How To Play Your iTunes Music On Other Systems

ptorrone writes "Engadget has a step-by-step for the non-uber geek on how to play your purchased music from iTunes on other systems. To be clear, this isn't a way to take music you bought and give it to someone else, this is so you can listen to your own purchased music on other systems or devices. In fact, your personal info is still in the file."

Comments

Cool... But...

[thedogcow]

This is a great way to do this legally... but... there is always someone that will circumvent the issue and find a loop hole to share music within iTunes.

I really don't see illegal mp3/acc file sharing to be stopped. Ever.

Re:Cool... But...

[arkhan_jg]

a) Terms Of Service are not a contract. They are terms which if you do not obey, they are grounds for terminating your business relationship. I.e. if apple catch you removing DRM from itunes tracks, they can refuse to sell you any more tracks. However, once they've (Apple) sold you something, first sale doctrine dictates that they cannot use copyright law to impose further restrictions. Specifically, use restrictions (i.e. you cannot do this with our product) are simply not enforceable post purchase. The music is not licenced, it is sold, and the only restrictions are those of copyright itself, i.e. you cannot distribute your copies to other people.

b) even if by some legal juggling*, these TOS could be treated like a contract, i.e. you were considered to be licensing the music, not buying it, you cannot give up your legal rights by contract. No more than you can sign into slavery, or sign away your first amendment rights in the US. Such a clause would be, and has been judged to be an illegal clause, and thus stricken from the contract. Since fair use rights are not constitutionally granted rights, it would be less clear cut; but there is a strong precedent for fair use rights not being revocable by contract terms. But in this case it's a moot point, as there's emphatically not a contract post sale.

c) There are in fact two offences you could be taken to court over. The first is copyright infringement. Your fair use rights are a defence to this charge, as long as you do not distribute copies to anyone else. Potentential to distribute has nothing to do with it, you have to actually be spreading those tracks on a p2p network. Therefore, making copies to play on another device would be legal.
The second charge would be with the DMCA. However, it's not illegal to use a DRM-removal tool under the DMCA, only to write or distribute one. Therefore, stripping music you own of drm to use on another device is also fully legal.

Ergo, despite what Apple and it's fans tell you, removing DRM from music you own is 100% legal. Distributing it to others without permission is 100% illegal. Since the article contains instructions on how to play your legally purchased music on other devices you legally own, that is a 100% legal action.

* Note, in order for it be a valid contract, the seller has to have to have an ongoing relationship with you regarding the product post sale. If, on the other hand, they give you something, and you give them money, and you get nothing more from them after that other than their legal obligations like warranties (and you pay them nothing more for that particular product) it is a sale, and the contract is finished regarding that item, regardless of what the vendor would have you believe by tacking on EULA's, use clauses, licences or anything else. The only things that apply from that point on are the relevent laws of the land, and the vendor *cannot* restrict you any further than the law allows. And I will keep saying this till people stop spreading false information to the contrary.

It just works?

[Bifurcati]

I find it ironic (though perhaps humorous!) that this hack is most simply implemented on a Windows platform. Note that on Mac et al., you have to have an iPod, and have it plugged in, because that's where the decrypted keys come from. On Windows, however, the key encryption has been reverse engineered somehow (I don't really understand this bit) and they're able to get the key directly from your computer. This hasn't been done on the mac, so you have to wait for the iPod to decrypt it for you.

I just find it interesting that the DRM was most easily compromised by allowing iTunes for Windows! Is this just because of the sheer user base, meaning things get hacked together faster, or is it more profound, i.e., Windows is more easily hacked. Food for thought :)

PS - I've just ordered by G4 Powerbook laptop (drool, drool), doing the switch from Windows. Faintly nervous, but all my friends (both of them...) are getting the Powerbooks and loving them!

Re:It just works?

[Dahan]

That's pretty interesting... Your earlier message says Apple added a flag to execve(), but Darwin's execve() looks standard to me:
int execve(const char *path, char *const argv[], char *const envp[]);

Having execve() do the protection wouldn't work anyways, seeing that gdb wouldn't call execve() with that flag set. I ktraced iTunes, and it's just calling ptrace(PT_DENY_ATTACH, ...) on itself, rather than having its parent do it. You could probably run iTunes under a debugger and set a breakpoint on ptrace() and skip over the offending call.

On the other hand, while recompiling Darwin may not be "something a user would be able to do" (I've never tried), I'm sure someone who is knowledgable enough to reverse engineer iTunes' key generation scheme is also capable of compiling their kernel.

Re:4 cents

[harlows_monkeys]

You did not buy them outright. You bought them with conditions attached. You licensed them for use with iTunes and iPod

Then how come iTunes supports CD burning? Are you only supposed to use iTunes to play those CDs?

Re:Not necissarily

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Breaking a contract is not necissarily illegal

Yes, it is. We even have a term for it: "breach of contract."

The contract stiplulates the penalty for breaking the contract: refusal of service.

Right. Which means if you run PlayFair or Hymn or I'mABigScriptKiddieLookAtMeWoo or whatever on one of your iTunes songs, you are no longer legally authorized to listen to any of your iTunes songs. You are, at that point, engaging in copyright violation, which if you do it enough is a felony!

Re:I have an easier method:

[real_smiff]

This method (the one discussed in the article) is superior* because it doesn't involve transcoding.

*from an audiophile (i.e. not legal) perspective

Re:Not necissarily

[d34thm0nk3y]

Except that at this point you are no longer copying them since they are already on your computer. Copyright only deals with distribution.

Re:4 cents

[TwinkieStix]

WRAAAAAG! At times it feels like I'm the only one who recognizes that fair use does not apply when you have contractually agreed not to bypass the DRM... for further info, see some of my other posts in this thread.

Contractually? I believe that it's a "license agreement" not a contract. That's a big difference. And these licenses haven't yet been tried by a court. License are intended for copyright - how I can distribute the program. If I pay for something, I own it, and nobody but the government can legally tell me what I can and can't do with it.

Some of those things I can do:

• destroy it
• dispose of it in an environmentally friendly way
• drive over it with my car
• yell at it
• take it apart and look at it
• tell my friends that I have it
• make backup copies of it
  

Some of the things I can't do:

• use it to kill people or physically harm them
  
• copy it and distribute it without permission
• use it to hurt the environment or some endangered specie

Re:Not necissarily

[damiam]

Playing a CD over the radio is distribution.