For a little while now, I've been intrigued by the offerings of DRM free music through Apple's iTunes music store. I understand that a lot of independent offerings have been made available as well as some major label music albeit not a lot. However, as my computer systems run Linux and have no option to boot into Windows, I haven't had the opportunity to check it out.
It seems to be a pretty daft situation really. iTunes is available for Mac OS X, obvious since it's Apple's system. It's also available for Windows - it has to be since Microsoft dominates the PC OS market. However, Linux is left out. One might ask why that's daft since Linux users are in a minority, but Linux is improving all the time and with distributions such as Ubuntu (and its derivatives), PC Linux OS and Sabayon; it's getting very easy to use "out of the box".
This can only mean that the number of Linux users will continue to grow and as a result of that, the number of people unable to use Apple's music store also increases. This could impact the sales of iPods due to the (mistaken) belief that iTunes is an essential requirement to owning the leading digital music player.
As it stands at the moment, my digital music downloads come from eMusic, Audio Lunchbox and 7Digital. All of these provide DRM free music in the MP3 format but a vast majority of the 7Digital catalogue is off-limits to me due to major labels insisting on DRM in their files which comes in the form of protected WMA files. Now I know there is little chance of these files being playable on Linux systems due to the format belonging to Microsoft and them requiring a royalty for the ability to decode WMA files.
So there is an opportunity here for Apple. One where the company can provide the only solution to purchasing DRM protected music on Linux based systems. Considering OS X is UNIX based, a port from their Mac version of iTunes to a Linux version shouldn't be too difficult.
Unfortunately, at the present time their does not seem to be much hope that a port will happen. Their is a petition available to sign on the internet that has just shy of 11600 signatures, but I doubt that's really enough.
So their are only three other options available. One is to have a dual boot computer with both Windows and Linux available, but I don't see that as an ideal solution. Second is to try to use iTunes with WINE under Linux. Version 7.3 of iTunes does install in the latest version of WINE but it runs incredibly slowly to the point where it's not really usable, however hopefully it will improve with later versions of WINE. The third option is to forget it and continue taking my business to the stores I currently use.
At the moment, I'm going to continue with the third option. I do like the stores I currently use and have little intention of dropping them completely even if iTunes does make it to Linux. It just seems a missed opportunity by Apple not providing a version of the leading digital music store that myself and many others like me would be willing to run and spend money through.
It seems to be a pretty daft situation really. iTunes is available for Mac OS X, obvious since it's Apple's system. It's also available for Windows - it has to be since Microsoft dominates the PC OS market. However, Linux is left out. One might ask why that's daft since Linux users are in a minority, but Linux is improving all the time and with distributions such as Ubuntu (and its derivatives), PC Linux OS and Sabayon; it's getting very easy to use "out of the box".
This can only mean that the number of Linux users will continue to grow and as a result of that, the number of people unable to use Apple's music store also increases. This could impact the sales of iPods due to the (mistaken) belief that iTunes is an essential requirement to owning the leading digital music player.
As it stands at the moment, my digital music downloads come from eMusic, Audio Lunchbox and 7Digital. All of these provide DRM free music in the MP3 format but a vast majority of the 7Digital catalogue is off-limits to me due to major labels insisting on DRM in their files which comes in the form of protected WMA files. Now I know there is little chance of these files being playable on Linux systems due to the format belonging to Microsoft and them requiring a royalty for the ability to decode WMA files.
So there is an opportunity here for Apple. One where the company can provide the only solution to purchasing DRM protected music on Linux based systems. Considering OS X is UNIX based, a port from their Mac version of iTunes to a Linux version shouldn't be too difficult.
Unfortunately, at the present time their does not seem to be much hope that a port will happen. Their is a petition available to sign on the internet that has just shy of 11600 signatures, but I doubt that's really enough.
So their are only three other options available. One is to have a dual boot computer with both Windows and Linux available, but I don't see that as an ideal solution. Second is to try to use iTunes with WINE under Linux. Version 7.3 of iTunes does install in the latest version of WINE but it runs incredibly slowly to the point where it's not really usable, however hopefully it will improve with later versions of WINE. The third option is to forget it and continue taking my business to the stores I currently use.
At the moment, I'm going to continue with the third option. I do like the stores I currently use and have little intention of dropping them completely even if iTunes does make it to Linux. It just seems a missed opportunity by Apple not providing a version of the leading digital music store that myself and many others like me would be willing to run and spend money through.