Before Apple’s much-hyped media event on the 1st, it was reported that CEO Steve Jobs was actively trying to get iTunes Store track samples extended to 60, or even 90 seconds, from the current 30.
The event came and passed, and nothing about the time lengths of the samples was discussed by Jobs or the country.
Cnet says today that licensing issues are holding up the process, but that Jobs is still in active discussions to get the samples extended to 90 seconds.
Says Hanna Pantle, a spokeswoman for BMI, one of the organizations that collects royalties for publishers and songwriters: “We are in active negotiations with Apple.”
Furthermore, Apple has already received the go ahead to extend the samples, from the record labels. Their existing contract with the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) also allows for 90 seconds, so it appears to be just a couple of holdouts keeping the update from occurring.
Result for: royalties
The RIAA and NAB have proposed a new bill that would force all smartphones, MP3 players and tablets to include an FM radio in the future.
Gary Shapiro, the president of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), had some harsh words for the proposal, as it would affect a large number of devices built by CEA members.
“Rather than adapt to the digital marketplace, NAB and RIAA act like buggy-whip industries that refuse to innovate and seek to impose penalties on those that do,” Shapiro added, via Ars.
For example, a product like the iPod Shuffle would be impossible to create, as the body would need to be made larger, and more controls would be needed to be able to tune stations.
The NAB is willing to cave into paying $100 million a year to the RIAA in royalties (under the Performance Rights Act), if the FM radios are implemented.
Result for: royalties
The latest update to Google Maps 3.4 has enabled multi-touch for the Motorola DROID, with pinch-to-zoom now available for the device, at least while using the popular app.
Last week Google updated the Nexus One to have multi-touch, silencing critics who had claimed that Google was purposely leaving out multi-touch for a number of different reasons including not wanting to pay patent royalties to rival Apple.
I updated my G1 to Maps 3.4 today and pinch-to-zoom didn’t work so it seems as though this may be DROID-only for time being.
