Remember Jon Lech Johansen? The 15-year old Norwegian that brought DeCSS and QTFairUse into the world? Well he's still free and still up to his reverse-engineering ways - but now with DoubleTwist Ventures up in SF, CA.
Their pitch is very interesting. They are selling "iTunes-compliant" Apple DRM (Fairplay) so that you can protect your content - but with the rub that you do not have to go through Apple. It is a concept that I considered a year back but dismissed due to my concerns around legal ramifications. I’m not sure they won’t get slapped (enjoy the double negative) with a TRO and C&D from the get go. I see no reasonable and viable way to achieve this without reverse engineering Apple's work - which normally would be legal - but in this case, runs afoul of the DMCA (IMHO).
Presumably there is a link embedded in FairPlay protected content that instructs the player (iTunes) where to get a license from. DoubleTwist embeds their own link, auths the user (within iTunes or independently through a web-session), and determine which license, if any, to send. It's all fine and dandy until our Apple Overlords get all litigious.
Apple's DRM licensed to others by DVD Jon
Jon Lech Johansen’s Blog
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