Here’s some information from firstamendmentcenter.org:
The 2000 case of Universal City Studios v. Reimerdes considered whether computer programs that circumvented encryption protection for DVDs could themselves be protected as fair use. The district court noted that programming code, a means of expressing ideas, was protected in that capacity under the First Amendment. However, the court stated, “By prohibiting the provision of circumvention technology, the DMCA fundamentally altered the landscape.” Thus, the decryption software and anyone linking to it on the Internet violated the DMCA, the court ruled.
In 2001, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Universal City Studios v. Corley came to the same result as the earlier district court decision. The 2nd Circuit said that a decryption program allowing unauthorized and unlawful access to copyrighted materials loses some First Amendment protection for itself.

Here is some DMCA penalty text:
In addition, it is a criminal offense to violate section 1201 or 1202 wilfully and
for purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain. Under section 1204
penalties range up to a $500,000 fine or up to five years imprisonment for a first
offense, and up to a $1,000,000 fine or up to 10 years imprisonment for subsequent
offenses.

I think it would be hard to prove that an open source community attempting to write software to make a product they purchased actually WORK is done for the purposes commercial advantage or private financial gain.

I really hate Apple. More than I ever hated Microsoft. I hate being forced to use iTunes. It's a piece of crap software. A piece of crap medium. I don't want to buy your stupid Top 40 music from your online store. I want to put the music I have already aquired on my iPod. Why can I not do this without a specific ad-ridden, bloated, memory hog of a program that is forced down my throat by the manufacturer. Maybe if iTunes wasn't such a piece of a garbage, people wouldn't need to try to write other software. Maybe if they made a *nix version of iTunes then people wouldn't need to write said software.

Frank
http://stuffididlastnight.com

I know there are lots of great alternatives to the ipod. They aren't as trendy, and they wont make you "cool", but they play your music without the hassle. Don't just settle for drm and software lock ins because apple tells you to!

Funny...Apple resembles Microsoft more and more each day.

However i don't own one, why, iTunes. If i could just copy my music to it like a standard USB stick i'd buy one straight away. As it is i'll keep using the 4gb microSD in my mobile (which uses a standard micro-usb connection).

I guess the initial iPod sale is only the start of having to pay/put up with one so i see why apple wants to hang on to its current way of doing things.

jess
http://www.privacy.cz.tc/

"I really hate Apple. More than I ever hated Microsoft. I hate being forced to use iTunes. It's a piece of crap software. A piece of crap medium. I don't want to buy your stupid Top 40 music from your online store. I want to put the music I have already aquired on my iPod. "

Nobody's forcing you to use an iPod. There are hundreds of alternative MP3 players out there without the restrictions of an Apple iPod. So if you don't like it, use something else. Don't waste all your energy hating a company. It was your decision to buy an iPod after all. Why did you buy it? Probably because you like the user interface, or maybe the construction of the device ... well, nothing is perfect.

I drive a Mini Cooper. The run-flat tires cost $400 each to replace. I knew that when I bought the car. If I ever do have to have a tire replaced, I'm not going to bitch and moan and complain about how much I hate BMW/Mini. What would be the point of that?

I have no problem with Apple restricting the iPod as they do, simply because there *are* alternative players out there. If there weren't other alternatives, then I would probably care more.

What you are suggesting is that, i may like to drive a Cooper Mini but purely and solely because of BMW's Tire choice, i have to drive a corolla.

Sure, you know that the runflats in your Mini Cooper cost 400 to replace.

You can, however, at your own decision, replace them with whatever tires you deem fit. Pirelli P-Zero, Goodyear Eagle. Bridgestone Potenza RE55s. Et al.

They will fit on your car, and you car is drivable. it is usable.

an iPod, connected to a computer that cannot run iTunes (IE: linux) is not usable. Does that mean we have to either shell out for an OS that is bloated and doesn't suit us (again, that "i want a Mini, but i have to settle for a corolla"), or shell out for a player that doesn't suit me (FWIW, Motorola's Bluetooth transmitter and the almost de-facto standard of the Dock connector that swayed me. All other bluetooth enable players (all of about 3) don't have standardised sockets, and i'm not touching sony)

When I buy something it want to control what I do with it, I dont want the manufacturer of the product I bought to then tell me how I can or cant not use it. I am not leasing the damn things

THAT IS TO SAY:

Cracking this file lets you use your iPod as an mp3 jukebox without any need for iTunes.

This is not about DRM, or piracy IMO. It's about Apple locking up the hardware to prevent a legal, reasonable use. The excuse is "piracy" but the bad smell people notice is the monopolization that iTunes represents. It does media management, license management, and acts as the marketplace. And it's the only way to purchase iPhone apps.

They could have divided iTunes into a separate functional units, some of which are vanilla innocent things like "add mp3 to db", "play db item" and "playlist mgmt"

I followed the DeCSS wars and I do not fall for the argument that "reverse-engineering anything in iTunes is a violation of DMCA"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS

I need to find one of those t-shirts with the DeCss algorithm, and the long n

So you obviously have stronger feelings about Sony than you do about Apple then. I guess they've REALLY crossed some line in the sand, if you're not willing to even buy their products and then bitch about any limitations they might have :-)

If Apple isn't willing to support Linux or make their products work the way some users think they should work, that's their prerogative. It's not like they used to work a certain way and then they clamped down on it. They've never supported Linux and as far as I'm aware, you've never been able to just copy music onto the iPod directly.

Why people feel the need to complain about Apple's methods, instead of choosing a company that supports their way of thinking, I'll never understand. If you don't like the way the iPod (or any other Apple product) works, don't buy it.

If enough people choose a competitor over this issue, Apple's either going to have to face declining sales or they're going to have to meet the demands of the consumer. If not enough people care about this issue to make a dent in Apple's sales, I guess that proves that Apple's way of doing business is working.

And there's really no merit for anti-competitive measures here, in my opinion. There are plenty of alternatives to choose from, both in the hardware and the content delivery aspects.

If Apple suddenly added Zune compatibility to iTunes, allowing the Zune to work with all the features iTunes offers, but didn't give Microsoft the chance to add iPod compatibility to the Zune ecosystem, that would be an issue. As it stands right now, they're just supplying an end-to-end solution, but they're not really using their market leader status to drive other companies out of business.

Unlike Microsoft adding various features to Windows that essentially make other companies' products unnecessary, putting them out of business (Netscape anyone?) That's what got them into trouble over their monopoly powers.

I think the difference here is that bulwiki simply provided information that could be used to construct a to circumvent fairplay. Where as in the previous case, it was a discussion of the actual program.

The question is whether or not the DMCA restricts free speech such that a website with the hash code, not a program to actually circumvent the process, just some information that could be used in such a program.

You can put any file you want on the IPod but the IPod will only use files that show up in the database file. This database is created by the user in the ITunes software. Allowing other programs to change that database might make it less likely that people buy music from the ITunes store but has NOTHING to do with circumventing the Fairplay DRM.

If you can't deal with Apple's changes, run Rockbox on your iPod and be done with it.

More importantly, why buy an iPod? There's Zune, Zen, Sansa...all great player that don't pin you down to their store.

I truly don't understand why people still buy iPods when there's much better out there. iPods are dated.

Time for you to grow up kid, your churlish and puerile rant only serves to vitiate the validity of your tag.

http://apple-investor.com

More importantly, why buy an iPod? There's Zune, Zen, Sansa...all great player that don't pin you down to their store.

I truly don't understand why people still buy iPods when there's much better out there. iPods are dated...