See his article blasting us for charging extra for ringtones, headlined, “The Ringtone Racket.” You know what? He’s right. I’ve made a big deal about how any business that’s based on screwing customers or forcing customers to do things they don’t want to do is doomed to failure. Now here we are, taking part in just that kind of behavior. And yeah, we can use the excuse that the record labels are making us do this, but you know what? That’s lame. If I were a customer I’d be the first to call bullshit on that.

Money quote from Gruber: “Faced with the choice between doing what’s right for customers or charging them money for something they shouldn’t need to pay for, Apple chose the latter. There is no middle ground. And any business that hinges on your customers ‘not knowing any better’ is a bad business.”

Namaste, John Gruber. I honor the place where you and I become one. Perhaps, if enough people complain, we will drop this policy at some point in the future and make ringtones free. And maybe, at that point, we will offer anyone who paid 99 cents for a ringtone a retroactive partial rebate in the form of a fifty-cent store credit. I’ve got Phil Schiller working on this right now. Peace out.