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Buying DRM-Free Songs From the ITMS

mirko writes "Jon Johansen ("DVD Jon") has published a small program which allows the acquisition of DRM-free file from Apple's iTunes Music Store. He explains that his program works by bypassing iTunes which adds the DRM itself at the end of the transfer. His program, pymusique, is Windows-only compliant but it'd be easy to port it to other platforms."

11 of 894 comments (clear)

  1. More Details by OctaneZ · · Score: 5, Informative
  2. Re:Wouldn't it be ironic by harlows_monkeys · · Score: 4, Informative
    I'm now tempted to join and buy music through them, because now[1] I can do what I want with it once I've bought it

    You could do what you wanted before, with Hymn.

  3. I love ITS but ... by SamSeaborn · · Score: 3, Informative
    I love ITS and the whole iTunes thing, but it does bug me that I can't easily make a CD of mp3 files that I can play in an mp3-compliant CD player (like in a car).

    I'm using the songs legally, but to do what I want I have to burn the 99-cent songs to an audio-CD, then rip them back into iTunes as mp3s, *then* copy the mp3s to the CD.

    Sam

  4. Another little article by ilithiiri · · Score: 5, Informative

    from The Register: iTunes pyMusique.

    --
    If anyone can hear me, slap some sense into me But you turn your head, and I end up talking to myself
  5. Hymn? by sesshomaru · · Score: 5, Informative

    I used Hymn to remove DRM from some songs so I could move them to an older model Creative MP3 player. It seemed to work fine for me.

    --
    "MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
  6. Re:Wouldn't it be ironic by mecro · · Score: 3, Informative

    You could do this before. The simple way to defeat the apple DRM is to burn your songs onto a Virtual Drive (daemon tools) or onto a real CD, then rerip them to a high quality mp3. With iTunes and a decent drive, it takes less than 5 minutes, and is completely DRM free.

  7. Moot. by baudilus · · Score: 3, Informative

    FYI - In the iTunes burning options, you have a choice of burning a Music CD, a Data CD, or an mp3 CD.

    Just thought you should know.

  8. Re:It's a freedom you wouldn't notice much by rworne · · Score: 4, Informative

    Not really. There's been a steady creep towards more onerous DRM as time goes on from iTMS.

    First was the restriction of streaming libraries to local subnets.
    Second was reducing the number of CDs burned from a playlist from 10 to 7.
    Third was changing from 5 concurrent listeners to 5 different listeners per day.
    Fourth was the recent reports that iPhoto albums, iMovie movies and Keynote presentations that use iTMS songs refuse to play on other systems.

    The only loosening of restrictions was changing the number of authorized computers to listen to a DRM'd file from three to five.

    --
    I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
  9. Re:Napster is far better, and free by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Gregory K. Spath
    528 South West Street
    Carlisle, PA 17013
    gspath@freefall.homeip.net
    7172458563

  10. Re:Don't you guys realize... by allgood2 · · Score: 4, Informative

    This has nothing to do with DRM. iTunes, the application, introduce Rendezvous music sharing, which works with any music that can be played by the iTunes app, including mp3, wav, aac, etc. Rendezvous initially had very little limits, anyone else with iTunes or a similarly enabled Rendezvous application could stream any music you marked for sharing.

    This caused some pause in the Music Industry, but caused an even bigger ruckus in the Educational Market, since many a university bandwidth was being ate up by music streaming. Tons of Universities complained, I know most of the CSC at my campus block it if they have that level of control.

    Apple then placed limits on it, very similar to the multi-user limits embedded in FileMaker (also owned by Apple), 5 simultaneous users. Then months ago, that limit was switched to 5 daily users.

    Now I see no benefit in 5 daily users, unless they are trying to guarantee personal use vs office level radio station. I still believe 5 simultaneous users was more fair. But in all honesty, automated music streaming was a feature Apple added, not a right of your music.

    You can still share and stream your music without the limits if you set up your own music server. Obviously more effort than clicking a checkbox in an application, but the same effort that was required before Apple put the checkbox in the iTunes preferences.

    The limit applies to all music that you would use iTunes for, including non-DRM music. But has absolutely nothing to do with DRM, as opposed to application functionality.

  11. Re:Don't you guys realize... by mr_zorg · · Score: 3, Informative

    You're assuming that the lossy AAC files you buy from iTunes started out as a CD. My understanding is this is NOT true. AFAIK, iTunes starts with the master tapes and encodes the files at "better than CD" quality. Lossy, yes, but theoretically less so that a 16bit/44.1KHz CD...