According to a federal judge, MP3 files are legal to sell if the person selling them, bought them. This is after Capitol Records wanted to shut down a used MP3 store which the record company deemed not legal to do.

Record labels have quite a stronghold over music and are very serious about people sharing that music as well as selling the music. Of course, it’s a losing battle with Millions upon Millions of people doing so, but they still try to abuse their power.

Via Arstechnica:

“A one-of-a-kind website enabling the online sale of preowned digital-music files got a major legal boost late Monday when a federal judge refused to shutter it at the request of Capitol Records. ReDigi, which opened in October, says it’s a modern-day, used-record store that provides account holders with a platform to buy and sell used MP3s that were purchased lawfully through iTunes. The platform’s technology does not support other digital files such as those purchased from Amazon or ripped from a CD.”

“Sullivan’s decision means that the case is still headed to trial, where Capitol will attempt to prove its allegations that ReDigi facilitates wanton copyright infringement and is not protected by the first-sale doctrine.”

Very interesting case and we’ll keep an eye on how it progresses. As many would agree, if you bought the music, then you should be able to sell it. Same as if you buy a movie, you can sell it to someone and so on.

Do you believe it should be legal to sell an MP3 if you purchased it?

Used MP3 Music Files Legal To Sell Says Federal Judge is a post from: The Inquisitr

I am pretty sure that we can expect a disclaimer about how this is a bug and will be dealt with immediately, at least we hope it is a bug, but Tom Cheredar over at VentureBeat is reporting that users if iTunes Match are finding that songs in their collections that have ‘explicit’ lyrics are getting replaced with ‘clean’ versions.

Now the iTunes Match service is something fairly new from Apple and allows members to have legal access to any songs currently in your iTunes music library and for $25 per year you can download your songs from Apple’s cloud to any device running the iOS 5 operating system. It is here where the “glitch” is showing up in that only ‘clean’ versions of the songs are being downloaded, not your “explicit” versions that you wanted to listen to.

Apparently it has been confirmed that this has happened in regards to songs by Kanye West, Jay-Z, and Ice Cube. There have been several blogs that have reached out to Apple for confirmation but we are still waiting to hear back.

However as Tom Cheredar points out in his post on the news this bug does show that this isn’t a true cloud storage solution as what you download should be exactly what you uploaded. I think it also points out once more Apple’s puritanical tendencies but we’ll have to wait and see just how they spin this one to really decide.

[Opps Dept.] iTunes Match is swapping clean versions of songs for the ‘dirty’ ones is a post from: The Inquisitr

Apple on Thursday announced the release of an iPad app for iTunes U. The announcement was made during a New York City press conference by Apple’s Eddy Cue.  iTunes U has served 700 million downloads to date and is used at universities around the country, primarily for lecture purposes.

The new iOS version of iTunes U brings an iBooks type interface to the iPad.

With the new version of iTunes U teachers can provide new tools to their students which allow for the creation and management of entire curriculums. Teachers can also provide assignments to their students and stream live content at will.

Just like Apple’s new digital textbooks students are also able to take notes directly inside the materials display.

For enterprising people who simply want to educate themselves course materials are already available for download from several Ivy league schools including Harvard and Yale.

The best part may be that iTunes U for iPad is available now for free from the iOS App Store.

Do you plan to download and use the iTunes U App for classroom use?

[via BGR]

iTunes U App Arrives For iPad Users is a post from: The Inquisitr

Swift tweeted the news and composed a quick thank-you note to her fans. She said:

“I’m also counting this as another beautiful Christmas gift.. Thank you for making ‘Safe & Sound’ the #1 song.”

The country beauty and The Civil Wars edged LMFAO’s abysmal ‘Sexy and I Know It’ into second place, while Rihanna’s ‘We Found Love‘ (which actually has a pretty good video, I thought) took bronze. ‘Safe and Sound’ is part of a soundtrack album that also boasts tracks by the usually excellent Arcade Fire and The Decemberists.

The Hunger Games hits U.S. theaters on March 23, 2012. It follows a girl called Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence) as she replaces her little sister in a fight-to-the-death annual event called the Hunger Games. Based on a trilogy of books by Suzanne Collins, two further films are expected.

Oh, and Swift had another reason to celebrate over the weekend: she passed 10 million followers on Twitter. Playing it cool (when we all know she was hitting ‘F5′ the whole of Christmas Eve), she tweeted:

“Wait wait wait. I just noticed my page has 10 million followers now? That’s crazy! What a lovely Christmas present!!”

She knows I’m close behind her, though.

Taylor Swift’s ‘Safe and Sound’ Christmas Number 1 on iTunes is a post from: The Inquisitr

If you plan to buy your loved ones, friends and co-workers iTunes gift certificates this holiday season you might want to avoid e-mail offers for the cards. A group of 11 specialists are warning buyers of fake certificates that offer no monetary value while placing malware on the users computer.

The emails, which read “iTunes Gift Certiicate” provide readers with a 50% off option that will then give them a code that can be used for music downloads. Once a user downloads the file via attachment their computer is immediately infected.

In order to have users activate the malware the file says they must open the file ”Gift_Certificate_iT2718.zip which in turn created a “backdoor” into the users computer which then allows the hackers to grab personal information such as credit cards and passwords.

Making matters worse the system creates a link to a remote server which allows for further contamination of the PC.

Holiday buyers are warned that other gift card scams are also circulating, including a popular option from a fake Starbucks account.

Even if an email looks very real, unsolicited emails should be ignored and remember that if an offer is “too good to be true” it likely is and should be avoided.

Fake iTunes Gift Certificates Leading To Malware Infections is a post from: The Inquisitr

UC Davis police Lt. John Pike has found himself unwittingly achieving meme status, and out of all the ones I’ve seen, this cracked me up the most.

Pepper Spray Rage is a post from: The Inquisitr

Apple has posted a link on its website to a video of the company’s memorial services for its employees to celebrate the life of its founder Steve Jobs.

The event, held last Wednesday in an outdoor amphitheater at Apple campus, was closed to the public. Reporters were even asked to stay away from the Apple premises during that time. The company also closed all its retail stores so that employees could view the memorial service via webcast.

The video which runs 81 minutes is Apple’s way of sharing to the public the company as they mourn the death of Jobs at the age of 56 on October 5 due to a long battle with pancreatic cancer.

Apple CEO Tim Cook said the past two weeks had been the saddest of his life:

“But I know Steve. Steve would have wanted this cloud to lift for Apple and our focus to return to the work that he loved so much.”

Cook also revealed that the last piece of advice that Jobs gave him was “to never ask what he would do, just do what’s right.”

Jobs’ wife Laurene Powell and former Vice President and Apple board member Al Gore were also present during the event.

Despite not being involved with Apple, how do you celebrate Steve’s life? Or is this just another passing of a great mind?

Apple Posts A Celebration of Steve’s Life Online is a post from: The Inquisitr

Despite a big push to make TV rentals one of the strongest selling points of the Apple TV, Apple has decided to pull the plug on the 99-cent TV rental service previously available on the iTunes Store. Instead, users will now have to purchase the episodes.

The reason, Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr explained to AllThingsDigital, is that customers rather overwhelmingly preferred to purchase individual episodes, or a season pass, rather than going for the cheaper rental alternative.

“iTunes customers have shown they overwhelmingly prefer buying TV shows,” Neumayr said. “iTunes in the Cloud lets customers download and watch their past TV purchases from their iOS devices, Apple TV, Mac or PC allowing them to enjoy their programming whenever and however they choose.”

Consumers weren’t the only group that the TV rentals service didn’t catch on with. A statement from Fox suggests they weren’t quite on board, either.

“After carefully considering the results of the rental trial, it became clear that content ownership is a more attractive long-term value proposition both for iTunes customers and for our business. To further enhance the value of ownership, we are working with Apple to make content available within their new cloud-based service.”

If Apple doesn’t have something up their sleeve to replace TV rentals, I’d be wholly surprised. Perhaps it has something to do with the newly-resurfaced Apple HDTV rumors?

Source: AllThingsDigital (via Engadget)

Apple TV, iTunes lose TV rental option is a post from: The Inquisitr

It’s not very often that you hear of Walmart getting out of a business segment but that is exactly what is happening when it comes to the MP3 music download business.

Walmart was one of the first big brand companies to follow Apple into the business of MP3 track downloads after iTunes launched back in 2003. Unfortunately though, it never gained traction the same way that iTunes did and while they haven’t publicly stated why they are getting out of that business they have said that as of August 29th the service would no longer be available.

Some are suggesting that part of the reason for its failure was its choice in formats for the music tracks.

Much of Walmart’s failure has been blamed on its choice of formats. Making the presumption that endorsing Microsoft’s choice of format would lead it to success, it opted for Windows Media Audio and found itself locked out of Apple’s iPod, guaranteeing a lack of mainstream adoption. The choice of a Microsoft alliance compounded the troubles further when Microsoft launched the Zune and its companion Zune Marketplace, leaving Walmart to compete against its own partner.

via electronista

Walmart cries Uncle and gets out of the MP3 download business is a post from: The Inquisitr

The LP is truly dead- do you do this?

[Graph] On demand music listening patterns over time is a post from: The Inquisitr

Steve Jobs “killed” the music business, at least that’s what Jon Bon Jovi thinks. The musician recently spoke with The Times Sunday Magazine and said that the move to digital music, lead by iTunes, all but ended the “magical” experience of listening to music.

According To Bon Jovi, gone are the days when you would discover new music while donning headphones in a music store, cranking the music up to 10 and ignoring the problems in your life.

He goes on to say that buying music “by the track” has taken away the mystique of music buying:

“Kids today have missed the whole experience of putting the headphones on, turning it up to 10, holding the jacket, closing their eyes and getting lost in an album,” while he added, “And the beauty of taking your allowance money and making a decision based on the jacket, not knowing what the record sounded like, and looking at a couple of still pictures and imagining it… I hate to sound like an old man now, but I am, and you mark my words, in a generation from now people are going to say: ‘What happened?’ Steve Jobs’ personally responsible for killing the music business.”

For their part, Apple developers have tried to give a full listening experience, for example iTunes LP allows listeners to listen from end-to-end of albums with full album art, but unfortunately that program lacks pre-listening discovery, which can be remedied with programs such as GrooveShark.

If you ask me, it has been the last decade of record label greed that has killed the enjoyable part of the industry. I remember watching CD’s rise in price on what seemed like a monthly basis, while the quality of music turned into a turnkey type business full of pop recycling from a handful of producers, if anyone killed the music business, it was the music business.

These days I can download the songs I want, watch their music videos on YouTube, find song meanings and lyrics using Google search and even watch interviews about those albums online with live performances thrown in for good measure.

Sure the “magical” aspect of popping on a Vinyl may be gone, but if used properly there is a lot more to discover about the music we buy when online “magic” is thrown into the mix.

Bon Jovi: Steve Jobs “Killed” The Music Business is a post from: The Inquisitr

That huge new data center Apple is getting ready to open in North Carolina will be used solely for Apple iTunes and MobileMe applications according to a company statement made today.

Apple announced the data centers planned use when speaking with shareholders at their annual meeting on Wednesday.

Apple also revealed that “corporate systems” would be housed at the new building which is set to open “sometime this Spring.”

While no specific details have been revealed, it’s expected that the new cloud-based iTunes service which has been rumored for some time now will run out of the center, while MobileMe should see a good deal of expansion.

Apple To Shareholders: North Carolina Data Center For MobileMe, iTunes is a post from: The Inquisitr

How smurfing angry would you be at your kid if she spent $1,500 on in-app upgrades after finding out your iTunes password?

Unlike yesterday’s big-haired family who were unable to wiggle out of a $1,700 XBox Live charge, however, the family of 8-year-old Madison Kay will be able to get a refund from Apple after their grade schooler went on an expensive “Smurfberry binge” playing Smurfs’ Village over Christmas break. The Washington Post points out a fifteen-minute window after an iTunes password is entered during which kids can go effing crazy with your credit card, and an advocate for- oh, I don’t know- preventing kids from going on app spending sprees- explains why this is a problem for parents’ whose kids have iPods:

“Parents need to know that the promotion of games and the delivery mechanism for them are deceptively cheap,” said Jim Styer, president of Common Sense Media, a public advocacy group for online content for children. “But basically people are trying to make money off these apps, which is a huge problem, and only going to get bigger because mobile apps are the new platform for kids.”

Capcom Interactive, the game’s maker, called the loophole “lamentable.” While kidless folk might say that parents should keep a better eye on their anklebiters, any parent who has shelled out a couple of hundred bucks for the pricey devices will probably tell you 15 minutes in which your kid is out of your hair is the whole reason parents buy iPods in the first place.

Although Capcom Interactive says the high charges aren’t meant to bait kids, bushels of Smurfberries and snowflakes on the game range can cost $20 or even $100. Do you think parents should be liable when kids go crazy and buy expensive app enhancements?

[via]

Mom apoplectic after kid spends $1500 on Smurfs’ Village app upgrades is a post from: The Inquisitr

I don’t own any Apple products, and I really don’t ever expect to because there isn’t a product out there that I can’t find a more reasonable priced version of and I don’t have to worry about their increasing platform lock down.

It has always amazed me how everyone continues to target Microsoft as the big bad monster of proprietary platform when in fact Apple is proving over and over again that it is much more tyrannical when it comes to their platform.

The interesting thing is that while Microsoft did deserve to get beat up on in the past for its anti-competitive actions Apple has done much the same thing and yet everyone continues to give them a pass. Even with the news today regarding the Sony e-reader app being rejected from the Apple App Store people continue to give the company a pass.

It was along these lines that Thomas Baekal raised an interesting point in a post today where he suggested that what apple is doing is profoundly illegal at worst but anti-competitive at best. He goes on to point out how if you took the same documents used to haul Microsoft before the DoJ and substituted Apple, and their products, for Microsoft there isn’t much of a difference.

Try this. Head over to Wikipedia, and find the article about the anti-trust lawsuit between the US Government and Microsoft (over the anti-competitive nature of Microsoft vs. Netscape), and then replace the words with Apple.

Here is the converted introduction:

Apple abused monopoly power on Mac OS based phones and tablets in its handling of device sales and application sales. The issue central to the case was whether Apple was allowed to bundle its flagship iTunes App Store software with its iOS operating system. Bundling them together is alleged to have been responsible for Apple’s victory in the mobile application wars as every iPad user and developer were required to use the App Store.

It was further alleged that this unfairly restricted the market for competing app stores. Underlying these disputes were questions over whether Apple altered or manipulated its application programming interfaces (APIs) to restrict the iTunes App Store over third party App stores, Apple’s conduct in forming restrictive licensing agreements with 3rd party developers, and Apple’s intent in its course of conduct.”

“Apple stated that the merging of iTunes App Store was the result of innovation and competition, that the two were now the same product and were inextricably linked together and that consumers were now getting all the benefits of iTunes. Those who opposed Apple’s position countered that the App Store was still a distinct and separate product which did not need to be tied to the operating system, since a separate version of the App Store was available for jailbreaked devices.

With Microsoft vs. Netscape we still had a choice. It was still a disaster for Netscape, but we could always just download Netscape. We see the same pattern with the iPad, but we are not given a choice. We can’t download Sony’s ebookstore directly.

One has to wonder just at what point apple will have pushed too far and suffer a backlash that could drastically hurt the company.

There is making money and then there is downright greed. Apple goes for the latter. is a post from: The Inquisitr

It’s only been a week since the Apple announcement that they promised us a day that we would never forget and finally made the Beatles song catalog available on iTunes but between then and now they have sold two million songs and 450,000 albums.

According to Billboard sales worked out like this:

The initial Beatles sales figures are in: More than 450,000 albums and 2 million individual songs were sold on iTunes worldwide, according to Apple, since the Beatles catalog was made available Tuesday (Nov. 16). In U.S. the best-selling album was “Abbey Road” and best-selling song was “Here Comes the Sun.”

Of that tally, U.S. album sales totaled 119,000 units, which included 13,000 digital box sets, while individual digital track sales reached 1.4 million, according to industry sources. Each digital box set included 13 studio albums, the two-volume “Past Masters” compilation and the “Live at the Washington Coliseum, 1964” concert film. Sources say the U.S. album sales tally of 119,000 counts each box set as one unit, while Apple’s worldwide album sales tally counts each box set as multiple sales units, although it wasn’t immediately clear how many units each box set accounted for.

I’m not the biggest Beatles fan, I do have my favorites, but it isn’t surprising at all that their music is selling as well as it is.

The Beatles prove once more how timeless they are thanks to iTunes is a post from: The Inquisitr

Beatles Coming To iTunes Tomorrow [Leaked Rumor] is a post from: The Inquisitr

Another crass app that’s popular with kids has hit the iTunes App Store, and this one has a bit of “cyberbullying” stigma attached to it.

The app scans iPhone pictures and rates them on a scale of one to ten, with one being more attractive, and ten prompting some insults from the app. Stephen Balkam, CEO of the Family Online Safety Institute in Washington, expressed concerns that the app could be harmful if used by teens or tweens in a school or social setting:

“I can see that the guys who programmed it were having a bit of fun and all,” Balkam said. “If you’re 25, 26 or 28, this sort of thing could be quite funny or amusing. But in the hands of a 14- or 15-year-old, it could be quite the reverse, and particularly if someone is submitting someone else’s photograph and then circulated that photo around school. For impressionable young teens and tweens, it could potentially be quite damaging,” he said. “It could be used in cyberbullying.”

Eugene Overline, one of the apps creators, pointed out that if children plan on being cruel to their peers, the app won’t stop that behavior. Also, he grudgingly admitted that he scored a very ugly 8.7 on his own app.

iPhone ‘Ugly Meter’ app prompts cyberbullying concerns is a post from: The Inquisitr

Apple is well known for applying their corporate (of Steve Jobs’) morality upon anything that happens within their sphere of influence. We have seen this happen more than a few time when it comes to apps but apparently this same morality is being applied to things like Twitter messages on the promo pages for artists that are a part of their new music social network called Ping.

Marshall Kirkpatrick at ReadWriteWeb is posting about the cleaner version of Lady Gaga’s promo page. Not cleaner as in now racy pictures, although that still remains to be seen, but rather the Twitter messages from Lady Gaga’s Twitter stream.

You see Lady Gaga is a vocal opponent to Proposition 8 – the anti-gag marriage legislation – and quite often takes to Twitter to voice that opposition. The problem is none of those messages are showing up in her Twitter stream on her Ping promo page.

One has to wonder how Lady Gaga is going to feel about this muzzling of her right to free speech within Apple’s newest playground?

images courtesy of ReadWriteWeb

Apple’s morals strike their new social music network by muting Lady Gaga tweets is a post from: The Inquisitr

Prince did an interview with the UK’s Daily Mirror, in which he explains his unusual position of banning digital distribution of his work and says he believes the internet is “over.”

The diminutive pop star, now 52, elaborates:

“The internet’s completely over. I don’t see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They won’t pay me an advance for it and then they get angry when they can’t get it.

“The internet’s like MTV. At one time MTV was hip and suddenly it became outdated. Anyway, all these computers and digital gadgets are no good.

“They just fill your head with numbers and that can’t be good for you.”

Prince, who says he is always interested in “finding new ways to distribute (his) music,” has even gone so far as to remove his official website completely. Later in the interview, the artist currently known as Prince blames much of modern woes on young people who “don’t have enough God in their lives.”

Prince declares the internet ‘over’ is a post from: The Inquisitr

To speed up the process you can also disable the inital backup that occurs, when you connect your iPhone/iPod/iPad with iTunes. That is pretty clever!

The app is now submitted for Apple’s approval, so hopefully wel’ll know more in a few weeks.

WiFi Sync For iPhone – Speed Demo is a post from: The Inquisitr