Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.
The Hymn Project - an effort to deliver software allowing the use of FairPlay-protected music files with hardware and software not supported by Apple - has been crippled by legal moves.
The hosting provider used by the project received a 'cease and desist' letter last week calling for the removal of any programs that can be used to remove DRM from music or videos sold through the iTunes Store.
In an apparent effort to avoid a complete takedown, the operators of the Hymn project have removed the files and any links to copies on other sites.
"In no way has this site ever promoted piracy," wrote site moderator 'DrmBytes'. "[W]e feel that artists should be compensated for their work. We truly believe that people should be able to free the music they've legally purchased from the shackles of DRM."
In a later post, DrmBytes suggested the trigger for Apple's letter was that someone posted a link to Requiem, a new program that actually decrypts FairPlay-protected files using reversed-engineered code. This contrasts with other methods that work by intercepting data streams after decryption by Apple's software.
Messages about Requiem in other forums (eg, Google's archive of newsgroup postings) have also been deleted in response to legal complaints.
Other software that can be used for similar purposes, including the recently released doubleTwist, is still available.
Some people view the development as a trigger to move their business to other music retailers.
"Because I can no longer remove the DRM from songs I purchase legally from iTunes, I am boycotting the iTunes store and purchasing all my future music from vendors who no longer shackle their music with the chains of DRM," wrote DrmBytes.
"Look, I'm not stupid, I'm fully aware that my boycott has absolutely NO effect on Apple's bottom line and they couldn't care less about it," s/he added. "Basically [the tools were] to restore the rights I have with a physical purchase of a CD. Now that Apple has decided to crack down on all tools, there's no reason for me to purchase from their store. Support those who sell music without DRM."
Not all music sold by the iTunes Store is protected by DRM, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs has challenged the music industry to drop DRM. Apart from EMI, the major labels seem reluctant to provide Apple with DRM-free music, even though they do make unprotected tracks available through other online retailers such as Amazon. At this stage, Apple has considerably wider geographical coverage than other retailers selling DRM-free tracks.
David Bass
| For the fourth year in a row, IDC has placed content security provider Websense (NASDAQ: WBSN) at the top of the IDC Worldwide Web Security 2011 –…
How to Make Business Discovery Work for Your Business
Business Discovery takes its cues from consumer apps. Like Google, it encourages us- ers to hunt for and explore data without worrying about or even noticing the underly- ing technology. Their entire experience is working within an intuitive interface to get real-time, self-service results with only minimal training. ...more
Try an easy-to-use set of web-enabled
tools for business-class productivity services. Office 365 provides
anywhere-access to email, important documents, contacts, and calendars
on almost any device.
