Filed under: Audio, News, Windows, Macintosh, Apple
Steve Jobs flips 180 on DRM
by Grant Robertson Feb 7th 2007
Steve Jobs released an open letter to iTunes critics yesterday entitled, "Thoughts on Music" in which he discusses DRM, the major label system and why iTunes isn't "open." Ok, so in points the letter is factually incorrect. It tends to over-simplify the DRM debate by discounting any open alternative. As a well-known and widely read enemy of DRM, I'll take it. In Steve's own words, "Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven't worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy." He's right, and I've said nearly the exact same thing before, as have many others.
The simple fact is Steve has hopped on the bandwagon of industry figures proclaiming the death of DRM for music. Naysayers swore this day would never come and, they might have been right save for the constant downward pressure provided by groups like Defective By Design, music blogs of all stripes and genres as well as the actions of several European countries. I'm not at all convinced that Jobs' changed stance comes from an altruistic place deep within his stylishly dressed torso but, all the same, I welcome him to the right side of the argument.
So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
