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CoverFlow technology and intellectual property was recently sold to Apple.
coverflow.com — We are pleased to announce that all CoverFlow technology and intellectual property was recently sold to Apple. It has been incorporated into the latest version of iTunes. Please visit www.apple.com/itunes Correct Web Address: http://www.steelskies.com/coverflow/
maddogg- 947 diggs
- digg it
- Stecchino, on 11/07/2007, -1/+79One can imagine that it was so well-developed and though-out that Apple just purchased it outright instead of developing their own version (like the Konfabulator vs. Dashboard debate).
Kudos to Cover Flow's author. Kudos to Apple for integrating this into iTunes 7 and making it work so damn well!- Blah_Blah_Blah, on 10/12/2007, -46/+4bury this fast!
- flernk, on 10/12/2007, -2/+39As a designer, I aplaud Apple's decision to make Cover Flow an integrated part of iTunes. As album cover art was getting closer and closer to its ultimate demise (having been rendered nearly useless by the digital age), Apple has not only saved it from the edge of a cliff, it has ensured that cover art will remain a relevant and necessary part of every album.
This is a huge step in the right direction for digital music. - gmillerd, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Noticed that their 'download cover art' doesn't actually add the art to the mp3s. it stores it elsewhere (i have not investigated where). definately to mtime changes.
- ZaNkY, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10May I be the first to say: THAT WAS FAST!
(CoverFlow RC1 like came out a couple days ago! )
Kudos to the CoverFlow coder, he did a great job, so good that Apple outright agreed. Good for him :) - smhill, on 10/12/2007, -9/+2Coverflow has been around for a while. The RC1 may have only came out a few days ago, but I have had it for at least two months.
Great though, nice addition. - hackwrench, on 10/12/2007, -11/+2So what's coverflow? The first link just goes to a typosquat type website, the second link just says it's been sold to apple, and the link from that site is just the iPod page.
Marked as inaccurate. The submission makes it sound like it's possible to go back edit the submission description but not the link. I didn't think either was possible, but is this just an attempt to get people to visit the typosquat website? - tizz66, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I think what has happened is in the past, someone has linked to the main page of a site (which is a bit annoying), which then means that link cannot be submitted again. So the submitter has had to put a dud link in, in order to post the story. Just my guess, anyway.
CoverFlow is a way of viewing albums in iTunes in a sort of virtual CD rack. You navigate by flipping through the covers. - lankybutmacho, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I gotta say though, it amazes me how they still managed to screw it up. One of the vital features of the original CoverFlow was its ability to display only albums for which you had at least X number of tracks. The way iTunes has it, I have a huge number of "albums" showing up in the Cover Flow view for which I really only have one track. This makes too bothersome to navigate, so I probably won't end up using it. If they could just include the same basic feature set the app originally had, I would be totally in love with this feature.
- weareglass, on 11/07/2007, -2/+4I know that this deal has been in the works since before last Christmas. Perhaps Apple did try to buy Konfabulator but they wouldn't bite? Or maybe if they learned from their PR mistakes. iTunes itself is a redesigned, rebadged version of Casady and Greeen's SoundJam MP, after all. Either way, kudos to all parties for developing something cool that made its way to the masses with credit given (in the form of ca$h) to its originators.
- geekdreams, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7"Perhaps Apple did try to buy Konfabulator but they wouldn't bite?"
That's exactly what happened. Google it. - simX, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9No, that's not exactly what happened. Konfabulator was based on an entirely different model, (it couldn't use Cocoa extensions, and the Konfab widgets stupidly stayed on your screen all the time, and Dashboard widgets used HTML and CSS too) and Apple decided it didn't like the technology. Besides, it's not exactly like widgets were a new concept -- look at desk accessories in the Classic Mac OS.
- geekdreams, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3My bad, I thought they were offered a buyout and refused but that's not correct:
"After the keynote address introducing Dashboard, rumors swirled around WWDC that Apple had tried to purchase Konfabulator, but Rose and his partner refused the deal -- a point Rose emphatically denies.
"They never contacted us," said Rose. "Whether or not we would have taken them up on anything, the fact that they didn't even bother is appalling to me."
http://www.macworld.com/news/2004/06/29/konfabulator/index.php - cleverboy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3simX write: "and the Konfab widgets stupidly stayed on your screen all the time"
Add to that, that the Konfab widgets had their own memory handling issues. Where Apple widgets run off of a "platform", each Konfab wdiget runs in its own process and gobbles up a sizeable amount of memory.
There's a really nice right up comparing them:
http://daringfireball.net/2004/06/dashboard_vs_konfabulator
I think this part says it best:
"Adding a new platform layer to the system is a serious decision and commitment. If you’re still willing to argue that Apple should have bought Konfabulator as the basis for Dashboard, you’re implicitly arguing that Apple should be more concerned about being nice to third-party developers than they are about the quality of the engineering undergirding their platform." - reichg, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1A program that apple really needs to buy is inquisitor (http://www.inquisitorx.com/) i use that addon more than any other 3rd party app and it is not just more icandy *cough*coverflow
- geekdreams, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7"Perhaps Apple did try to buy Konfabulator but they wouldn't bite?"
- diamondg14, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2The has so much damn potential, I think Apple can do big things with this. Great job to the developer, I have enjoyed this software for months.
- totorototoro, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Congrats, Steel Skies, for getting your work recognized in such a huge manner. Looks great right there in iTunes :D
- arkestra, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2i am loving iTunes 7 -- but i am getting diagonal black lines across all my coverflow cover arts. also -- the transarencies are not right.
any suggestions on how to fix this?
Using:
Windows XP
Radeon Mobility ATI 7500C- kippjon, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2I haven't had any black lines, but iTunes is currently using 268 mb of RAM to run. I thought it was a RAM whore before... hopefully this is just a bug
- r3zonance, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Get a Mac. It works fine on that :P /sarcasm/
- Pharaoh777, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Wow really? I didn't notice when I watched the Keynote or while reading the Liveblogging or any of the other 90 articles about the new iTunes. I'm really glad you informed me!
- titlesaysitall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I was wondering what that amazing new feature in iTunes 7 was! It flipped through my artwork and it just amazed me but it was hard to pinpoint exactly where it was from.
- kanned, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Hmm didn't someone just post the CoverFlow RC1 just a few days ago...
- Hyprtime, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Yeah, it was just released. I'm very happy for the developer, though. CoverFlow was a labor of love (he used to post at a forum I haunted) and he put tons of effort into something that slowly developed into a real neat, fun tool. It was great at parties, when you were using your Mac as a jukebox. People would just flip through covers, hit enter and rock away.
Nice to see you hit the big time, CoverFlow. THIS is how Apple should treat its dedicated third-parties. - simX, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10@Hyprtime: Good grief, this *IS* how Apple treats third parties, when they develop good technologies. Sherlock 3 was in development before Watson ever saw the light of day. Panther's command-tab-switcher had its roots in the Classic Mac OS and in the Windows feature, not with stupid Proteron. Dashboard was based on an entirely different model than Konfabulator, and Time Machine implements a backup solution entirely differently from other manufacturers. (The developer of SuperDuper is NOT alarmed by Time Machine in Leopard.)
Apple doesn't step on its developers' toes. It buys out technology when its worth it, and doesn't do so when it's ***** (a.k.a. Konfabulator). Apple has done this before -- it bought the rights to SoundJam when it initially created iTunes, and it bought a lot of the Shake and Motion technologies as well.
Apple treats its developers well. It's only the lame-ass third party developers like Arlo Rose who complain loudly over something that has a passing resemblance to their product.
- Hyprtime, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Yeah, it was just released. I'm very happy for the developer, though. CoverFlow was a labor of love (he used to post at a forum I haunted) and he put tons of effort into something that slowly developed into a real neat, fun tool. It was great at parties, when you were using your Mac as a jukebox. People would just flip through covers, hit enter and rock away.
- oOLiquidNightOo, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7i'm really glad to hear this, i'm a mac guy but it's always disappointed me that they've crushed "developers" instead of buying their product/concept outright.
this is one of the best stories i've seen from today's "big event".- geekdreams, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2They only do that when the original developers decline a buyout offer. Think about it, it's a lot easier to buy existing technologies and rebrand them than it is to spend months developing their own version from scratch.
- 13tongimp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8This story points to a domain squatter site or something like that.
http://www.steelskies.com/coverflow/
That is the site and announcement. - JoshP, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Suggestion for apple: add "Has Album Art" to the list of criteria that can be used to make smart playlists. So that you can ignore tracks that don't have cover art when you are party shuffling. A bunch of my music doesn't have any cover art easily available (live shows, hip hop mixtapes, dj mixes, etc).
- MaverickCC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Does this work with mp3's? I have properly tagged (i'm pretty sure anyway) songs and nothing is getting downloaded from apple. Has anyone gotten this to work w/ iTunes 7 for music not purchased from iTunes store or ripped straight from a CD?
- geekdreams, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Is it stuff available in the iTunes Store? Are you logged in to your account?
- MaverickCC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yes, I picked two easy ones..
Dave Matthews Band, Say Goodbye, Crash... filled in every detail i could, checked spelling against what iTunes has, etc...
and another from coldplay..
and yes I'm logged in
neither worked. Does it work for anyone w/ an individual mp3 for anyone?
- oOLiquidNightOo, on 10/12/2007, -6/+5on an unrelated note, i'd like to say that the new "+my #1" button is hideous. the rest of digg is so minimal, so well laid out, this button just looks .. bad.
- caper88, on 10/12/2007, -4/+4The above article is linked to a domain aggregator; reported as SPAM.
- dracocat, on 10/12/2007, -7/+2Spam.
- deadbaby, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I was wondering about that... I'm glad they were rewarded for their work. CoverFlow was cool and all but its the type of thing that should be built into a player, not a separate app.
- Vandel405, on 10/12/2007, -4/+2How is this not spam. Did any of you click the link!
- mouthster, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4What is up with this link? There has been some BAD digging going on today.
- rspeed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1And amazingly you and I are the only ones to notice it.
I was gonna Digg this down as lame for reasons stemming from my outburst of "No *****, Sherlock", but the fact that the link is WRONG is even worse.
WTF is going on?
- rspeed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1And amazingly you and I are the only ones to notice it.
- CypherXero, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4Spam.
- inkhead, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1iTunes DOES INFACT STORE THE COVER IMAGE INSIDE OF THE mp3 file. SO for example if you download .mp3 from say another source or your own disc and ask itunes 8 to find to cover it puts it inside of the mp3 metadata. The person who said so IT DID NOT was just plan wrong.
The movie store is pretty cool I've hooked my Macbook Pro up to my 60" HDTV and played Pirates of the Caribbean, it's pretty much the same as any DVD and was widescreen. Decent. Obviously in January they are going to be allowing downloadings/streaming of HDTV content because the box they are building "iTV" has HDMI- MaverickCC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1so you are successfully getting cover art from iTunes 7? I haven't used coverflow or anythign, i'm saying just from ITunes..so far I haven't gotten one cover to download. Is there any trick to getting this to work?
- sw0rdfish, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Click Advanced then Get Album Artwork...
Make sure the Album and Artist name is right :) - badtz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0no it does not. When you use the "get artwork" feature, it stores the artwork in ~/Music/iTunes/Album Artwork
- superrcat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1The directory of images is to speed up the cover flow view. iTunes will still update the music file with the cover image.
- JeffreyAtW, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Incorrect. I checked file sizes of MP3s before and after I added album art to them, and they were not modified at all. This was even when they were consolidated into my library.
- solarisom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I wonder if CoverFlow could make a debut in the iPod 6G, imagine the beauty of a widescreen running this. This is definitely a huge incentive to update my album art. Yet another example of Apple telling me what's cool...and me unashamedly listening :)
- andyatkinson, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1For a brief overview of CoverFlow:
http://p1tt.com/coverflow_browse_album_covers_with_style - delay, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I am glad they bought it from the developer rather than to just copy the idea. Hopefully we will see apple doing this more in the future with other well developed apps instead of just ripping off the idea from a third party developer.
- maddogg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Thanks Tizz66, that is what happened:
"I think what has happened is in the past, someone has linked to the main page of a site (which is a bit annoying), which then means that link cannot be submitted again. So the submitter has had to put a dud link in, in order to post the story. Just my guess, anyway."
I hate that about DIGG, there are many time that a new story is needed about a company or link that has already been added. They make you make something up just to get it submitted.
Maddogg - MBX1, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0i downloaded the latest coverflow at macupdate.com and noticed the album art perspective and movement is much sexier than in itunes. it's slightly in motion when you're on a album... in itunes7 it feels rigid.
it's really sad to see apple downgrading ui's. not only itunes7 looks like cheap plastic now they also downgraded the coverflow coolness. - TinFoil209, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I really wish we can know the turkey $$$ of the deal. Also with Konfabulator, they told Apple to take a flying F I heard. They think they had gold and in return Apple made it gold by making part of a whole OS. No point in buying shareware when its in the OS. Even if it has some better features.
Apple if your listening, MAKE COVERFLOW FULLSCREEN IN ITUNES!!!! Fun to see the good quality from iTunes being used to its potential. The high res bloats the hell out of the mp3 / aac so make it worth it. Also do artist / song search without knowing the album name. Im sure this is for legal reasons but still.
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