tech industry
07/29/2004, 12:35am, EDT
Thursday, July 29th
RealNetworks may license Harmony, Apple must choose
Apple will need to respond to RealNetworks' Harmony application "fairly quickly, as the other digital-music download stores will likely want to add the 'iPod Compatible' sticker to their sites and Real seems ready to license it," according CNN/Money, who notes that Apple may have to balance iTMS song sales with iPod sales: "To create Harmony, Real reverse-engineered Apple's proprietary AAC format, and created a way for Real's downloads to appear in AAC format when loaded onto an iPod. Industrious hackers have attempted such a feat but have been spooked by legal threats. Apple may yet decide to challenge Harmony in court, but it should carefully think through the consequences: Harmony may actually prove beneficial to Apple and the industry as a whole....The question the company now must answer is, Is it strategically more important to preserve its closed system, or is the iPod the future profit machine for the company? In the latter case, it should pump up sales numbers at any reasonable cost. It's quite a pickle."
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Dimwit media people.
Anyway, look at it like this, if another store was selling tracks in unprotected MP3 format, they would also be playable on iPod. The way I see it, the store (which controls the DRM) should be able to decide where you can use the music (this sounds bad but it's what you agree to when purchasing from them) not the makers of various hardware for playing music. Therefore, if Apple says you can't play iTunes tracks on a competing player, that's fine but if Apple says you can't play another store's music on your iPod that's rather silly and seems like a PR mistake on their part.
Yes, and no. While AAC is not proprietary, the FairPlay DRM Apple uses is.
Actually, from what I understand, Fairplay isn't either. Apple licensed it, therefore it isn't "Apple's proprietary format'