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BusinessWeek on Opening Apple's iTunes DRM

Posted by michael on from the back-seat-driving dept.

hype7 writes "BusinessWeek is running a very interesting story on Apple's foray into music, with a different bent to everyone else's. BW suggests that, instead of opening the iPod up to the world, Apple should instead license its DRM - 'Fairplay' - to anyone who wants to start up a music store. The upside is obvious: it would mean that Apple's music format, AAC, would become ubiquitous; Apple could quite feasibly make money on licensing fees (say 1 cent per song sold); and, it would just happen to stick it to Microsoft and the Windows Media Format. As the iTunes Music Store isn't running at a profit (or forecast to make a big one), having the Music Store clones eat into Apple's existing market share wouldn't be a problem; all these stores would be doing is building a bigger potential market for the iPod."

6 of 489 comments (clear)

  1. Re: Apple DRM? by yabos · · Score: 1, Redundant

    You're wrong. AAC is an open format. http://www.vialicensing.com/products/mpeg4aac/stan dard.html

  2. Re:AAC by barryblack · · Score: 2, Redundant

    You are correct. Apple raps AAC with a DRM technology called fair play. Fair play is what should be opened up to other stores/devices.

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  3. Re:AAC is already gaining ground by LostCluster · · Score: 1, Redundant

    AAC is sort of like MP3 in that the base standard contains no DRM at all... it's not Apple's to license either.

    But what Apple owns is FairPlay, the DRM tech that they use over AAC in order to make the iTunes music store a happy place for both consumers and the RIAA.

  4. Apple's DRM by Kris+Thalamus · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Click here to read about Cory Doctorow's problems the iTunes DRM.

  5. AAC by alienface · · Score: 1, Redundant

    AAC is NOT an Apple format. It is an open standard that Apple happens to use. Apple can't license AAC. it doesn't own it.

  6. This is Apple we're talking about. by Canadian1729 · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Historically, they don't know the meaning of the word open, and that's why they're a niche market now. When the IBM-PC was taking over the whole market because of clonemakers, apple tightly guarded both their hardware and software.

    MS is the company who cleaned up on IBM's openness because they made DOS, but in Apple's case, they should have opened the hardware and make their money on Mac OS. If they had, they'd be a much more dominant player in the market today.

    It's the same thing with their codec, they should license it because it's in their best interest, but they won't.

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