Is iTunes on its way to being DRM-free? Video

Is iTunes on its way to being DRM-free? Video Transcript

[ Music ] ^M00:00:04

>> What's happening. I'm Brian Tom, and welcome to the Apple Byte. It's everything good and bad inside the world of Apple. So let's get to the goodies. Apple and three of the major music labels are in talks to bring more DRM-free tacks to iTunes. CNET news senior writer Greg Sandaval [Assumed spelling] broke the story, so I figured it would probably be a good idea to bring him in the set. What's up Greg, welcome to the show.

>> Thanks for having me.

>> And what's the skinny with this whole DRM-free thing coming to iTunes.

>> Well, it looks like Apple might be close to getting more DRM-free music, something that its customers have been asking for for a long time.

>> And it's three of the big music labels that are part of this --

>> The three largest, yes.

>> And you broke the story first, so do you have any inkling, I know they keep really tight-lipped of who is the closest of those three?

>> Well the speculations so far from other -- the rumors have been it's Sony. But none of my sources have been able to confirm that.

>> Okay, well thanks for all the great work, and I can't wait for all the DRM-free stuff.

>> I appreciate you having me.

>> All right. Cool. Thanks a lot, Greg. And you know we keep it fresh here for you all with all the guests. Now I've shifted over to the Amazon store because its DRM-free, and I can play that music anywhere I want. So this might bring me back to iTunes. Adobe's bringing Flash to smart phones with arm chips, but not the iPhone yet. At the Max conference they demoed Flash 10 on the android platform, Windows Mobile, and Simian. But why not the iPhone even if the processor can support it. Well, Adobe CEO Kevin Lynch said we need to pass the taste test of Apple's head chef. And I can tell you that's a very specific taste. Flash 10 releases in the second half of 2009. Now we talked about Apple negotiating more DRM-free content with other studios, but here's a quick tip with Tom Merit showing you how to buy Amazon store music through iTunes.

>> Well, this new genus feature in iTunes, it's pretty clever at telling you songs similar to the ones you already own. And it's a great way to find new music. But most of the iTunes music store is DRM -- that means it's restricted. I prefer to shop at a store like Amazon that sells unrestricted MP3s. I saw this site on Boing Boing [Assumed spelling], called Advantageous. They offer a script that combines the Amazon store with iTunes. Here's a quick tip on how it works. Go to advantageousmp3.com and download and install the script. Then go into iTunes. Shop the music store as you usually would. And when you find a song I'd like to buy go up there to the script icon up there in the menu and select Get Mp3 From Amazon. Your default browser will open with the Amazon music store where you can purchase the track you were looking at. Advantageous notes they can't guarantee that every song in the iTunes library is going to link directly to one in the Amazon store, so make sure you've got the right MP3 before you click to buy it. That's it for this quick tip. I'm Tom Merit, cnet.com.

>> Thanks, Tom. And nice hair. Now do you want to watch a movie you purchase on iTunes on your TV screen? Well, not so fast. Less talk, bad Apple. The Unibody MacBooks look great but this aren't so hot when there's built in copy protection. Now a technology called high bandwidth digital content protection, or known as HDCP, prevents the copying of digital audio and video content from one point to another through different display connectors. Now [Inaudible] article claims a high school teacher was trying to play the movie Hellboy Two that he purchased from iTunes from his MacBook to a protector that wasn't HDCP compliant, and the movie wouldn't play.

>> Oh crap.

>> Now let's forget that he was showing Hellboy Two at school, because that's one bad-ass teacher. But if I buy a movie from iTunes and my older TV set isn't HDCP compliant it won't play there. It won't play on other non-HDCP monitors that I have, and it won't play on projectors. Awesome. Apple's choice to use the display port technology threw them into this whole world. And if I'm buying something I better be able to play it wherever I want. Now not all of iTune's content is protected yet, but this is stupid, stupid, stupid. Okay, you know we want to hear from you, so e-mail us at the Applebyte@cnet.com. Next week we'll be showing off some of your e-mails and showcasing some snappy apps. I'm Brian Tom for cnet.com, thanks for watching, and come back next time for another bite of the Apple. ^M00:04:18 [ Music ]