Increase the compelling works available on our chosen platform
Increase the compelling works available on our chosen platform
Posted Jun 24, 2006 12:40 UTC (Sat) by bignose (subscriber, #40)In reply to: This would be nice, but... by hummassa
Parent article: Indie Podcasting with Open Source (O'ReillyNet)
> it's no use a podcast that can't be heard in 90% of the portable
> players and in 99.9% of the not-only-CDDA car players.
By the same logic, it's no use offering a GNU/Linux version of a program that can't be run on the vast majority of desktop computers.
That's a false dichotomy. We've already seen that programmers can offer the same program so it's available to users of non-free *and* free platforms. This broadens the availability and popularity of the work.
It has the indirect effect of increasing the attractiveness of the free platform, because compelling works are available for it.
> I'm crazy for getting iPodLinux to work universally and PodZilla being
> more widespread, but things just aren't there yet.
The only way we're going to get broad support for free formats is if there's a significant demand. The only way that demand can exist is if compelling works are available in those formats. I'm asking for those who make compelling works to make them available in free formats.
Posted Jun 24, 2006 14:35 UTC (Sat)
by drag (guest, #31333)
[Link] (2 responses)
They refuse to support Ogg, even though their hardware is capable of it. (rockbox proves that).
Most people that listen to podcasts do use ipods. Ipods won't play ogg files.
Most people that listen to podcasts use Itunes free service to find them and listen to them. If you stream in a ogg format or other unsupported format then Apple won't allow your work to be shown on Itunes.
Both commonly used propriatory platforms (Microsoft Windows and Apple OS X) have a vested interest in users using their respective propriatory formats. They want you to use DRM to 'protect' your stuff. Same exact lock-in mechanism you get from using Microsoft Office.
they specificly make it easy to use their formats. Make it difficult to use Free software formats. Microsoft and Apple could easily build support for ogg/flac formats into their systems. There is no royalty to pay, there is no licensing or patent restrictions. There exists code they could use. There even exists open firmwares and hardware that supports it. But they don't support it by default. Same old game.
When the platforms your end users are using are controlled entirely by people who have a very strong desire to see you fail, except in specific cases were it serves them, then your at a extremely large disadvantage.
(hint: Watch what happens to Firefox's market share as IE7 and Vista gains popularity.)
Posted Jun 25, 2006 0:16 UTC (Sun)
by bignose (subscriber, #40)
[Link] (1 responses)
Rockbox is proof that we don't need to be limited by the hardware vendor's default software.
> Most people that listen to podcasts do use ipods.
That's as irrelevant as saying most people that use a computer on their desktop use a Windows on Intel platform. It does not argue against providing the work in a free format, for existing or potential users of the work.
Posted Jun 25, 2006 22:35 UTC (Sun)
by drag (guest, #31333)
[Link]
The-powers-that-be have a huge interest in making non-favored formats and items hard to use vs Free software items. This makes things especially difficult... I am not saying that it makes it not worth doing, however. It's very much worth doing.
I think what Free software folks realy need to do is make a Itunes equivelent. Something were you can go to easily find creative content items from intellegent publishers. Something people can use to _advertise_.
Think about it.. There are dozens of smaller indie music publishers that do CC licensed music. There are 'free' multimedia media items like Elephants dreams and numerious interesting artifacts from old film that has since passed into public domain. Even CC licensed ebooks and public domain books.
All sorts of interesting intellectual and timeless items like 'The Plato's Republic'.
The hard part for those people is exposure. Most people don't know stuff like this exists, much less were to get it and how to pay for it.
So you can theoreticly setup a Free software application were people can easily download and enjoy this content on any sort of media player or viewer they like. It's just a way to access this content.
You click on a song, for instance, that looks interesting. You get a picture of the album, a short marketting blurb from the publisher or artist, a link to their website or whatnot. You download it and listen to it (preferably with a open format).
So the end user gets a bunch of free content, the publishers get exposure, developers maybe get some income, and you promote Free formats.
Everybody wins. I think something like that would be great.
The people that control the hardware (namely Apple) won't let this happen.Increase the compelling works available on our chosen platform
> [Apple] refuse to support Ogg, even though their hardware is capable of it.Increase the compelling works available on our chosen platform
> (rockbox proves that).
Just like the difficulty of simply downloading and correct burning cdroms is a huge barrier for non-technical people vs going to the store and buying a fully configured Windows computer.Increase the compelling works available on our chosen platform