iTunes blocking Palm Pre

[WelshBloke]

Shocked I am, shocked I tell you.


Apple really can be spiteful bitches sometimes. :|

 

[dougp]

Well if Palm had remained tight lipped about it, probably would have gone "unnoticed." But when you try to rub it in the face of the company that develops the software, obviously they're going to try and fix it.

Besides, who the fuck wants to sync with iTunes? I hate that piece of software but use it because of my iPhone.

 

[gorcorps]

Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

 

[WelshBloke]

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

No, I'm surprised they spent time and money just to break the Pre compatibility.

Apple had put no work into the Pre sync, they did put some effort into breaking that sync.

 

[gorcorps]

Originally posted by: WelshBloke

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

No, I'm surprised they spent time and money just to break the Pre compatibility.

Apple had put no work into the Pre sync, they did put some effort into breaking that sync.

Oh Jesus fucking Christ. That's really what you think? This BS is gettng out of hand. Do you also believe the moon landing never happened and aliens built the pyramids? Apple updated shit and it happened to break Palm sync. They didn't test it as it's not their problem. Apple had nothing to gain from breaking sync so why would they do it? I've never expected to defend Apple of all companies but you're just too fucking stupid to ignore.

 

[bucwylde23]

Originally posted by: gorcorps

Originally posted by: WelshBloke

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

No, I'm surprised they spent time and money just to break the Pre compatibility.

Apple had put no work into the Pre sync, they did put some effort into breaking that sync.

Oh Jesus fucking Christ. That's really what you think? This BS is gettng out of hand. Do you also believe the moon landing never happened and aliens built the pyramids? Apple updated shit and it happened to break Palm sync. They didn't test it as it's not their problem. Apple had nothing to gain from breaking sync so why would they do it? I've never expected to defend Apple of all companies but you're just too fucking stupid to ignore.

Did you read the list of "fixes"? Engadget has also updated the original blog post to include this:
"Update: Apple's now gone beyond the "verification of Apple devices" phrase, calling out the Pre by name in a statement issued to BusinessWeek: "It also disables devices falsely pretending to be iPods, including the Palm Pre."

So yes, it appears Apple did go out of their way to break the Pre/iTunes sync.

 

[randay]

Originally posted by: chrisg22

Originally posted by: gorcorps

Originally posted by: WelshBloke

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

No, I'm surprised they spent time and money just to break the Pre compatibility.

Apple had put no work into the Pre sync, they did put some effort into breaking that sync.

Oh Jesus fucking Christ. That's really what you think? This BS is gettng out of hand. Do you also believe the moon landing never happened and aliens built the pyramids? Apple updated shit and it happened to break Palm sync. They didn't test it as it's not their problem. Apple had nothing to gain from breaking sync so why would they do it? I've never expected to defend Apple of all companies but you're just too fucking stupid to ignore.

Did you read the list of "fixes"? Engadget has also updated the original blog post to include this:
"Update: Apple's now gone beyond the "verification of Apple devices" phrase, calling out the Pre by name in a statement issued to BusinessWeek: "It also disables devices falsely pretending to be iPods, including the Palm Pre."

So yes, it appears Apple did go out of their way to break the Pre/iTunes sync.

its ok, i doubt anyone needed to use itunes with their pre more than just once

 

[gorcorps]

Originally posted by: chrisg22

Originally posted by: gorcorps

Originally posted by: WelshBloke

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Wait a minute... People are surprised that Apple doesn't spend time and money trying to support a competitors device? People really are trying to find any reason to hate apple aren't they? Maybe they should be bitching that Palm was relying on somebody else to provide a syncing service when they should be doing it themselves.

No, I'm surprised they spent time and money just to break the Pre compatibility.

Apple had put no work into the Pre sync, they did put some effort into breaking that sync.

Oh Jesus fucking Christ. That's really what you think? This BS is gettng out of hand. Do you also believe the moon landing never happened and aliens built the pyramids? Apple updated shit and it happened to break Palm sync. They didn't test it as it's not their problem. Apple had nothing to gain from breaking sync so why would they do it? I've never expected to defend Apple of all companies but you're just too fucking stupid to ignore.

Did you read the list of "fixes"? Engadget has also updated the original blog post to include this:
"Update: Apple's now gone beyond the "verification of Apple devices" phrase, calling out the Pre by name in a statement issued to BusinessWeek: "It also disables devices falsely pretending to be iPods, including the Palm Pre."

So yes, it appears Apple did go out of their way to break the Pre/iTunes sync.

I did read it, but the update wasn't there at the time.

Fair enough, WelshBloke... my apologies. I still stand by my thought that Palm needs to deal with the sync themselves instead of bypassing somebody else's protection and praying they're okay with it.

 

[bucwylde23]

Eh I don't really care if apple broke it on purpose, I would never voluntarily use iTunes anyways. There's much better software for that.

 

[gorcorps]

I wouldn't think any Palm user would want to use itunes either. I can't stand it. I only have it installed to update my iphone, and I still would like another option. It's not allowed to ever touch my music after what it did to it the first time.

 

[pm]

This move doesn't seem like a smart business move for Apple - this seems more like one of those angry-CEO moves that are more emotion based than intellect based.

If I'd been them, I have let it sync just fine and put up an ad for Apple products while it syncs or something. Disabling - and in particular coming out in the press and saying "we disabled it on purpose" makes them look petty, and reduces the number of users using the iTunes store. If people use iTunes to sync, they are more likely to use iTunes to buy movies and music. If they can't... they'll look elsewhere... like Amazon.

I'm not impressed. Punishing the customers who just want to use your product is never smart.


Like many others, I mostly view iTunes as a necessary evil to use my iPhone. I like the iTunes store in general - I like the organization of it. But I don't like iTunes software itself. It can be a bit flaky - it stopped backing up my iPhone at some point for some mystery error that wouldn't fix itself even when I reinstalled (resolved itself when I switched to Win7). I don't like the way it organizes music, I find the interface mostly non-intuitive, and it has weird little bugs (like there are two copies of my movies and some of my apps and I have no idea why, but deleting them and then rescanning results in 2 copies again, but there's only one copy on the disk). I agree with everyone else - if I had a Pre, I'd use something else. But regardless of the quality of iTunes, this is still not a smart business move in my mind.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

Originally posted by: pm
This move doesn't seem like a smart business move for Apple - this seems more like one of those angry-CEO moves that are more emotion based than intellect based.

If I'd been them, I have let it sync just fine and put up an ad for Apple products while it syncs or something. Disabling - and in particular coming out in the press and saying "we disabled it on purpose" makes them look petty, and reduces the number of users using the iTunes store. If people use iTunes to sync, they are more likely to use iTunes to buy movies and music. If they can't... they'll look elsewhere... like Amazon.

I'm not impressed. Punishing the customers who just want to use your product is never smart.


Like many others, I mostly view iTunes as a necessary evil to use my iPhone. I like the iTunes store in general - I like the organization of it. But I don't like iTunes software itself. It can be a bit flaky - it stopped backing up my iPhone at some point for some mystery error that wouldn't fix itself even when I reinstalled (resolved itself when I switched to Win7). I don't like the way it organizes music, I find the interface mostly non-intuitive, and it has weird little bugs (like there are two copies of my movies and some of my apps and I have no idea why, but deleting them and then rescanning results in 2 copies again, but there's only one copy on the disk). I agree with everyone else - if I had a Pre, I'd use something else. But regardless of the quality of iTunes, this is still not a smart business move in my mind.

They should be mad. Palm scooped up a lot of ex-Apple executives/employees. If Palm wanted to have a good media manager, they should have made one instead of trying to have it sync with iTunes. Apple does not have any obligation to support non-Apple devices.

/thread

 

[pm]

They should be mad. Palm scooped up a lot of ex-Apple executives/employees. If Palm wanted to have a good media manager, they should have made one instead of trying to have it sync with iTunes. Apple does not have any obligation to support non-Apple devices.

They don't have to support non-Apple devices - heck they could even flash up a message saying something like "non-Apple product found, please contact the manufacturer of your player for support". This is not a really technical issue - Palm changed the USB interface name to Apple's vendor Id and the Product Id for an iPod but left the root USB node ID as Palm. So Apple can very easily identify Palm Pre's masquerading as iPods (look at the root node Id) - and splash up ads, warnings or whatever. Instead, they just changed their look-up to check node Id's and lock-out non-Apple root Ids.

If it's a question of support - that can be easily handled with a splash screen telling users to call Palm in the event of issues.

But it's not like they accidently disabled support for Palm as a byproduct of something they did in the new version. Instead they are specifically looking at USB node Id's to check for Apple products - and locking out non-Apple products.

The question is in my mind is whether is makes sense to alienate over 1 million potential users (Pre's sales as 5 days ago) by denying them access to your software. I don't think it does. iTunes is a media synching program, but it's also an internet portal for selling music and movies. If users use iTunes to sync, they are far more likely to use iTunes to buy music and movies. If they are off using something else like WM Player, then they'll more likely use Amazon or something else. If it was me, I'd do something like put up an iPhone ad when a Pre users syncs, and then a splash screen about support and leave syncing in there... it's makes business sense.

 

[WelshBloke]

Originally posted by: gorcorps
*snip*

Fair enough, WelshBloke... my apologies. I still stand by my thought that Palm needs to deal with the sync themselves instead of bypassing somebody else's protection and praying they're okay with it.

No worries mate. :thumbsup:

 

[zerocool84]

Yea this is stupid. The Pre is a great device and it's selling well so far and killing iTunes syncing is just hurting Apple since so many people have iPods and I'm sure would want to put some music on their Pre. Apple is only hurting themselves and giving themselves bad publicity. Whether you hate iTunes or not, it's too popular to ignore since so many people use it.

 

[senseamp]

Hmm, good thing I don't use I-tunes. Would suck to be pressured into picking an Apple device just because you use their mp3 player.

 

[gorcorps]

Originally posted by: senseamp
Hmm, good thing I don't use I-tunes. Would suck to be pressured into picking an Apple device just because you use their mp3 player.

Itunes doesn't stop your entire computer from reading any other mp3 player. People who use itunes can still use whatever they want and not worry about it. Pretty much every mp3 player manufacturer has their own software to use for sync, and some can actually just drag and drop right from windows explorer.

Just like the article said, Pre owners can still drag and drop just fine so it's not exactly broken.

 

[DivideBYZero]

It's not as big a problem as some of you are making it out to be. Other manufacturers have built software into their desktop tools to sync with iTunes libraries. It will only be a matter of time before Palm bring out their version of such a tool and you're all back on the road to tunage.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Apple should have just throttled download speeds from iTunes by 1/2 for Pre owners...

 

[dionx]

Apple invested their own money to develop iTunes software to be used with Apple products. The Palm uses a backdoor to sync to iTunes. Palm didn't invest any money for that development. Now if Apple wants to license iTunes to competitors for a fee, that would be fine.

 

[sjwaste]

Slashdot's thread on this when the feature was first discovered was rather intelligent. Many speculated that Palm simply had a load of patents that Apple was probably infringing, considering that Palm products were syncing with PCs before PCs even had the horsepower to decode MP3s. The patent portfolio was likely brought up in conversation, and detente would result. Well, looks like Apple decided to make a move here, so I wonder if Palm does have some patents it's willing to litigate over.

 

[randomlinh]

Originally posted by: dionx
Apple invested their own money to develop iTunes software to be used with Apple products. The Palm uses a backdoor to sync to iTunes. Palm didn't invest any money for that development. Now if Apple wants to license iTunes to competitors for a fee, that would be fine.

I don't get it tho, Apple could easily make MORE money by allowing other devices to hook into their eco system. they just don't have to support it if someone calls them.

But alas, anyone who didn't see this coming is naive. When Palm announced it, I was shocked they had the balls to call it a feature, especially how they implemented it.

I use iTunes, I like it. Foobar takes quite a bit of effort to make it similar, and even then it doesn't work the way I expect it to.

Anyway, I really am curious as to how many people ended up using itunes to sync their palms, it'd be interesting little statistic

 

[gorcorps]

Originally posted by: randomlinh

Originally posted by: dionx
Apple invested their own money to develop iTunes software to be used with Apple products. The Palm uses a backdoor to sync to iTunes. Palm didn't invest any money for that development. Now if Apple wants to license iTunes to competitors for a fee, that would be fine.

I don't get it tho, Apple could easily make MORE money by allowing other devices to hook into their eco system. they just don't have to support it if someone calls them.

But alas, anyone who didn't see this coming is naive. When Palm announced it, I was shocked they had the balls to call it a feature, especially how they implemented it.

I use iTunes, I like it. Foobar takes quite a bit of effort to make it similar, and even then it doesn't work the way I expect it to.

Anyway, I really am curious as to how many people ended up using itunes to sync their palms, it'd be interesting little statistic

I'm not sure how Apple would make more money. If they allowed it, them maybe some Palm users would buy songs and stuff from itunes but that isn't a guarantee. Also, some people just really like itunes, and their choice may come down to what supports it and would then have to get an iphone instead of the pre. It's hard to say if they'd make more money either way as we have no idea what the trends are.

 

[zerocool84]

Originally posted by: gorcorps

Originally posted by: randomlinh

Originally posted by: dionx
Apple invested their own money to develop iTunes software to be used with Apple products. The Palm uses a backdoor to sync to iTunes. Palm didn't invest any money for that development. Now if Apple wants to license iTunes to competitors for a fee, that would be fine.

I don't get it tho, Apple could easily make MORE money by allowing other devices to hook into their eco system. they just don't have to support it if someone calls them.

But alas, anyone who didn't see this coming is naive. When Palm announced it, I was shocked they had the balls to call it a feature, especially how they implemented it.

I use iTunes, I like it. Foobar takes quite a bit of effort to make it similar, and even then it doesn't work the way I expect it to.

Anyway, I really am curious as to how many people ended up using itunes to sync their palms, it'd be interesting little statistic

I'm not sure how Apple would make more money. If they allowed it, them maybe some Palm users would buy songs and stuff from itunes but that isn't a guarantee. Also, some people just really like itunes, and their choice may come down to what supports it and would then have to get an iphone instead of the pre. It's hard to say if they'd make more money either way as we have no idea what the trends are.

Yea who knows if they will buy stuff from Apple store use iTunes but there's at least a chance. By blocking them you're guaranteeing that they won't buy from there.

 

[Kaido]

What I don't understand is, why do they block the Pre, but they don't block Hackintosh?