[cw-discuss] iTunes

[Simon Roby]

On 11/8/07, John Wheaton <johnwheaton2 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Search for "iTunes Linux Petition"
> Here's one I'd signed:  http://www.petitiononline.com/itmslin/petition.html
>
> Apple is continuing to do better at hiding any real email links.
> There appear to now be "discussions" for iTunes Music Store and
> iPod+iTunes.  searching for discussions or starting a new one would be
> a way to raise the issue again.
>
>
> Also, please do not misconstrue this as anything against Wine or
> Crossover.  My goal in the future includes rediscovering games that I
> can run under Kubuntu thanks to Crossover.  My issue with iTunes is
> that I personally find it ridiculous that Apple practically refuses to
> take the steps to go from their *nix OS to other *nix OSes.  They are
> throwing away marketshare (and have lost this customer).

You seem to imply that iTunes would be a simple tweak-and-recompile
away from being usable under Linux. Mac OS X may have a BSD layer but
iTunes and all other GUI apps in Mac OS X are _not_ running under that
layer. Porting iTunes to another "*nix OS" is far from being a trivial
job, in fact it would be just as much work as the Windows port, which
was justifiable because Windows owns about 95% of the market, but is
definitely not the case for Linux. The marketshare they're "throwing
away" is insignificant, especially when you take into account that
most Linux users are likely to not being interested by iTunes at all,
since it's 1) not free software and 2) a DRM tool.

Anyway I don't understand why people find it "ridiculous" (to use your
own words) that Apple won't port iTunes for Linux. Apple sees Linux as
a direct competitor to their platform. They have absolutely no reason
to support it. I don't see how they would be even remotely interested
in doing a Linux port of _any_ of their applications, even if it were
a simple job.
-- 
- SR

> Something I've turned onto lately is Amazonmp3.com.  As I said, I'm
> happy staying away from Apple's proprietary M4A/AAC format in favor of
> MP3s.  It's probably too much to hope for OGG or FLAC one of these
> days, so the ubiquitous MP3 will have to do.
>
> Regards,
>  John.
>
>