DVD Jon Versus The Tyranny of the iTunes Music Store
Okay, before you all start attacking me for hating on Apple in this article and / or for not simply banning use of the iTMS outright, let’s get some things straight. I consider the iTunes Music Store, or something very close to it, to be the future of music sales. Also, I haven’t seen a legal alternative to the iTMS that comes close to carrying all the musicians whose music I want to buy and that sells me the actual songs without any sort of rent-for-life subscription nonsense. I just bought the new Queens of the Stone Age album today, and I doubt there is anywhere else I could have grabbed it so effortlessly (and legally).
However, there is a huge Achilles heel in the current set-up, at least in my eyes: Digital Rights Management / DRM. I outlined my basic beef with DRM in The Problem with the iTMS DRM back in August. At that time, I noted:
... I don’t really blame Apple for the DRM. Apple is stuck in the middle between the consumer and the-guys-who-own-the-rights-to-all-the-songs-in-the-world. These guys aren’t concerned with art or producing a good product; they just want to hoard as much money as possible and stick it in their ears. To hear more about why DRM is evil, make sure you read this wonderful piece by Cory Doctorow of the EFF, an organization which is concerned with your rights as a consumer and is fighting for these rights daily.
While I still think that the RIAA is behind the problem, as each day passes, I’m starting to blame Apple more and more for the DRM. I think recent events warrant a return to this subject.
Apple doesn’t seem to be taking a stand against the RIAA, but Jon Lech Johansen—aka DVD Jon, the guy who cracked DVD encryption, was sued for it, and acquitted of all charges—is taking a stand against the iTunes Music Store. Back in November of 2003, Johansen came out with QTFairUse, a program that stripped iTunes-purchased songs of their DRM. In July of 2004, he came out with FairKeys, a program for extracting your iTunes DRM FairPlay keys from Apple’s servers. From FairKeys, hymn was born, was chased off the internet by Apple legal, then re-emerged elsewhere and since then has given birth to JHymn and iOpener. These programs disable the DRM on iTMS-purchased tracks so that the songs can then be played outside of an iTunes environment, on operating systems and hardware, like Linux and various non-iPod music players, that are not currently supported by iTunes. The songs, stripped of their DRM, still have traceable IDs that point back to the original purchaser of the music, so no song stripped via these methods would be likely candidates for mass pirating.
Most recently, Johansen and a few of his colleagues released a new program, PyMusique. PyMusique offered a non-iTunes interface for accessing the iTunes Music Store, so that anyone with an already established account at the iTunes Music Store could launch PyMusique, pick, purchase, and download songs from the iTMS with the added benefit of having all these songs remain free from DRM. On Monday, Apple blocked PyMusique and any non-iTunes 4.7 program from accessing the iTMS. By Tuesday afternoon, Johansen had already decrypted Apple’s attempt to block the hole that allowed PyMusique to work, and a new version of PyMusique containing the decryption was shortly thereafter announced.
Most likely, Apple will again encrypt the hole and try to patch it, and Johansen will again decrypt and enable access to an iTMS free from DRM. This cycle will go on for a while, perhaps, and sooner or later, Apple will sue, as they are prone to do these days. DVD Jon has been sued for similar actions in the past and won. If Apple moves to sue him, there’s a chance they could lose. Since day one, the legality of the DRM has been questioned by some since it effectively interferes with existing fair use rights that we are legally supposed to have.
So why? Why is Apple taking this route? If someone wants to pirate and illegally resell songs purchased on the iTunes Music Store, all s/he needs to do is burn the tracks to an audio CD and then re-rip them to the computer. The freshly ripped tracks are all ready to be duplicated and sold as many times as the pirate likes and without all the pesky trackable purchaser information that is still embedded in DRM-stripped iTMS tracks. Music pirates know this.
What does the DRM really prevent? What does shutting down PyMusique benefit? If people buy music through PyMusique, Apple is still getting money for their music and the RIAA is still getting their cut. In fact, since there are numerous Linux users out there, and the iTMS doesn’t currently support Linux, PyMusique provides Apple with a larger market through which to sell their songs. If PyMusique is allowed to continue and thrive, then the iTMS and Apple will gain.
Why DRM? Because the RIAA thinks it gives them back the power they have been losing for quite some time. In my opinion, Apple needs to rethink its DRM-shackled alliance with the RIAA, lest that decaying beast manages to somehow drag Apple down with its last attempts at controlling a market that has outgrown middlemen and unnecessary restrictions.
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Comments
CK - DRM is necessary. Wow, some people don’t get it.
Think of this as an equality issue. The record labels want digital distribution of music to be on equal footing as CD distro.
Since DRM free music has distro advantages (no physical manifestation) DRM is put in to bring it back to a level playing field. The distro advantage (electronic) is so large nowadays with broadband - that without DRM - good people will “steal” aka share music without boundaries.
Your example of your girlfriend wanting to listen to your music you bought, and hers as well is a great one - if it was a CD, she would have to borrow it from you, physically put it into her laptop/walkman and both of you couldn’t listen to it simultaneously in seperate locations. Now why should you assume that you should be able to listen and share simulaneously digital versions of music? What, is this a new world order all of a sudden? Your fair use of music is changed based on method of distribution? Its the SAME WORLD fer chrissakes. Just because its digital doesn’t mean you should have more rights over over physical.
To wrap it up, Apple is a distributor - adding DRM is to (try) keep digital distro’s on the same playing field as other distros.
You should be taking issue directly with the record companies, who should update their arcane and out-of-date agreements with physical distros… and generally their whole monopolistic, anit-artist business.
How is it difficult to share temporarily with iTMS?
Digital: You authorize your friend machine, send them the track, shared. They say: “That band blows.” Deauthorize their own machine. No need to return digital media.
Physical: You get the CD, physically give it to your friend. Your friend says “That bad blows.” They physically return the CD back.
Now, tell me which one is harder over a statistically relevant number of times. Physical, always. Your friend could be in Alaska, and you could be in Africa. With digital, it is the same amount of hassle and time no matter the distance.