At: Adrideo/2007/ipod-touch-starbucks

Why, if I pay for an iPod touch...

(which I probably will)

…should some of the features I paid for only work in Starbucks?

It's about time portable devices spoke freely to each other and to the base stations, regardless of brand or partnership arrangement. Ashok has been on to this for a long time.

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Tagged: Media

Posted at 07:48 BST, 6th September 2007.

2 Comments

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Ashok on 6th September 2007

Because Apple can make more money restricting their users' choices, at least for now.

Apple's earlier music approach was essentially pro-user – Rip, Mix, Burn & all that. The modern analogue to that would be rip your DVDs, record broadcast television and move the files from your computers to personal media players easily and simply. We have all of the technology to do that, and make it shiny, but Apple is (quite understandably) addicted to being the retailer, as well as the shiny-gadget-maker, and they are well placed to put road-blocks in the way of people who want to use their devices in a more open way.

I honestly expect that we will get more open systems over time: we've seen that shift, particularly in networked systems, for a very long time. CIX and Compuserve were interesting systems, but they couldn't compete with the open internet, as it matured. Many publishers & many readers, with a wide variety of devices and software using common protocols and formats. We're a shockingly long way from that with online video, not in the tech, but in how people use it.

I think the iPod touch is a damn fine Web browsing device, and possibly a very funky, hopped-up universal remote. There's a fair chance I'll buy one, too; but I can't see myself using the iTMS, because I'm not willing to rent my music, and I've no idea what will be the best player in 4 or 5 years time. I'm interested in how the arguments play out about loading your own software on them. Apple's assertion that they need to lock down the iPhone to assure the stability of the cell network is a little hollow. I doubt they will take the hands-off approach to the geeks as they have with the Apple tv.

As you say, I've been thinking about how to make these widgets play nicely with one another for some time, and have a couple of notebooks stacked with ideas. Now comes the fun part, when we start playing with real devices.

Chris Jackson[chris] on 7th September 2007

It's funny. Most people agree that Apple has a better chance of growing its earnings through hardware than through content retail.

My comments were from a consumer perspective. From Apple's corporate perspective these closed content partnerships only make sense if they do not risk denting hardware sales.

I guess they must be more optimistic than me about the amount of goodwill they will enjoy.