've recently discovered, the academic equivalent is "I was just testing the security of the code review process".
cipher_system 6y ago
I always assumed they would be available as long as Apple or iTunes doesn't go under. Guess i'm not a reasonable consumer but luckily I haven't spent much money on them.
- joshmanders 6y ago
  I've spent a lot of money on iTunes content (Nearing 1,000 purchased movies on AppleTV), and my assumption was the same. As long as Apple/iTunes doesn't go under, and given I don't do anything to violate Apple's terms, I will have access to this content. I understand I can lose access, I'm not paying for the content in the idea that I own it forever even if Apple goes under or I get terminated, but I have perpetual access to it given the circumstances don't change, and I pay for the convenience of this. If I had expected to own it forever, I'd probably have bought DVD's, not digital.
  - interestica 6y ago
    > If I had expected to own it forever, I'd probably have bought DVD's, not digital. This is the opposite of what it should be. DVDs degrade over time, and can last for as little as 10 years. Digital should be mean transportable and convertible indefinitely.
    - joshmanders 6y ago
      Sure but who's gonna pay to keep those servers up in perpetuity? I would never buy digital thinking I'll have access indefinitely. At least with DVD's I can rip them and burn them on new DVD's if I wanted them to be "forever"
      - scatters 6y ago
        The company can use part of your purchase price to buy a long term debt instrument (e.g. a 30-year T-bond) and use the yield to keep the server running. Or, more realistically and prosaically, they can and should debit the net present liability of keeping the server running in perpetuity from their corporate accounts at the time of purchase. Accountancy knows how to value such things and finance delights in monetizing them.
tluyben2 6y ago
I do not think consumers know this at all and very much do agree that what they buy will be available to them during their lifetime at least. When I told friends that this can (and does) happen to books on Kindle that they paid for, they were very surprised. I am a reasonable consumer but yes, of course I assume that if it does not say 'rent this movie or book for a day' but instead uses the word 'buy' (often next to the button rent, so they they are making a distinction!), it will not dissapear. If it does disappear, I should get a refund, no matter the reason for it disappearing.
- Applejinx 6y ago
  If it was an object in your house, and they made it disappear and left you some money, that would be theft. Thoughts? I'm not convinced 'making digital goods disappear' is good. I know WHY it's done and totally understand the justification, but I continue to dislike and distrust the practice. Should we normalize the idea that everything we own is fungible, at the discretion of a third party, for its exchange value? Under what conditions do they get to swap out our property for replacements or money?
wdn 6y ago
They are a monopoly. I hope the Judge on Epic class call this Apple’s Motion to Dismiss. Hopefully there will be platform independent store where you can buy once and available on all devices.
- easton 6y ago
  For media, Amazon is platform-independent for music, books and movies.
weird-eye-issue 6y ago
Seems crazy to me. Sure, all their content won't always be available to purchase. But once you've purchased something, how can that not always stay in your library? It is just a long term rental, not a purchase, if it can disappear and that isn't obvious to anybody without looking into it (and how should you know to look into it in the first place?)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
mc32 6y ago
Historically media has had a limited play-life. 78s, 45s and 33 warped, broke or got scratched, etc., tapes wore out, broke, got tangled etc., CDs scratched or deteriorated after some time. There are exceptional specimens for all the above, but a good number don’t survive long unless owned by an aficionado who took care of their media. With digital you can have backups and in theory they could last forever as you convert the format into whatever is popular. How do they price this? Do they not do CRCs and hashes and let your bits rot over time and have you buy a new one? How do you approach this commercially? Make music or video very, very faddish so even if it lasts forever no one will want to listen to or watch something out of style ten yeas hence? I’m not defending Apple. I’m asking how do you price things reasonably if they potentially last forever?
- Retric 6y ago
  For CD’s it’s legal to make backup copies in the US which are digital and thus don’t degrade. Many of the oldest recordings still work, and can be played indefinitely with an optical needle. The time value of money means the possible purchase by a small fraction of buyers 20+ years out isn’t worth much at the time of sale. It’s only moving forward in time that makes anyone care about these sales. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable
  - mc32 6y ago
    I’m curious are iTunes and similar stores licensing the music to you? I’m guessing it is a license and not ownership. In either case I can see them addressing this problem of lower velocity with subscription only licensing where you license tunes for X amount of time. Obviously not in the interest of consumers but I can see why sellers would go this route.
    - syshum 6y ago
      All Copyright is a license, you buy a physical CD you are also buying a copyright license. You are attempting to make a distinction when none is present or valid
DigitallyFidget 6y ago
Amazon argues the same exact thing if you buy a movie digitally from them. It's only available to you for as long as they host it on their servers. This is why I pirate shit that I can't find on Netflix or Prime Video. Buying digital content is merely "long term rental" and really needs to be better advertised as that.
- vbsteven 6y ago
  I wonder if we will ever see a model similar to Qobuz/Bandcamp for movies and TV shows. These services allow downloading your purchases as DRM-free flac files.
  - dylan604 6y ago
    As long as the MPAA exists, this will never happen.
    - easton 6y ago
      Apple got the RIAA to go along with it, they definitely could get the movie studios to if they wanted (the pirates already broke Netflix, Amazon, and Disney's encryption, it's not helping anyway). I think the bigger problem now is that people don't buy enough movies for anyone to want to chase this down, and if you want to own a movie, 99% of the time I can get the Blu-Ray+digital version for the same price of the digital one, and then the license syncs to like five different video services. And if they all ban me, then I still have the Blu-Ray.
      - dylan604 6y ago
        The MPAA vs RIAA is sort of an apples vs oranges comparison though. Audio is much easier to compress, and MP3 made it very easy to make files small enough to download via dial-up modems. Video had years to go before quality was good enough at small enough sizes to make them a viable thing on the internet. Because of that, the MPAA got to watch/learn from mistakes that RIAA made in trying to protect its kingdom. Rather than fight the digital inevitablity like RIAA did, MPAA allowed the digital with DRM. This allowed for the "honest" public to have legal viable methods of watching the content. The useless tact RIAA fought caused its own demise in the fight making an entire generation of kids think that music should be free because that's all they knew. Their allowing of DRM free FLAC files was a white flag. MPAA is in a much stronger position to allow that to happen.
narag 6y ago
>> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely >Remember this sentence to change your mind for the next time you see some movie to buy online. I read this as "no reasonable consumer would trust us".
fsloth 6y ago
To be fair, Apple has upgraded the quality of several movie titles I have purchased as HD to to 4k, without a charge. Personally I treat my Apple purchases as volatile and approach the budgeting for them similarly as I would budget for events such as movie tickets.
- mxcrossb 6y ago
  Conversely, I think a lot of people buy digital movies and never watch them because they want to own them. We all probably have friends who buy games they never play off of steam.
RyanGoosling 6y ago
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes
TheRealDunkirk 6y ago
> Remember this sentence to change your mind for the next time you see some movie to buy online. If you use iTunes, and "add to library," like I do, you'll see how often albums get removed or replaced or remixed. It's unnecessary and unnerving. The labels are constantly faffing about with albums. Every couple of months, I'll go to play an album, and find that it only has, say, 2 songs in it. Sometimes I can go back and re-add it to my library, sometimes, there's a new "remastered" copy, and sometimes those songs are just no longer available in iTunes. I pay for the subscription, and don't buy music. And I'm glad. I don't know why these changes wouldn't happen to me even if I had paid for it, but maybe that would be exempted? If someone can tell me that this doesn't happen if I buy the album, I would snatch up some of my favorites right away.
- bananabiscuit 6y ago
  The same stuff also happened to some albums that I actually “bought” long before Apple started a music subscription service.
- Wowfunhappy 6y ago
  iTunes music is DRM free if you download it, so this is one case where you really could make the access indefinite if you wanted.
- ksec 6y ago
  >If you use iTunes.... Is this iTunes or Apple Music ? Because it happens all the time on Apple Music which is why I hate streaming services.
  - TheRealDunkirk 6y ago
    Ah, yes. You are right. I forget there’s a distinction.
- cheese_van 6y ago
  I have "purchased" movies from Amazon, movies for which Amazon later lost streaming rights, and which are no longer in their catalogue - and so my "purchase" was temporary. I am sure their EULA expressly permits this but it's irrelevant now as I have learned my lesson. I now longer "purchase" digital products unless I can download them after purchase. When this first occurred, I was angry. Now, I just consider myself educated to avoid Amazon at all cost.
ksec 6y ago
>> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely. I guess I will soon start a site about the amount of crap and hypocrisy modern Apple are saying. I dont know exactly what happened but post Steve Jobs Apple are getting ridiculous with their defence.
- Kuinox 6y ago
  Do it please !
HarryHirsch 6y ago
University libraries all over the world would disagree, their archivists make very sure that digital journals are still available to their audience even if the subscription has expired. Access to digital content is a solved problem, even though Apple would have you believe otherwise.
- sjy 6y ago
  How does this work? Is it normal for university libraries to keep a huge secret backup collection of PDFs? What happens if the university chooses to discontinue its subscription, as opposed to the publisher going out of business?
  - HarryHirsch 6y ago
    Contracts stipulate that material that has been paid for remains available even after the subscription is cancelled, that's usual for publishers. There's also agreements that material is transferred to archive sites if a publisher goes out of business and finds no buyer. I wouldn't know about ToU violations, universities routinely get banned from arXiv for weeks because CS departments hand out assignments to write a webcrawler - no clue what kind of grovelling is requited there, but it must be well ritualized now.
grishka 6y ago
I do. This is the exact reason why I've never bought anything digitally. Paying real money just to have some bytes streamed to you just doesn't feel right. And, I mean, you can't even resell or lend the thing.
Animats 6y ago
That's the "Tucker Carlson defense".[1] "The Court concludes that the statements are rhetorical hyperbole and opinion commentary intended to frame a political debate, and, as such, are not actionable as defamation." That worked in a defamation case, but the First Amendment defense probably won't work in a false advertising case. [1] https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7216968/9-24-20-McDougal-v-Fox-Opinion.pdf https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7216968/9-24-20-M...

dmitryminkovsky 6y ago

Really surprised to see Apple taking this approach. You'd think they could have come up with something less offensive to their users. This is the exact same line Sidney Powell is using in her defense against Dominion: "'No Reasonable Person' Thought Her Election Fraud Claims Were Fact" [0]. Amused but not surprised to see this from her, I am quite aghast to see this from Apple. The fact is, just like any reasonable person would believe that claims of election fraud are claims of election fraud, any reasonable person would certainly believe that when Apple says "buy" they mean to purchase and to own outright in perpetuity without the possibility of repossession. I wonder what effect this will have on the App Store, where apps are "sold" using the same language. [0] https://www.law.com/nationallawjournal/2021/03/22/facing-defamation-sidney-powell-says-no-reasonable-person-thought-her-election-fraud-claims-were-fact/ https://www.law.com/nationallawjournal/2021/03/22/facing-def...

lettergram 6y ago
Not sure why Sidney Powell was brought up here, but that’s ongoing litigation and neither side has emerged victorious. Further, the claims in that article were odd and don’t seem to match the filing Sydney Powell actually made: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699.22.2_3.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.225699/... So I don’t think that’s necessarily a great source to cite. EDIT: In either case, these are lawsuits. There’s a few things that have to occur in the Powell (and Apple) case: 1. Is it reasonable to believe the people making said statements or taking actions believe they are correct / the truth 2. Was there malicious intent (predicated on point 1). Those suing have to prove the statements are both (a) convincing to a 3rd party and (b) show the defendant was trying to take action contrary to their beliefs Because of the setup, it makes sense to basically say “prove a reasonable person believes the claims and prove the defended intended to cause harm, using evidence contrary to their beliefs” That’s equivalent to saying “prove it.” This is standard in a motion to dismiss, which is step one in the legal battle.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- kemayo 6y ago
  This is a bit of a tangent from the actual article we're nominally discussing, of course, but... > Further, the claims in that article were odd and don’t seem to match the filing Sydney Powell actually made So, the bit of the article I can read says "Attorneys for Sidney Powell are asking a federal judge to dismiss a defamation lawsuit filed against her, claiming that “no reasonable person” thought the pro-Trump lawyer’s statements about the 2020 election results were factual." This is directly referring to a claim in the document Powell's lawyers filed. If you scroll through to page 32 of the PDF you linked, you'll find this: "Such characterizations of the allegedly defamatory statements further support Defendants’ position that reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact but view them only as claims that await testing by the courts through the adversary process." It's literally arguing that "no reasonable person" would ever believe that anything anyone says about an upcoming court case is meant as a fact. It's an argument that would mean it's absolutely impossible to defame someone who's in any way related to a person you're suing, no matter how meritless that lawsuit might be. (Particularly, it argues, if your lawsuit is related to politics.)
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    What Sidney Powell is trying to do in the proceedings is to argue that the allegedly defamatory statements are part of legal proceedings. Legal pleadings are by definition protected speech and cannot be defamatory. The problem she faces is that, while the lawsuits themselves are protected, she held several press conferences and made the same speech in other venues where it is not so protected. Furthermore, by making essentially the same speech in legal pleadings, portraying the speech as opinion or hyperbole and not factual statements (the usual defense in a defamation lawsuit) would mean admitting to committing sanctionable offenses in filing those pleadings. But they're trying to still play that defense as well, which leads to the awkward conclusion "it's so outlandlishly false that no one would believe it to be fact, merely a fact we're arguing is true in a court case," which kind of makes it more likely they get slapped both with the sanctions for making false statements before the court and being the rare defendant to lose a defamation suit.
mrweasel 6y ago
You’re right that’s honestly a shitty way for Apple to make a counter argument. I suspect that a large number of Apple customers would see a purchase of a movie on iTunes as equivalent to buying a BluRay or DVD (the price would certainly indicate it), and now Apple is calling them unreasonable. Apples legal team also seems forget that their customers expect them to behave better than the industry in general. No reasonable person would expect Apple to deny a loyal customer access to previous purchases.
- FridayoLeary 6y ago
  Apples legal team have obviously lost the forest for the trees. In fact, i imagine some high up execs are tearing out their hair.
baryphonic 6y ago
> This is the exact same line Sidney Powell is using in her defense against Dominion: "'No Reasonable Person' Thought Her Election Fraud Claims Were Fact" [0]. Amused but not surprised to see this from her, I am quite aghast to see this from Apple. The sentence in the filing is true: no reasonable person would see her opinion about an event as a fact. Opinions are not facts. Powell's problem is that her "facts" used to support her opinion are flaming dumpster-fire ridiculous and Loony Toons level crazy. (My opinion, also not a fact, is that she had a really bad filter for technical information, and so ended up filing complete trash in court.) Apple is also making an opinion claim here: "buy" in an Apple context does not mean "buy" in the colloquial context. I think it's a dumb argument mostly unsupported by facts (don't know how well supported it is by law), but, again, it's their opinion. Only the judge's opinion really matters, as well as the customer's when she decides not to "buy" this crap from hostile streaming services.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- dylan604 6y ago
  So if I "buy" an Apple M1 series computer, am I renting it or buying it? The only thing Apple can do to hardware is to quit supporting it via software updates, but I am still free to use it with the last supported software as long as it runs. (Depending on make/model/build quality, that may actually stop before software support ends like the 2016-2017 MBPs.)
  - fencepost 6y ago
    There's pretty convincing evidence that you own that computer. Your ability to use it in some fashion (e.g. as a hammer) is not dependent on Apple permitting that use.
alisonkisk 6y ago
"no reasonable person" defense is used when the defendant knows they were caught in a lie and have no other defense. It's the legal version of "just a prank bro" or "I was kidding", and just as despicable.
- dane-pgp 6y ago
  And, as we've recently discovered, the academic equivalent is "I was just testing the security of the code review process".

cipher_system 6y ago

I always assumed they would be available as long as Apple or iTunes doesn't go under. Guess i'm not a reasonable consumer but luckily I haven't spent much money on them.

joshmanders 6y ago
I've spent a lot of money on iTunes content (Nearing 1,000 purchased movies on AppleTV), and my assumption was the same. As long as Apple/iTunes doesn't go under, and given I don't do anything to violate Apple's terms, I will have access to this content. I understand I can lose access, I'm not paying for the content in the idea that I own it forever even if Apple goes under or I get terminated, but I have perpetual access to it given the circumstances don't change, and I pay for the convenience of this. If I had expected to own it forever, I'd probably have bought DVD's, not digital.
- interestica 6y ago
  > If I had expected to own it forever, I'd probably have bought DVD's, not digital. This is the opposite of what it should be. DVDs degrade over time, and can last for as little as 10 years. Digital should be mean transportable and convertible indefinitely.
  - joshmanders 6y ago
    Sure but who's gonna pay to keep those servers up in perpetuity? I would never buy digital thinking I'll have access indefinitely. At least with DVD's I can rip them and burn them on new DVD's if I wanted them to be "forever"
    - scatters 6y ago
      The company can use part of your purchase price to buy a long term debt instrument (e.g. a 30-year T-bond) and use the yield to keep the server running. Or, more realistically and prosaically, they can and should debit the net present liability of keeping the server running in perpetuity from their corporate accounts at the time of purchase. Accountancy knows how to value such things and finance delights in monetizing them.

tluyben2 6y ago

I do not think consumers know this at all and very much do agree that what they buy will be available to them during their lifetime at least. When I told friends that this can (and does) happen to books on Kindle that they paid for, they were very surprised. I am a reasonable consumer but yes, of course I assume that if it does not say 'rent this movie or book for a day' but instead uses the word 'buy' (often next to the button rent, so they they are making a distinction!), it will not dissapear. If it does disappear, I should get a refund, no matter the reason for it disappearing.

Applejinx 6y ago
If it was an object in your house, and they made it disappear and left you some money, that would be theft. Thoughts? I'm not convinced 'making digital goods disappear' is good. I know WHY it's done and totally understand the justification, but I continue to dislike and distrust the practice. Should we normalize the idea that everything we own is fungible, at the discretion of a third party, for its exchange value? Under what conditions do they get to swap out our property for replacements or money?

wdn 6y ago

They are a monopoly. I hope the Judge on Epic class call this Apple’s Motion to Dismiss. Hopefully there will be platform independent store where you can buy once and available on all devices.

easton 6y ago
For media, Amazon is platform-independent for music, books and movies.

weird-eye-issue 6y ago

Seems crazy to me. Sure, all their content won't always be available to purchase. But once you've purchased something, how can that not always stay in your library? It is just a long term rental, not a purchase, if it can disappear and that isn't obvious to anybody without looking into it (and how should you know to look into it in the first place?)

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

mc32 6y ago

Historically media has had a limited play-life. 78s, 45s and 33 warped, broke or got scratched, etc., tapes wore out, broke, got tangled etc., CDs scratched or deteriorated after some time. There are exceptional specimens for all the above, but a good number don’t survive long unless owned by an aficionado who took care of their media. With digital you can have backups and in theory they could last forever as you convert the format into whatever is popular. How do they price this? Do they not do CRCs and hashes and let your bits rot over time and have you buy a new one? How do you approach this commercially? Make music or video very, very faddish so even if it lasts forever no one will want to listen to or watch something out of style ten yeas hence? I’m not defending Apple. I’m asking how do you price things reasonably if they potentially last forever?

Retric 6y ago
For CD’s it’s legal to make backup copies in the US which are digital and thus don’t degrade. Many of the oldest recordings still work, and can be played indefinitely with an optical needle. The time value of money means the possible purchase by a small fraction of buyers 20+ years out isn’t worth much at the time of sale. It’s only moving forward in time that makes anyone care about these sales. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable
- mc32 6y ago
  I’m curious are iTunes and similar stores licensing the music to you? I’m guessing it is a license and not ownership. In either case I can see them addressing this problem of lower velocity with subscription only licensing where you license tunes for X amount of time. Obviously not in the interest of consumers but I can see why sellers would go this route.
  - syshum 6y ago
    All Copyright is a license, you buy a physical CD you are also buying a copyright license. You are attempting to make a distinction when none is present or valid

DigitallyFidget 6y ago

Amazon argues the same exact thing if you buy a movie digitally from them. It's only available to you for as long as they host it on their servers. This is why I pirate shit that I can't find on Netflix or Prime Video. Buying digital content is merely "long term rental" and really needs to be better advertised as that.

vbsteven 6y ago
I wonder if we will ever see a model similar to Qobuz/Bandcamp for movies and TV shows. These services allow downloading your purchases as DRM-free flac files.
- dylan604 6y ago
  As long as the MPAA exists, this will never happen.
  - easton 6y ago
    Apple got the RIAA to go along with it, they definitely could get the movie studios to if they wanted (the pirates already broke Netflix, Amazon, and Disney's encryption, it's not helping anyway). I think the bigger problem now is that people don't buy enough movies for anyone to want to chase this down, and if you want to own a movie, 99% of the time I can get the Blu-Ray+digital version for the same price of the digital one, and then the license syncs to like five different video services. And if they all ban me, then I still have the Blu-Ray.
    - dylan604 6y ago
      The MPAA vs RIAA is sort of an apples vs oranges comparison though. Audio is much easier to compress, and MP3 made it very easy to make files small enough to download via dial-up modems. Video had years to go before quality was good enough at small enough sizes to make them a viable thing on the internet. Because of that, the MPAA got to watch/learn from mistakes that RIAA made in trying to protect its kingdom. Rather than fight the digital inevitablity like RIAA did, MPAA allowed the digital with DRM. This allowed for the "honest" public to have legal viable methods of watching the content. The useless tact RIAA fought caused its own demise in the fight making an entire generation of kids think that music should be free because that's all they knew. Their allowing of DRM free FLAC files was a white flag. MPAA is in a much stronger position to allow that to happen.

narag 6y ago

>> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely >Remember this sentence to change your mind for the next time you see some movie to buy online. I read this as "no reasonable consumer would trust us".

fsloth 6y ago

To be fair, Apple has upgraded the quality of several movie titles I have purchased as HD to to 4k, without a charge. Personally I treat my Apple purchases as volatile and approach the budgeting for them similarly as I would budget for events such as movie tickets.

mxcrossb 6y ago
Conversely, I think a lot of people buy digital movies and never watch them because they want to own them. We all probably have friends who buy games they never play off of steam.

RyanGoosling 6y ago

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes

TheRealDunkirk 6y ago

> Remember this sentence to change your mind for the next time you see some movie to buy online. If you use iTunes, and "add to library," like I do, you'll see how often albums get removed or replaced or remixed. It's unnecessary and unnerving. The labels are constantly faffing about with albums. Every couple of months, I'll go to play an album, and find that it only has, say, 2 songs in it. Sometimes I can go back and re-add it to my library, sometimes, there's a new "remastered" copy, and sometimes those songs are just no longer available in iTunes. I pay for the subscription, and don't buy music. And I'm glad. I don't know why these changes wouldn't happen to me even if I had paid for it, but maybe that would be exempted? If someone can tell me that this doesn't happen if I buy the album, I would snatch up some of my favorites right away.

bananabiscuit 6y ago
The same stuff also happened to some albums that I actually “bought” long before Apple started a music subscription service.
Wowfunhappy 6y ago
iTunes music is DRM free if you download it, so this is one case where you really could make the access indefinite if you wanted.
ksec 6y ago
>If you use iTunes.... Is this iTunes or Apple Music ? Because it happens all the time on Apple Music which is why I hate streaming services.
- TheRealDunkirk 6y ago
  Ah, yes. You are right. I forget there’s a distinction.
cheese_van 6y ago
I have "purchased" movies from Amazon, movies for which Amazon later lost streaming rights, and which are no longer in their catalogue - and so my "purchase" was temporary. I am sure their EULA expressly permits this but it's irrelevant now as I have learned my lesson. I now longer "purchase" digital products unless I can download them after purchase. When this first occurred, I was angry. Now, I just consider myself educated to avoid Amazon at all cost.

ksec 6y ago

>> Apple countered by arguing that “no reasonable consumer would believe” that content purchased through iTunes would be available on the platform indefinitely. I guess I will soon start a site about the amount of crap and hypocrisy modern Apple are saying. I dont know exactly what happened but post Steve Jobs Apple are getting ridiculous with their defence.

Kuinox 6y ago
Do it please !

HarryHirsch 6y ago

University libraries all over the world would disagree, their archivists make very sure that digital journals are still available to their audience even if the subscription has expired. Access to digital content is a solved problem, even though Apple would have you believe otherwise.

sjy 6y ago
How does this work? Is it normal for university libraries to keep a huge secret backup collection of PDFs? What happens if the university chooses to discontinue its subscription, as opposed to the publisher going out of business?
- HarryHirsch 6y ago
  Contracts stipulate that material that has been paid for remains available even after the subscription is cancelled, that's usual for publishers. There's also agreements that material is transferred to archive sites if a publisher goes out of business and finds no buyer. I wouldn't know about ToU violations, universities routinely get banned from arXiv for weeks because CS departments hand out assignments to write a webcrawler - no clue what kind of grovelling is requited there, but it must be well ritualized now.

grishka 6y ago

I do. This is the exact reason why I've never bought anything digitally. Paying real money just to have some bytes streamed to you just doesn't feel right. And, I mean, you can't even resell or lend the thing.

Animats 6y ago

That's the "Tucker Carlson defense".[1] "The Court concludes that the statements are rhetorical hyperbole and opinion commentary intended to frame a political debate, and, as such, are not actionable as defamation." That worked in a defamation case, but the First Amendment defense probably won't work in a false advertising case. [1] https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7216968/9-24-20-McDougal-v-Fox-Opinion.pdf https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7216968/9-24-20-M...