Last Wednesday, the day that Apple announced, launched, and opened the iTunes Music Store (iTMS), Microsoft put out a pre-emptive press release to dismiss Apple's efforts even as Apple gives Microsoft users more choices. John Gruber has an excellent article about this eerily Orwellian piece of propagandaspeak.
John sums it up well, and there's only a couple of other things I would add. First, Microsoft misrepresents this carefully worded press release as an interview. "PressPass spoke with Dave Fester...." That's not atypical of how quotes are worked into press releases, but its symptomatic of the misleading nature of this article.
"PressPass: In the last few months, we've seen the launch of many music services by Napster, BuyMusic.com, MusicNow, and Musicmatch."
It's curious that iTMS is missing from that list, and Napster is there even though it is not open for business. This press release starts right off making iTMS a non-person.
Timing is everything. It was released the day of Apple's announcement, presumably before Apple's announcement was official. This allows several highly misleading and factually incorrect statements to sneak in under the wire, with weasel words to make them technically correct if spoken prior to 11 A.M. that day, when iTMS and iTunes were available on Windows. For example:
"Fester: ... the leading music services today for Windows build their music services on the state-of-the-art media platform, Windows Media 9 Series."
As of 11 A.M. that day, that is a false statement. The leading music service "today" and "for Windows", iTMS + iTunes, does not use Windows Media. Without the weasel words "today" and "for Windows", that statement was false to begin with. By that logic, Microsoft could just as accurately have said that iTunes and iTMS are Mac-only..."today". And yet this whole press release is a response to Apple's services for Windows, that really are available "today".
"Additionally, users of iTunes are limited to music from Apple Music Store [sic]."
In fact, iTunes supports MP3 as well as AAC, so users have access to vast amounts of music in addition to the iTMS. Personally, virtually all of my iTunes content is high-bitrate MP3 material from my CDs encoded by doing nothing more than popping a CD into the CD slot and letting iTunes do its thing and spit the CD back out, with no user intervention. MP3 material works just as well as something purchased from iTMS on iPod. And is compatible with any MP3 player.
I also noted that above quote is lifted verbatim in (or was lifted verbatim from) an article linked to under the heading "Related Media Quotes". In fact, entire sentences are identical between the two "articles":
On http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2003/oct03/10-15MusicServices.asp, Microsoft attributes this quote to Fester:
"Additionally, users of iTunes are limited to music from Apple's Music Store. As I mentioned earlier, this is a drawback for Windows users, who expect choice in music services, choice in devices, and choice in music from a wide-variety of music services to burn to a CD or put on a portable device. Lastly, if you use Apple's music store along with iTunes, you don't have the ability of using the over 40 different Windows Media-compatible portable music devices. When I'm paying for music, I want to know that I have choices today and in the future."
On http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2003/Oct03/1015MusicServices-quotes.asp, Microsoft attributes this quote to "John Paczkowski, San Jose Mercury News, Friday, October 17, 2003:
"Additionally, users of iTunes are limited to music from Apple's Music Store. As I mentioned earlier, this is a drawback for Windows users, who expect choice in music services, choice in devices, and choice in music from a wide-variety of music services to burn to a CD or put on a portable device. Lastly, if you use Apple's music store along with iTunes, you don't have the ability of using the over 40 different Windows Media-compatible portable music devices. When I'm paying for music, I want to know that I have choices today and in the future."
Who is the "I" in that paragraph -- Mr. Fester, or Mr. Paczkowski? Somebody's doing a little too much cut-and-paste there. Digging deeper, we find the answer is...
...Microsoft! Indeed, Mr. Paczkowski's article contains that paragraph, but he is clearly quoting from and referring to Microsoft's press release, not making the statement himself. [ Link ] And then, back on Microsoft's "Media Quotes" page, they assign their own quote to Mr. Paczkowski. That's actually pretty funny, and is probably just sloppy work, not nefarious quote-breeding. The full context of the quote in Mr. Paczkowski's article is this:
' Speaking of Microsoft, the folks up in Redmond are none too pleased with Apple's new service. Asked about the iTunes Music Store for Windows in a Q&A posted on the Microsoft Press Pass site, Dave Fester, GM of Microsoft's Windows Digital Media Division, had this to say:
"ITunes captured some early media interest with their store on the Mac, but I think the Windows platform will be a significant challenge for them. Unless Apple decides to make radical changes to their service model, a Windows-based version of iTunes will still remain a closed system, where iPod owners cannot access content from other services. Additionally, users of iTunes are limited to music from Apple's Music Store. As I mentioned earlier, this is a drawback for Windows users, who expect choice in music services, choice in devices, and choice in music from a wide-variety of music services to burn to a CD or put on a portable device. Lastly, if you use Apple's music store along with iTunes, you don't have the ability of using the over 40 different Windows Media-compatible portable music devices. When I'm paying for music, I want to know that I have choices today and in the future." '
(emphasis mine)
As John noted, when Microsoft talks about "open" music services, "open" is code for "WMA proprietary".
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