http://fuware.nanocrew.net/pymusique/

This is an alternate interface to the iTunes Music Store. Apparently, the music that Apple sells isn't encrypted until after it is downloaded. So this software allows you to purchase music from the store and bypass the final step of encrypting the file.

You can also create an account from within PyMusique, which does not require agreeing to an EULA.

Very cool, but I wonder how long until Apple tries to shut this down and whether the shut down will come legally or technologically.

Let's keep it quiet and low-profile then??
I might give it a shot, but using an existing legit account, if one of my mates will let me test it with their details... No way I'm opening an iTunes account though this.

If I do test it I'll report back here.

Quite soon it'll be on Slashdot, if it's not there already...

It's amazing the amount of effort dedicated at breaking the iTMS DRM. I guess that tells something about its popularity compared to other stores.

It is now:
http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/03/18/1324235

Not concidering the clearly legal violations for a moment, I must say it is an impressive feat Jon and his friends have accomplished.

However I fail to see what Jon is trying to prove here, except that he is brilliant at code breaking.

The PyMusique executable is only available for Windows, so it is not about giving non-Mac OS and non-Windows user access to iTMS.

Besides that Apple has the most liberal usage right of all the companies offering DRM controlled downloads and the best sounding compression.

By attacking Apple DRM I can only see that the record companies turn to Microsoft DRM instead as I don't beleive they will give up selling downloaded music.

*yawns* People don't even care what DRM is, they burn it onto a CD and rerip it etc. Do you think Apple store would be successful at all if the purchased music was unplayable on anything but iPod+iTunes ?

I don't see what the big deal is: you still have to pay for the tunes using this new interface. There's always hymn to achieve the same goal.

This is imho a short-sighted argument. The only way to force companies to loosen/give up DRM is to either break it over and over, or boycott it. Obviously, you've got to start somewhere. Only focus on breaking MS-DRM in turn would make the most popular DRM-method right now - the one used in iTunes - stronger... and therefore strenghten the already most powerful DRM-provider. That doesn't seem like a wise strategy. If apples DRM should become weaker and MS-DRM stronger (in terms of marketshare), then MS is the next one to feel the futility of DRM - simple as that. So, i disagree with your argument completely: attacking the DRM-provider which is currently most powerful is exactly the right thing to do.

- Lyx

Will this software allow me to purchase songs even if I am not in a "supported" country?

So this is a crusade against DRM, in what ever form it takes.

Do you really think that no matter what DRM scheme comes allong it will eventually be broken?

Although history so far proven this to be the case I still haven't seen MS DRM cracked.

Furthermore the Blue ray consortium is going to develop even harder to crack DRM before movies begin appearing on HD DVD.

No. You need to provide a credit card number, and the system checks if that number is from an account located at the supported country.

No need to talk about Blu-ray. Even DVD-Audio DRM hasn't been broken to this date.

It is - like everything - about power and forces. DRM in its current form has only disadvantages for the users and no advantages. Unless the users are completely braindead, they will of course fight it.


As long as it can be played back, it can be recorded.

- Lyx

how does Apple know where you come from?

Then Roberto? How can I buy tracks?

I am pretty sure you figured this one out already...

It's written in Python using PyGTK2 and twisted, so it should run under at least Linux, BSD and Mac OS X.

Black magic

I think it has something to do with OS info, or IP adress, or credit card info, as Roberto said.

So now I and all the other millions of customers in iTMS, Napster etc. are braindead?

Now what is that signature you use... "The majority is wrong"


Sure but it will take up more storage and will suffer a performance degradation when recompressed.

I don't think it's the OS info nor the IP-address...credit card info would make sense, but is also easy to bypass...just get a credit card from a different country...but I don't think it's worth it...I wouldn't even take that iTunes stuff if I got it for free...

I am responsible for what i say, but not for what you (want to) understand.


You're avoiding a direct discussion when your arguments are evaluated - are you aware of that?

- Lyx

Your credit card number identifies the issuing bank and hence the country.

If you have a US credit card you can access iTMS from any country and buy songs.

Napster and MusicMatch use your ip-address to determine your country and does not allow Americans abroad to buy songs.

Sure. Cross the border and open an account at an american bank

So lets talk about the disadvantages of DRM

Sure. The basic idea why DRM is interesting to corporations is to restrict the use of the media for the users. The lock-in effect(you cannot use your bought wares freely with other whatever portable or software player or other equipment you have) in that sense is even something which is appreciated by some manufacturers like apple and microsoft. So that means that corporations currently don't just use DRM to restrict use, they use it to forcefully tie the user to them. One could argument that in the future, some standards may be implemented to allow playback on a multitute of playback-devices - but the very principle of what DRM does will make it impossible to make fair-use perfect.

This is because DRM works like a "whitelist" and not like a "blacklist": the target platform is first guilty until otherwise proven. So, in short: the idea of DRM _is_ to not be perfect and restrict fair-use - otherwise, it couldn't safely restrict illegal use.

The bottom line is that DRM is primarily good for corporations and secondarily for the good of users. Thus, DRM is made to benefit corporations, not users.

However, because the idea of DRM is an illusion (it will always be crackable or circumventable) it doesn't even work: The casual user will get the restrictions, while for the techies, its only an annoyance - but no restriction. It may be interesting to note that this basically (just like so other processes currently happening) criminalizes everyone who enforces fair-use with DRMed media - which in turn means that every user who doesn't bow down becomes criminal.

- Lyx

unless you use a proxy server - which could be also your PC at home...

Has anyone tried the software to purchase a song yet?

A more pressing question is, can Apple determine when this software is being used to purchase music?

Using DRM as a technology to lock users to a specific company is a bad thing. We have seen numerous examples of this, e.g. VHS vs. Betamax, DivX vs. DVD...



I beleive both media providers and end-users have a common interest in that happening. The Blue-Ray initiative seems to be a step in that direction.



Sure, but your rights have always been limited, only now DRM techniques are used to police these rights. Before it was up to you and your concience whether to stick within your usage rights.

However it will always be the media providers who set the usage rights and you who decide if you want to accept these rights. You always have the choice not to download their music.



With the newest DRM schemes I fear this will eventually become a restriction also for techies.

Eventually this will force Apple to update its version of FairPlay to make this possible.

Personally I think Apple will have to come up with a new version of FairPlay anyway, to match Napster On-The-Go.

Unfortunately Apple are more likely to put its resources into this development than gapless playback.

Try to imagine the implications of Napster On-The-Go being cracked, similar to what iTMS.

No matter what effort Apple puts into its DRM, 10x the effort will always be put into cracking it. DRM is classed as sucessful (for the company) if the vast majority of Joe Public are locked in because of it.

only Apple and the programmer of the tool would know for sure, but if they did their homework Apple shouldn't notice it...they just have to send the same headers like iTunes does...kinda like if you use an open source browser and modify the header information as if it was IE...the server would really think that you are using IE...otherwise it would only be a matter of days before Apple blocks that application...

I mean, since there are 3rd party tools that allow you to transfer your songs to your iPod there would be no reason to use iTunes anymore (which is not really easy on the ressources) + the obvious that you get files without DRM...without having to use an extra tool...

I really don't see what shitting the best DRM system is supposed to accomplish besides making it worse. I don't think any of the companies demanding it on their music are going to be impressed by this; wouldn't it be better to work on some other more restrictive system?

Maybe you don't understand the big picture and how forces work. If you look at the issue in an isolated way, then your conclusion seems right. Unfortunatelly, the world does consist of more than iTunes and time consists of more than the current.

- Lyx

Exactly my point.

By keep breaking FairPlay you will only force Apple into making a new version of FairPlay even if that means inconveniences for its users.

Such a version might cause files to be slower to play, due the license verification, or limit the rights presently offered with FairPlay.

For me it seems that the hackers are breaking FairPlay because they can, whereas WMA DRM has not been cracked.

By your logic, you should not do anything in your life, because the "cause" will result in an "effect". Investigative journalism shouldn't happen because some of the reporters could face ugly consequences. Demonstrations against bad things would never happen because some of them may get arrested. In general, nothing would be done against bad things, because the ones responsible for them would react.

The "Spiral Of Silence" is a good thing by your logic.

- Lyx

I suggest you do some reading into DRM. Here is a good introduction:

http://junk.haughey.com/doctorow-drm-ms.html

Microsoft Research DRM talk by Cory Doctorow

executive sumary:

I believe it addresses all your points/concerns.

And here's another relevant quote on the subject of DRM:



From this interview:

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/i...has-player=true

Thank you bawjaws for posting that December 2003 interview with Steve Jobs !

Interesting read indeed.


As you emphasised Steve Jobs said
In saying so he agrees with you and Lyx on the matter.
IMO it is a sales pitch and I would like the Ph.D.'s convincing opinions on the matter before agreeing. Still WMA DRM has not been broken.


The sad thing really is that too many lawyers are involved in pursuing every chance of revenue for the record companies.

In Denmark as a private person you have to pay:
- An additional fee for each radio channel available on your cable
- An additional fee on each empty cassette tape / CD / DVD you buy regardless of planned use

The fees we are talking about are not pocket money, but a real source of income for the lawyers who administer the collection and distribution of these fees as well as the artists.

You have to pay the fees just for the ability to listen to music on the radio / copying music to cassettes.


Furthermore there is an anti piracy group, again with lawyers raising law-suits against file swappers. Although they have been successful at reaching settlements with big file swappers, the artists has yet to see any money from this initiative.


The sad thing about lawyers is that they are obcessed with risks. They can spell out scenarios that make record companies fear the worst. One such risk management initiative is DRM.

I totally agree with Steve Jobs when he says
Personally I would prefer watermarking of digital media to DRM.

This would in no way limit my use of the media I choose to buy, nor would it police any minor violations of these rights. It would be as if I bought a CD and ripped it.

But knowing that a digital media, including any copies made, could be traced back to the person who purchased it, would make people think twice before violating any usage rights.

I'm not at all sure that watermarking is practical. If I buy a CD at a CD shop and pay cash, and then sell the CD at a garage sale would anyone care if it's watermarked? Would anyone know? It would require 'Big Brother' type tracking..... Call me skeptical.

I think that the problem of governments and corporations is just that they're still living in the pre-informationage era where physical control(be it through technology, or law executives) was the ticket to power.

What they missed from the rise of that era until now, is that the above is now obsolete and inefficient. In a global and digital information network (i'm not talking about the internet) information wants to be free and cannot be controlled(at least not in a large-scale). What in this era is more powerful is influence. It is not about full control anymore but about large-scale moderation and manipulation.

Until today, they didn't get that and ignore it. And thats why they began a few years ago to tighten their physical grip, for the worse of everyone. They don't want to accept reality and instead try to do it brute-force, while feeling how their precious "control" is leaving them drop per drop every day - but instead of taking this as a sign that a change of strategy is in order, they take it as a sign to tighten the grip even more - accelerating the spinal trap which they want to stop.

- Lyx

Well...

In the case of Apple and FairPlay I wouldn't call it brute-force.

FairPlay was a DRM I could live with. (Only complaint being that it is also being used by Apple to tie me to the iPod and the Mac, rather than being licensed to any company who want's to use it.)

The history behind HYMN and now PyMusique vs. updated version of iTunes have merely been small steps taken by Apple to annoy people having hymned files on their system.

I don't really see these small steps as tightening the grip. Its more than a friendly battle between Apple and "Pirates".


Steve Jobs statement that any DRM will eventually be broken is apparently not something the record companies believe since they have allowed Napster To Go.

Watermarks would only work for downloaded music that you are not allowed to resell.

Well, the guy that bought the CD from him puts the songs on the internet, but the shop has woody on its database. So the cops will go after woody, and he'll have to manage to prove he sold the CD to someone else before it was made available online.

Cheers for the article...best read I've had in a while.

Is DVD Audio even a finalized standard yet?

I looked here and didn't see anything one way or the other:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVD#DVD-Audio

One would guess so. There are players and discs being sold everywhere.

Glad you liked it, the following blog post and the articles it responds to, is more on the topic from the same author, with a focus on DRM and how it will be used to cripple your portable digital audio players (and DVR's etc.) without your consent.

http://www.boingboing.net/2004/12/29/cory_...nds_to_wir.html

It's a strange sales pitch to tell people that you can't stop their livelihood being stolen, when your competitors are claiming that they can protect it. Besides, you're reading too much into the comment, because you're letting the pro-DRM crowd frame the debate, and have therefore confused breaking DRM with DRM failing, because you believe that DRM works, up until the point when it breaks, which is not true. It's only a matter of time till any particular DRM is 'broken' (see Cory's MSFT talk for the reasons why) but DRM being 'broken' and DRM failing in its stated aim of 'protecting digital content' are two different things.

Until DRM stops you from capturing the digital output (and it never will until the manufacturers of every piece of digital equipment are required to enforce this by law) it fails to protect digital content, even if it hasn't been 'broken'. In fact you could strongly argue that as long as analogue recording is possible then DRM will automatically fail.

And if you're about to say 'but re-encoding the output reduces quality (or alternatively increases file size)', then think about the number of people on this board talking about moving to lossless audio for storing their collections, and then consider how utterly pointless DRM on lossless files would be.

Appropriately for this board, 'unbroken' DRM encourages media providers to release lossily encoded output that is of a quality high enough to impress the plebs but low enough that a re-encoding step would ruin the quality. There's something for high quality audio and DRM aficionado's to think about.

Yeah, especially when its only your own DRM system that has been broken and your competitors DRM still holds out.

Maybe thats why the recording industry did not buy the argument.

If they don't beleive in DRM "Napster To Go" would be history.

People never bothered breaking Windows Media DRM because nearly nobody uses it. What are the sales figures of Napster compared to iTMS? The day Napster or any WMA store becomes really popular, we'll see real breaking efforts.

You keep using this word 'broken'. DRM does not work. They are *all* broken, even before they are thought up.

You can burn as many CD's of as many tracks as you want from Napster for free!
http://blog.kordix.com/marv/archives/000400.html

What part of that is not 'broken'?