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BusinessWeek on Opening Apple's iTunes DRM
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."
For the nth time, AAC is not "Apple's DRM technology." It is part of the MPEG-4 specifications. More info here.. To quote:
AAC was developed by the MPEG group that includes Dolby, Fraunhofer (FhG), AT&T, Sony, and Nokia--companies that have also been involved in the development of audio codecs such as MP3 and AC3 (also known as Dolby Digital). The AAC codec in QuickTime 6 builds upon new, state-of-the art signal processing technology from Dolby Laboratories and brings true variable bit rate (VBR) audio encoding to QuickTime.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
I agree with this article. Adding WMA to the iPod is ludicrous (as is Rob Glaser's plea to add other support....Real.....get real!). However, licensing the DRM to AAC that Apple uses would nothing but grow the iPod marketshare because no one could complain that the iTMS is the only place to buy music for the iPod.
However,.......based on Steve's stubborness and protectiveness of Apple, I am not going to hold my breath on this one. Having clones to Apple hardware is one thing and I can understand Steve killing that idea but this is so totally different. Steve readily admits that iTMS is not a breadwinner. But Steve is a just a bit too protective still to license FairPlay.
Here's to hoping.....
No trees were harmed in the composition of this; however, numerous electrons were inconvenienced.
On the other hand, Microsoft's WMA is proprietary no matter how you slice it.
The only reason iTunes has DRM in the first place is because the major labels insist on it: they like their paying customers to have more restrictions than the folks that are getting it for free, makes sense right?
Every fumbling attempt the record companies make to control and restrict music blows up in their face. Case in point, the new, bannedmusic.org which is using a BitTorrent installer packaged with a specific torrent to spread music that's run afoul of the current copyright regime. They could have made money licensing this stuff, but now there ain't nothin they can do about it.
The obvious problem is that what incentive is there for someone to open a music store with encrypted songs that are only playable on the iPod?
Musicians already have ways of submitting their music to the iTMS.
Any large conglomerate opening a music store online is generally stupid or on the "music store" bandwagon, or both. Apple pretty clearly does it because it's a selling point for iPods, and with their early appearance on the scene, they have a good chance to dominate the market until such time as it does become profitable.
So what earthly good does licensing FairPlay do for anyone?
It doesnt say that AAC is Apples DRM.. it says that Apples DRM is called 'Fairplay' and licensing that to others would increase usage of the AAC FORMAT.
Fire in the hands of the village idiot is no tool, but a weapon of mass destruction
That's not Apple's decision to make, since they aren't the owners of AAC. And they're apparently smart enough at least to know that, unlike, say, you.
I think that Jobs has his own plan in mind, though I hope he's included "flexibility".
Option 1: Stay Alone
This basically has the iPod and the iTunes Music Store (iTMS) working only together. So far, this situation has proven to be the case, and it's working pretty well: the iPod is the #1 selling MP3 player out there, it's making Apple a butt load of cash (and when you try to carry money in your butt you'll know what I mean), and iTMS is the #1 online music sales system by far - 50 million songs sold compared to Roxio's 5 million. Even comaring apples to , er, apples, just within the 6 months since Napster has been out Apple has made 5 to 1 sales.
If this continues, then eventually Jobs can force out all of the "for profit" music shops out there, and boil it down to just the "for advertising" places, like Wal-Mart, Coke, and Microsoft (which would really be looking to make Windows Media Audio the default standard).
From this, Apple makes AAC the next MP3, and their DRM becomes the "de facto standard" - even though nobody else can use it. Apple makes all the money, and they like it.
This will only come true, however, if Apple keeps a huge lead. What happens when Microsoft (MS) unveals their own online music store (didn't originally they tell folks like Napster that they wouldn't? Well, nevermind that....), sells songs for $0.50 each, takes a hit on profits, and basically acts like they did with Internet Explorer. (Ignoring any antitrust issues - not that Microsoft ever has had to in the past.)
So that goes to Option 2: License the DRM
I have the feeling that Jobs will release this if and only if iTMS and iPod sales start taking a dive. It's his "ace in the hole" to keep iPod sales alive. All it will take is him going to the other stores, making an offer, and then everybody can use the iPod with any service. Sure, it could hurt iTMS removing the one thing that makes it different from everybody else - but Apple is about the hardware.
But what happens if someone like Dell or Gateway come out with their own MP3 player that starts to make the iPod look like yesterday's bulky cell phone? That's when option 3 kicks in:
Option 3: License WMV for the iPod
This one only happens when things are dire and Apple feels they finally have to put in their chips.
The question is, how likely is either option to be? I can see Option 2 and 3 as "someday, maybe" futures. But as of right now, iTMS and the iPod rules the roost, and as long as Apple keeps that up for another 12-24 months, everybody else just in it to "make money selling music" will be so marginalized it won't matter. We're more likely to see Pepsi style promotions than anything else - though Apple had already keep an eye on possible cracks in their popularity: McDonald's may have dumped a iTMS deal in favor of a Sony Online Music one already, though of course nothing is official yet.
2 years I think the dust will be settled. Until then, I'll keep saving up to buy my wife an iPod mini. Hey, if nothing else, they're cute. And she still buys lots of CD's.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Apple likes the 'go it alone' route, regardless of any benefits to other routes.
Which is why Apple has licensed the iPod to HP.
Which is why iTunes is also Windows software.
Which is why the iPod OS is designed and maintained by somebody other than Apple. Which is why USB, Firewire and other technologies are shared across the broad spectrum of platforms. yeah Apple goes it alone with such things as ATA, PCI
Apple goes it alone on these things:
Design (beautiful things work better see Donald Norman)
Usability (because if it's not brain dead simple I'll have to think about how to do stuff instead of just doing it.
Focus (whether in Digital lifestyle stuff like iTunes and iMovie or whether in bio-informatics, Apples hardware and software are tailored to getting things DONE)
Lifestyle (like the wearable computing fashion indicates, computers and devices are becoming embedded in our lives to such an extent that choosing these tools is a real factor in fashioning out lives)
And why Dell, Roxio, M$, and the others only sit and snipe.
If you send an email to iTunes Support, and ask them nicely, they will de-authorize all the computers on your account automatically. Just tell them you no longer have the computers you authorized and cannot de-authorize them the normal way.
Worked for me.
...but what would the fees be? Out of the reach of the small indie shops, or reasonable?
Poor talentless underdogs, my heart bleeds. If they can't afford DRM, they either shouldn't use it or they should start sucking less so they actually turn a profit. The iPod plays DRM-FREE MP3 files just fine.
Then again, why bother with DRM at all? My Dell Jukebox cost me less per GB, has a longer battery life, doesn't have any DRM, at least none that I'm aware of,
So it can play WMA but has no DRM support? That's like Satanism without the evil, it's totally pointless.
I don't get my sexuality questioned every time someone sees me use it.
Haven't had that problem... Considering the iPod has the majority of the portable audio marketshare, I highly doubt it comes into play as a factor in determining someone's sexuality. Now buying a pink mini and loading it with Ricky Martin's complete discography probably wouldn't help your case, but I digress.
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DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
They've left a tantalizing hint - if you look inside the iTunes application bundle, you'll see an icon for ogg files. It looks like they were at least considering supporting it enough to provide artwork. It's possible it supported it internally, but the feature might have been removed before shipping for some reason.
Let's see...Apple puts only what you call an ineffective lock on the music you download, yet this is the reason you haven't signed up for iTunes?
What, are you waiting for a store to come out with *effective* protection which gives you even less of what you want? "Federal take-it-up-the-@$$" protection?
Apple has to put some kind of protection on their downloads to reassure the labels. You claim that it is only a token effort. Isn't that the best you can hope for? Sounds like Apple is slying doing you a favor, as opposed to the draconian measures they could be taking.
Like Apple's DRM is worth a shit. It's as effective at protecting songs as my goldfish is at protecting my house. When anyone can defeat it by burning & reripping, what's the point? Really, why even bother?
this is actually a point Steve Jobs made to the music industry execs (according to an interview with Jobs online somewhere, I forget where). He told them that any DRM is basically useless, anything that can be encoded can be cracked. they told him to piss off, a year or so later he came back when all their drm schemes were cracked and he said "See?!" Then they listened.
so apple put in a bare minimum protection scheme, but more importantly made the terms so loose that nobody really wants to or needs to crack it. the restrictions are pretty insignificant (can't burn the same playlist more than 10x.... but change it slightly and keep going. But who's going to burn the same playlist that many times anyway?). the whole setup basically a fig leaf so that the industry can *feel* protected while raking in the bucks.
the real protection here is the easy terms that don't stop you from doing what you want to. iTMS is excellent competition to Kazaa & crew: faster, better, more reliable, decently tagged, good catalog, cheap. Apple got tired of waiting for the industry to figure out how to do it right, and did it for them.
so what exactly is your problem with iTunes?