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Will OSX Build In Torrenting?

Posted by CmdrTaco on Mon May 01, 2006 01:33 PM
from the imagine-that-itunes-catalog dept.
Cjattwood writes "Mac OS rumors has an article describing a possible implementation of a Bittorrent client into Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard", including a unique sharing reward system where the user can share bandwidth and get rewards, such as credit in the iTunes store."
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  • You upload a little and you get infinite download credit for whatever movie you want. Sometimes even before it's out in the stores!
  • wow... (Score:3, Funny)

    by sxtxixtxcxh (757736) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:35PM (#15239107)
    (http://prototypecreative.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday July 12, @11:52AM)
    imagine getting credit for itunes music for torrenting itunes music... what fun.
    • Re:wow... by Ofenza (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @07:33PM
      • Re:wow... by pyite (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @05:35PM
        • Re:wow... by Ofenza (Score:1) Tuesday May 02 2006, @05:57PM
    • Re:wow... by mr100percent (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @12:52AM
      • Re:wow... by FirienFirien (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @03:56AM
      • Re:wow... by mode_m (Score:1) Tuesday May 02 2006, @09:20AM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • by Dutchmaan (442553) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:37PM (#15239121)
    (http://slashdot.org/)
    When will we see codename "Kitty"
    or OS X "Domestic Cat"
    or even OS X "OMGmewmewmew"
  • Movie Store Distribution System (Score:5, Interesting)

    by richdun (672214) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:39PM (#15239147)
    Credit for torrenting? Why would Apple give away iTunes music just for people to run torrents? Well, maybe because those torrents will serve up iTunes movies. Dedicated bandwidth has been the greatest obstacle to getting a full iTunes HD movie store (well, that and the movie companies' agreement, but if the tech is there and economical, the content will follow).
  • Precursor for iT-Movie-S (Score:5, Insightful)

    by doormat (63648) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:40PM (#15239151)
    (Last Journal: Thursday September 09 2004, @09:38PM)
    I can see Apple doing this for movies since they're so large size-wise. I wouldn't mind using half of my upstream to earn credit at the store. Good way to defray the cost of my internet bill - and since I'm on a comercial account my ISP doesnt say anything about me using a lot of bandwidth.
  • Hard to believe (Score:2, Insightful)

    by scrow (620374) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:40PM (#15239153)
    I don't think that the legitamate uses of BitTorrent come close to equaling the bandwidth wasted on downloading pr0n, music and the latest blockbuster movies. So why would Apple build this into thier OS? Will it help legitimize BitTorrent? I doubt it. It would be interesting to see them distribute updates via bittorrent though.
  • Translation: (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Avillia (871800) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:41PM (#15239160)
    Help us take our hosting cost and we'll help you negate that bill you pay for 30 tasty megabytes of fiber... Yesss...

    Personally, this is the best implementation of the BitTorrent technology yet.

    $eeding.
  • This sounds like a great thing, since it would make BitTorrent more available for non-techie users and add another vote to the legitimacy of BT.

    However, if there's a crediting system, does that mean that Apple is watching your BT usage? If I'm not mistaken, Apple has some interest as a content producer and may not like what they see BT being used for. Is this going to be yet another organization watching what people transfer and ratting them out to the RIAA/MPAA/CIA, or will they be Not Evil (tm) and keep their noses out of people's business?
  • Groan. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Rob T Firefly (844560) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:44PM (#15239191)
    (http://robvincent.net/ | Last Journal: Tuesday October 09, @01:55PM)
    TFA seems slashdotted already, but given the name of the site I can only take this with an extremely large grain of salt.

    Beyond that, it's an interesting concept, but one that could seriously botch up torrenting as it is. Bittorrent works so well (with both legal and shady source material) because every user gets the combined benefit of getting what they want, and helping thers who want the same thing to get it. At the very most, a big ratio gets you get bragging rights on some tracker site. My inner folk-song-singing hippie cringes at what result throwing monetary things like iTunes credit into the mix would have.

    • Re:Groan. by enjahova (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @03:45PM
      • Re:Groan. by Rob T Firefly (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @06:08PM
  • If we can share the software updates between macs, it would be a good thing. With 3 macs in my house, why should I have to download the updates 3 times? I should be able to get a copy from the mac on my local net that downloaded it first. I just hope they allow the torrent client to have a throttle on it.

  • by joeykiller (119489) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:50PM (#15239247)
    (Last Journal: Friday July 09 2004, @03:58AM)
    I don't know if P2P built into the OS makes any sense, but certainly it makes sense to build it into iTunes (the application). Some people have claimed that Apple's margin on iTunes content is razor thin. I don't know whether that's true or not, but I certainly know that bandwidth -- when you want the best possible access to your customers, no matter where they are -- doesn't come cheap.

    So adding P2P to iTunes could be one area where Apple could improve their margins. I guess the credit system would be a way to secure that people actually kept on sharing their files after they were downloaded/bought from iTunes (the store).

    It's an interesting idea (if it's true).
  • A good idea... (Score:2)

    by BluhDeBluh (805090) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:51PM (#15239263)
    Why? Well, Apple are trying to get in the movie business, and the only efficient scalable way to distribute huge files is, frankly, P2P, and giving people incentives such as free credit is cheaper than providing the bandwidth themselves. It also partially legitimises P2P, which is considered a "bad thing". About time more companies caught onto it
  • Nice idea (Score:1)

    by clicketyclicky (972095) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:04PM (#15239387)
    But it probably won't happen. Not anytime soon at least.
  • Makes no sense (Score:3, Insightful)

    by paulxnuke (624084) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:06PM (#15239399)
    The name "torrent" would scare off the few IT managers willing to play with Apple: they wouldn't dare put anything that even suggests P2P on a company system (their VP may not know what a torrent is, but he's heard the name and thinks it's bad.)

    If Apple distributes this and then some sleazy congressman manages to make it illegal, they'll have a big media (if not legal) problem and have to disable high profile system services.

    If Apple distributes this, it will poison their relationship with the gangsters who control ITMS content (whether it has any bearing on song sharing or not.)

    What possible use is it? Apple owns Akamai. Their updates download faster than just about anyone's. If they use a torrent system it _will_ be slower (end user upload speed), not faster, and someone will sooner or later figure out how to upload trojans in place of updates and really wreck their day.

    If Apple wants to hurt themselves, it would be easier and cheaper to just start donating computers to Al Quaeda.
  • by supabeast! (84658) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:06PM (#15239401)
    "...including a unique sharing reward system where the user can share bandwidth and get rewards, such as credit in the iTunes store."

    If Apple is really this desperate for bandwidth, could this be a sign that we'll finally see higher-bitrate content on iTunes?
  • Please. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Steve Cowan (525271) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:09PM (#15239425)
    (Last Journal: Friday October 27 2006, @09:08PM)
    Mac OS Rumors has a long history of being the most uninformed, random Mac rumor site in existence. Its predictions are rarely accurate, and when they are, they have generally been mentioned on another site first.

    This is a fairly typical MOSR pipe dream.

    Apple does not need my unreliable, low-speed bandwidth. They deliver 100+ MB software updates to thousands of users without blinking. Given that most of their iTMS downloads (music, movies, whatever) are from Windows users, they would see little gain by offering software update credits to Mac users. In fact, for their paltry savings on the cost of bandwidth, they would have an administrative nightmare to face.

    I file this one under bullshit.
    • Re:Please. (Score:4, Informative)

      by ZachPruckowski (918562) <zachary.pruckowski@gmail.com> on Monday May 01 2006, @02:17PM (#15239497)
      Totally concur. Here's another example of this guy smoking stuff:

      From the MOSR front page: In the process of researching recent reports from sources regarding Apple's "Gamer's Dream" Macs now in the late stages of development, we uncovered information suggesting that Apple is testing an alternate version of the Gamer's MacBook which would employ an nVIDIA nForce chipset and dual GeForce 7800GTX Mobile GPU's. Memory bandwidth would be slightly less than that offered by the existing Intel chipset in today's MacBook Pro's, but graphics performance would be even higher than the ATi X1800/X1900 based dual-GPU laptop design we've spoken about previously.

      Not only does he have no sources, he doesn't have much of a clue about economics or design either. So he's a faker and not a very good one.
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Please. by BlueGecko (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @05:31PM
        • Re:Please. by jimbolaya (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @07:34PM
        • Re:Please. by ZachPruckowski (Score:2) Thursday May 04 2006, @09:09PM
    • Re:Please. by hardeight (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @03:24PM
      • Re:Please. by NutscrapeSucks (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @04:41PM
    • Re:Please. by PsychicX (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @05:27PM
    • Mod -1, Wrong by menace3society (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @12:00AM
    • Re:Please. by Maserati (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @01:40AM
  • FTA: Rewards would include[...]free airtime minutes for Apple's forthcoming "iPhone" and the like.
    Free airtime? Last I heard, they were just going to be making the phone, not becoming a carrier. Motorola doesn't include the minutes, Verizon does.

    Based on some rough math estimated for the proposal, the team pushing this concept believes they could cut Apple's bandwidth costs by hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars per year.
    TFA makes it seem like the project is rather far along. Too far for them to still be working on 'rough math'. Also, millions of dollars per year? I know that Apple sends out a lot of content, but still, that's a lot of bandwidth.

    [T]he system would also save terabytes of Internet backbone bandwidth that is now used for Software Updates, QuickTime Movie Trailers, and iTunes Store downloads among other things.
    Internet backbone bandiwdth, yes. But again, terabytes?

    Another thing: How would the client computer report to Apple that the data of X size was received intact?
  • Trying to get X windows in OS X configured correctly. Whoops, misread the title.
  • Not good for me (Score:1)

    by DarthChris (960471) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:14PM (#15239474)
    I live in halls of residence at the University of Manchester. As I work on the support team, I know that all P2P applications, inc. torrents, are blocked by the network packetteer. So if this feature does get put in, we'll get all sorts of complaints from users...
  • It's called "grid" distribution. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by tentac1e (62936) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:18PM (#15239500)
    (Last Journal: Friday May 21 2004, @11:42PM)
    I'm working on a project for one of the megaconglomerates we all love to hate. It incorporates bittorrent style sharing, but all literature refers to it as "grid" downloading. Also, content is never downloaded to the user's computer-- it's "cached". But since downloads are so damned DRM'ed, I guess you can't consider it downloaded anyway.
  • FTA:

    Uploads would use a unique port from other types of BitTorrent traffic so that network administrators can see it as separate and handle it accordingly.

    If ISPs recognize Apple's "iTunes BT port" as empirically a no-pirating-zone and remove any packet filtering, then I predict it'll be a prime target for "illegal networks" to use thus effectively making this whole "unique port" deal a flop from the first turn at the track. Because, after all, you can't just run any protocol you want on any port number, especially when the server and client have a mutual understanding (which is all your standard ports are)...

    Taking "handle it accordingly" another way, I can forsee that to mean "we [the ISP] want a dime on every 100 MB you send because of increased network load." Nevermind this bit: ...the system would also save terabytes of Internet backbone bandwidth that is now used for Software Updates, QuickTime Movie Trailers, and iTunes Store downloads among other things.

    So if it does nothing for packet filtering and is just begging for ISPs to charge users then exactly what good is using a "unique port" gonna do? My prediction: not a damn thing!
  • I use Cablevisions Optimum Online cable Internet service. They have some mysterious rules about subscribers using bandwidth. Seems if you upload for any extended period of time you will get capped. Capped being data transfer limits [logicalexpressions.com].

    My download is capped now at 250KB/s. That was the slowest I could download as far as I can remember. Is it our bandwidth to share? Is it our to use? If we upload even 20KB/s will other ISPs start capping everyone.

  • by alphasubzero949 (945598) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:28PM (#15239602)
    The day MOSR becomes a credible source on /. is when not only toasters fly but water flows uphill.
  • iTunes (Score:2)

    by Nom du Keyboard (633989) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:31PM (#15239627)
    bandwidth and get rewards, such as credit in the iTunes store.

    Oh, that's thrilling.
    [/SARCASM]

  • Bets Please (Score:2)

    by DarkNemesis618 (908703) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:35PM (#15239664)
    (http://www.darkernemesis.com/)
    Anyone wanna take bets on how fast the RIAA is going to start yelling? If this rumor becomes true of course.
  • Partnership idea (Score:1)

    by bberens (965711) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:38PM (#15239688)
    The folks at Azureus could partner with the folks at Apple/iTunes to create a really great combination torrent/itunes client. The Azureus team would be able to offer an incredible insight into the torrent distribution technologies and the expertise to have a truly OS transparent iTunes client.

    I know, it'll never happen, but I can dream can't I?
  • I would (Score:2)

    by GmAz (916505) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:43PM (#15239728)
    (Last Journal: Monday May 08 2006, @10:06AM)
    I would do it in a heart beat. As it is, my computer stays on all day. If I could build iTunes credit towards all that idle time, I would go for it. Too bad the service will never be used on the Windows Platform. Guess its time to buy a Mac Mini with the media center enhancements and just let it sit there and earn me...auctually my wife...some iTunes credit. She loves that damn store.
    • Re:I would by tddoog (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @03:09PM
  • He's just making up crap. The site is only right by accident. Why the hell does /. link to that?
  • by penginkun (585807) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:53PM (#15239824)
    I don't really know what else needs to be said. If the guy who runs MacOS rumors told me the sky is blue, I'd check. What's sad is he used to be reliable. Now he's just a washed up has-been who fabricates stories to drive traffic to his site. He's as reliable as Hussein's old minister of information, Muhammed Saeed al-Sahaf.
  • What I'd like to see... (Score:3, Funny)

    by utexaspunk (527541) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:00PM (#15239891)
    This may be a little OT, but I'd like to see Apple offer advertisements for download on the iTMS in exchange for store credit. They could make them interactive or something if they want to make sure you watch them. I don't mind commercials, I just mind that they interrupt whatever I'm trying to watch. I'd gladly sit and watch/interact with commercials for 20-30 min if it got me $2-3 to spend on commercial-free TV shows like Lost or The Colbert Report. There's a strange bit of psychology that makes me despise spending $2 out of my pocket for an episode of Lost but be fine with watching 20 minutes of commercials for it, even though my time is worth more than that.
  • by atarione (601740) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:12PM (#15239993)
    how long do you think it will be before comcast...etc throttle / block this traffic? or start charging you per mb easily costing more than any credit the apple store might give?
  • Shameless plug (Score:2)

    This is just the perfect story for me to plug my latest research [iacr.org], a couple of crypto protocols to help ensure P2P users behave honestly when uploading and storage rewards of some kind are involved, and there exists the incentive to cheat. Hope someone puts them to good use.
  • by Xugumad (39311) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:13PM (#15240005)
    Apple call up a few of the really big ISPs, and arrange to co-locate a couple of servers, with unlimited bandwidth to that ISPs customers. Should be brilliantly cost effective, and save both parties money.

    Don't get me wrong, BitTorrent is a great way of getting files around, but not for something as big or well funded as Apple...
  • by sarcasticfrench (949383) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:41PM (#15240201)
    I mean, bittorent has illegal music downloads on it, right? So why on earth would apple want to promote that, considering the iTunes store?! Unless they took the bittorent protocol and modified it into something of their own, and then filtered any music sharing on it, they would be working against themselves. I think this "rumor" must have been started by the author of the article.
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • by locu (935130) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:46PM (#15240231)
    This is yet another reason that unlimited broadband will soon disappear. Now Apple is planning to exploit DSL accounts to max out the traffic for their own benefit. I would imagine, looking at the costs of bandwidth, they'll use about $5 of bandwidth and credit the subscriber around a nickel to the itunes music store. IT's a total win for apple as they now won't have to increase infostructure and can ride on all the ISPs infostructure instead and their credit is a mere 1% (guessing) of what their cost to deliver it themselves would be. ... the beginning of the end of unlimited broadband.. it happened to dialup, and broadband is right around the corner because of exploitations of the service just like this.
  • torrent podcasts (Score:2)

    by Soong (7225) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:52PM (#15240303)
    (http://bolson.org/ | Last Journal: Friday May 20 2005, @03:44PM)
    Podcasts should be automatically fetched by torrent. This may require yet another extension to RSS for podcasting, but the benefit for creators of all size and bandwidth budget would be totally worth it.

    So, based on what I've seen Apple do with things like WebKit, is that they'll have an implementation nicely packaged into a library and one killerexample App which uses it.
  • Bandwidth Problems (Score:1)

    by mr-mafoo (891779) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:56PM (#15240353)
    With lots of ISPs restricting the ports that BitTorrent clients generally work on to preserve bandwidth often on the premise that bittorrent is used for illegal file swapping. So with the option of using your 40 Gigs a months bandwidth to get yourself a substantial volume of music/whatever, it would be an attractive offer. But I can see that with a legitimate use of such huge amounts of bandwidth being used, is this going to point out the naughty tactics that Broadband ISP sell services that their network couldn't sustain given higher usage.
  • lol @ IDS (Score:1)

    by pestilence669 (823950) on Monday May 01 2006, @04:48PM (#15240790)
    Some of the noisiest network traffic is caused by BitTorrent. It's responsible for so many false alarms that organizations tend to ban it completely.

    I'm sure ISPs will hate this and/or forbid it... so I must support it.
  • Novel idea ... (Score:1)

    by multimediavt (965608) on Monday May 01 2006, @07:27PM (#15241806)
    Interesting idea for limiting infrastructure costs for content delivery. Alleviate the the bandwidth and server burden on the supplier end and leverage the good things in a technology deemed evil by the very content providers (i.e., the RIAA, and MPAA) you are serving. Nice little bit of irony there.
  • by Durandal64 (658649) on Monday May 01 2006, @11:00PM (#15242906)
    Mac OS Rumors is, as usual, very, very high.
  • by OrangeTide (124937) on Tuesday May 02 2006, @12:25AM (#15243247)
    Spare upstream bandwidth isn't mine to "donate". The cable company actually resells it. The choices are they will block apple's "service" or be forced to raise my rate to provide more continous upstream bandwidth.
  • I reckon if Apple do this, it'll be a variation on BitTorrent (rather than a more generall torrent engine) specifically for making iTunes purchased downloads faster.
  • by rickatnight11 (818463) on Tuesday May 02 2006, @01:10AM (#15243393)
    So Apple is rewarding people who share music illegally...with more free music?
  • What? (Score:1)

    by void bear(void) (930003) on Tuesday May 02 2006, @06:15AM (#15244083)
    1. They are not talking illegal downloads, more software updates, and *speculated* itunes content. 2. It's not an upload for credit, it's a permission to use you as a node for credit. 3. MS has already bought groove networks and ray ozzie helped build p2p into vista - go look it up - Apple just following suit.
  • Re:DRM? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Luscious868 (679143) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:38PM (#15239130)
    RTFA. Traffic would occur on non-standard ports and you wouldn't be able to share anything you wanted. You would donate your bandwidth to share content Apple approved like software updates. It makes perfect sense and I'd certianly donate my bandwith at home when I'm at work in exchange for iTunes credits.
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:DRM? (Score:3, Interesting)

    The rumor goes that they will give you credit for uploading their software updates to other people (thereby reducing their bandwith bills); they won't offer you anything for uploading anything else...
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:DRM? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MrNougat (927651) <ckratsch@nOSpam.gmail.com> on Monday May 01 2006, @01:39PM (#15239143)
    Perhaps they intend to make torrents a legitimate method of delivery of purchased iTunes songs. So, you purchase an iTunes song, seed it as an 'iTunes torrent.' Then you get some amount of credit for more iTunes songs. Someone else who buys the first song you bought downloads it as a torrent from you (and others).

    It's a way for Apple to expand their ability to deliver content without having to drastically upgrade their own network infrastructure. You get a little iTunes store credit for being part of the delivery system.
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Nahhh (Score:5, Insightful)

    by nuzak (959558) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:42PM (#15239167)
    > I don't care how many good uses there are, Bit Torrent will always be labeled as a piracy tool.

    The name, sure. Otherwise ... it's just a goddamn protocol. WoW uses it for updates, and it's catching on elsewhere. They just won't call it BitTorrent, and it might not even be perfectly compatible. Just call it an "exchange-interlocked pareto-efficiency protocol" or something.

    Man, every time RFID or the BT protocol comes up, slashdot gets its collective panties in a wad.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:Nahhh by GoodbyeBlueSky1 (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @01:48PM
    • Re:Nahhh by 955301 (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @02:14PM
      • Re:Nahhh by eshefer (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @02:27PM
    • Re:Nahhh by houghi (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @11:55PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Nahhh (Score:4, Funny)

    2. Legal downloads of Linux/BSD CD's.

    Somehow I have never seen this as Job's first priority on the list of things to make easy in OS X.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:Nahhh by ZachPruckowski (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @02:06PM
    • Re:Nahhh by utexaspunk (Score:3) Monday May 01 2006, @03:11PM
      • Re:Nahhh by rachit (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @08:05PM
        • Re:Nahhh by shreevatsa (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @08:53PM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Nahhh (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Luscious868 (679143) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:45PM (#15239194)
    Except Apple is the one that dictates what it is you'll be sharing. You're simply donating some disk space on your computer and bandwidth. The traffic will also occur on non-standard bit torrent ports so admins can tell the difference between the Apple feature and standard bit torrent traffic.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:Nahhh by Em Adespoton (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @02:01PM
  • Re:Nahhh (Score:2)

    by Rob T Firefly (844560) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:46PM (#15239214)
    (http://robvincent.net/ | Last Journal: Tuesday October 09, @01:55PM)
    I don't care how many good uses there are, Bit Torrent will always be labeled as a piracy tool.

    You mean, like the Internet?

    [ Parent ]
  • Re:DRM? (Score:5, Informative)

    by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF (813746) on Monday May 01 2006, @01:48PM (#15239230)

    DRM? just curious, I can't imagine that they would let you offer the pirated music and movies and then get itunes credit for it...

    I think you're confusing the term upload. They aren't talking about you uploading some data you have to get credit to download other data. They are talking about you authorizing Apple to use your machine as a node in a bit torrent network that distributes data of their choice. Thus you click "yes" and they use your spare upload bandwidth to more cheaply and quickly send software updates, podcasts, iTunes downloads, etc. to other computers. The data is all encrypted and chunked so it is not useful to you at all, even though it is on your hard drive. In excahnge, they give a free itunes song or something every month or year or something.

    You win, because you weren't using all your hard drive and bandwidth anyway (and presumably it gives your data precedence). Apple wins because they no longer have to pay as much to distribute iTunes data and software updates. Theoretically, they could even expand this to third party software, cheaply distributing up to date version of any software companies want to give Apple a copy of. Hopefully it would be tied to a full service to keep all your programs updated.

    The risks are legally, Apple might have copyright challenges to copying little chinks of encrypted music, even if it is unusable, and the security risk of people masquerading as valid nodes to disrupt the network or try to inject fake data (unlikely unless the implementation is very weak).

    [ Parent ]
    • And who loses? by eMartin (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @02:28PM
    • Re:DRM? by Reverend528 (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @04:00PM
      • Re:DRM? by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @04:15PM
        • Re:DRM? by Reverend528 (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @09:11PM
          • Re:DRM? by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF (Score:2) Tuesday May 02 2006, @09:34AM
      • Re:DRM? by mrchaotica (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @09:12PM
    • Re:DRM? by Peter Bonte (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @04:28PM
  • Re:Nahhh (Score:3, Insightful)

    People said the same thing about CD burners.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:Nahhh by TomMorrisey (Score:1) Monday May 01 2006, @07:00PM
  • Re:Building things in the OS bad (Score:3, Informative)

    No, abusing your monopoly is bad.

    If MS did not abuse their monopoly, then no problems would have occurred and no one would have complained.

    What MS did, specifically, was to extort Compaq by threatening to withhold OS licenses if they shipped systems with Netscape Navigator as the default and on the desktop.

    In other words, if Apple threatened Best Buy and Walmart into stopping sales of competitive MP3 players, or PCs, with their iPod dominance then Apple would be in the same boat.

    They don't, so they aren't.
    [ Parent ]
  • by retsofaj (40630) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:24PM (#15239551)
    I would argue that the difference is in how opaque the integration is. The interfaces to WebCore (or is it WebKit?) and other Apple-provided frameworks are well-defined and in known locations. There is nothing preventing someone from (for example) writing a facade for Gecko and changing html rendering throughout the system. I don't believe (but don't know) whether that would be possible in Windows.
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:DRM? (Score:2)

    by Overly Critical Guy (663429) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:24PM (#15239552)
    I'm hoping this torrent technology is used for downloading podcasts. Currently, the Apple Store does not host the podcasts it's listing but links to their direct download links instead, which can kill their servers.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:DRM? by Firehed (Score:2) Monday May 01 2006, @04:39PM
  • Who says they'll build it into the OS? Did they build Safari into the OS, or did they create a web-browser framework called WebKit?

    Aside from the fact that these are only rumors at this point, with no confirmed feature set for OS 10.5 except a newer version of Boot Camp, what's to stop them from building a TorrentKit, that's usable to create torrent-enabled applications for 3rd party developers just like WebKit?

    Not every, dare I say, most, of the features touted by Apple's OS upgrades are not built into the OS. iChat isn't AV was not -- its an application. Safari is also an application. You are right that there are instances of OS features, i.e. Spotlight, Dashboard, Rosetta, and Expose, but many features/bug fixes that come with their OS upgrades are also done at the application level (Front Row, PictureBooth).

    [ Parent ]
  • by Overly Critical Guy (663429) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:29PM (#15239610)
    Or at least, that's what the rest of the industry keeps trying to tell MS. So if it's Apple doing it, it's okay?

    1.) Apple isn't a monopoly.
    2.) It's not like there's a commercial market for torrent clients or anything that will be threatened. Bittorrent is an open protocol.
    3.) What the industry is telling Microsoft is that they can't leverage their monopoly to damage free choice. For instance, making IE default to MSN Search on all new installations, even though MSN Search only has 11% of the market and Google is #1.
    4.) This won't be allowed to be used for illegal piracy anyway.
    [ Parent ]
  • by slagish666 (607934) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:37PM (#15239682)
    How is it that OSX gets the pass on this? I M$ built it into Windows Vista (and if it worked) you'd scream foul over anticompetitive bullying.

    Dude, what are you talking about? IF MS had the foresight to do this, it would be great. Imagine getting WinXP SP3 at the full download speed your Internet connection is capable of. Heck, MS could save thousands, if not millions of dollars in server and bandwidth costs if they used BT to distribute their service packs and updates.

    But, all MS has done is to try to sell BT-like vapor ware. Apple has the vision, if they implement BT they will be the ones saving millions, and getting my respect.

    [ Parent ]
  • How is it that OSX gets the pass on this? I M$ built it into Windows Vista (and if it worked) you'd scream foul over anticompetitive bullying.


    First, nobody even knows what "this" is yet (other than a vague rumor posted on an unreliable rumor site). Apple hasn't announced anything. Second, when Apple has 90+% of the operating system market and a criminal history of anti-competitive practices, they will be subject to strict scrutiny also.

    [ Parent ]
  • by gsfprez (27403) on Monday May 01 2006, @02:56PM (#15239856)
    "build in" was the wrong terminology used by the poster.

    "Included with" is what he should have said to be more accurate... and is exactly the termniology Apple uses when they talk about Mac OS X... as in..

    Safari is included with Mac OS X - but you can delete the app in one step.
    iChat is included with mac OS x - but you can delete the app in one step.

    The only "built in" things Apple has been doing lately are...
    building in cameras into their computers (you can't take them out - boo!)
    building in bluetooth (to the point where its nearly impossible to remove)

    When Apple hands out software, you don't see anyone complaining... because you can get rid of/delete whatever you want
    like Widgets? Hell, i hate em - and therefore, i deleted them, and diabled Widgets with one System Preference.

    Try doing that with Internet Explorer, ActiveX, and the billions of crappy services that cmoe running by default ni Windows.
    [ Parent ]
  • by payndz (589033) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:06PM (#15239940)
    BTW, what will they call this flavour of "peer to peer"? "apple to apple"?

    'Appleseed', duh!

    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Building things in the OS bad (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rizzo320 (911761) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:19PM (#15240053)
    The difference:

    I can delete Safari from any version of Mac OS X it runs on. Can you uninstall Internet Explorer from your current verion of Windows XP?

    What I am leading to here is that Apple builds features into Mac OS X, and then creates modular applications that take advantage of them, or allows you to disable these features in the operating system. Plus, other applications built by third party developers can take advantage of the features (such as OmniWeb with WebKit) as well. No one who installs Mac OS X is forced to leave Safari, iChat AV, Mail, iCal, etc installed on their computer. They can delete them and then choose to install Firefox, Thunderbird, Adium, and Sunbird, and there is no penalty to the user.

    Again, try doing that to Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, or Microsoft Messenger, without a third party XP hacking tool. You can hide those applications to the user, but can never fully delete them.

    If Apple builds torrenting into 10.5, I'm sure there won't be anything that prevents you from running the normal bittorent clients that are already available for your standard pirating needs.

    And that, my friend, is the difference between good and evil :-)
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Peer Impact (Score:2, Interesting)

    by microbrewer (774971) on Monday May 01 2006, @03:47PM (#15240248)
    (http://www.blowfly.com.au/)
    Peer Impact's patent on Incentives for p2p

    Here's the Patent

    COMPUTER SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR ENHANCING THE DISTRIBUTION AND REVENUE STREAMS DERIVED FROM WORKS MADE AVAILABLE IN DIGITAL FORM

    Abstract of WO2005038617
    Methods and computer systems for increasing the revenue stream from a work made available in digital form are provided. The methods and systems of the invention are particularly useful for musical, video, interactive game files, and artistic or commercial works that can be digitally copied and transferred or distributed, such as via the Internet. Embodiments of the present invention advantageously can form part of a greater system that provides access to digital forms of numerous works or groups of works, such as those that are copyrighted, to thereby extend the revenue-producing capabilities for the copyright holder of digital or digitized works to bona fide purchasers of those works. In turn, bona fide purchasers of a work who later provide copies of that work or other authorized works, or provide transfer or distribution bandwidth with respect to that work or other authorized works may receive incentives. Advantageously, no central warehouse of digital content is necessary with the present methods, and users may introduce authorized content into the present system in a controlled manner, through peer-to-peer systems, while realizing economic incentives for doing so. The present systems and methods also provide a myriad of embodiments of incentive and apportioning payment schedules, configurations and properties.
    Data supplied from the esp@cenet database - Worldwide

    http://v3.espacenet.com/textdoc?DB=EPODOC&IDX=WO20 05038617&F=0 [espacenet.com]

    [ Parent ]
  • more like "i for an i" ...
    [ Parent ]
  • by DannyO152 (544940) on Monday May 01 2006, @04:06PM (#15240443)
    nuucp?
    [ Parent ]
  • Of course, because MS has demonstrated anticompetitive behavior in the past. A link to a similar response to a similar post in this very article thread here [slashdot.org]!

    The gist is: Microsoft threatened Compaq to pull their Windows license if Compaq installed Netscape Navigator. Apple has not done any such thing with their OS, so they aren't under scrutiny.

    If you're going to complain about how people treat MS, at least understand WHY people treat MS differently too.
    [ Parent ]
  • Legiferate? (Score:1)

    by nasch (598556) on Monday May 01 2006, @05:34PM (#15241098)
    Is that like a cross between legislate and refrigerate?
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:ISPs? (Score:1)

    by Sometimes_Rational (866083) on Monday May 01 2006, @05:36PM (#15241111)
    It depends on how the file-sharing will be implemented. If the sharing is restricted to the local network, then the ISP's have nothing to complain about and in fact this will save them some bandwidth.

    Consider the case of A, B, C, D, E on a local network. As it stands now if they all use Software Update, then they all go outside their local network to get it from Apple. Under file-sharing, if A gets the update from Apple first, then B, C, D, E get the update from A or from each other, so Apple and the ISP only have to supply bandwidth for one update + a small reward to the sharers instead of 5 updates. The ISP can't complain because it is perfectly OK to share files inside your local network.

    The local network administrators have little to complain about either, since these are things that would be downloaded anyway, so it is the same number of bits being exchanged, only now the bandwidth is mostly distributed across local computers instead of coming entirely from the gateway server.

    We are all speculating at the moment, but think how well this would work on a college network, where multiple labs are updated regularly and there are many students listening to the same few popular songs.

    [ Parent ]
  • by Jerry Rivers (881171) on Monday May 01 2006, @06:57PM (#15241653)
    Doing that would be an insult to the many developers of FTP clients for the Mac.

    If the command line is too much hastle (as it is for many) then download a free client such as Cyberduck.

    Why must Apple supply everything?
    [ Parent ]
  • If you consider asking a pointed question to be flame bait, then I suppose I'm guilty.

    The truth is, if Microsoft enters a niche currently served by freeware/shareware/open source, the assumption is that it is the evil empire out to squash all the little perfect peace-loving Linux and OSX people.

    Frankly, I just want to see the same scrutiny applied universally.

    Look for a second at Apple. The only reason they're not Microsoft is that they didn't do it well enough 20 years ago. The failed, they didn't "take the high road". Apple is pushed DRM down our throats more successfully than Microsoft. They also found a way to make downloading music workable for the record companies and for most of the customer base (at least for now). Apple's proprietary hardware and planned obsolecense has made upgrading their equipment nearly impossible for decades.

    Hell, I had a ][+, a IIe, and a //c, a Mac SE, and own an eMac G4. I'm not anti-Apple. I had to be dragged kicking and screaming from my Apple machines to that damn Mitsubishi built "Leading Edge" clone (the first one, not the Tandy 1000 clone they made later). Today, I have several Linux boxes -- and prefer them for server work hands down, but for workstation work, XP does what I need it to do.

    If Apple builds a BT client into the OS and declares it "Part of the Operating System" because it uses that to obtain its patches, how is that different from Microsoft doing it with IE?
    [ Parent ]
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