A while ago, I was pleased to discover iPodDownload, a utility that let you move audio files from your iPod to a computer. Apple doesn’t want you to do this, because it apparently encourages piracy. While I’m a sometime pirate, all I wanted to do was use my iPod to move my audio files from my desktop to my laptop computer–a totally legal and legitimate application of the technology.
Unfortunately, as BoingBoing reports, Apple has released iTunes 4.7, which breaks iPodDownload. I’m displeased, but Cory Doctorow is very upset:
What’s the lesson here? Well, Apple’s not on your side, even if you’re an Apple customer. If you buy into a proprietary platform where the music industry gets a veto, you’re scr0d. Every time you buy an iPod, you are financing legal and technical countermeasures aimed at taking away legitimate features that enable you to do more with your lawfully acquired music and hardware.
As Cory’s fond of saying, “no consumer wakes up in the morning and wants to do less with their technology.” Thanks a lot, Apple.
UPDATE: Cory Doctorow has more to say on the iPodDownload business, as does Dave Winer.
UPDATE #2: Further evidence that Apple acted intentionally, and a fix. C’est bon. Thanks, Unofficial Apple Weblog.
DarrenBarefoot.com 
“As Cory’s fond of saying, ‘no consumer wakes up in the morning and wants to do less with their technology.’ Thanks a lot, Apple.”
Apple never suggested you should use iPodDownload. I’m sure, if you asked, they’d suggest you use your iPod in “disk mode” to transfer your files:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61131
Krishen: Thanks for that. I’m aware of disk mode, but that would require me to (as per the 10 step procedure on that page you referenced) delete all of the music off my iPod, turn on disk mode, copy all my music from my desktop to my iPod, then copy all my music from my iPod to my laptop (assuming, of course, that my laptop automagically recognizes the iPod as an external hard drive. If not, I’ve got other steps to sort out).
It is obviously far more convenient to use iPodDownloader.
The point here is that I should be able to use technology in legal, legitimate ways other than the ways the seller suggests. Apple has only succeeded in making it harder to use their technology, and irritating me.
For example, say that the makers of Mini Cooper suggested that you don’t take your Mini off-roading. However, the way cars currently work, I can still do so if I want to. If they maintained cars the way Apple maintains its hardware and software, my Mini would grind to a halt when its wheels touched gravel.
You can still transfer files from the iPod with existing programs, such as PodWorks. Which amazingly, having not been updated majorly since before summer, works flawlessly with iTunes 4.7.
I’m amazed that Apple is at fault for a hack program breaking with an application update and the reasons for the breakage is attributed to Apple wanting to eliminate alternate usage when they hired the programmer of PodWorks.
James: I was unaware of PodWorks, so thanks for the tip. I checked it out, and it wouldn’t work for me, as it “allows you to copy songs from any Mac iPod to any Mac running OS X 10.2 or higher (including Panther).” I’m transfering from a Windows desktop to a Mac laptop.
This is silly. It’s not Apple’s responsibility to ensure that the iPod works with third-party hacks.
Every time something like this happens, people get all up in arms as if the big corporations want nothing better than to stick it to you, the little guy, as though there were something fundamentally wrong with a company making a profit off a good product. It’s tedious.
Joke: In light of the fact that this is a point release, the likeliest conclusion is that Apple has intentionally blocked the iPodDownloader functionality.
Where did I say that there was something wrong with Apple making a profit? All I’ve said is that there’s something fundamentally wrong with making their device less convenient for me to use.
I don’t know what a point release is. 4.7 is the version designed for compatibility with the iPod colour. I imagine it was inadvertent, in light of the fact that Apple has provides the iPod-as-disk mode and that several other utilities still appear to work.
Darren, you’re right. I was being peevish, and fretting about something more general. I think people get upset at how a company behaves, which is often pretty sensible — they’re certainly not trying to screw anyone — and often don’t focus on the big picture, that there is something fundamentally wrong with intellectual property law (e.g. the DMCA).
Well I doubt it was inadvertant, but regardless the limitations on copying music tracks in the first place are enough to irk me.
Sometimes I feel like the biggest goodie-two-shoes, because every .mp3 I’ve ever kept around for a long time has been legally mine.
That’s nearly true of me as well. The vast majority of my collection have been legally acquired (well, the legality of http://www.allofmp3.com is up for grabs). Then, of the minority, many are bootlegs, which are illegal but there’s no means for me to acquire them legally.
I suspect that the majority of music listeners pull mostly from their own collections of CDs, albums, etc..
The HUGE majority of people I know have mostly pirated music. They’re all in their early to mid 20’s, and probably have at least 30GB illegal music each.
Personally, I still buy new CDs of bands that I really like. New NIN disc coming out? I’ll get it, because I have every other one. New Primus DVD/CD? Sure. But I’m not going to go buy Beatles or Floyd albums – if I bought the White Album or The Wall, who would the money go to? The rights have likely been sold off years ago. So, I download the entire Beatles / Floyd discography. Most of my friends have the same mentality.
i said it once, i’ll say it again: don’t ever buy apple products!
Chris, I really see your position. I don’t even steal music for which the original artists are dead, but I don’t really know why. I guess I always like to have the whole album, and I believe that we should try to obey laws, even if they’re bad. I wonder, if you receive royalties on your works, and then die, do your heirs continue to receive royalties? And if so, do they pay inheritance tax on royalties they receive years after your death?
It looks like I was wrong about the iPodDownload thing. It suprises me, particularly given that Apple provides a disk mode. I wonder what Apple’s reasoning was.
I always download whole albums, not single tracks. Well, with the notable exception of one-hit wonders, and/or random stuff like Monster Mash.
Additionally, I don’t mind breaking the law if it doesn’t harm another. For instance, pirating music (that I wouldn’t have bought otherwise), doing drugs (that doesn’t support organized crime, such as ones I’ve made myself), etc.
4.7 may be a point release but it has restructured iPod support for the iPod Photo
A bit of an aside, but point-releases often connote large feature upgrades — witness the change from Mac OS X 10.2->10.3 — not just user-crippling malware.
By the way, Darren, shortly after your reply to my comment, I contemplated at length on what Apple’s possible motives were, and could not come up with a reasonable explanation, other than to keep the label lawyers happy. But by the time I was about to post it, several other people had come along with new information and had invalidated what I was going to say 🙂
That “iPod Download” shows up in iTunes’ hex sure is damning. Though I must say this is the first evidence I’ve seen to suggest the breakage was more than accidental.
Great discussion, by the way.
Krishen: Yeah, though really Apple is flouting traditional software practice with the scope of their point release. Both Wikipedia and Macromedia suggest that point releases feature minor updates.
Point releases don’t really mean anything about the size of the change. There’s no enforcement at all. I could release a brand new piece of software as version 7.0. Tex, the typesetting system, has version numbers that asymptotically approach pi – the fifth release was 3.1415, the current version (the seventh) is 3.141592. The company I worked for this summer, the world leader in boat navigational software, moved from 4.2 to 4.3, and it was a MASSIVE overhaul. Winamp went from 3 to 5.
The change in number means next to nothing. Sometimes it can be indicitive of change, sometimes it can be completely unrelated. The only reliable indicator is the changelog.
Chris: You’re right, and that’s unfortunate. I’ll bet if we went back 10 or 15 years, we’d find some industry agreement on what changes to the right and left of the decimal place actually meant.
I’m not sure if such an agreement exists – the industry is more organized now than it was 15 years ago, and even now it would be very hard to get “the industry” to agree on this. Also, Tex and my former company’s software have been around at least that long.
TeX (and its sister METAFONT, whose version number asymptotically approaches e=2.71828182…) are in a mature, completely stable form. Donald E. Knuth, their author, is offering an exponentially increasing (by factors of two) sum to anyone who finds a bug. The sum is presently $327.68. That’s cojones.