Wednesday 6 October 2004

What's your digital format of choice?

Most people are familiar with the myriad of formats out there for digital music - mp3, wma, ogg vorbis, aac, etc. According to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, however, the most popular format, especially for owners of iPods is "stolen". Now I'm not a tech head, but I think that this format is open source and no royalties need be paid to a governing body.

Apparently he's not familiar with the fair use clause in the US where a person is allowed to make a back up of purchased music for their own personal use (in this case for their Ipod) or the raging success of sub-standard downloads from places like the iTunes Shop. Ah to be in charge of a company and be so out of the loop.

According to Silicon.com today, Ballmer's almost apologised for his gaff... if saying "I don't know what I said exactly, but it was baaaaad!" can be considered an apology.

I've got no time for paid-for downloads of sub-standard quality, but I also have no time for being called a thief just because I had the misfortune to buy an Ipod. My CD collection runs into the thousands (mainly because the record industry CAN'T release a single on a single CD, ironically) and as such, I will continue to import the tracks I choose onto my Ipod to listen to when and where I want, and be damned Microsoft and this Ballmer character.

-- Link: Slashdot.org

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