back to article USB supreme court backs Apple in Palm Pre kerfuffle

The USB Implementers Forum has decreed that Apple has not violated industry standards by preventing the Palm Pre from accessing iTunes. When Palm released the Pre over the summer, it synced up nicely with Apple's online music and media fiefdom, cleverly masquerading as an iPod. But Jobs and company soon put a stop to such …

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  1. Drew Scott
    Stop

    Bashing head against brick wall...

    Why is Palm being so boneheaded about this? No one is stopping them from syncing with media stored on their users' computer. If they want to use Apple's library so they can get playlists, etc then the library is stored as a XML file with documented format. This is how other vendors are syncing with iTunes!

  2. Mark 65
    FAIL

    @Drew Scott

    It's because Palm are lazy shits and want to ponce off of the back of somebody else's labour. Upgrades for free, fixes for free etc.

  3. Antidisestablishmentarianist
    FAIL

    Moral Crusade

    So it comes out that Palm are the ones breaking the 'rules' rather than Apple. How embarrassing for them. Will they give up quietly now, or turn this into some groundless freetardlike moral crusade.

  4. Andrew Johnson 1
    Alert

    Or Maybe...

    Yes they may want Apple to do the work, but surely this is good for Apple. It's another device that will let people continue to use iTunes & the Apple store. Doesn't this make it easier for the customer too ? instead of having to use 2 bits of software to use. If it wasn't for the fact I have an iPod and an iPhone, I would be using Amazons MP3 service - it's cheaper than Apple in the UK!

    If Apple want to stay the market leader in online music, they should let other people in. Palms breaking of the rules not withstanding.

  5. Alex King
    FAIL

    Palm fail

    Fingers will now fall off

  6. windywoo
    Jobs Horns

    Shame

    Although I agree that Palm were in the wrong to use another vendor ID, I also think that Apple are being their usual shit eating selves by allowing the primary media library on OSX to synch only with iPods. If this were Microsoft with Windows Media Player think of the witch hunt that would ensue.

    Allowing 3rd parties to write their own software is an AWFUL solution. Just look at all the shit that third parties put on your computer for printers, cameras, phones etc. Windows comes under criticism for having lots of bloat, but Apple are encouraging it, and confusing their customers at the same time. What happens when the customer gets a new MP3 player? Are they going to uninstall their old software? In my experience, no they won't.

    Apple use their OS to sell more iPods, a practice which is as detestable as it is lapped up by every fanboi with more money than sense.

  7. Ascylto

    But ...

    Palm offered Apple zillions of dollars to help in Apple's development and implementation of iTunes didn't they?

    They didn't?

    Oh!

  8. Simon Buttress
    Coffee/keyboard

    @Drew Scott

    It's corporate idiocy at its very worst. Someone came up with the good idea of the Pre palming off as an iPod when connecting to iTunes. No-one pointed out the bloody obvious that it is in fact a stupid idea that's bound to fail in the real world once Apple knew what they were doing.

    Now all they are doing is backing their idea until they run out of courts and/or money until the inevitable face loss...or Palm are working virulently behind the scenes to get to an out-of-court settlement whilst the public law show is a distraction.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    @Antidisestablishmentarianist

    Freetardary doesn't come into it. Entitletardary does.

    Anyway, Palm are clearly in the wrong here. And remember, if iTunes was a MS app it'd be encrypted and DRM'd to hell and back. It's surprising how often Apple gets things right.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    @Antidisestablishmentarianist

    I bet freetardiness

  11. Jess

    Palm should not fake another ID in a shipped device

    however, I don't think it would be wrong to ship an app that temporarily changes the identity until the next reboot.

  12. Stephen Usher
    FAIL

    @Drew Scott

    Unfortunately, it seems that Apple change the library format with every major release of iTunes. Have you not noticed the "Updating Library" dialogue box?

    As I see it, both Palm and Apple are being boneheaded.

    Apple should see this as an opportunity. The more devices which sync with iTunes the more revenue they'll get from the iTunes store. *Ka-Ching!*

    Palm should play by the rules. They should also have tried to go into discussions with Apple over trying to get an agreement to sync their device.

  13. rincewind
    Jobs Horns

    o iTunes

    Surely they should just piggy back off winamp, the superior syncing application. As i recall iTunes was a bloated old hag of a program and kept doing weird syncing/backups when i didnt want it too.

  14. Matthew Morrison

    @ Andrew Johnston 1

    You know, Amazon's MP3 service supplies a program that automatically imports your purchase into iTunes for you.

  15. Alan 6

    @ AC 07:33

    No, if iTunes was an MS app they'd have been dragged before the supreme court for not letting World + Dog have free & open access.

    the answer to all this is simple, stop buying low grade music from iTunes, get it from somewhere that doesn't compress the hell out of the music...

  16. Gary F 1

    @windywoo

    "I also think that Apple are being their usual shit eating selves by allowing the primary media library on OSX to synch only with iPods"

    The library can be synced with other devices, just not by using iTunes.

    "Allowing 3rd parties to write their own software is an AWFUL solution"

    Are you truly stupid or just so much of an Apple hater, that when talking about them you can't help the drivel that comes out?

    Why should Apple spend their time and money to offer support for the competitions hardware?

    iTunes is Apples software used to sync to Apple hardware.

    Do you also want HP to offer support for Epson and Cannon Printer in thier drivers?

    3rd parties writing software to support their own hardware is entirely the point. If they can't or won't support their own device in that basic way, then I don't want their device.

    Why buy hardware that the manufacturer doesn't fully support, instead expecting another company to do the job for them?

    " Apple are encouraging it, and confusing their customers at the same time"

    Moron.

    By that rationale, every Printer, camera and peripheral manufacturer is confusing their customers when they give drivers/software for their devices, whether on Windows or Mac OS.

    "Apple use their OS to sell more iPods, a practice which is as detestable as it is lapped up by every fanboi with more money than sense".

    You obviously haven't used OSX if you think it is just a platform to sell iPods. This statement alone singles you out as a trolling simpleton.

    And the old "Macs are expensive" argument? Are they? seriously?

    I honestly don't class them as anything near expensive.

    It would seem your issue is probably that Burger King aren't paying you enough, so just because you can't afford a Mac, you have to hate them instead.

    Loser.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Alan 6

    Alan 6 wrote: "the answer to all this is simple, stop buying low grade music from iTunes, get it from somewhere that doesn't compress the hell out of the music..."

    Yeah that's right. Buy it from Amazon and load it into iTunes anyway...

    And to all the other retards who don't yet know - MP3s are MP3s, you can always use drag and drop!!

  18. The BigYin
    Flame

    Simple answer?

    How much would it cost Palm to build their own iTunes syncing app?

    Take that figure and offer it as the fee for a perpetual license to Apple, plus an annual fee for "support".

    If Apple bite, then Apple get not only this fee but all profit from future sales on iTunes made by Palm owners.

    (Some terms would no doubt need to be negotiated - depends on the revenue from iPod/iTune sales).

    If Apple do not bite, bring in the regulators to investigate.

    iTunes is the de facto media MP3/media manager on all platforms bar Linux. They have the monopoly (and for good reason, iTunes is fairly good at what it does; certainly better than any of the alternatives). Apple need to be compelled to act like a benevolent monopolist, not a bunch of shits.

    Hmm...even better...force Apple to standardise the library format and have it made an ISO standard. Any device that uses the standard can sync. But that would be too damned easy.

    If this was MS doing the same thing, the Apple/Linux fanbois would be up in arms. But as it is Apple, Saint Jobs does no wrong and we must all hail the Cupertino Overfiends.

  19. Rod MacLean

    @Stephen Usher

    Stephen Usher wrote: "Unfortunately, it seems that Apple change the library format with every major release of iTunes. Have you not noticed the "Updating Library" dialogue box?"

    It's XML. They might add a new tag in there from time to time but as far as I know, they don't change the tag names, so once you know how to read it, you always can.

  20. Sarah Bee (Written by Reg staff)

    Re: @windywoo

    See, this is the moderator's conundrum - how to allow people to respond fairly to others but not let it descend into girlie fisticuffs.

    Less of the direct insults, please?

    Macs *are* expensive. I have no particular loyalty, and would probably get a Mac if I could afford one. But I can't. Anyway, as you were.

  21. Jacqui Smith's DVD Collection!
    Stop

    I use iTunes

    I use iTunes to sync my music and podcasts to my Apple TV, as it stands I need to manually keep another app in sync with iTunes so I can keep my Sony Walkman in sync, why? because Apple insists in keeping it's software locked up.

    Palm should be demanding access along with the other manufacturers, iTunes is in effect a monopoly.

  22. Psymon

    I'd have to agree with windywoo

    Palm went about this the wrong way.

    Of course they were bound to lose by complaining to the USB standards authority, as it was their device, not apples that was implementing the USB standard incorrectly by faking the devices ID.

    This is a big no-no for so many obvious reasons.

    The immoral and monopolistic behaviour is actually in the Itunes code that forces lock-in to ONLY Apple devices. Again, this type of behaviour would not be tollerated from the more established and mature companies like Intel and MS.

    As for the whole spunging arguement? Grow up. The customer might using a different device, but they are still buying all their music through Itunes and the Apple store, which makes Apple more money in the long term than the single sale of an Ipod (which has a aggresively low profit margin specifically to ensure rapid adoption of the Apple store).

    It's the same culture of corporate arrogance that you see in all young companies that experience sudden and explosive growth.

    Apples behaviour and general tendancy to lock in or lock down is steadily drawing attention to the fact that they are no longer selling highly custom and proprietry products to niche markets. The Ipod is just an mp3 player, no different to the other miriad of mp3 players on the market, and their Itunes software does not rely on or require the device in any way to function correctly. This was the same arguement that defeated MS in the IE case.

    These deliberate attempts to block other organisations from using their standards and protocols are dangerous waters, and stiffle innovation. It's only a matter of time before some clever legal team establish that Apple are a monopoly on SOME level, and when that happens hevy sanctions will be levied

  23. E Haines

    @Stephen Usher

    >"Unfortunately, it seems that Apple change the library format with every major release of iTunes. Have you not noticed the "Updating Library" dialogue box?"

    You're terribly confused. The iTunes library is used only by iTunes. If they do change it every release, so what? Nobody cares. The only people who have to deal with it are the iTunes programmers.

    The XML file, on the other hand, is essentially a copy of the library in an open format for use by third parties. iTunes itself does not use this for anything. It does not get changed every release. It's there so everybody else can happily interoperate with iTunes in any ol' way they like.

    Simple, no? Maybe Palm can use this, like--I dunno--RIM maybe? Works for them....

  24. hexx

    Gary F 1

    you've just saved my fingers:)

  25. Jason Bloomberg Silver badge
    Happy

    As expected ...

    ... thank god, or there'd be no justice in the world.

    Palm effectively complained that Apple had changed the lock to their front door and Palm's cloned key no longer worked. Well that's just tough, and it was clear to everyone - except Palm apparently - who was in the wrong here.

    Palm have however got off lightly because, while everyone is entitled to choose what opens their doors, Palm broke the rules by creating a clone key and masquerading as something they were not. How Palm ever thought the USB consortium would ever decide otherwise is beyond me, as is how they thought that Apple would continue to let them get away with it.

    Palm have made themselves a laughing stock. Talk about five-finger shufflers.

  26. Michael C
    Stop

    @Psymon

    1) So should HP be slapped for not allowing Cannon printers to use their drivers and software? Should Kodak be allowed to spoof Sony's ID so that their cameras can operate as camcorder inputs into Sony's proprietary software? No. And here's the big one: Should PALM then not be forced to allow APPLE'S iPhone to sync with Palm Desktop!?!?! I'm sure Palm would have serious issue with that (as they DID prevent numerouscompetitors from doing just that!)

    2) iTunes is not a market, its an application. A FREE application in a field of other FREE software that directly competes on features. Music is the market, and there's no lock-in with the music sold by Apple, it's not proprietary to their devices (even when it was, all one needed to do was rip to CD and back again, LEGALLY, and fully supported by Apple's EULA), iTunes plays any MP3 files, and any software that wants to can freely (again, supprtoed undedr the EULA) connect to the XML file and sync anything, including playlists, ratings, and more. iTunes actually isn't even so much an application, but a DRIVER, not at all different from the proprietary software that comes with your ATI video card, or an HP printer, that only works with their devce even though it does things very similar to other devices. This software was developed by Apple at their won cost. They HAVE a legitimate plug-in interface which can be cheaply licensed and used, and have provided free (no license) access to the XML file for anyone to access and use.

    3) Music sales in iTunes, though massive, are not higer profit than the iPod segment of their business. iTunes REVENUE, yes, much higher, but the PROFIT is less, even more so when you strip out TV, Movie, and App purchases. Even the smallest iPod, the shuffle, costs only $26 to make out of it's $79 street price (about $62 wholesale), so a roughly $40 profit per unit sold... The Touch has closer to a $80 profit per unit and the iPhone more than $200. I'd not call a 30-60% profit margin "reduculously slim", in fact its quite HIGH considering the norm in the industry is only 15%... Apple, profits only pennies per track from music sales, and has often stated that the iTunes MUSIC store itself doesn't do much more than cover it's own costs, it exists to prop iPod sales. In the 5 year history, the store has only cleared 8.5 billion songs (as of Sept 2009), and at a profit of about $0.09 per song, that's less than $1B in total profit over 5 years. Apple profits nearly $2B anually, and it's no secret iPods out-profit Mac Sales. This CLEARLY demonstrates facts that prove the iTunes store can not possibly outprofit the iPod.

    4) Even if Apple did have a Monopoly on the MUSIC market (not the music management application market, since there is no such thing) it is NOT illegal to BE a monopoly (they're actually not even #1 in the music market, btw). The government does not differentiate between physical and digital music sales as seperate markets, since no matter HOW a comsumer gets music, it can all go onto their computers and portable devices. Still, Apple has less than 70% of the total DEVICE sales for DIGITAL music. Even at 95%, the generally accepted monopoly mark, they'd not only have to acheive that goal, but they would actually have to USE that staus to ACTIVELY PREVENT other competitors from entering the market, or use their status to acheive monopoly rank in a different market segment.

    5) Apple has provided more OSS than any of the other major firms, and has steered the industry to advance in numerous market segments. They've been part of more than a dozen standards groups and promoted USB, FireWire, 802.11, DisplayPort, ExpressCard, GCD, Darwin, various C++ extensions, WebKit, and many, many, many more. iTunes is a good program, which is why it's popular, and Apple PARTNERS with multiple companies for iTunes integration and offers support for syncing in multiple ways. They have done NOTHING to prevent Palm from writing their own integration, they have simply prevented Palm from doing so using an unsupported USB method that causes expenses on Apple's behalf to deal with code errors and device validation they've never before had to account for, and for Apple to take the rist that if they did NOT prevent this integration, that future updates would allienate potentially millions of iTunes users when their experienced support later broke with an update. If Apple makes it clear from the beginning that they do not support direct integration, then customers can't later be dissapointed.

    iTunes is not a protocol, it's not a standard. It is an APPLICATION, used to manage, update, control firmware for, and report errors in Apple devices. It;s a driver suite. It happens to ALSO include a music management system, but that's just a fancy GUI backended by a FLAT FILE SYSTEM, and OPEN SOURCE XML DATABASES!!! IT IS FREE TO USE, IT IS NOT PROPRITARY, it just takes EFFORT on PALM'S side to use it.

  27. jai

    @The BigYin

    "force Apple to standardise the library format and have it made an ISO standard"

    please read the rest of the comments on this thread - and every other time this topic has been mentioned on El Reg

    last i was aware, XML is a restricted subset of SGML which is ISO standard 8879

    iTunes library is accessable via XML

    Palm just need to put a couple of hours work in to build an app that'd parse the file. there's tons of 3rd party shareware apps that do this, i don't understand why Palm have so much trouble

  28. MacGyver
    WTF?

    Re: Gary F 1

    "Why should Apple spend their time and money to offer support for the competitions hardware?"

    No one asked them to, Palm spent their time and money giving their customers a choice, Apple spent their time and money trying to remove that choice. Twice.

    "Do you also want HP to offer support for Epson and Cannon Printer in thier drivers?"

    No they shouldn't, but wait until HP figures out a way to make you use only HP paper in their printer.

    "3rd parties writing software to support their own hardware is entirely the point. If they can't or won't support their own device in that basic way, then I don't want their device.

    Why buy hardware that the manufacturer doesn't fully support, instead expecting another company to do the job for them?"

    What software? The driver? You mean "USB removable Storage" driver? The same driver that just about ALL USB based media players use. The one built into windows? That driver?

    All Palm did was change their "VEN_8721&DEV_0034" into Apple's "VEN_1092&DEV_0021" on their usb chip. So that restrictions put in place by Apple would not apply, and iTunes would think it was an iPod.

    Palm wasn't asking Apple give their Pre owners tech support. Palm was just letting users of iTunes continue to use the program they were used to using, and Apple was getting money from songs sold on iTunes.

    You could always use Winamp with your Pre, and it's free as well. Palm was just giving their customers choices. Apple on the other hand, was trying to stop their iTunes users from using something other than an iPod.

    Apple on numerous occasions Apple changed their iPod database format, which in turn screwed up my ability to use Winamp with my iPod. They were taking away my choice. Paying money again to take away my choice.

    "I honestly don't class them as anything near expensive."

    Really, because I can go buy all the exact x86 based hardware that is in a new Mac, and pay one third the price. I could load OSX on it with all of it's built in drivers and it would be the same. But I can't, because OSX looks for the little Apple TPM chip. Same exact hardware, but the OS is crippled. I know, because people hacked the piece of code to ignore that chip, and it loads right up.

    "...you can always use drag and drop!!"

    Sorry, no you cannot, Apple designed their iPod to be worthless without iTunes. If you drag and drop MP3s onto your iPod, you cannot listen to them on your iPod.

    The reality is that if I buy something, it is mine. I will do with it as I please. If I want to use Winamp with my iPod, I will. If I buy music from iTunes, I will listen to it on whatever I choose.

    I know there are people out there that think because some EULA says otherwise, that what I think is wrong.

    What kind of sorry loser sits at home and thinks it's ok for other people to decide what they can and can't do with their own personal property. If they take my money, and give me their product, I will do as I damn well please, our transaction is complete, their input on my actions after that is neither welcome nor taken into consideration. But the EULA, the EULA? That's simple, I don't read EULAs, therefore I have no idea what they say. I don't care. If sell sell someone my car, and as they drive off I yell "only put Super Unleaded in it from Esso" No one would think the person I sold it to is now under a verbal contract to forever put gas from Esso in it..

  29. bolccg
    Thumb Up

    Not just good with chewing gum and paper clips!

    Nicely put there MacGyver - whole heartedly agree!

    Now, isn't there a nuclear power plant entering melt down that you sould be doing something about?

  30. Gary F 1

    @MacGyver

    Please read Michael Cs reasoned and very well constructed reply a few posts up.

    He pretty much invalidates all of your points in a reasonable, friendly and detailed way. (Much better and nicer than I would or could have).

    Lets just put it simply for all of you Palm apologists / Apple haters.

    1) Apple is not stopping you from putting your purchased music on other devices.

    2) ITunes is essentially a glorified driver, firmware manager and music organiser written for use with iPods / iPhones.

    3) Palm could (and should) have provided their own software to organise and sync that exact same music, but instead chose to leech from Apples own software.

    4) Apple have no obligation to provide any drivers or music organisation software for any other device (and I ask again, why on earth should they do this for the competitions hardware?).

    5) And once again, for those in the cheap seats, the downloaded music can be used without iTunes, and can be synced to other devices, IF your hardware manufacturer can be bothered to provide THEIR customers with the means.

    Put more simply:

    i) Purchased music - usable on other software and devices.

    ii) Free iTunes software - a device driver / music organiser for purchasers of iPods / iPhones (Apples paying customers).

    "Palm spent their time and money giving their customers a choice"

    No, they spent nothing and then fooled their customers into believing that syncing with iTunes was a done deal.

    Its amazing that you defend Palm in this.

    You talk like Palm have made every possible effort to enable music to be synced to the Pre, when in reality, they tried taking the easiest, cheapest (and dodgiest) route and got caught out.

    And somehow this is Apples fault.

    Really, take off the blinkers.

  31. Sean Timarco Baggaley
    FAIL

    @MacGyver

    You're wrong. And it's not because Apple's iTunes is a glorified driver and sync app for their iPod / iPhone products either: it's because there's a serious technical principle at stake.

    The whole point of having vendor and model IDs for USB products is because programmers need to know what the hell you've just plugged into your computer.

    The Palm Pré is NOT an iPod. It says so right there on the box: "Palm Pré" not "Apple iPod". So why is it deliberately pretending to be something it's not?

    The IT world has hardware interface standards for a f*cking reason.

    Any programmer will tell you why you really do need to know exactly what your program is trying to talk to. If iTunes thinks a Pré is an iPod, it may well try and reflash it, bricking the device. And guess who will get the blame for it! (Hint: not Palm.) Most people don't fully understand the distinction between hardware and software, so there's no reason to assume they'll realise iTunes does not, in fact, have a valid update file for their Pré.

    For this alone, I'm with Apple and the USB Industry Group. If you're going to do something, do it *right*. Don't cut corners.

    Palm's approach is primarily about cutting support costs by foisting them onto a rival. What are Apple supposed to do when a customer phones / emails to whine about iTunes not being able to upgrade their "MP3 phone thing", or run apps from the App Store, or play rented movies..? Apple's support team will now have to be trained to ensure the customer is actually using an Apple device first.

    And if the customer replies with, "Erm, it says 'Palm' on the edge. Does that help?" what is the support person supposed to do? Hang up? Tell the customer to phone Palm, who would probably just tell the customer to phone Apple again? Apple have a good track record when it comes to customer support, but Palm's trick forces them into an awkward position when it comes to public perception. They'd look bad either way.

    As others have pointed out, syncing 3rd-party devices to an iTunes library, with its playlists, etc. is EASY technically: it's just XML. It's documented. It's an open standard. It's been used happily by the likes of RIM for their Blackberry devices for ages. What the hell was Palm's problem?

    Finally, some information for the terminally ignorant:

    - iTunes is not a profit goldmine for Apple. They make a few cents per song at most. They make far more money from their iPods / iPhones. The iTunes Store is an incentive to buy the hardware, not vice-versa.

    - The iTunes store is NOT A MONOPOLY: A few seconds on Google shows Amazon sell MP3s. Napster sell MP3s. 7Digital sell MP3s. Even bloody *Tesco* sells MP3s! There's a more complete list here: http://www.mp3storeguide.com/

    - iTunes is also not the only free music syncing application on Earth. There are dozens of others, many of which are free too. If iTunes is still popular despite that competition, the reason is simple: Apple's software and UI designers must be pretty good at their jobs. That other developers suck at both is NOT Apple's fault. This is what competition is *for*.

  32. Sean Timarco Baggaley
    Stop

    @MacGyver (again)

    "What kind of sorry loser sits at home and thinks it's ok for other people to decide what they can and can't do with their own personal property."

    And your point is...?

    If I bought a low-end FIAT Punto—to use your own car analogy—would I expect it to tow a large trailer? Would I complain that it can't hold 7 people in comfort with all their luggage? No. Because that's not what it was designed for, neither do FIAT make any such claims.

    When I use iTunes, I do NOT expect it to treat non-Apple MP3 players as native devices. Why? Because Apple make no claims that it will.

    Yet you seem to believe that they do. Why?

  33. windywoo
    Paris Hilton

    @Gary F

    I don't know where to begin because plainly reading is not your strong point. You have read all sorts of bollocks into my statement that wasn't there, or didn't read what was there.

    I can afford a Mac thanks, have two, don't think they're anything special and certainly not worth paying extra for. Lucky I bought them as spares and repaired them or I would have wasted money. This is what irks me about Apple, their products are nothing special, they just look nice and people will lap that up.

    All your points about other companies drivers fall to bits because Apple provides an operating system, not just peripherals. They allow other companies routers to work with Macs because they know they would be screwed if they didn't. They have to allow other companies printers to work with their OS because again they would be screwed. But since Apple make a media player and a phone they decide not to allow other products to work with the Media Library application of their own OS. They pick and choose as they please what should work and what shouldn't.

    By the way, I am not suggesting that Apple write this software, just that they allow other companies to write drivers so that they can synch PROPERLY with iTunes, from within iTunes itself, not the third party company's software. Of course printer companies have to write their own software to make their products work, but frequently they go beyond what is necessary to make the hardware work and install all sorts of tray loading crap. Apple is encouraging this sort of bloat by refusing to allow other companies products to synch through iTunes, thus disadvantaging their customers. You can synch through all sorts of other programs but face it, the average computer user is not too well educated about computers and doesn't want the hassle of working out how to use another shitty piece of software for their phone. I should know, I help people with this sort of thing as a living, not Burger King thanks.

    If this were Microsoft, the haters would be all over them crying monopoly. Well Apple is damn close to a monopoly with iTunes, and even if they aren't at that level yet, its still double standards to allow them to get away with this.

    Sara Bee where did I hand out personal insults? I insulted a group of people, not one individual. You should see the crap they spout over at macrumors about PCs and Microsoft. Insult a lot of people and you get away with it. Insult one particular person and its a forum violation. In fact its Apple's followers that have pretty much set me against Apple. I bought a little second hand Mac and went to a Mac site to learn more about it. When I got there, the lies they told about PCs, the exaggerations made me not want to be associated with Apple. Apple's own marketing is such a crock of shit that it reinforced my feeling as well. Copy and Paste, on the iPhone marketed as if its something novel and innovative. Macs made out to be some sort of Fort Knox when in fact hackers just couldn't be bothered to attack them.

    Paris because she's famous just for her looks too.

  34. Rodrigo Rollan
    FAIL

    Sad

    If any other vendor had limited their access to apple devices, you´ll see a lot of Apple users complainign of lack of interoperability. For instance, MICROS**T WMP supports lots and lots of devices. Why itunes only supports apple´s products being one of the main music content providers is beyond me. Noone is demanding support from apple. Palm is providing support for Pre users with itunes (I know this matter of factly). Palm went about it the wrong way, but they are making a point in the fact that providing options is good.

    I propose that every vendor locks apple devices out and we´ll see: FAN BOYS,FAN BOYS , WHAT YOU GONNA DOOOO, WHAT YOU GONNA DO WHEN THEY COME FOR YOU.....

  35. Al Jones

    Boneheads

    There's lot's of boneheaded behaviour being displayed here, and most of it seems to be by those supporting apple.

    This isn't about Palm being "too lazy" to write their own application. This is about end users who already use iTunes extensively, because for most of them, they don't even understand that alternatives exist. Apples decision to "lock out" Pre users is an artificial restriction introduced for no other reason than to make it harder for end users to use a Pre. That's anti-competitive, plain and simple, and anyone who argues that Apple is doing the right thing needs a poke in the eye (especially the bonehead who suggests that Apple shouldn't "spend their time and money" supporting other hardware (which they aren't doing), but apparently thinks that they should spend their time and money introducing artificial restrictions to the end users environment.

    Go Palm, and keep putting your end users interests first!!!!!

  36. ratfox
    Thumb Down

    What if...

    What if Microsoft sold printers, and rigged Microsoft Word so that it would only print on Microsoft printers?

    Microsoft does sell mice. What if they blocked Logitech USB mice using the vendor ID?

    I understand that Apple wants people to buy iPods, but I hate it that they are, on purpose, blocking a functionality that it working.

  37. James Butler
    Thumb Down

    Goose/Gander

    So it's okay for Apple to spoof hardware encryption so the iPhone can pretend to support a security mechanism enterprise admins who run MS Exchange might attempt to enforce, and so that Apple can attempt to gain enterprise market share by lying about their device's capabilities, but it's not okay for Palm to spoof Apple's device id to make life easier for iTunes users who happen to prefer the Pre to the iPhone? Pfft.

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Can't say I care for the approach of either company

    Firstly Palm breaking the standard; just because they have good intentions doesn't make it right

    Secondly Apple; what can I say... they're just pig headed.

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