So, recently I have been re-watching some classic films from my childhood, The Flight of Dragons and The Prince of Egypt to name but two. Turns out I am quite attached to the soundtrack from the latter but iTunes was a bust - I even tried to buy it from a real shop but it was no where to be found.A few Google searches later turns up 7 digital, a relatively small and unknown, but well backed, digital music retailer of both protected WMA and the unprotected MP3 formats. Unfortunately for me, The Prince of Egypt soundtrack only comes in protected WMA. "Never mind" I say, "I'll burn it, and rip it into iTunes!". So I fire up Parallels and hand over my £8.
After a rather nice page which automatically licenses me for these tracks I think I'm well away and progress to the download page where I try to download the album. 96%... 97%... 98%... 99%... "Error, the connection was reset by the server." - great. I try again. 96%... 97%... 98%... 99%... "Error, the connection was reset by the server." - Grr! 4 tries later I give up and download the files using Safari on OS X only to copy them back into Windows to actually use them. At last.
Connect my DVD-RW to Parallels. Pop in a blank CD. Open Media Player. Click burn. "Please attach a burner and restart the player." - What? It says it's a burner in My Computer!? Three virtual reboots later and a quick scan of the parallels forums indicates that CD burning from media player is not supported. Great.
Reboot into Windows on the hardware. "Windows needs to be activated to continue.". OK. Activate over the internet. Nope. What? Why not! I bought this copy of Windows (I really did) - why can't I activate!? Call support? It's 10:30 PM, not now. Reboot into OS X, fire up Parallels.
OK, so as you can see not a happy experience so far. So I hunt for some software to remove the protection without burning to CD - which if you haven't ever done so, while possible requires very specific version of Media Player to even work, I tried three different tools until one finally spat out untagged MP3's. Good enough. I'll add the tags myself. Finally, in iTunes and synchronised to my iPhone.
Lets catch up on some TV I've missed messing around with this using 4oD (Windows only). What's that? Automatic updates are turned off? I'll turn them back on... on. On. On, err, I said on! AVG: "You are infected!"
Yes, I got a virus. A virus. Which I was still trying to remove 18 hrs later. All this for a few minutes of music which I can play on my iPhone!?
Eventually I gave up and blasted Windows away.
The amount of ridiculous access controls and limitations added by Microsoft to this process have ensured I'll never buy WMA protected music again - even for a Zune. Sometimes I think I should give up - pirating my music and software would be easier!
Disclosure: this incident happened about 5 months ago, but I've only just got around to publishing the draft!
5 comments:
Users have walked just as frustrating a path with iTunes DRM, and it's only recently that Apple started dropping DRM.
With OSX you have the benefit of sitting with a first party hardware and software platform and there's greater control over your experience as result, which obviously comes at a premium. The first stupid thing you did was buy DRM music in the first place - you're only supporting the principles that caused the frustration you experienced, and you blamed Microsoft, not the music labels that imposed these restrictions, for the pleasure. But ok, MS are not beyond admonition on this, so let's leave it at that. There are more reasons to hate DRM anyway: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2008/04/drm-sucks-redux-microsoft-to-nuke-msn-music-drm-keys.ars and this is true of ANY provider facilitating or applying DRM practices.
The second stupid thing you did was use AVG, a free antivirus software, which was recently raked over the coals for having removed a critical windows file during an update. But fair enough, there's a point to be made about NEEDING such software in the first place.
So let's come back to "Windows DRM from a Mac Users perspective": is there any perspective, across heterogeneous systems, where you would have had a favourable experience?
I'd say in general I have a positive experience with Apple's DRM. Not only can you burn it not matter what platform you choose to use you can do so an unlimited number of times. I had five attempts with Windows DRM, and that was it.
My alternative of course was not to have the tracks as I was unable to purchase them in a physical media format or DRM free at that time. I'd rather support the artists involved rather than pirate the tracks.
Microsoft in this case, I find at fault for not providing a player for the Mac platform. As I have already highlighted, Apple already does so.
Despite the fact that I paid for the privilege of using Windows (and Media Player by extension) by actually purchasing it I was unable to use it to burn a disc of my music, although it was within my rights to do so. If this was the fault of Microsoft or Parallels is up for debate, but I was not attempting to do anything unlawful or technically difficult.
I was also quite disappointed by Microsoft's product activation system for Windows XP. After installing Service Pack 3 (some weeks earlier) I was then unable to boot natively on the hardware with out reactivation which the system refused to do.
While I'm rather not get into a debate about my "stupid[ity]" with regard to my choice of antivirus software (Note: Grisoft is the worlds fourth largest AV company and is backed by Intel) with you I'd like to point out that Norton and McAfee rarely fair any better.
Yup, you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned that there's no WMP for Mac... you shouldn't have to be constrained by the software any more than you should be constrained by the OS. Until digital music is sold DRM-free in non-proprietary lossless formats such as FLAC, we're all just chumps for one restriction or another. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FairPlay#Restrictions doesn't sound like a cakewalk - all these complex funnels to appease the record companies, and yet it all ties in very neatly into Apple products only, with exceptions for one licensed 3rd party vendor.
AVG's not horrible, but it isn't great - and Symantec / McAfee are famously bloated as well, so I was never going to put them forth as worthy alternatives. I've used licensed version of Norton, McAfee, Bitdefender and Eset Smart Security and can happily recommend the latter - there is a free version, but the basic paid-for version is very good and offers a firewall and antispam.
PS. It may not be a label with music to your taste, but try www.bleep.com - they offer FLAC downloads of artists on the Warp label. Also: www.magnatunes.com, www.marineparade.net (they offer WAVs but the store is a bit broken at the moment), and even Amazon sells drm-free mp3s.
also: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/03/apple-adds-still-more-drm-ipod-shuffle
I didn't want to make rash assumptions without seeing the product or having more than circumstantial evidence but it turns out their is NOT any DRM in the 'new' Apple headphones, simple a "transmission chip" which can [legally] be reverse engineered.
The only reason you would want a license from Apple is to display the "Made for iPod" logo in the same way you'd license the "Made for Windows" logo from Microsoft.
More information can be found here: http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2009/03/16/manufacturer-confirm.html
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