[GRLUG] Itunes and France

[proclus at gnu-darwin.org]

On  1 Jul, Ron Lauzon wrote:
> And companies (like Microsoft and Apple) who have business models based  
> not on providing the best value, but rather on DRM and customer lock-in,  
> want to either own these "standards" or cry foul when their proprietary  
> standards become de facto standards and they are called to open them up. 

I am enjoying this thread very much, and I hope that the following is
not repeating what has already said.  

No one should feel locked into proprietary standards, if there is such
a thing.  There are free and open source software (FOSS) alternatives to
the goods provided by proprietary software vendors, such as Microsoft. 
OpenOffice is a great replacement for Microsoft Word.

http://www.openoffice.org/

In my experience, the file formats are meticulously compatible, thanks
to some superb effort by FOSS developers.   My personal favorite word
processor is AbiWord, which provides compatibility with simple word
"doc" files, and it can write in an open format called "rtf", which is
readable by nearly all word processing software.  I also like Ted for
similar reasons.  Here are links.

http://www.abisource.com/
http://www.nllgg.nl/Ted/

As a replacement for Adobe software, there is the GIMP, and many other
FOSS programs exist to help you with your image processing needs.

http://www.gimp.org/

If you are having trouble getting off of the proprietary operating
systems, such as Windows and Mac OS X, there are likely binary-level
versions of these programs, which are you can use to help you with the
transition to a FOSS-only computing environment. 

Switching to FOSS can be hard for some people, but it is well worth the
effort, because you are learning a genuine standard that will be
around for the duration.  By learning and sharing free and open
source software you are helping your neighbor by defininition, and
moreover FOSS developers are extremely dedicated, and we will help you. 
For those with a bit investment in Apple hardware, there are Linux
distributions to accommodate you. 

http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/

By way caveat, I also operate a competing OS distribution which is
Darwin-based and free-software-only.  You will find a link below. It
is based on the same *nix foundation as Apple's OS but also GNU, so that
it may help you to ease the transition as you learn FOSS tools.  It is
important to show that you can get the same job done with FOSS tools, 
such as GNU/Linux and GNU-Darwin as you can with proprietary schemes. 
Have a look.

http://www.gnu-darwin.org/gdc/

There is software available for the processing of the acc audio
format, which is used by Apple iTunes, but you might have some trouble
with the embedded DRM.  Try a Google search.  If you are upset about
DRM, I'd urge you to have a look at http://defectivebydesign.org/,
which is doing something about the problem.

In my opinion, it is now time for everyone to embrace the values of
freedom, open source, open standards, public access, etc, and we are
pushing these values up into new arenas where people can have greater
benefit.  FOSS developers have lead the way, and we can be encouraged by
their example. If you need help with your transition to a FOSS-only
environment, please feel free to drop me a line.

Regards,
proclus
http://www.gnu-darwin.org/



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