Article: RealNetworks' online petition backfires

After reading the article and the petition posts, its really incredible how deep the hatred for Real is. And its well deserved. Consumers realize that we do have a choice without Harmony:
- the choice to buy WMA-compatable mp3 players or iPods
- for iPod/iTunes users in the US, France, the UK, and Germany: the choice to buy $9.99 aac albums from iTMS or to buy CD's
- for CD buyers: the choice to rip albums to mp3, AAC, Apple loseless, or AIFF

The integration of mp3 player, computer music jukebox, and online music store is a fantastic innovation that is receiveing well-deserved success. Is it a monopoly? Not until iPod market share exceeds 90-some-odd %. So no one has an inherent "right" to reverse engineer this product.

At the end of the day, Real's tactics are not about the warm and fuzzy notion of consumer choice. It's to cash in on this new market. And the public is not at all fooled by it.
 
The latest version of the site - try to see the signatures list:

PetitionOnline.com has temporarily disabled the display of email addresses for signatories who chose to make their address public.We have done this to reduce the spread of harmful new viruses which harvest email addresses from the web cache of infected computers. This will also prevent spammers from harvesting email addresses from this site.
Click to expand...
 
Real has been an evil company for a long time. They have hidden the free version of the player in a tiny corner so you think you have to buy the player in the past. Then they bombard you with ads if you find the free version of their sluggish bloatware.

No thanks.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top