Winamp

bron: tweakers.net

Nullsoft is van plan om van zijn nieuwe versie van Winamp een betaalde variant uit te brengen, zo lezen we op CDFreaks. Naast de freeware versie van Winamp 5 zal het bedrijf ook komen met Winamp 5 Pro, waarmee het mogelijk zal zijn om mp3’s te encoderen. Ook is het met de betaalde versie mogelijk om cd’s te rippen en branden op een snelheid die hoger is dan de snelheid waarmee het freeware programma dit doet. In de toekomst is het mogelijk dat er meer dingen worden toegevoegd die enkel bedoeld zijn voor Winamp Pro.

Als verklaring voor deze stap geeft Nullsoft dat het bedrijf zelf een licentie moet betalen voor het encoderen van mp3’s, die per uitgegeven kopie aan Thompson moet worden afgestaan. Men zegt dat als het mogelijk was geweest om de encoderingsfunctie gratis te gebruiken, het programma ook gratis zou zijn geweest. Er is nog geen prijs genoemd voor Winamp 5 Pro, wel heeft Nullsoft aangegeven dat mensen die voor de shareware versie van Winamp hebben betaald toch opnieuw geld moeten uitgeven voor kopen van de nieuwe versie:

I paid for the shareware version of Winamp a while back before it went free, why do I have to pay again?

Because this is Winamp Pro. If you paid for the Winamp shareware you can still use Winamp, there is no pressure to upgrade.

Remember, it costs Nullsoft for every single Winamp Pro licence. If Nullsoft could do Winamp Pro for free, they would.

Winamp Pro

Why Pro?

In forthcoming versions of Winamp, new features are going to be optionally included which need to be paid for on a per copy basis. As Winamp gets a lot of downloads, it is not viable for Nullsoft to pay for this themselves.

What will I gain from getting Winamp Pro?

Currently you will be able to:

Encode MP3

Rip CDs at full speed

Burn CDs at full speed

Also, in the future other Pro features will be added, for which your Winamp Pro key will work. (Things like DVD Playback, hopefully )

What will I lose from sticking with regular Winamp?

Nothing!

Indeed, you will gain the ability to Rip and Burn CDs at slow speeds, as well as all the other new features in Winamp 5.

I already have a good free CD Ripper/Burner, do I have to have CD Ripping/Burning in Winamp?

No. In the installer, under Audio File Support you can uncheck what you don’t want.

Why do I have to pay for MP3 encoding when it uses LAME which is free and open source?

Even though LAME is open source, Nullsoft has to pay per copy to Thompson for a licence to encode MP3. Thompson only offer MP3 encoding licences on a per-copy basis, so unfortunatly it has to be only included in the Pro version.

I paid for the shareware version of Winamp a while back before it went free, why do I have to pay again?

Because this is Winamp Pro. If you paid for the Winamp shareware you can still use Winamp, there is no pressure to upgrade.

Remember, it costs Nullsoft for every single Winamp Pro licence. If Nullsoft could do Winamp Pro for free, they would.

Winamp 2.92 and Winamp 2.95 had free, full speed CD Ripping, what gives?

They were leaked versions never intended for public consumption. This is the reason that they were illegal leaks.

I give in, I need winamp pro in my life, where can a buy it and how much will it cost?

You can’t buy it just yet, wait until the new website comes into force. As far as costs go, we just don’t know, but it won’t be too much, as it is just to cover the licencing costs of the new technology.

I found/made a crack/keygen for winamp pro, what do I do?

Send mail to /dev/null, they might care more than we do. Of course, if you post links to anything like that on the forums, your post will be edited, and will be banned. If you made the crack/keygen yourself, then you need to come to terms with your total social inadequacy and move away from your computer.

See the full source forum thread here.

(Z@3) +1