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France Considers Anti-DRM 'iPod Law'
Asklepius M.D. writes "According to the Washington Post, France is contemplating legislation designed to 'to force compatibility between digital songs and the different machines that play them.' Known colloquially as the 'iPod bill', it is opposed by Apple, the Business Software Alliance, and others who refer to it as 'state-sponsored piracy.' Two versions of the bill have already passed France's Senate and National Assembly. From the article: 'Under the proposed law, Apple Computer Inc., Sony Corp., Dell Inc. and other companies could have to reveal trade secrets of their software so that their songs can play on competitors' devices.'"
This is great news!
In countries, like Norway, where I live, where DRM is not protected by law, this will allow hardware and software to support every format they want to. If it passes, of course. Vive la France!
The bills have already been altered in such a way that not only will Apple NOT be hurt by the bill but will most likely benefit in the long run. The French public was so infuriated by the changes in the bill that they have already had public demonstrations protesting the French governments bending to big business. Do a little DD before posting such nonsense. This is OLD news.
With the iPod, Apple does not currently provide a way to copy music from the iPod onto a computer
iTunes software allows you to:
Burn downloaded iTunes songs onto a CD
Re-rip the CD back into iTunes as MP3 files
Once they're MP3s, you can copy and play them with any MP3 player.
I do this all the time, and listen to songs downloaded via iTunes on my Palm. It's a couple of extra steps, but it works just fine.
The second option is for the intended recipient to transmit a public key (well, not really public since only the content holder will receive it). The content holder then decrypts the content and uses the public key obtained to build an SSL tunnel to the recipient, which can then re-encrypt it natively.
Ok, that handles that part. Now we need the data format. This will contain one or more of DRM headers, DRM data, and content. Since the data is encrypted in transit, using keys only the two parties know, we don't need DRM protections, only the DRM information. By ripping out the DRM, then converting that information into XML or some other "universal" format, we can preserve the DRM information without needing the DRM to be active.
At the destination, the DRM meta-data is then parsed. Those elements for which no local definition exists would be dropped, and those elements not filled by the meta-data would be set to the most constrained values allowed. The protections may change, with such a system, but they should average out.
We now have a universal DRM exchange protocol that needs to know NOTHING about any foreign DRM mechanisms and therefore does NOT need to be patched as new formats come out, and does NOT need to be bloated with a multitude of foreign algorithms. All it needs is an industry-standard XML template, an implementation of RSA, an industry-standard public key exchange mechanism and optionally an implementation of SSL.
Total hardware complexity? One standard encryption chip and one moderate-sized FPGA should be sufficient. Two scraps of silicon, adding maybe a couple of grammes to the total weight. I can really see this killing the entire music industry... assuming the entire music industry is in fact a small piece of blue-green algae and the chips are dropped on it from an altitude of 30,000 feet.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
From TFA:
Both versions would decriminalize piracy and make it equivalent to a traffic infraction, with fines that computer companies say are so small they would offer no deterrence.
Let 'em withdraw, and vive le Torrent!
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
When you reencode to MP3, you lose quality. Many people don't really notice, but please be aware that it's a concern for some people.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
You can do it yourself from your account settings on iTMS. I think the limit is once every 12 months that you can deauthorize all the computers associated with your account.
What the Assemblée's version of the text forced DRM makers to give publicly is NOT "trade secret", just "informations needed for interoperability", with such precision : "technical informations and programming interfaces needed to obtain a copy in an open standard of a protected work".
These informations should be made public for a competition to be free. If it isn't, then it's use for blocking competition. That's because they didn't disclose such informations that Microsoft was found guilty by the European Commission.
Now we understand that US Corporations don't want competition to be free, the just want to rule the market, by whatever mean.
Let's not worry, though, thanks to their lobbying (Apple Corp and the DoC pushed very hard on the french Senate), the new text just allow some kind of stupid commission to ask and say "please!" in order to _try_ to obtain thoses informations now.
Get comfortable, no one will be able to compete with US DRM. The "iPod law" (what a stupid name! are people able to pronounce "interoperability" or do they have to always speak in trademarks??) is going to be erased under Apple's pressure.
(more infos on http://eucd.info/index.php?English-readers )