Napster points finger at Microsoft for iTunes market share

So...there are no other online music sources? And there are no other PMP (Portable Media Players)? Because for Apple to have a "borderline" monopoly on the field, you'd pretty much have to have no other way to get music.

I can still go to my local used shop and buy a stack of CDs, make MP3s and use them on any PMP you choose to give me, whether it's an iRiver or an iPod. I can go to Napster and buy tracks (in the loathesome, DRM-encumbered Windows Media format) or to Rhapsody or Yahoo! Music, or eMusic or download tracks for free from artists' websites (and yes, there are lots of artists who make their work available for free online).

For Apple to have a monopoly, borderline or not, they would have to CONTROL how you get and listen to music. Since they DON'T (I haven't paid one cent to Apple for any of the hundred plus gigabytes of music on MY computer) there's no reasonable way you can call Apple's marketplace dominance a monopoly.

Windows Media ... is really going to be the ubiquitous formatIt will be if Apple doesn't wise up in the next two years and license both the dock connector and FairPlay. Components prices on hardware will come down enough in the next few years that Apple will not have as much incentive to continue to sell so many iPods -- thus, they would be idiots not to license, under strict terms, use of FairPlay, and the dock connector as "iTunes Compatibles." Apple has 80% of the market now, but that market is maybe 1/10 of what it will be five years down when components are so cheap that anyone can have a 10 gig player for 50 bucks.Mark my words: Apple will license both FairPlay and the Dock connector -- that will be the death knell of PlaysForSure, and will guarantee Apple a huge piece of the digital music pie for 10-20 years. Also, if Apple doesn't do it, a Court will make them. Bundling iPods with iTunes is illegal tying given Apple's borderline monopolistic marketshare.

IPod = the reason for iTunes success.

Real people (non geeks) could care less where they buy there music, or what formats its in. They just want a cool player, and an easy way to buy and get music onto that player.

The iPod and iTunes are exactly that.

"Windows Media ... is really going to be the ubiquitous format."

ROFL

It's a not humorous comment, it is very creepy. I don't really love FairPlay, but the MS alternative is something I couldn't digest.

"Windows Media ... is really going to be the ubiquitous format."

Great, now I wet my pants at the office. You shouldn't come up with funny stuff like that, not safe for work.