As most probably already know, some countries in Europe (Norway, France and the Netherlands among others) are putting pressure on Apple to force it to open the Fairplay DRM system. They argue that digital tunes should be playable on any digital music player, much in the same way that vinyl records could be played on any turntable.

There are some flaws with that reasoning. After all, I do not recall similar threats to Sony when they released Betamax (and more recently the ATRAC audio compression algorithm) or Nintendo who offers downloadable games that only work on their console. However, I think that everyone agrees with the fact that if Fairplay protected tunes could be played on any device, that would be better for consumers. After all, that would offer everyone the freedom to choose a player fron a different brand once the time comes to upgrade to newer gear. However, even though I am all for more freedom, I do not want this (small) improvement to result in higher prices. Why am I concerned?

Today, Apple can afford to leverage its large iPod installed base to put some serious pressure on the majors in order to keep the price of digital downloads relatively low. Therefore, because Apple makes money on the players, not the music, legal music downloaders have actually benefitted from Apple’s near monopoly. If Apple is forced to allow digital music interoperability, the leverage is lost and the majors will be able to set higher prices, much like what they have done with ring tones (in conjunction with network operators), and regain control of the online music distribution business.

So, who stands to win if EU regulators manage to force Apple to open up Fairplay? In the short term this could seem to be good news for SanDisk, LG or Philips (a Dutch company), among many others. However, there isn’t much money to be made in a totally commoditized market. The real winners would be the music labels, specially the majors (think RIIA), who would regain full control of the market. Where does that leave consumers? We have to choose between Steve Jobs (a benevolent dictator) and the freedom to choose a music player while living under the grip of the music tyrants.

For now, I sincerely prefer the Steve Jobs option. Why? Because right now Apple makes the best music players and because once you start buying a lot of digital music, like I do, the price of each song becomes more important than the price of the player. Of course, things could change in the future and therefore such a measure could become necessary. However, I would really appreciate if EU regulators tried to break the music oligopoly before suing Apple. Otherwise there is a clear danger that the remedy could be worse than the problem they are trying to fix. As a Dutch citizen I would like to see my government reconsider its decision.

I do not write movie reviews very often, but when I go to the movies and I feel that I got ripped off, my only mean to get even is by using my blog.

In this case, it is really about the script. If I had read the book beforehand, I would never have bothered to see the film. Most recent American best-sellers are based on he same recipe, select a theme that is interesting to a large audience (Illuminatis, submarines or the personal life of Jesus), add surprising, little known facts, detailed descriptions of interesting places, and finally, a thin plot to hold everything together. This has worked great for authors such as Dan Brown or Tom Clancy, even though I personally think that the formula is starting to lose some of its magic.

There are many problems with The Perfume. The most important one, is that it is evident that Patrick Saskind had no clue whatsoever about how to finish his novel. That is why the last ten minutes of the movie are just ridiculous and spoil the whole movie. However, there is a reason why finishing the book proved difficult. For us, humans, scent is becoming less and less relevant. People may still enjoy a good perfume, but that is about it. This sense will not cause us to modify our behavior, despite all the unsubstantiated talk that surrounds pheromones.

So, even though the novel may have pleased readers with long descriptions about the art and mysteries of perfume creation, the movie is unable to carry them to the big screen effectively. The result is that, in the movie, the ridiculous conclusion is evident and unforgivable.

As a developer I recently received an e-mail from the ADC (Apple Developer Connection) in which Apple offers to those developers with Select and Premier memberships to buy the new Apple TV using their hardware discounts. I do not want to read too much into this announcement, since it may just be a perk for loyal Apple developers.

However, it is weird that Apple offers a product that apparently cannot be extended in any way (software wise) to developers. It could also be that this offer is mainly directed to hardware developers who may want to offer accessories but I sincerely hope that there will be opportunities for software developers. After all, there is a strong demand for additional Codec support (Divx, Flash video, etc.) and there is potential for casual games like the ones that are currently available for the iPod.

It is unlikely that Apple will totally open access to the Apple TV APIs. In order to maintain control over the user experience, if they decide to open the product to third parties, Cupertino is likely to work with a very small group of developers, much in the same way it has done with the iPod (and will do with the iPhone). I sincerely hope that the ADC mail sent to developers means that at least some of them will be invited to offer additional software that will help improve what already looks like a great product.

When Apple first announced the iTV, back in September, we all assumed that it was just another CE device, much like ElGato’s eyeHome or more recent devices from Linksys. It turns out that this is not true and that the Apple TV is much closer to a traditional computer than previously thought.

According to AppleInsider, the device sports an under-clocked 1.0GHz Pentium-M processor, a 40GB Hard drive, 256MB of memory as well as an nVidia G72M video board with 64MB of video RAM. While the specs aren’t really impressive compared to current laptop offerings, this is as close as you get today if you want to develop a computer that sells for under US$300, doesn’t require a fan [correction: actually the device sports a small fan, however it does not seem to produce a loud noise] and fits in a very small form factor.

This design offers many advantages for Apple. Since it is based on an Intel Architecture, the code developed for iTunes and Front Row can be easily reused. Additionally, in the future, as prices for more recent components continue to drop, the Apple TV can be easily upgraded to support better technologies such as 1080p output and Blue-Ray high-definition DVD playback.

It is clear to me that the Apple TV is basically a low-end Macintosh computer that lacks some features in order to keep the price down and eliminate the need for a noisy fan, an important feature for a device designed to be used in the living room, something that Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo seem to be unable to understand.

We may never see Mac OS X (or any other OS) boot on an Apple TV, although I wouldn’t dismiss the idea. After all, hackers have been able to install linux on a WRT54G router and even on the iPod, so why not do the same with this much more powerful device. However, what really struck me was that at a time when Apple has just dropped the word Computer from its name it may have just released the cheapest Macintosh ever.

The iPhone announcement may have put an end to years of speculations, however I feel that it still raises lots of questions. Many of these questions have already been discused, but surprisingly I haven’t seen any of the following questions asked on the web:

1. What does the iPhone mean for the future of the iPod?
If you were to believe Steve Jobs, the iPhone is an iPod, the wide screen iPod everyone has been clamoring for. The truth is that what people were really asking for was a US$249 80GB true video iPod. The announcement of the iPhone, while exciting, has not eliminated the need for such a product. Apple is expecting to sell 10 millions of iPhones this year, which is great but from my point of view, a true video iPod could easily beat that target. The reason is price, storage and global availability. The low end iPhone will retail at US$499 which is significantly more expensive than the current iPod with video. Add to that the price of the monthly Cingular fee and you can see that this is not a product most teenagers will be able to afford. Storage space is a problem too. I do not have tons of music, photos and videos, yet my 30GB of storage are almost filled up. Finally, there are large regions of the world where the iPod is currently an immense success but, at least initially, there are indications that the iPhone will not be available. Latin America is one of those regions. Most customers there buy the iPods in the US and then smuggle them back to their countries. That will not happen with a product that these customers cannot use at home. So, the question is, will Apple release such a product. That seems unlikely for two reasons. First, it could cannibalize sales of the iPhone which is dangerous since Apple needs a blockbuster launch for its phone if it wants to be a credible player in the cellular maker industry. Second, the true price of the iPhone seems to be close to US$1000, if you take into account the Cingular subsidy. By removing the cell phone features, it is unlikely that you can bring the price down to US$350.

2. Will some of the iPhone innovations eventually make it to the Mac?
Apple claims that the iPhone underlying OS is indeed Mac OS X and it implies that the iPhone inherits most of its power from the Mac. This is probably an overstatement. The truth is that Apple is probably using a deeply modified version of Darwin with a graphics layer that uses some Cocoa APIs but includes many new private APIs not available on the Mac today. That means that there are technologies that have been developed for the iPhone that could be useful for the Mac. Could some of these technologies be the “secret” features Steve Jobs was talking about when he unveiled Leopard at WWDC 2006? We will know pretty soon, when the new OS is released next spring.

3. How long before competitors catch-up with the iPhone?
Apple claims that the iPhone has a five years leap over the competition and that over 200 patents will prevent competitors from releasing a similar product. This is probably an exaggeration. Let’s examine for example the browser included in the iPhone. Apple is just using the WebKit open source project which had already been adopted by Nokia for future phones and therefore, while any contributions made by that company have been available to Apple, it also means that Nokia will be able to soon release a similar browser on their own phones. Sure, the finger based user interface may be unique, but differentiation will diminish over time.

4. Will January 2007 will be remembered as the beginning of the end for the PC?
When Apple first released the original bondi blue iMac, one of its main innovations was the lack of a floppy disk drive. Everyone knew that the device wasn’t really needed but PC manufacturers did not dare to eliminate it. Today we are in a similar situation, this time the endangered species is the PC. Except for some computer intensive multimedia applications such as Final Cut Pro, most of us really use the PC to connect to the internet. By removing the word Computers from the company name, Apple inc. is recognizing not only that it manufactures consumer electronic products but also that the PC age is coming to an end. This doesn’t mean that Apple will stop manufacturing fine computers for the foreseeable future, it simply means that when analysts start to see a downward trend in computer sales to consumers Apple will be somewhat shielded from a negative valuation as they will be participating in other growing markets.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts.

One nice thing about traveling to a country every year or two is that you can better appreciate what is happening there (or not) and measure the pace of change. Now that I am back from my recent trip to Spain I can confidently state that from a politics standpoint nothing hasn’t changed much over the last twenty years or so. That country is Spain. After the death of dictator Francisco Franco, the country went to an accelerated democratization process that culminated with the election in 1982 of Felipe Gonzalez as the first socialist prime minister after forty years of fascism. That, in addition to over three decades of prosperity, shoul have put an end to a dark chapter of Spanish history. It did not.

It turns out that democracy and prosperity were unable to heal the deep scars that still divide the Spanish society today. Political tensions are currently running at an extremely unusual level for a country that is witnessing economic growth and slowly decreasing unemployment. On one hand, the right wing party (Partido Popular) simply does not stand being in the opposition and violently criticizes any decision taken by the government, trying to polarize society over any issue in order to regain power. The situation, is in many ways similar to what happened back in the thirties when the right believed that the country could not survive a socialist government and therefore started the civil war. This is, by the way, a common lie spread by politicians, as history has demonstrated that, in democratic countries that obey the rule of law, elected government really do not have the capability to cause irreparable harm during their term. On the other hand, separatist parties in Euskadi and Catalonia keep their fight to become more independent, or simply, independent. They claim that they want to separate from Spain because they are different from the rest of the Spaniards, however, what they really mean is that they are better than the rest. This isn’t new either.

This ridiculous belief that people in a region can be better than their neighbours, is a direct result of the industrialization process that occured during the 19th century. There are many countries where this can be clearly witnessed. In Italy for example, the industrious North has had many temptations to separate from the agricultural South. In Mexico, Northerners tend to feel superior to Southerners, because industry has made them richer. This is specially ridiculous because these regions did not prosper because their inhabitants were particularly smart or worked harder, it was simply because it was where natural resources were located. In some countries, that ill-gotten pride disappeared when the industrial model started to collapse in Western countries (this for example happened clearly in England during the second half of the XXth century). In other parts of the world, though, in industrial regions that were able to maintain their leading economic status, this transition never happened and this superiority complex that has been living in the collective unconsciousness is being used by politicians for their personal gain.

What really strikes me is how such an open society can still be fighting over the same battles that have caused so much pain in the past. The will to be right is definitively winning over the search for truth and peace. This is absolutely ridiculous. We live in a globalized world and the population is rapidly growing. We cannot keep paying attention to old quarrels when facing new global challenges such as global warming. The solution, from my point of view, is talking about issues that really affect the quality of living of the people. Providing free health care to everyone is such an issue. Creating new countries in large economic block such as the EU in order to issue new passports is not.

We keep telling adolescents that there are many dangerous things that they must avoid (alcohol, drugs, unprotected sex and now the Wii), even if it means not being able to belong to a group they want to be part of. I would argue that nationalism as well as radical ideologies are at least as dangerous for the adults, who are usually responsible for having their children fighting their own battles. Education is the main vehicle for passing hatred and misinformation from one generation to the next. As parents we have an obligation to maintain an open mind and try to understand all the perspectives. As human beings we have the obligation to always try to be objective, irrespective of what may have been taught to us. Truth shall make us free, but truth is sometimes hard to find. Keeping an open mind as well as always trying to be objective is probably an easier goal to reach.

As I am flying over the Atlantic, on my way to Spain for some well deserved family vacations, slightly bored by the in-flight movie, Miami Vice, I can’t avoid redirecting my thoughts to the future of the Internet.

The original idea behind the Internet was to build a tool that would help share knowledge by making it easy for scientists to publish information that would be easy to access and navigate. That original idea never really disappeared, but once large corporations entered the Internet and started the e-business era, that originally focus was largely lost.

Now, after Time named “Person of the year” You, we have officially entered a third era, the era of user generated content. This has a number of advantages as it makes sure that nobody can control the public opinion. However, there are also a lot of drawbacks, the main one being that all kind of questionable material is made available to people who are not prepared to separate truth from fiction.

I was recently listening to a podcast in which a member of a non-profit organization, devoted to make the Internet available to poor regions of Africa hailed some of the initial results that he had seen. He said that one community had started to create a site documenting traditional medicine that the population could use, which was important since this region was being devastated by the AIDS virus and that since anti-virals where extremely expensive, this could prove to be a good alternative.

That assertion got me thinking. How do we know that those traditional remedies are effective against AIDS? I have no problem helping poor people get cheap medicine, as long as it works. Otherwise this is just a total waste of time. The problem is, how do poor people with elementary education understand that this information has not been validated by the scientific community and that they may be wasting precious time using ineffective medicine?

This problem, of course, is not limited to Africa. Every day, students all around the world use the Internet in order to do their homework. Their process, Google, Cut and Paste, also known as plagiarism, is becoming the standard way to quickly produce reports and research documents. Most of the time, those who perform the searches go with the first result they obtain, without trying to analyze the quality of the data or the source of the information.

The result is that urban legends, questionable information and plain damn lies are quickly spreading all over the Internet. There is a clear danger that in the future, there will be no more trusted sources of information. Today, most quality data is posted by those who have gone through a classical education. However, as younger generations who rely on the Internet in order to obtain their information grow older and traditional, respected information sources start disappearing because they can no longer compete against free content, we may see start to see a new phenomenon, more information than ever before, with a rapidly diminishing quality or accuracy.

Many may say that Wikipedia proves me wrong. On the contrary. What will happen when a popular belief becomes so strong that those who know the truth are on the minority. Sure, the article may be disputed, but who defines the truth? Truth is not obtained through a democratic process, it is the result of analysis, investigation and science. Today, the most prevalent opinion is likely to get ahead on Google’s result page. It could mean that in the future we may, as a society, believe in Creationism, the Earth being the center of the Universe or the Horoscope being able to predict our future. That is scary thought.

In the past, we lived in a world full of certitude. The truth was available from a limited number of trusted sources. That was dangerous. Today we are moving to a world where the truth (if it exists) can be challenged by anyone, even if that person is absolutely not qualified to make an informed judgement. That is even worse, specially if our kids are not properly trained to develop a critical thinking and the general quality of education continues degrading.