IP: Let them eat MS cake : Good Morning Silicon Valley Thu Apr 12 12:15:25 EDT 2001

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Windows XP users to eat what they're given: Even as Napster works with 
> <http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/svfront/nap041201.htm>veteran 
> valley engineer Nick Nichols to resolve its differences with the recording 
> industry, several leading technology companies are fast developing new 
> methods of distributing digital music that will challenge the dominance of 
> the MP3 format that made Napster a household name. According to the Wall 
> Street Journal, the formats being developed use digital-rights management 
> technology to both limit the ability to share copyright-protected song 
> files and improve their sound quality. To this end 
> <http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2707267,00.html>Microsoft 
> plans to compromise the quality of music that can be recorded as an MP3 
> file using software in its Windows XP operating system, thereby 
> "encouraging" users to rely upon its proprietary Windows Media Audio 
> format, which reportedly sounds clearer and requires less storage space. 
> Indeed, according to one analyst, MP3 audio files played on a machine 
> running XP "sound like somebody in a phone booth underwater." While 
> several companies are diligently working to unseat MP3 -- among them Real 
> Networks, AT&T, Dolby Laboratories and Sony -- Microsoft seems the most 
> likely to succeed. "Certainly, when Microsoft decides to put something in 
> their operating-system support, it becomes the standard," David Farber, 
> former chief technologist for the FCC told the Wall Street Journal. "The 
> average consumer will use what comes on the disc when he buys the machine. 
> They're very effective in that way.... The consumer is going to eat what 
> he's given."



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