DRM-Free
Music: Not a Chance!
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
by Scott Marlowe
This morning I read an article in
the Boston Metro shedding more light on my suspicions
that Apple’s iTunes is even more underhanded
and sneaky than I at first suspected. After unveiling last week
that Digital Rights Management-free song downloads will soon be
available from their online store, it turns out, according to
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, said tunes
may be embedded with bits of information about the purchaser.
In other words, while the person who buys the downloaded song
will be free to burn it to a CD, put it on an mp3 player, or whatever
else he might want to do with it, freedoms DRM-encoded versions
don’t afford, Apple or the Recording
Industry Association of America or whoever will now be
able to identify exactly where and from whom any mp3 file originates.
This coding of private information will allow
for the precarious situation that if these songs are found shared
with others (like, for instance, a burned CD given to a friend
and then ripped onto their computer) the RIAA
will know exactly where the songs came from and hence, froth at
the mouth in anticipation of releasing their lawsuit happy lawyers
on unsuspecting music lovers everywhere.
Talk about Big Brother watching, this is just
about as low as Apple or the RIAA
can get in their crusade to altruistically protect artists or
however they are currently spinning their bullshit. Apple
arch enemy Microsoft are bastards in their own
way, often squishing and bullying their competitors, but Apple,
with their proprietary everything and holier than thou
attitude are unquestionably the more despicable of the two for
jumping in bed so happily with the RIAA and their
evil ways. Personally, I prefer my devils dressed in red, like
Microsoft, sporting horns for all to see. Apple,
in contrast, is like the angelic beauty talking sweet and nice
until revealing the dagger behind her back and stabbing you in
the throat and the pocketbook.
As for the RIAA,
that most loathsome of hypocritical corporate tyrants, they signed
their deal with the devil decades ago so I’m sure there’s a nice
spot in Hell already waiting for them. And while admittedly they
may not have had a direct hand in this little travesty, (it is
ultimately Apple’s decision to embed the code
on the downloads), their stench certainly isn’t far away.
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