Excellent analysis.

Except, of course, that it is anything but. If you install 3rd party software on your apple machine, is Apple going to support it or are they going to say, “go speak to the developer”?

In broad brush strokes, Apple like to be in control. With a positive spin you might say this enables them to deliver a stable user experience because it vastly reduces the number of variables they have to allow for.It also happens to mean they tend to be voracious in shutting out competitors whenever they feel like it. Sure they have the right to do it but it doesn’t make it taste any better from where I’m sitting. If M$ did half the things Apple do these days, people would have the pitchforks out.

[If Palm did anything wrong in terms of security or general bugs or whatever in the sync process with iTunes, users would experience that as a problem with iTunes. Think back to Palm's terrible HotSync software and how troublesome it was to use with iSync. Most people would blame the "Mac" not "Palm's software." See also Adobe Flash.

That is why Apple wants to be in control of its own stuff. Look at the wonderous success of platforms where there is no control: Linux on the PC, Android to a large extent, and even Windows, where Microsoft lets developers do nutty things and just tries to accommodate it all. Not a good strategy. Sounds good when expressed as a ideology though. - Dan ]

Daniel actually never said that Apple said it was illegal for the Palm Pre to sync, he simply said that it was a hack and it could break because the protocols were undocumented and private to Apple.

If Apple wants to block Pre, that is their decision, but accusing Pre of doing something illegal, immoral or whatever is plain wrong. They are doing nothing illegal, immoral or else. They are doing what programmers like to do. They are proving their knowledge against Apple and taunt Apple about it. In the meantime they make use of their device a bit easier for their customers.

So, again, Apple has every right to change the protocol, encrypt calls, whatever… that is as far as I care their decision, but please do not write about something that is a bit over your head. You do not like Pre accessing iTunes, fine. Rant as much as you like, call them bastards, but do not disseminate complete nonsense “What Apple is trying to stop is the unlicensed use of iTunes by another company.”, because Palm is doing nothing like. Ask Apple lawyers. Your gullible readership (just check their comments, ROTFLMAO) can actually start thinking you are right.

Disclaimer : I am a iMac owner, iPod and iPhone owner, software developer for Mac OS X and Windows, Master of Technology and I do know sh*t.

Let me enlighten you. The way iTunes talks to iPhone is called a protocol. It is legally allowed to reverse engineer the protocol. That is what Palm did. There is nothing in the world that Apple can do to them, expect, change the iPod and iTunes to use different protocol. Currently Pre is not pirate, or doing anything illegal, or whatever you call them. Ask Apple lawyers. They are doing what smart people can do. Use their brain.

This is not unlicensed usage of iTunes. This is a usage of iTunes, the same way Firefox and IE are using Apache and/or IIS.

[Not sure what your overall point is, but performing an iTunes sync using private APIs is not at all similar to a browser accessing a web server using documented protocols. The downside to using a private API is that the vendor's changes will likely break compatibility, as Apple warned and as Palm is responding to with its ironic USB complaint. - Dan ]

So, if Apple decides to change the protocol, more power to them, but please learn first about topic that you want to talk about.

Couple of things:
1)The demand is already exploding. People are looking for good devices with good operating systems and programs, that will ALSO have a good user experience and sync well with other forms of computing. Believe it or not (it’s sad but true): I never had a laptop, mobile phone or mp3 player before, and I just got a one of the latest 32GB iPod Touches in January this year. Nothing else moved me to get into mobile computing.

Now all the talk is about dumb phones going extinct, smart phones not cutting it, and where are the other pocket computers like the iPhone and Touch.

2) Why bother with less than the best? Everyone else’s distinguishing selling points are color, price, how fast the plastic does or doesn’t fall apart, etc. But it just isn’t fair that Apple hardware has a distinguishing selling point that it just works well with Apple’s own software and that it makes life fun, easy and convenient. What slimebags!

3) You seem to be under the impression that iTunes will equal or replace the internet or www. I don’t see that happening. People got away from mediated internet experiences like AOL and other sub networks of the www. People want to see and experience what others are creating on the internet, whether or not it has any artistic merit or polish.

I don’t see people’s “lives being run through iTunes”, but I can imagine people doing most of their online shopping through something like iTunes. Who wants to put up with time-wasting crappy interfaces when they need to purchase something. If iTunes takes over from Amazon and everything else, whose fault is that? Palm can’t be bothered to write their own interface to sell apps and music, and everyone else’s media stores are failing.

It’s so unfair! Apple just has to let other hardware interface with it in just the same special ways that Apple’s own hardware can — even if it means dumbing down Apple’s hardware so that it doesn’t show everyone else up. I mean, yes there are ways that Apple hardware and Apple software can better interface together, because after all Apple made both — but it’s not fair to the competition. Somebody do something!

4a) You are confusing the products sold on the iTunes “platform” as (you call it) with iTunes, which is a vehicle to make these products useful to you. If nobody else is making a vehicle to get me what I want or need and making it easy for me to find and use these products, then why would I want to use anything else?

What I am looking for is apps for my iPod Touch. If I wanted Pre apps, I would expect to go somewhere else. As it happens, I don’t want and never will need Pre apps. If a Pre owner likes using iTunes to organize “his life”, and yet needs Pre apps (are there any, I wouldn’t know?), tough cookies. He can find them elsewhere. Really, what’s the problem here.

4b) You are confusing the “iTunes Platform (as you call it) with the iPhone/iPod Touch mobile computing platform. The fact that iTunes may become ubiquitous, is not why developers are attracted to the iPhone. They hope that the iPhone itself will become ubiquitous. People who use iTunes to organize their media, but do not own an iPhone are not of interest to developers. The iPhone Platform has merit and is a great thing to develop for in its own right — the interface, APIs, single platform, easy to use product that people really rave about, etc, etc. The fact that iTunes exists is icing on the cake. It means these developers (people who develop real, useful products that people want) don’t have to worry about distribution, because their great products are presented in a media center that people likewise find useful and fun to use. Hmmm, maybe the company that came up with the mobile platform that is useful and fun to use, also put some thought into their media center that is also useful and fun to use. Oh, yeah, they’re connected. Same company, same values, same energy, same resourcefulness. What do you know?

Everyone else only wants to paint half the picture (because they followed the MS picture of the world). Tough. You trust someone else to make half your product (software/hardware), you take your chances. MS “plays for sure” partners can tell you all about it. MS broke agreements, but doesn’t get any flack. Apple doesn’t want to (nor does it need to) enter the agreements in the first place, and still gets all the flack. C’est la vie.

so yeah of course Apple wants to stop other companies from ripping off iTunes to be the front end for the other companies’ media hardware. but that is not the same as locking down the iTunes library so no other device can use it and synch from it with its own software. the distinction is important, and the article didn’t make it.

iTunes is the true “killer” media software platform. it actually does multiple functions so seamlessly the user never thinks twice about it all. it is, first, your very convenient media database organized with metadata. it is also a media streamer. it is your account manager, handling transactions and licensing. it is a massive media store. it is a media utility that can convert file formats, copy and burn physical media. it networks across a LAN to work on multiple computers. and last but not least, it is a very sophisticated device management utility – for iPod, iPhone, and AppleTV. all in one package. people always say it was the iPod that changed everything. but actually i would say it was really iTunes – without which the iPod could not have been what it was.