Sony Moves to Support AAC

[Chris Gohlke]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6070936.html' target='_blank'>http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6070936.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Sony is moving to make its music management software compatible with Apple Computer's audio file format in the latest evidence of Apple's dominance in digital music. The behemoth Japanese conglomerate, which once controlled the portable music market, announced Tuesday that the company's data compression technology would be compatible with a number of rival formats, including Apple's format of choice, AAC. In the past, Sony has fiercely held to its own Atrac system. By switching to a technology that supports AAC, Sony appears to be acknowledging Apple's dominance in the digital music playing market, say analysts."</i><br /><br />Seems the king of proprietary formats finally realized they've been beaten and are opening up support. I always love creating a good conspiracy theory, so here is my prediction. Sony wants iTunes music to be playable on their devices. Apple has kept this proprietary, so Sony contemplates legal action, but figures they had better clean up their own house first. What do you think? Is this plausible, or am I completely nuts?

[Filip Norrgard]

Yes, death to Atrac! :twisted:

On another note, it seems strange that the press seems to think that AAC is "Apple's format", when it isn't. Although my Nokia N91 supports AAC, it doesn't mean it will play Apple (DRM'd) AAC files from the iTunes store. This article will hopefully be enlightening: "Note to the Press: AAC is not "Apple's format"" (http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2006/5/11/3921) ;)

[Felix Torres]

Anybody out there remember the Compaq digital music players of 2000?
The first portable players to support AAC.
http://www.edgereview.com/ataglance.cfm?Category=audio&amp;ID=96

Have to wonder what planet those "reporters" live in that simple fact checking (such as Sony being one of the contributors to the original AAC spec) is irrelevant.

As for why Sony is doing this; duh, they just formally unveiled the PS3 music download and playback features! Since XBOX plays AAC as well as WMA and MP3, they *had* to announce something more than just Atrac!

[klinux]

Have to wonder what planet those "reporters" live in that simple fact checking (such as Sony being one of the contributors to the original AAC spec) is irrelevant.

Not sure where the "simple fact checking" comes in. Are you stating that there are factual errors in the article? I did not spot any in my read through.

Sandoval wrote for Washington Post, AP, and apparently now CNET. So yes, I would say that his credential of a "reporter" (sic) stands just fine.

[klinux]

For the original thoery, I do not think this is plausible. What legal platform would Sony stand on? Apple is not preventing others from negotiating with the content provider. There is no barrier for one to set up one's own shop. Transmission of that content is obvious not an issue.

Apple could argue: we negotiated the contract, digitized the content, handled the billing, and paid for the bandwidth (at least the delivery part) to the consumer on a player we built and they built. Hard to argue with that.

If this is remotely winnable, we would have already seen legal action from Real, for one.

[f1rick]

I would doubt it. Sony also added native WMA support to their latest walkmans in the last firmware update but never included playforsure support. Or sadly windows media player syncronisation. Which I am sure they could have if they wanted to, but then customers wouldn't use their connect store. So I really doubt they have any plans for supporting tunes from the iTunes music store.

[moi]

Yes, death to Atrac! :twisted:

On another note, it seems strange that the press seems to think that AAC is "Apple's format", when it isn't. Although my Nokia N91 supports AAC, it doesn't mean it will play Apple (DRM'd) AAC files from the iTunes store. This article will hopefully be enlightening: "Note to the Press: AAC is not "Apple's format"" (http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2006/5/11/3921) ;)

That's true. It struck me as soon as I read the article, which implies Sony is going over to "Apple's compression format". AAC is not owned by Apple, it's a more universal format, like MP3.

Apple does have its proprietary DRM version of AAC, and I'm sure that Sony players will not support that. (Songs bought from ITunes, for example.) Apple will not allow any player other than its own Ipods to play its Itune songs.

Apple has always been very tight about not allowing its software to be used on hardware other than its own. For instance, the Mac OS has been made to only work on computers made by Apple. And I greatly doubt that they'd ever let players from other companies play their Itunes songs.

But AAC is a much wider format than Itunes. In fact, many consider it to be the successor to MP3.