November 3, 2004 11:26 AM PST
Apple blocks music sales to older iTunes
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Later on Wednesday, Apple will stop allowing people running version 4.2 to purchase songs from the iTunes Music Store.
"As of today, customers will need to use one of the three most recent versions of iTunes--4.7, 4.6 or 4.5--to continue purchasing and downloading songs," Apple said in a statement provided to CNET News.com.
The company, which had warned users the move was coming, downplayed the impact of the move.
"Less than 5 percent of all iTunes customers are using the old iTunes 4.2 version, so asking them to upgrade to the free iTunes 4.7 is no big deal," Apple said.
When Apple released version 4.5 in April, the company disabled support for a number of programs that tried to expand iTunes music sharing beyond the streaming of music files. And with the new version 4.7 that Apple introduced last week, the company quietly disabled support for iPodDownload, a program that let customers copy music from an iPod into their iTunes library.
Apple touted the benefits of later versions, including features such as iMix, Party Shuffle and CD Insert Printing. The version also is required to support the features of the iPod Photo.
See more CNET content tagged:
Apple iTunes,
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photograph
So no copying back and forth of files from iPod to other macs (that is what Apple fears and thus Rip.Mix.Burned).
Personally, folks that have Windows can do this with other software. And 4.7 has its fair share of issues.
Apple is protecting itself. Not its customers.
new version of iTunes can patch it with trivial effort. There are
two steps. Get the program HexEdit through VersionTracker.com
or google to find it (it is a free program). In the open menu of
HexEdit navigate to Applications -> iTunes -> Contents ->
MacOS -> iTunes. With that file open search for the string "iPod
Download". Notice that iTunes depends on matching a string in
order to block the functionality so change the string to any other
string that has exactly the same length and save the result.
It would be possible to write a program to do this patch but I
don't know if people would be inclined to use such a solution. It
really isn't hard to do it yourself (using HexEdit) and see exactly
what is being changed.
So you have the choice of using 5 minutes to make this change
or rise up with torches and pitchforks and storm the castle. I
think applying the patch makes more sense.
I still run really old software on my XP box. It?s a good thing. Forcing people to upgrade isn?t the best plan I?d say. Apple has been doing this for years. It?s nice being able to run any software on any version of Windows (just about anyway).
---Remeber unlike PC's that have to been thrown away every 8-12 months and have gotten price down to a deluxe TV or VCR. Mac often last for 10 years or more. ----
What a foolish comment. Not only is most of the hardware the same, I have boxes very old that run just fine ? AND run all the newest software. Those run slow but hey most are 7-10 years old!
More trolling Cupertino zealots ?
iTunes 4, which was released the same day as the Music Store,
or higher. The most current version of iTunes that even ran on
OS 9 is 2.0.4.
I say we just boycott Apple! The only reason Apple iTunes is as successful as they are is because they were the first, and people have a hard time switching.
Why don't we all just take a leap of faith and just switch already. There are other music sites out there that are far better and I am sure more options are still to come. I have heard good things about Rhapsody... maybe if Apple users switch to Rhapsody, Apple will have second thoughts about how they treat their customers and stop being such a selfish bully.
http://allwaysmusic.modblog.com/
Since the iPod supports more-or-less standard open formats, that was a good thing too.
Recent moves to make the iPod more restrictive, more closed and less flexibile really make the platform a lot less appealing for me. I should note I own 2 iPods and do not bootleg songs (I use it mostly for timeshifting or somtimes listening to my own CD's).