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
“The SOLE purpose of the iTMS is to sell iPods. That’s business. The iTMS isn’t intended for people who don’t have iPods.”
Yes, but you’ve been saying how DRM is intended to protect artists and prevent piracy and blah blah blah. I guess your’e admitting now that’s total bullshit, and really DRM is there to prevent customers from doing what they want with the music just like we’ve been saying all this time.
“It works - and that’s called “a sound business strategy.”“
No, that’s called abusing your market share power. Or least that’s what they call it when Microsoft uses the same kind of “sound business strategy”.
Go back and read what I said.
1) “Blaming Apple in this deal is shortsighted.
Apple HAS to close down any loopholes (especially the very public ones) to satisfy it’s contract with the record labels. That’s what the labels expect. And without that effort, things could change very quickly - and suddenly the tide in the online music war shifts. Apple doesn’t want that.”
2) “The sad fact of the matter is that without DRM in place, people will steal music rather than pay for it. But with some method to do it legally, many people will avoid stealing and pay for their music. ” —- this is proven by the fact the iTMS has sold hundreds of millions of tracks
3) As a musician, I have no problem with this method of doing business. —this couldn’t be clearer - nowhere in here do I say that DRM is for the artist
You’ve mistated what I’ve been saying. Read the first thing I said. This is driven by the record labels.
The DRM is in place to set guidelines for . YOU KNOW the guidelines - yet you still purchase the track. You act as if you’ve been had.
OMG beeblebrox.
you can’t be serious.
I make a product. It’s a hit. I improve the product. It’s a bigger hit. People are happy with my product. I extend the functionality of my product to make it more useful (iTMS) and it becomes an even bigger hit. That is business, buddy.
Apple is out to make money - don’t tell anyone. They want your money and mine.
““The sad fact of the matter is that without DRM in place, people will steal music rather than pay for it. But with some method to do it legally, many people will avoid stealing and pay for their music. ”—- this is proven by the fact the iTMS has sold hundreds of millions of tracks.”
Now there’s logic for you. ITMS selling hundreds of millions of tracks doesn’t prove that they do it because of DRM. It does prove that people want an easy way to download music and will pay for it. If anything, ITMS sales might actually be higher without the annoyance of DRM that prevents them from doing what they want with their music. I know people that won’t buy from ITMS because of DRM. I don’t know anyone that buys BECAUSE of DRM.
“I extend the functionality of my product to make it more useful (iTMS) and it becomes an even bigger hit. That is business, buddy.”
How exactly is disabling the ability to play a song on any other player than the Ipod “extending the funcionality” of ITMS?
Imagine if Sony became the #1 distributor of DVD movies and then encoded their movies so that they would only play on Sony brand DVD players. Is that “extending the functionality” of their product? No. It’s exploiting their market share in order to drive out the competition.
That’s legal only up to a point, as Microsoft has discovered in its dealings the DOJ. At the point you become a defacto monopoly, such practices become anti-competitive and illegal. Apple currently has a 60% market share on portable mp3 players and that share is increasing.
The only difference here between M$ and Apple here is the sheer volume of sycophants willing to justify and defend every single thing Apple does.
Hmmm…. Let’s see….Apple, The Music Companies, and the Artists are still earning their $0.99 per song, more people can buy songs, and it didn’t cost anyone anything. Where’s the problem?
I don’t know why everyone is so hung up on DRM for low quality files in the firstplace? You can still go buy a CD with 10 times the quality with no DRM so what’s the big deal if someone buys a low quality song with no DRM? Someone is still getting paid. I can go buy that same CD used for a third of the retail price and then Apple, The Music Companies, and the Artists won’t earn a single dime. No DRM there.
Besides, in 2003 DVD Jon already cracked the DRM for iTunes. That didn’t seem to hurt sales did it?
This is just crazy. Just forget the DRM already.
mightyDave, first, I just want to note that I checked out your website and I hate you b/c you have a Mac mini with Media Center and a LARGE flat panel TV.
Again, CDs don’t avoid DRM altogether, b/c some CDs have DRM and the ones that don’t still pay money back to the RIAA who are behind all the DRM.
Also, DRM should exist for the record labels peace of mind?! As I explained, it is a false peace of mind. Apple has been running the iTMS long enough and successfully enough at this point where they could start renegotiating with the RIAA, pointing out that DRM is problematic and a false security net, and suggesting something new and better that doesn’t happen to violate consumers’ fair use rights.
dude - could you please just read what I’ve written.
“But with some method to do it legally, many people will avoid stealing and pay for their music.—- this is proven by the fact the iTMS has sold hundreds of millions of tracks. “
Here is what you are saying
“It does prove that people want an easy way to download music and will pay for it.”
What is the difference here? I’m not saying that people are buying tracks because of the DRM - I’m saying they are wanting to buy because it’s the legal way to do it.
You are saying the same dang thing.
CK - I can now officially invite you over to see the Mac mini setup
I see your point about the CDs - but I still disagree with you over Apple’s roll in this.
Do you see a way in which the record companies would actually agree to forgo DRM? Even with Apple urging them all the way. Doubt it.
I understand you see it as an evil. I see it as a necessary evil, for now at least.
“I’m not saying that people are buying tracks because of the DRM”
...
“The sad fact of the matter is that without DRM in place, people will steal music rather than pay for it”
That sounds awfully like you just said “people are buying music because they can’t steal it due to the DRM” but “i’m not saying people are buying tracks due to the DRM”
It has been repeatedly pointed out that people who want to “steal” music will do so regardless of DRM and those that want to purchase music will do so because they don’t want to “steal”. However the DRM only inconvinences those who purchased the tracks.
I note you have made no comments re magnatune, as an artist I would have though the distribution model and % revenue might interest you? You seem to be defending the labels/distributers at the expense of both the artist and the consumer here.
Our band is independent - always has been. The magnatune idea is a great one. For bands like our - it’s great.
We use CDBaby - mainly due to it’s inroads with a lot of national distributors. It’s a great avenue for independent artists.
mightyDave,
I don’t see DRM as being necessary at all. That’s what drives me nuts about it. It doesn’t serve any *real* purpose except for possibly some vague hand-holding of RIAA execs that just don’t get it.
And even if we put aside that it infringes on existing fair use rights, and assume that it is necessary, then I still have a bone to pick with Apple. Namely, that Steve Jobs continually touts iTMS as being the success it is because we actually own the songs. Only thing is, the DRM cow-towing legalese agreement we all sign off on to use the store treats it more like a limited service that Apple can change (and has changed) any time they like.
Very much false advertising, in addition to being fundamentally wrong, evil, and illegal (in that it violates fair use).
“Our band is independent - always has been. The magnatune idea is a great one. For bands like our - it’s great.”
Great, I might actually buy some of your tracks/albums then. I m ake a point of supporting Magnatune and have spent quite a bit of funds there recently. I also am aware of CDbaby but I live in the UK, I notice that they have downloads available via that ex MP3.com guys (am I correct in recalling its the guy behind Lindows, Michael Robertson? or am i getting confused) website.
I have looked at that, it looks pretty good but it only allows 30 sec listens whereas I spend hours listening to albums prior to buying on magnatune and the only option is 192kb/s MP3 IIRC.
I want Flac or wav (or apple lossless, or anybody lossless, but preferably flac, I also use OGG for portability and 128KB/s MP3s for my gym player, all available at Magnatune, which saves me a lot of hassel) and I want to be able to listen to the whole track before buying, like the radio. Which you can do at CDbaby (sometimes look at this http://cdbaby.com/cd/joshritter Wierd?) but I don’t think you can then download the tracks from there?
Anyway at least we are not coming from completely opposite ends of the spectrum but I think its important to remember that people like me will buy music that fits in with their philosophy as well as their musical tastes but won’t buy music that is to their taste but does not fit their principles.
Good luck with the band, post the name and I will look you up at cdbaby.
It never ceases to amaze me how people will stand in line for fifteen minutes every morning at Starbucks to spend three bucks for a cup of coffee, and then whine and complain because they don’t want to spend .99 cents for a piece of art that brings them happiness and enjoyment and in some cases might even change their entire outlook on life…or at least brighten up their day. Makes me wonder about the things we value in this society.