Laughing Meme » itunes

Space for a real website around iTunes app store

Kellan — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:18:08 +0000

I haven’t poured hours into it, but I have looked around a bit trying to find good iPhone apps, and I find the conversation frustrating and fractured — echoing and empty. And I think Apple’s its-a-webiste-but-not-really iTunes store is the problem. It is definitely a 2nd class web citizen, and one that has rather aggressively not learned the lessons of Web 2.0.

I’d love to see someone do a full on iPhone-apps-as-social-objects site as a translation layer on top of the iTunes store. It would be easy, and it would be awesome. And if Apple weren’t Apple (say if they were Amazon) you could earn a nice affiliate income stream. As it is you’d probably wake up every morning and check your inbox for a C&D, but still it would be great. You should build it.

Photo from Paul Hammond

Wired: Why Is DRM-Free Music Tagged With Name and E-Mail?

Kellan — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 03:14:39 +0000

I don’t know — maybe because it is the most effective, least invasive version of copy protection/DRM ever invented? No surprise to anybody who has bought a Pragmatic Programmers ebook.

“Photocasting”

Kellan — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 07:36:00 +0000

James Holderness (check the comments)

Do you ever think maybe the Apple guys are just winding you up? Nobody could possibly be that stupid.

Maybe, though I tend to share Phil’s skepticism. Lets start the with the name, “photocasting”. Worst name I’ve heard since “MacBook”. I’d speculate that Apple’s marketing department recently started outsourcing to Engineering, except I’d be slandering my own profession. That’s a minor thing, aesthetic really, but dear god, how could they screw up the RSS? Again? (especially as I know people at Apple who are not only smart and clueful, but get XML)

I mean the iTunes name space was a train wreck. (though truth be told podcasting for some reason produces the scariest, wackiest feeds on the planet, at one point roughly 1/3 of the feeds Odeo was crawling had serious errors)

User agent detection? Of RSS? In 2006?!? Come again?

Embedded CSS? Misformatted dates? Random, namespace-less new elements (PhotoDate?) A new standard for including comments within an item.

See Phil’s comment, Sam, Dave Winer

Hey Apple, consider hiring someone who knows something about syndication, it’s worth it.

Take a look (unless of course you’re using Firefox).

update: [2005/01/18] MarkP on “photocasting”. It’s not just bad, it’s spectaculary bad. (via)

rc3.org: Changing the rules

Kellan — Wed, 16 Nov 2005 16:19:00 +0000

Sony is changing the cost/benefit analysis of buying CDs vs buying tracks at Apple’s iTunes.

http://rc3.org/2005/11/changing_the_rules.php

MarkP: “it appears that iTunes uses a real, draconian, namespace-aware XML parser… “

Kellan — Wed, 06 Jul 2005 02:38:08 +0000

except that namespaces are case-insensitive. (just keeps getting better)

http://www.intertwingly.net/blog/2005/06/28/Podcast-Specifications-Questions#c1120421138

Edd’s first look at iTunes RSS extensions

Kellan — Wed, 29 Jun 2005 01:09:42 +0000

Verdict: gob-smackingly ignorant, daft, and nuts. (okay, he thinks they did a decent job in a handful of cases)

http://usefulinc.com/edd/blog/contents/2005/06/28-rss-apple-itunes/read

They Stopped Calling It Rendezvous

Kellan — Fri, 04 Mar 2005 18:34:20 +0000

flirting via iTunes

http://www.al3x.net/archives/2005/02/22/they-stopped-calling-it-rendezvous/