iTunes 4.9
Today iTunes 4.9 was released. In our previous post we already strongly recommended sticking to your existing client, but why is that? and what do we think about Apple entering the podcasting market?
After our previous post (right after release) we spend some time playing with the newly added podcasting part in their software.
The good thing is that Apple has the power to popularize podcasting, think about the amount of people they reach with the software they deliver. People who never heard about podcasting, but just visit the iTunes Music Store, now see Podcasting in their iTunes. This could be a big step forward for the podcasting community!
However, we don't think it's a good thing for existing listeners to change your favourite podcatcher for iTunes. We even hope the new people who just got in touch with podcasting via iTunes will swap their iTunes for other podcatchers.
Why? There's a number of reasons:
And please, don't get us wrong, we do work on Mac's, pc's, Unix and Linux boxes. It's about delivering something good for a fresh community.
Posted on June 28, 2005 22:17 (GMT +01:00) by Robin | Permanent link | 2 Comments
Tags: community, itunes
After our previous post (right after release) we spend some time playing with the newly added podcasting part in their software.
The good thing is that Apple has the power to popularize podcasting, think about the amount of people they reach with the software they deliver. People who never heard about podcasting, but just visit the iTunes Music Store, now see Podcasting in their iTunes. This could be a big step forward for the podcasting community!
However, we don't think it's a good thing for existing listeners to change your favourite podcatcher for iTunes. We even hope the new people who just got in touch with podcasting via iTunes will swap their iTunes for other podcatchers.
Why? There's a number of reasons:
- they own their directory, and it's closed for third parties
- existing ipodder.org directory maintainers are completely cut out (they did, and do, a lot of great work)
- no support for bit-torrent
- which implies that you have to sign up with their hosting services to 'help you out'
- AFAIK there is no support for OPML (import or export) or dynamic OPML for web-interoperabillity.
- iPod only, no other mp3 players are supported
- The RSS namespace definition of Apple is prefix by a trademark which could be a signal that they want to own the market (see also Dave Winer's RSS)
And please, don't get us wrong, we do work on Mac's, pc's, Unix and Linux boxes. It's about delivering something good for a fresh community.
Posted on June 28, 2005 22:17 (GMT +01:00) by Robin | Permanent link | 2 Comments
Tags: community, itunes
malagodi commented, on July 21, 2005 at 05:38 (GMT +01:00):
I am pretty frustrated with the Itunes implementation. First they made me irritable by dragging me into the Itunes music store. I'm not looking for music, I'm looking for podcasts. Then, most of the podcasts that I want weren't listed or just didn't work.
I've gone back to Ipodder.
p.s. Has anyone tried to add a url for a radio station stream in Itunes? Sheesh!
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Goebbels commented, on June 30, 2005 at 19:26 (GMT +01:00):
It is NOT closed to 3rd parties. They have standards and a vetting process, but this does not make it closed.