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Napster Takes on iTunes, Offers DRM-Free Music to iPod / iPhone Owners

Songs without DRM are currently the subject of an active debate in the US

By Filip Truta, Apple News Editor

20th of May 2008, 11:03 GMT

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Bet you didn't hope you'd hear this when you got up this morning: the Napster full-track download service will (allegedly) work with Apple's iPod, iPhone and any other mobile handset.

The new Napster service basically tries to take on Apple's expensive digital download service and offer more songs without copy protection or DRM (digital rights management), Reuters is reporting.

"We're now moving from under the DRM cloud," said Chris Gorog, Napster chief executive. "Now consumers can use Napster with any device," he added. According to the above mentioned source, most songs on the service will be priced at 99 cents each, while an entire album will be available for $9.95. The advantage? No copy protection or digital rights management (DRM), which means that, whatever the media player you own (including the vastly-popular iPod), you'll be able to use the service to your heart's content.

As everyone knows, Apple hosts some six million songs on its iTunes Music store, most of which are protected by Fairplay DRM, which encodes protected songs purchased from the iTunes Store with iTunes and prevents them from being played on portable players other than the iPod.

Also, when music or video purchased through the iTunes Store is copied from an iPod, it will only play on computers that are authorized with the account that was used to purchase them. Third party utilities have been proven successful in removing this limitation by stripping iTunes DRM from protected files. As most US residents know, the legality of using such a software is currently the subject of an active debate in The States.

Napster claims users will be able to automatically sync their songs with a user's existing iTunes library, from which they can be transferred to an iPhone or any other smartphone the old-fashioned way.

Napster used to offer an unlimited monthly streaming model. It had 760,000 subscribers at one point, sources indicate.

TAGS:

Napster | DRM | digital rights management | iTunes | download service

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