WTF, Apple?

I upgraded my iTunes to version 9 and sync'd up my iPod and, what do you know, it can't sync because it needs more space for firmware. The orange "other stuff" bar measures a full 400MB. 400 megs? Really? For non-music? It's bad enough that two and a half gigs are taken up by marketing.

I'll explain.

There is some distinction to be made about whether a Gigabyte is 1024 to the third (technically a gibibyte) or 1000 to the third. What it comes down to is that the back of the iPod says 30 GB, but when I plug it in, I'm told I only have 27.6GB, of which a full 400M is now busy taken up by "other stuff".

Clearly the discrepancy doesn't bother Apple too much.

A little further research (care of my wife) has indicated to me that iTunes is now automatically including album artwork when it does a sync, and that's what is taking up that extra hundred megs or so. I had this feature turned off before, but now I can't find it.

I don't mean to rag on them--I'm an Apple fanboy if ever there was one, but I'm quick to acknowledge their flaws, and my biggest pet peeve is that they assume they know better than I do how I want to use my computer. They have marvelous user interfaces, but they are horribly inflexible. So yes, I'm a little bit bitter about it and yes, I intend to stay mildly bitter until I learn how to turn that particular feature back off.

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