Apple to License iTunes Fairplay DRM?

Nice!

that will certainly give iTS a better position in the Zune vs. iPod war (or should I say massacre the way it's going now)

One of the oldest arguments against the iPod/iTunes gone. I don't see any music player with Fairplay killing the iPod, although the money is in the hardware for Apple, not the music. for now

In what instances would one want to the ability to 'stream' protected AAC via USB?

If its true.... that has to be one of the smartest moves Apple has ever made.

Music download companies will fall overthem selves to get their music on iPods and as a result of that... more iPods will be sold.

Nice!

agree - apple has probably more to gain to license Fairplay than not doing it. In the long run apple will probably loose - especially when it will arrive non-DRM alternatives on a broader scale.

In what instances would one want to the ability to 'stream' protected AAC via USB?

USB port in AppleTV ;)

The report of protected AAC support in the Netgear device appears to be in error.

are we actually talking about letting others make music players that can play Fairplay AAC's or letting others sell Fairplay AAC's? (the second one was already offered by an outsider who replicated Fairplay withouth reverse engineering)

are we actually talking about letting others make music players that can play Fairplay AAC's or letting others sell Fairplay AAC's? (the second one was already offered by an outsider who replicated Fairplay withouth reverse engineering)

Replicate Fairplay without reverse engineering? How could he possibly do that? Some revengineering had to take place, orelse he would just be shooting blindfolded.



I don't really think Apple would do this. What good would it do to their bottom line?

In what instances would one want to the ability to 'stream' protected AAC via USB?

nowadays all the iPod accessories like the iPod HiFi and such are connected via analog outputs in the iPod connector.. and iPod clearly isn't the greatest sounding component for a hifi system.. this will allow the devices to get the audio data from iPod in digital form and use a much better digital to analog converters in their devices, hence achieving better sound..

I wonder if that means everyone will have to implement their own MP3, AAC and Apple Lossless decoders in their software.. seems like a waste of resources to me, this should be handled by the iPod which already handels it and only stream the decoded data via the dock connector, protected or not..

Replicate Fairplay without reverse engineering? How could he possibly do that? Some revengineering had to take place, orelse he would just be shooting blindfolded.



I don't really think Apple would do this. What good would it do to their bottom line?

These are the article I was referring to. I read somewhere that what he did was not necesarely illegal, but I don't remember the details.

http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/10/20061025082316.shtml
http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/10/20061002155354.shtml