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Media (Apple) Businesses Media Music Apple

iTunes 4.9 With Podcasting Support 498

Posted by CmdrTaco from the waste-of-bandwidth-and-time dept.
eakthecat writes "Hot on the heels of the 4.8 release, Apple has released the next version of its popular iTunes jukebox software. Version 4.9 incorporates several new features, most notable of which is podcasting. The front page and iTunes webpages have not been updated yet, but you can get your greedy little hands on it or through the new podcasting link in the music store! !"
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iTunes 4.9 With Podcasting Support More

iTunes 4.9 With Podcasting Support

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  • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:5, Informative)

      by djkoolaide ( 729441 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:05AM (#12930464)
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcasting [wikipedia.org]

    • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:06AM (#12930472)
      Podcasting is an audio distribution system based on RSS with enclosures. This allows anyone to setup their own audio show and easily distribute it to subscribers. One of the pioneers of Podcasting is Adam Curry http://www.curry.com/ [curry.com]
      • Okay. If podcasting exists then it stands to reason that it already had such support. Isn't it just downloading someone's audio and playing it? Is iTunes merely adding "sites" to iTunes that you can goto and GET audio like this?
        • If podcasting exists then it stands to reason that it already had such support.

          It was enabled by third-party software. Check out this site [ipodder.org] for links for some software and the podcasting feeds.

          Isn't it just downloading someone's audio and playing it?

          Yes, but it's also more than that. The podcast's website typically is set up with an RSS-type feed (coded in XML, I believe) which your podcasting-enabled software automatically checks each day or so, downloads the new and/or updated content, transfers it
    • Long story short: A podcast is an audio blog.

      The iTunes support for podcasting means that now iTunes will act as your audio blog aggregator/player.

    • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Jubii ( 315611 )
      A better question is, "why should I care?" I understand that you visit people's sites, download their rants and listen to them on the go... but I still don't "get" it. Why is this useful to me? I see so many geeks excited about this, and I feel I must have missed out on something. Does this appeal to the whole blogger group... who enjoy hearing about a complete stranger's day, or listening to them voice their opinion? Because that's what podcasting seems like to me... again, I wonder if I'm missing som

      • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:5, Informative)

        by SFEley ( 743605 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:00AM (#12930888) Homepage
        If it was news or other information, I could see the usefulness, but podcasting seems like a fancy soapbox for people.

        Some of it is news [slashdotreview.com]. Some of it's music [coverville.com]. Some of it's audiobooks [podiobooks.com]. And yeah, some of it's just personal life and ranting. But don't limit your perspective to just those. It's basically whatever you want.

        My own podcast narrates science fiction short stories [extraneous.org]. We also do some reviews and commentary, but I've made a solemn promise on it never, ever to simply tell you about my day.

        • I bought an iPod specifically so I wouldn't have to listen to people blathering wherever I go. I guess Podcasting isn't for me then. Even the music Podcasts have irritating DJs introducing everything, but at least I can fast forward through them.

          • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Skynyrd ( 25155 )
            I bought an iPod specifically so I wouldn't have to listen to people blathering wherever I go. I guess Podcasting isn't for me then. Even the music Podcasts have irritating DJs introducing everything, but at least I can fast forward through them.

            You get more than whiney blogs. Many news outlets podcast their shows.

            Really want to hear "The Treatment" on KCRW? or "Classic Rockstar Interviews" on Q104.3?
            Simply subscribe to them.

            Personally, I'd love to get NPR's Marketplace. Sadly, I'm at work when it's br
            • I know I'm picking nits here, but technically, Marketplace is not an NPR product. It's American Public Media (and used to be Minnesota Public Radio IIRC) and is distributed by Public Radio International.

              True, almost all the outlets for it are considered "NPR stations". However, it's not really accurate to call it that.

              If you want to hear Marketplace without using iTunes, you can get the streams from their site:

              http://www.marketplace.org/ [marketplace.org]
        • More importantly some of the major broadcasters are supporting it. There is one reason why I want to update iTunes to the one that supports Podcasting and that is In Our Time [bbc.co.uk]. A wonderful programme on BBC Radio 4.

      • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by lucifuge31337 ( 529072 ) <daryl@in t r o s p e c t . n et> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:04AM (#12930935) Homepage
        A better question is, "why should I care?"

        I'll tell you why I care: after having a tivo for years now, I like my entertainment time shifted. The few things I listen to on the radio are mostly NPR broadcasts, and mostly on an inconvenient times for me. So I get the podcast versions of those. Done.

        I don't listen to lame ass rants made by some kid in his mom's basement, and I'm guessing that few adults do. Podcasting has been going on a lot longer than you think. Take for example Audible [audible.com]. They've been doing it since way before it was trendy, and I've been downloading (and in the earlier days paying for) NPR content from them. Simply because it's convenient for me.

    • Re:What IS podcasting? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Zhe Mappel ( 607548 ) on Wednesday June 29, 2005 @02:51AM (#12939398)
      If you disentangle people from the teat of majority culture, interesting possibilities arise.

      Podcasting can do that.

      In its small way--like blogging and posting--podcasting is helping to unplug people from the central switchboard of corporate media.

      No, it's not as if this is the Enlightenment, and you have a lot of Voltaires running about beaming great thoughts into mp3 files, and suddenly we'll throw off the tentacular church and state. Someone blabbing about his day through your expensive tiny white headphones does not a revolution make.

      Doesn't matter. American society is like Terry Schiavo: if you want excitement and growth, brother, you've come to the wrong vegetable. That's why anything outside of the grey, soggy, monolithic blob that constitutes our majority media is welcome at this stage--just to show people that they don't need Big Daddy Fox or Mommy MSNBC.

      Podcasting removes these baleful arbiters. It shortcircuits the money power's monopoly on the conversation. It says, "Who the fuck needs a doorknob like Brit Hume, anyway?"

      The early signs are promising. With each download, podcasting happily extends the trend of declining audiences for corporate media. And that is a Good Thing. The less the great obedient horde lines up for more orders, the better.

  • "Mac-dotted" (Score:5, Interesting)

    by amichalo ( 132545 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:04AM (#12930458)
    The iTunes Music Store has "Mac-dotted" themselves. After getting 49, I tried to download some podcasts but the store that can serve up hundreds of millions of tracks is a bit overwhelmed right now. Try again later.

    In other news, Apple also modified its iPod line by removing the iPod Photo as a unique line:

    20GB COLOR iPod $299
    60GB color iPod $399
    1GB Shuffle $129

    • Re:"Mac-dotted" (Score:5, Informative)

      by the_unknown_soldier ( 675161 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:10AM (#12930492)
      The podcasts are held on the server of whoever makes them. Slowness of teh podcasts is most likely due to the fact that Curry/Madge can't handle the bandwidth hit.
      • This one needs modded up. Anyone that made the statement the grand parent made does not understand how RSS and Podcatchers work.

      • Re:"Mac-dotted" (Score:3, Informative)

        by Seanasy ( 21730 )

        If you look at Curry's blog it mentions that Apple is supposed to be distributing the podcasts they index on Akamai. They just haven't gotten that going yet.

    • Re:"Mac-dotted" (Score:4, Interesting)

      by FidelCatsro ( 861135 ) <fidelcatsro&gmail,com> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:15AM (#12930521) Journal
      In the Euro market the Ipod 20GB colour costs 299 euros or 361 dollars.
      All the Euro prices are identical to the dollar prices (which is very annoying considering the dollars value right now) except for the 1GB shuffle which is 139.

      • Re:"Mac-dotted" (Score:5, Insightful)

        by zulux ( 112259 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:13AM (#12931020) Homepage Journal
        All the Euro prices are identical to the dollar prices

        The cost of doing business is *much* higher in western Europe than in the States. Hence, the higher prices - so that companies can attempt to recoup the taxes they must pay. It's not just Apple: Phillips, BMW, Mercedes and Virgin's products are more expensive in Europe - even if they are European companies.

        You didn't think that all those social services were free did you?

        • Don't stomp the world flat. It's complicated. (Score:4, Insightful)

          by ianscot ( 591483 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @11:32AM (#12931869)
          Inside of the last year-plus, the price of luxury goods from Europe has gone up dramatically here, too. The difference is almost strictly the decline of the dollar against the Euro.

          My own painful example would be Leica and Swarovski optics. A Leica spotting scope that cost 800 USD three years ago is now $1300. Leica isn't paying dramatically more taxes today than they were then. I still can't buy their dang scopes, and I could have back then.

          Anyone who's traveled in Europe or anywhere else could tell you that prices in different sectors of the economy can differ in ways that may or may not reflect the added costs you're talking about. Gas for private cars is much more expensive. Other stuff will be far cheaper than you'd find them in the US. And until the Euro there was tons of variation in those things from place to place. Soda in Paris, always expensive. Instanbul is cheap, but it's hard to say how cheap at a given moment because of Lira inflation.

          The world is not reducible to doctrines.

        • Your sig is more correct than I suspect you realize.

          When you add up all local, state, and federal taxes, it's not unusual to find that fully 60% of one's income is consumed by them.

          Now, what is slavery, but the state where 100% of the fruits of one's labor is confiscated?

          Hence, the average American is currently about 60% enslaved.
    • Personally I'm having no issues with my morning podcasts... although I am using this app [roxio.com].
    • The iPod shuffle went COLOR too, you just can't see it yet.

  • Annoying installer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kevmo ( 243736 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:05AM (#12930461)
    Is anyone else annoyed that their is no real Windows "updater" for iTunes, and each update basically requires iTunes to reinstall, sometimes clobbering my settings that tell Quicktime to stop bothering me?

    I really wish that if Apple releases software for Windows that they actually put the work necessary into it to make it a good product. (Don't get me wrong, I still like iTunes, it just seems very unpolished in Windows).

    • Re:Annoying installer (Score:4, Informative)

      by chota ( 577760 ) <chrishota@gmail.com> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:10AM (#12930493) Homepage

      Hmm... I've never had the problems you've described, maybe you're using the iTunes + Quicktime combined installer instead of the iTunes-only one? In any case, when the "Register Quicktime" box comes up next time, set your clock forward about 4 years, click "Not Now" and then set your clock back to the real time. No more annoying pop-up. :)

      (Don't get me wrong, I still like iTunes, it just seems very unpolished in Windows).

      I think that may be by design, to get you to "switch".

      Also, it's now available on the website: Download iTunes 4.9 [apple.com].

      • Re:Annoying installer (Score:2, Informative)

        by kevmo ( 243736 )
        I think that may be by design, to get you to "switch".

        It's going to take more than a rough-around-the-edges music player to get me to switch to Apple hardware. Specifically, it would take about a $500-$1000 price drop as well as more software companies releasing games with support for Mac OS X (Battlefield 2 anyone?)
        • A Mac Mini is $499, so does this mean you wouldn't switch unless Apple paid you for it?

          (I know it's not $499 because of the extras you have to buy, but I'm betting you have a keyboard, mouse and monitor lying around).

          D
        • If you drop the price of the Mac Mini $500, you get a free computer... Sure it needs more ram, but as an owner, it is a nice little machine...

          Lower the price of a 12inch powerbook $1000 and you have a free laptop...

          Are you a student? They have nice student discounts that are super easy to get.
          • You don't even have to be a student - just be somehow marginally connected with some kind of educational institution. Have a kid? Or a sibling? Do any work for a university?
        • I'd like to see the Mac box that does justice to BF2. If you can point it to me, I'll give Apple a more serious look (and yes I know that is it not ported as of yet, but a box that SHOULD run it well enough will do).
    • NEVER had iTunes upgrades on Windows clobber my quicktime prefs....EVER. In fact, just finsihed installing 4.9 on my laptop. No goofy Quicktime icon in my tray....like I like it.
    • I have the same feeling towards Windows Media Player for OSX, so don't feel bad. At least you're not perpetually a full version behind. Perhaps it's just the balance of the universe being maintained. Tell you what: ou work on Microsoft, I'll work on Apple. :)
    • (Don't get me wrong, I still like iTunes, it just seems very unpolished in Windows).

      On OS X, the software update auto updates ALL mac software, including iTunes. Since you are using windows, well.... sorry. It may be me, but I don't think Mac really wants to get friendly with their competition operating system. There's a reason there's not Final Cut, iDVD, etc for Windows.

  • What's with the dept line...? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chota ( 577760 ) <chrishota@gmail.com> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:05AM (#12930463) Homepage
    from the waste-of-bandwidth-and-time dept.

    Ouch!

    Can someone explain why this is a waste of bandwidth and time? Wouldn't a major company with a massive userbase supporting podcasting actually help the genre?

    Also, since (presumably) Rob hasn't actually *tried* the software, isn't judging it a little harsh?

  • Podcasting mainstream? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by grqb ( 410789 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:07AM (#12930475) Homepage Journal
    We'll see if this makes podcasting more mainstream. From what I've heard apple seems to be fairly committed to podcast support in iTunes, they've been consulting with some of the podcasting community so they obviously feel that podcasting is on the up-and-up.

    They must envision an economic model for podcasting one day, similar to their iTunes store I'm guessing, it'll be interesting to see how this develops.

  • Sadly this release once again breaks fairkeys and DeDRMS [nanocrew.net] by Jon Lech Johanson. And with him employed by Apple now, he can't re-break them because it would be divulging a trade secret.

    It is legal to reverse engineer for compatibility if you don't have inside information. It is not ok if you do. It is sad, but a good move for Apple.

    RIP DRM Free iTunes, Viva allofmp3 . [allofmp3.com]

  • Playing with it for a few minutes (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dark Paladin ( 116525 ) * <jhummel.johnhummel@net> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:12AM (#12930501) Homepage
    The Good:

    Rather nicely done. A good interface, the search function works, and the display is very iTunes-ish - to be honest, better than using iPodderX or NetNewsWire to import the songs, and you can add in custom feeds.

    I like the ability to tell it "Keep the most recent X and dump the rest" - for news based Podcasts, I usually have to do that manually with listened ones. Now, once I listen to it, it will automatically be taken out. Sweet.

    The Bad:

    No built in support for turning MP3 to bookmarkable AAC's. I don't see any kind of support for video podcasts (such as Rocketboom, which is odd since iPodderX can export the videos to iTunes, perhaps in support for a (someday) future video iPod).

    Otherwise, it's a nice addition, and it's going to be interesting to see where it goes. Kudos to Apple for getting it - now let's see how long it takes the Napster and Rhapsody folks to catch on ;).
    • now let's see how long it takes the Napster and Rhapsody folks to catch on

      or for that matter windows media player / msn music ;)

    • Make bookmarkable workaround (Score:5, Informative)

      by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:40AM (#12930713) Homepage
      No built in support for turning MP3 to bookmarkable AAC's.

      A workaround for now (on OS X):

      1. Set your importing preferences to AAC
      2. Install this Make Bookmarable [dougscripts.com] Applescript
      3. Select the MP3, go to Advanced->Convert to AAC
      4. Select the newly-created AAC, run the Make Bookmarkable script on it
      Finished, and you only need to do steps 1 and 2 the once, of course. I've been using this to convert BBC radio captures to bookmarkable AAC for a while (workflow: Tivo->MP3->bookmarkable AAC).

      would agree that making an AAC bookmarkable could do with being integrated into the main interface though.

      Cheers,
      Ian

    • Side note: turns out you can get Rocketboom, but I had to add it through the iTunes Store interface, not just cut 'n paste the RSS feed I had in iPodderX. I'm willing to bet most of the comments I got are about that ;).

      One other thing: Now, if Apple will just add in support for multiple users on iTunes, so I can log into the computer and have the same library as my wife when she logs in, and so on. I know there are some hacks, but it doesn't sync up all that well I've found unless you have one dedicate
      • Just move your main music library to the "Shared" folder and (unfortunately) set it read/writeable by all users; then make an alias to the folder and put it in each of your music directories with the proper name (sans "alias").

        Works like a charm, especially when you want to store your massive music collection on a second hard disk. Ditto for the iPhoto library, we keep ours separate but on the second hard disk.
    • Tim O'Reilly pointed their mistake during WWDC. Apple should tie garageband into the iTunes flow. Make a song, opload it into the music store, let apple sell it, the customer downloads it into the ipod/mac.

  • I just installed 4.9 on my mac (Score:5, Funny)

    by pHatidic ( 163975 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:17AM (#12930537)
    It feels way snappier than the last release.

  • Gnomedex and the pod father (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Ghost-in-the-shell ( 103736 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:19AM (#12930558) Homepage

    Adam Curry (yes that guy from MTV) is the father of Podcasting and as such he gave the keynote speech at Gnomedex this past weekend. The full keynote is also one of his many podcasts.

    (Ok, if you don't know a podcast is basically an audio file. The term originates from the idea of Broadcasting and the iPod. The idea is take your content with you and listen when you want. The CBC has some of their radio content available as a podcast. So the concept is catching on!)

    This keynote is well worth the listen. It is motivational, and it is focused. Users demand content and they don't care how the delivery method works (ATOM, RSS, etc). For the rest of the speech, go over to Adam's [curry.com] site for a link to the audio file. Listen, enjoy, and think about what he has to say.

  • hm (Score:4, Insightful)

    by speel3k ( 793160 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:23AM (#12930574) Homepage
    This is what i love about apple. They see the customers need and they execute simple as that.
    • Why would they execute customers they need?
      Seems rather violent. And not in the shareholders' best interests.

  • Also an iPod update (Score:5, Informative)

    by generic-man ( 33649 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:23AM (#12930575) Homepage Journal
    I'm also downloading a new iPod updater [apple.com] which is supposed to add Podcast support to "iPod with color display," "iPod with Click Wheel," and "iPod mini." Looks like the 3G series has reached its end-of-life as far as support goes.
    • It does work with 3Gs. I'm listening to podcasts on it now, although it appears as an ordinary playlist. I assume later models get a couple of extra features or something.

  • slick, but: (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jeffehobbs ( 419930 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:25AM (#12930593) Homepage
    I think, technically speaking, it's as good an implementation as you're likely to see for a while.

    The only missed opportunity from my perspective is the lack of some peer-to-peer method of distribution of the podcasts. That would be awfully nice. As it is, if your podcast gets popular, you're going to have to contend with a hefty bandwidth fee, which leaves at least a vestige of the old-media power structure in place; those who have the bucks control the means of distribution. With a stripped-down BitTorrent or even a Gnutella-style "swarm" distribution model, your listeners could actually distribute your podcasts for you; truly listener-supported public radio.

    Otherwise, good stuff. More nice work by the iTunes team.

    ~jeff

  • IPOD UPDATE (Score:5, Informative)

    by the_unknown_soldier ( 675161 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:27AM (#12930603)
    Perhaps more interesting.. there is also an ipod update available!

    http://www.apple.com/ipod/download/

    This means that your podcasts will FINALLY be organised on your ipod, and your ipod will treat it like an audio book: press pause, come back later and it remembers where you are!
  • Quite a few people have complained about the lack of functionality of iTunes and I've noticed that it can be accessed using the SDK provided by Apple.

    Short of the vbs examples that Apple provide, does anyone know of any decent links/documentation on accessing and manipulating track data using Visual Basic?

    With this kind of information, accessing and manipulating the music files would be easier and allow of a greater range of functionality outside of iTunes, the advantage of VB would that a basic fronte

    • Well, on the Mac, you're supposed to use AppleScript to work with iTunes. I wrote a little podcast aggregator using Cocoa and it uses AppleScript to interface with iTunes to add/delete tracks and manage a Podcast playlist. Quite easy. XCode makes Mac development really easy.

  • UI is a mess though (Score:3, Insightful)

    by JeFurry ( 75785 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:29AM (#12930626)
    Unfortunately, and unusually for Apple, some of the changes to the iTunes user interface are somewhat confusing.
    • Going to a category subsection of the podcast list on the iTunes Music Store results in a browser window that lists genres, yet clicking any genre goes back to music listings, without any way to return. Podcast genres are in fact listed under the "Artist" column, and podcast titles under "Album".
    • There is now a subgenre column in the iTMS browser, which could be helpful if I could find any way to read or set the subgenres of music I already own.
    • The "All" item sometimes disappears from the top of the Artist column, meaning that you have to change genre/subgenre in order to change artist.
    • There are "[x>" icons beside some podcasts which aren't explained (though they could just be part of the feed name).
    iPod/iTunes's strength is partly in its simplicity - it's a good app for many people's music archival and retrieval needs. Perhaps it's being pushed to do too much? Some of the recent additions such as photo browsing (which can't be anything but mediocre on a 2" screen) and the new podcasting facilities might be better suited to a different GUI rather than being shoehorned into the existing ones. I love the idea of Podcasting in iTunes, but it's different enough from album browsing to warrant a bit more GUI work.

    I felt the same way about MacOS X Tiger's slightly premature release - although it was quickly improved with updates, the "release as beta, fix afterwards" approach is one I'd come to expect more from one of Apple's chief competitors. I hope Apple don't continue down this path - their software has often been a comparative joy to use, and these annoyances reduce that enjoyment.

  • Prompted by BadFruit's BadApple? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Webs 101 ( 798265 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:29AM (#12930629) Homepage
    From the latest Netsurfer Digest:

    BadApple Plug-in for iTunes Podcasts

    At some point, Apple is going to add explicit support for podcasts to iTunes. Podcasts are really only long, often dull sound files, the 21st century equivalent of talk radio on cassette. Still, it's a fad, and since iTunes lets you look you for streaming broadcasts, why not podcasts, too? At least, so think the anonymous folks behind BadFruit, an outfit that just released the BadApple iTunes plug-in, ironically for the Windows version of iTunes only. The plug-in adds another link, called Podcasts, to the main iTunes window. Click on the link and you get a list of podcast categories. Drill down to download specific podcasts in iTunes and use them as you would any other iTunes sound file. BadApple claims to be pre-emptive insurance against any potential limitations Apple may place on the podcasts it may offer in future versions of iTunes. CNET speculates that MP3.com founder Michael Robertson, who now has a new site called MP3Tunes.com, is the anonymous author of BadFruit.
    BadFruit: http://www.badfruit.com/ [badfruit.com]
    CNET: http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5754227.html [com.com]
    MP3Tunes.com: http://www.mp3tunes.com/ [mp3tunes.com]

    • Short answer: No.

      The goal of BadApple is clearly stated in their FAQ [badfruit.com]:

      Why was BadApple created?

      The goal is to make iTunes and iPods interoperate with other piles of media. I'm worried that when and if Apple adds podcast support they will only list a few podcasts that they approve. Remember this is a company that sues web sites that say good things about their upcoming products - bad Apple! Podcasts are significant because they offer a wide-range of diverse topics and ideas, not just those endorsed by one
    • Didn't Apple announce that they'd be adding podcasting support at WWDC? So I doubt this is in response to a third-party app that appears to have been released more than a week after WWDC.

    • BadFruit's BadApple is a BadProduct (Score:5, Informative)

      by nuxx ( 10153 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:38AM (#12931281) Homepage
      People may be interested in my write-up on Badfruit's BadApple which I posted to LiveJournal here [livejournal.com].

      In short, this tool modifies your HOSTS file to point the iTunes Music Store link in iTunes to a local copy of IIS. That copy of IIS serves a python app which hosts a fake music store to offer Podcasts. This copy of IIS is open to the entire world (listening on *:80) running some rather untested software, and the redirection (via the HOSTS file) essentially 'breaks' iTunes Music Store functionality. This behavior (still) does not appear to be documented on BadFruit's site.

      It also appears to have some hooks into mp3tunes.com, but I wasn't able to completely determine what. BadFruit may be selling music or collecting referrals, I'm not sure which.

      In short, please use lots of caution before installing this software. It makes some rather drastic changes to one's machine, and these aren't documented on BadFruit's site.
  • hot on the heels? 4.8 was released months ago
  • Mac OS X users can get the new version of iTunes quick an' easy though Software Update on the system Preferences Panel, along with a corresponding update for the iPod, if needed.
  • Looks as if we will continue to need to use 3G iPod-Linux for recording audio at anything higher than 8kHz
  • CNN has started offering free video for the latest news. It is a two or three minute quick update of the latest developments.

    It would be supremely sweet if that was offered as a podcast and there was a video device that could play it.

    I charge my iPod every night and it would be nice if it had the latest news as I pick it up and get ready for the daily commute.

    Well, I guess the radio news would be good too. I'm going to have to get this for sure.

  • DAAP & iTunes Music Sharing (Score:4, Informative)

    by crazney ( 194622 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:04AM (#12930939) Homepage Journal
    In case anyone was wondering, Apple have not changed the DAAP authentication [craz.net] with this new version of iTunes. So my various iTunes apps for linux, etc [craz.net] still work.

  • Podcasting Laws? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by randomErr ( 172078 ) <.ervin.kosch. .at. .gmail.com.> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:27AM (#12931174) Journal
    Here is something that I've been wondering: What are the legal guidelines for podcasting? I know the ones that are talk and original music are fine. But what about people who play their favorite song or remake of existing songs?

    I listen to a couple of podcasts where people play their favorite songs and I was wondering if that is legal? I know this is offtopic but this one question have yet to find an answer too.

    • Re:Podcasting Laws? (Score:3, Informative)

      by slim ( 1652 )
      Adam Curry and the guy behind Coverville, at the very least pay ASCAP licensing fees.

      See this topic on Podcast Alley [podcastalley.com] for details.
    • Love him or hate him, Rush Limbaugh just recently started publishing a Podcast for his 24/7 subscribers. He had a team of lawyers look into all the 'issues' and ended up not playing any music whatsoever on his Podcasts. That includes his musical parodies.

      The concern was how would they handle paying royalties, etc. They already pay them for radio broadcast but to put it into an MP3 and distribute it over the net allows anyone to edit it out and literally steal the song. So there is no model in place to

  • obGrampa (Score:5, Funny)

    by djdavetrouble ( 442175 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @10:43AM (#12931319) Homepage
    I don't read blogs, and I don't intend to listen to any 'podcasts' either. Books are for reading, and iPod's are for music. As far as I can tell, the main disadvantage of these digital soapboxes is that you can't hurl tomatoes at the orator. These newfangled ideas are nothing but chicanery perpetrated by charlatans. In fact, the iPod is nothing more than a cassette player crossed with a cue ball.

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