True, for a total newbie. A bit more learned person will find the way without too, but those probably help. I haven't seen Automatix but EasyUbuntu is a script (a graphical UI) that has some fancy choices and a button that will grab the wanted things from the net.
They help getting the needed codecs to play all those fancy ripped media files, along with bought dvds and downloaded (legal, of course!) mp3s..but please consider this too: a lot of people are in an awkward situation because of software patents, because of strange situations in copyright law cases etc., and that's because formats like mp3 or (protected) wma are used. I strongly recommend trying to use the open-source alternatives as long as possible, since using the non-open-source, non-free, proprietary software will only lead to more problems with overall freedom, that should be the idea behind open-source that you're using right now. There is a reason why certain codecs do not come preinstalled on your open-source operating system. There are open-source audio and video formats, and unless you download the music/videos from the net (and even then), please try to use open-source solutions and if needed, convert from existing formats to them, if possible.
You can do things the easy way first, facing the same things the hard way later - or you can do things thinking beforehand, easing the future. Consider all these protected, encrypted, commercial formats. Do you want a piece of software that only works if you pay monthly fee or pay dozens of per cents extra price when buying it, just for doing something as simple as playing music or chatting with your friend?
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