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Napster To Go DRM cracked already: stupid is as stupid does

ham_man

ham_man

macrumors 68020
Jan 21, 2005
2,265
0
Everybody with a half a brain saw this coming, and Napster should have...
 
dejo

dejo

Moderator emeritus
Sep 2, 2004
15,982
452
The Centennial State
I wouldn't say the DRM was "cracked". To me, that means you could run some program to turn it off. What this solution is is more of a work around. The songs downloaded from Napster will still retain their DRM.

And why did this take seven days to discover? Sounds like a solution that was available even before Napster To Go went live and could be used to circumvent any DRM-protected music.
 
jsw

jsw

Moderator emeritus
Mar 16, 2004
22,910
44
Andover, MA
So, by my calculations, ~200 coordinated users could, between them, download every Napster track, for free. Ah-ha-ha-ha.

But the Windows fanboys are right, though: Napster is better. 252 free full CDs of songs, downloaded legally, per available credit card number.
 
Aldaris

Aldaris

macrumors 68000
Sep 7, 2004
1,790
1,247
Salt Lake
That made my day!

Well since the original Napster was shut down, it just hasn't been Napster... I really hope that with this they'll finally go bankrupt and no one will come to save them with a life preserver made of benjamens...

Do the Math~ Apple is still Better!
 
M

madmaxmedia

macrumors 68030
Dec 17, 2003
2,932
42
Los Angeles, CA
To call this a 'crack' isn't really accurate at all, this is just plain common sense. I was thinking about it the other day, but I figured it might not be worth the trouble. But I didn't think of outputting straight to WAV (and then to CD), which eliminates signal degradation (besides original encoding to WMA of course.) You could also do this with RealRhapsody (if it uses decent bitrate.)

Someone will come up with a simple script to automatically re-encode files as the WAV files are generated, and copy the ID tag info from the original DRM'ed song. The sound quality will go down of course, but we're starting with compressed files to begin with. I wonder what the bit rate of the original files is?

This may really kill the subscription type service in the long run, if many people are joining Napster To Go for a free month, downloading 20 GB of songs, and then re-encoding to remove DRM...I'm sure they thought of this before, but I don't know how much 'theft' they anticipate from this sort of activity.
 
mainstreetmark

mainstreetmark

macrumors 68020
May 7, 2003
2,228
293
Saint Augustine, FL
Sure, it's the same kind of crack that affect iTMS, but the difference is, you have to give iTMS a buck first. Napster allows you to grab their whole library for $15 a month.

If you get 100 users to spend 2 months downloading 10,000 songs each, Napster gets $3,000, and (in time) we get all their stuff. To do that to iTMS would, of course, still be a buck-a-song.

...and yeah, the whole "Napster's Back" is total crap. There's nothing common but the legal right to the name.
 
iJaz

iJaz

macrumors 6502a
Dec 16, 2004
540
0
I don't like this, how is ITMS going to compete with this ? "Unlimited" number of songs that you can burn to CD and keep forever? :mad: I really hope RIAA is going to shut down this music renting crap ASAP!
 
V

Vonnie

macrumors regular
Apr 13, 2003
138
0
I think you are all overreacting. Have you actually read how it was cracked? Basically play your music, and record it. Replace Napster with iTunes, and the instructions would still remain valid. (but then the itunes drm was _really_ cracked, and it's easier to use hymn than to use the analogue loophole available to any drm scheme)

Personally I think that all the napster bashing is pretty sick.. The more competition, the better. I hate all monopolies, I don't care if it is a stylish monopoly.

Bah, maybe someday there will be a music download service that doesn't lock me in on their platform, that doesn't restrict me what I can do with _MY_ music, that gives me high quality music! A service that doesn't suck to put it bluntly. When we get there, it will be thanks to plain old competition in a free market. Nothing else.
 
dejo

dejo

Moderator emeritus
Sep 2, 2004
15,982
452
The Centennial State
Vonnie said:
Personally I think that all the napster bashing is pretty sick.. The more competition, the better. I hate all monopolies, I don't care if it is a stylish monopoly.

Bah, maybe someday there will be a music download service that doesn't lock me in on their platform, that doesn't restrict me what I can do with _MY_ music, that gives me high quality music! A service that doesn't suck to put it bluntly. When we get there, it will be thanks to plain old competition in a free market. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

But that's just it. This new Napster service gets us no closer to that ideal. In fact, it's a step backward.
 
Lacero

Lacero

macrumors 604
Jan 20, 2005
6,637
3
Finally, Napster and Real can finally both just die. End their misery once and for all. please!
 
Littleodie914

Littleodie914

macrumors 68000
Jun 9, 2004
1,813
8
Rochester, NY
Hehe... Getting what they deserve, I suppose... :rolleyes:

Not that they really deserve it, but it always warms my heart when I see an Apple put-downer be laid to rest :eek:
 
Mainyehc

Mainyehc

macrumors 6502a
Mar 14, 2004
863
418
Lisbon, Portugal
mainstreetmark said:
Sure, it's the same kind of crack that affect iTMS, but the difference is, you have to give iTMS a buck first. Napster allows you to grab their whole library for $15 a month.

If you get 100 users to spend 2 months downloading 10,000 songs each, Napster gets $3,000, and (in time) we get all their stuff. To do that to iTMS would, of course, still be a buck-a-song.

...and yeah, the whole "Napster's Back" is total crap. There's nothing common but the legal right to the name.
Click to expand...


No, actually, if you *do the math*, what we're talking about here really sounds like "Napster's back, wooohooooo!!" :D
 
Mainyehc

Mainyehc

macrumors 6502a
Mar 14, 2004
863
418
Lisbon, Portugal
Vonnie said:
I think you are all overreacting. Have you actually read how it was cracked? Basically play your music, and record it. Replace Napster with iTunes, and the instructions would still remain valid. (but then the itunes drm was _really_ cracked, and it's easier to use hymn than to use the analogue loophole available to any drm scheme)

Personally I think that all the napster bashing is pretty sick.. The more competition, the better. I hate all monopolies, I don't care if it is a stylish monopoly.

Bah, maybe someday there will be a music download service that doesn't lock me in on their platform, that doesn't restrict me what I can do with _MY_ music, that gives me high quality music! A service that doesn't suck to put it bluntly. When we get there, it will be thanks to plain old competition in a free market. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

True, the iTMS locks you in the iPod platform (even though that also includes Motorola phones :rolleyes: ), while Napster et al. lock you in the Wintel platform :eek:. However... "do the math" (how I hate this slogan), and tell me which is worse: being locked to a digital music player (über-cool, btw), or being locked to a (decaying) OS?
 
Sun Baked

Sun Baked

macrumors G5
May 19, 2002
14,937
157
I wonder how long it takes Napster to upgrade their apps so they will no longer work when a common pirating tool is operating.
 
ClarkeB

ClarkeB

macrumors 6502
Jan 24, 2005
319
0
Getting iTunes tracks out of iTunes is really easy...you just burn it to a CD and rip! :D
 
S

space2go

macrumors regular
Feb 5, 2004
162
0
Sun Baked said:
I wonder how long it takes Napster to upgrade their apps so they will no longer work when a common pirating tool is operating.
Click to expand...

If they want a reliable solution: five minutes
if they want one that works most of the time: forever.

The reliable solution: breaking their apps completely
unreliable: detecting the presence of certain tools.
 
J

JeffTL

macrumors 6502a
Dec 18, 2003
733
0
As I recall that Steve Jobs said, no DRM scheme will be secure forever and will ultimately be cracked. They're really only useful for helping honest people stay honest.
 
jsw

jsw

Moderator emeritus
Mar 16, 2004
22,910
44
Andover, MA
Vonnie said:
Replace Napster with iTunes, and the instructions would still remain valid.
Click to expand...
Not the same thing. If you replace Napster with iTunes, there is no 14-day free download-fest. Sure, you can burn 252 CDs from iTunes this way. But it'll cost you a lot more than nothing to get them.

Unless, of course, you're happy with half a minute of each song.
 
musicpyrite

musicpyrite

macrumors 68000
Jan 6, 2004
1,639
0
Cape Cod
So it really does only cost $15 to fill my iPod! I knew Napster was better! :rolleyes:

But I'm going to try this on my PC. Can't resist getting free music legally. :cool:
 
RichP

RichP

macrumors 68000
Jun 30, 2003
1,579
33
Motor City
WooHoo! as said, the REAL napster is back! Unlimited, free, pirated songs..where is my old Windoze box when I need it!

Seriously, this is far from a crack of the DRM, and something you can easily do on iTunes (I do it so I can strip DRM from my library so my Roku Soundbridge can play all my music) However, iTunes isnt giving me unlimited access. I wonder if the iTunes team thought of such things, or it is a fortunate side-effect of their choice of music service?

Now..how long before someone eliminates the need to actually burn a CD to make this all work? :p
 
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