Anyone else find this really irritating?

robus · Nov 18, 2018

Satyrn said:
Yeah, you have them because you added them instead of buying them again through iTunes. Just like you can have D&D stuff on DDB by adding it instead of buying it through DDB.

So you’re saying I’m dreaming about iTunes Match? https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204146

doctorbadwolf · Nov 18, 2018

Elfcrusher said:
Sure you do. You get all kinds of cool functionality that you didn't have when all you had was the CD. You can mix the track into new playlists. You can give the CD some stars (or not) and have iTunes recommend more music.

You couldn't do any of that with just the CD, and it's all free.

You aren’t engaging with the actual point I’m making. I don’t care about nitpicking.

iTunes doesn’t put those tracks on your iTunes library, or add them to iCloud for you, just because you purchased a cd. It allows you to manually rip the files from disc to the library, and it’s a very easy process, but if for some reason you weren’t willing to do that, you’d have to do without or repurchase.

The fact that once you have your music on iTunes it has extra functionality is 100% tangential to anything I’ve said. Having purchased a cd years ago doesn’t get you any of it. You have to go the extra step of ripping (IIRC they just unlock the tracks and put them on your iCloud now, but that’s just methodology) the music by insirting the cd and scanning it with the iTunes service, or add the tracks from your device to your iCloud/iTunes library.

I don’t understand why there is confusion about what I’m saying, here.

Azzy · Nov 18, 2018

robus said:
So you’re saying I’m dreaming about iTunes Match? https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204146

Let me know when iTunes will let me have the music I bought on cassette.

robus · Nov 18, 2018

Azzy said:
Let me know when iTunes will let me have the music I bought on cassette.

Well there are limits...

Guest 6801328 · Nov 18, 2018

doctorbadwolf said:
You aren’t engaging with the actual point I’m making. I don’t care about nitpicking.

iTunes doesn’t put those tracks on your iTunes library, or add them to iCloud for you, just because you purchased a cd. It allows you to manually rip the files from disc to the library, and it’s a very easy process, but if for some reason you weren’t willing to do that, you’d have to do without or repurchase.

The fact that once you have your music on iTunes it has extra functionality is 100% tangential to anything I’ve said. Having purchased a cd years ago doesn’t get you any of it. You have to go the extra step of ripping (IIRC they just unlock the tracks and put them on your iCloud now, but that’s just methodology) the music by insirting the cd and scanning it with the iTunes service, or add the tracks from your device to your iCloud/iTunes library.

I don’t understand why there is confusion about what I’m saying, here.

Really? That was your point? That iTunes doesn't somehow know what CDs you own and make them magically appear on your hard drive?

Ok, sure, I'll grant you that one.

Let me know if you want to make any other bold claims...

jgsugden · Nov 18, 2018

Azzy said:
Not free. Also, not from iTunes. You paid (I assume) for the CD. Then you ripped the CD to iTunes. That's the point that was trying to be made.

No, it isn't.

People complain about paying for the books, the equivalent of buying a CD, and then having to pay for it again to view them on D&Dbeyond, the equivalent of listening to them on your device via iTunes.... WHICH CAN BE PERFORMED WITH NO ADDITIONAL MONEY CHARGE. Yes, you need to upload them, and yes - depending upon how you do it, there are some limits - but the core is this: Pay for content once, use it digitally or from the original source material with no additional cost. Any other elements of this arguments are essentially meaningless clinging to the desire to be right.

Morrus · Nov 18, 2018

Calm down, please folks. The last thing I expected to see on this site was people shouting at each other about how iTunes works.

Guest 6801328 · Nov 18, 2018

Elfcrusher said:
Really? That was your point? That iTunes doesn't somehow know what CDs you own and make them magically appear on your hard drive?

Ok, sure, I'll grant you that one.

Let me know if you want to make any other bold claims...

EDIT: Ok, sorry for sarcasm.

I did understand the point you were making; I was feigning to misunderstand it in order to make another point: iTunes doesn't own any music content (like D&DBeyond doesn't own any WotC content) but by adding significant and valuable additional functionality to your existing CD collection, FOR FREE, they persuaded people to keep their music collection there, instead of on a shelf. Then they were able to start selling them additional content.

Upthread I got some snarky responses about how D&DBeyond did all this hard work and they deserve to get paid for it. Sure. And IF I had been able to get access to the content I had already paid for I would have adopted it. I might have even paid a few bucks a month for the privilege. But I didn't want to re-purchase the books I already owned.

(And now, several releases later, I own several more expensive hardcover books. If I had been on D&DBeyond I probably would have bought the digital editions. I kind of wish I had just eaten the cost when it was only a couple of books. And three or four releases from now I will probably wish I had done it today.)

So, no, iTunes doesn't give me the music I already own; I need to do a little bit of work to upload it. But they do give me something related to my CDs...additional functionality...for free, and they leverage that utility to then sell me more stuff. Which totally worked.

WotC and D&DBeyond didn't do that, and I have absolutely zero reservations about accessing illegal version of the content I've paid for. And I think there are countless people out there like me. I bought Xanathar's, for example, fully expecting to barely reference the physical copy. So you may conclude that, "Well, WotC got my money one way or another." Except that they and D&DBeyond are missing out on opportunity to upsell more services to me.

Satyrn · Nov 18, 2018

robus said:
So you’re saying I’m dreaming about iTunes Match? https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204146

No. I was just taking about how you still have to rip the CD yourself (or otherwise add it to your library) before iTunes Match can do its thing. Once you do that with DDB homebrew you get the same sort of thing. I'm just surprised that what's not getting pointed out is that DDB doesn't allow a compete upload of all content.

@Elfcrusher's pointed out that iTunes is way more functional when it comes to adding new content, but even if DDB matched that functionality - like a tool that could "rip" game content from a pdf or other text file and save the data effectively - DDB still doesn't support homebrew classes.

doctorbadwolf · Nov 18, 2018

Elfcrusher said:
EDIT: Ok, sorry for sarcasm.

I did understand the point you were making; I was feigning to misunderstand it in order to make another point: iTunes doesn't own any music content (like D&DBeyond doesn't own any WotC content) but by adding significant and valuable additional functionality to your existing CD collection, FOR FREE, they persuaded people to keep their music collection there, instead of on a shelf. Then they were able to start selling them additional content.

Upthread I got some snarky responses about how D&DBeyond did all this hard work and they deserve to get paid for it. Sure. And IF I had been able to get access to the content I had already paid for I would have adopted it. I might have even paid a few bucks a month for the privilege. But I didn't want to re-purchase the books I already owned.

(And now, several releases later, I own several more expensive hardcover books. If I had been on D&DBeyond I probably would have bought the digital editions. I kind of wish I had just eaten the cost when it was only a couple of books. And three or four releases from now I will probably wish I had done it today.)

So, no, iTunes doesn't give me the music I already own; I need to do a little bit of work to upload it. But they do give me something related to my CDs...additional functionality...for free, and they leverage that utility to then sell me more stuff. Which totally worked.

WotC and D&DBeyond didn't do that, and I have absolutely zero reservations about accessing illegal version of the content I've paid for. And I think there are countless people out there like me. I bought Xanathar's, for example, fully expecting to barely reference the physical copy. So you may conclude that, "Well, WotC got my money one way or another." Except that they and D&DBeyond are missing out on opportunity to upsell more services to me.

DDB also adds a ton of value to the product for free. Moreso than iTunes does, by a wide margin. iTunes is fine, but it’s much less useful than Spotify, IMO.

Literally the only difference is the amount of work involved in adding your already purchased content to the service. Ripping a CD is easy, inputting the book data is...well also extremely easy, but more time consuming.

Well, that, and the fact that DDB is incredibly useful, and comes with a character builder, and makes all your game data into a single integrated service that cross references, with things like hyperlinks and tool tips, so you’re also getting an enormous increase in utility over the alternatives.