06-22-2011, 02:40 PM

Amazon now 'very engaged' in music talks to catch Apple

A seeming off-hand reference after repeating leaks of Amazon's tablet plans has revealed that Amazon is back into negotiations to improve Cloud Player. The company is "very engaged" with music labels to go beyond the upload-only service it launched with before. Progress and the nature of the services weren't mentioned to AllThingsD's sources for the claim....

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06-22-2011, 03:21 PM

Mess with the bull, get the horns.

06-22-2011, 03:51 PM

Behind the 8ball yet again !!!!

06-22-2011, 06:26 PM

I don't get why Amazon is so adamant about this industry. Just do what you do, because the only thing you are dominate in is online book sales. Let the people who deal with music take care of real music sales. If you can offer better deals, than do it, otherwise, it is what it is. That's just my opinion. This can go for the new tablet they are going to release.

06-22-2011, 06:36 PM

^ I wonder what Steve Jobs would have said to that statement back in the late 90s, when Apple Computer, Inc. was devising the iPod, and shortly after, the iTunes Music Store.

Musing aside, Amazon's adamant about sales. Period. Their original claim to fame may have been books, but the true "killer app" that Amazon offered to the world was a ground-breaking Internet sales engine. Today, I shop at Amazon for everything, not just books, because they provide the best shopping experience of any site on the web. And anything that promises to keep users like me shopping in the Amazon "mall" is something they're going to be interested in offering. And why not?

Moreover, given Amazon's involvement with eBooks, one has to ask: is an mp3 really so different than a ePub file? Seems to me that, if you're going to offer electronic merchandise, you might as well sell it all.

06-22-2011, 07:35 PM

Originally Posted by idrinorbarsaku

I don't get why Amazon is so adamant about this industry. Just do what you do, because the only thing you are dominate in is online book sales.

This is so untrue. Beyond retail sales, Amazon is also one of, or maybe the largest, supplier of on demand cloud computing options. It's a master at infrastructure and also licenses its store technology. They're probably one of the nets most unsung tech powerhouses.

Let the people who deal with music take care of real music sales. If you can offer better deals, than do it, otherwise, it is what it is.

Actually they already offer better pricing and often way better album prices than iTunes normally.

06-22-2011, 08:06 PM

Amazon is awesome, go right ahead, I say.

06-22-2011, 08:22 PM

Apple,amazon, and Volkswagen are my favorite companies. I really like amazon for buying things, apple for their design and ease of use, and Volkswagen because of how simple and fun they are.

06-22-2011, 08:43 PM

Originally Posted by rabbitjetta

...and Volkswagen because of how simple and fun they are.

OK, not to hijack this thread, but have you looked under the hood of one? "Simple" is not how I'd describe a semi-modern VW.

06-22-2011, 09:51 PM

Originally Posted by cwa107

OK, not to hijack this thread, but have you looked under the hood of one? "Simple" is not how I'd describe a semi-modern VW.

I don't think any automobile is simple. >_<"

06-22-2011, 10:10 PM

Originally Posted by CrimsonRequiem

I don't think any automobile is simple. >_<"

Oh, you've never seen just how convoluted a VW engineer can make a car.

Try changing a tail light on one sometime. On an ordinary car, you'd give the bulb receptacle a quarter-turn, release it from the housing and pop the bulb out and pop a new one in. On a VW, the owner's manual tells you to take it to the dealer. If you're brave enough to risk it, the process includes removal of a backplane, retained by 18 tabs. Once you've got that out, try to figure out the sequence of twists, turns and tabs to get the 1 out of 7 bulbs you need to replace (and hope you identified the right one). On a Japanese or American car, it's a 2 minute affair - on a VW, it's a half hour, easy.

I once saw a Passat wherein the VW brainiacs decided that they wanted to install the engine in the standard longitudinal fashion (as opposed to transverse, like nearly every other FWD 4-cylinder car on the planet). In order to accomplish this, they had to have the exhaust manifold right next to the air intake (in other words, the worst possible position to put it in). So, they installed a tremendous heat shield to try to keep the intake air as cool as possible, but in doing so, they couldn't make the air filter housing accessible. So, where changing an air filter in most FWD 4-cylinder cars can be done by a trained chimp, on the Passat, you'd better devote the afternoon to painstakingly disassembling the engine bay.

I always thought I might like to own one someday - a number of them are very attractive, but I was steered away by my more mechanically inclined friends. Now I know why.

06-22-2011, 10:22 PM

Originally Posted by cwa107

Oh, you've never seen just how convoluted a VW engineer can make a car.

Try changing a tail light on one sometime. On an ordinary car, you'd give the bulb receptacle a quarter-turn, release it from the housing and pop the bulb out and pop a new one in. On a VW, the owner's manual tells you to take it to the dealer. If you're brave enough to risk it, the process includes removal of a backplane, retained by 18 tabs. Once you've got that out, try to figure out the sequence of twists, turns and tabs to get the 1 out of 7 bulbs you need to replace (and hope you identified the right one). On a Japanese or American car, it's a 2 minute affair - on a VW, it's a half hour, easy.

I once saw a Passat wherein the VW brainiacs decided that they wanted to install the engine in the standard longitudinal fashion (as opposed to transverse, like nearly every other FWD 4-cylinder car on the planet). In order to accomplish this, they had to have the exhaust manifold right next to the air intake (in other words, the worst possible position to put it in). So, they installed a tremendous heat shield to try to keep the intake air as cool as possible, but in doing so, they couldn't make the air filter housing accessible. So, where changing an air filter in most FWD 4-cylinder cars can be done by a trained chimp, on the Passat, you'd better devote the afternoon to painstakingly disassembling the engine bay.

I always thought I might like to own one someday - a number of them are very attractive, but I was steered away by my more mechanically inclined friends. Now I know why.

Trust me I know what you are talking about. I use to have a VW Jetta. VW likes to make things difficult. >_<"

06-22-2011, 10:33 PM

Crimson, fwiw, I can't even add my own window washer fluid.

06-22-2011, 11:06 PM

Originally Posted by idrinorbarsaku

I don't get why Amazon is so adamant about this industry. Just do what you do, because the only thing you are dominate in is online book sales. Let the people who deal with music take care of real music sales. If you can offer better deals, than do it, otherwise, it is what it is. That's just my opinion. This can go for the new tablet they are going to release.

Originally Posted by Shikarnov

^ I wonder what Steve Jobs would have said to that statement back in the late 90s, when Apple Computer, Inc. was devising the iPod, and shortly after, the iTunes Music Store.

Quoted for truth. Don't underestimate a company with capital, technology and expertise.

Amazon entered the cloud market and has an estimated 90,000 virtual servers on one coast alone (source). Think back to two months ago when Amazon had the significant outage - that made the tech news for a reason. Even NASA uses it to, "support the Mars rovers, deep space exploration, public outreach, lunar mapping and modeling, air born missions, and a lunar rover project" (source). I think you've established yourself as a tech powerhouse when you've reached the point where NASA depends on you for its Mars exploration program.

06-22-2011, 11:20 PM

Amazon needs to engaged bugs out of their uploading software. I had to delete more than 100 duplicates from my cloud account!