Hardware DRM: Has Apple Joined the Dark Side?
2:37 pm, March 15th, 2009, Lonnie Lazar
A tiny authentication chip in the headset with on-cord control shipped with the just-released iPod shuffle is raising concerns among some that Apple will extort licensing fees from third-party headset manufacturers who wish to make headsets compatible with Apple’s new music playing devices.
First reported Friday in a review of the new shuffle at iLounge, the authentication chip was then derided by the Electronic Frontier Foundation as Apple’s attempt to invoke the Digital Millennium Copyright Act not to stop piracy, but to impede competition and innovation.
Saturday night, Boing Boing Gadgets posted pictures of the curious chip, along with a thoughtful piece pondering whether Apple’s engineering really amounts to DRM: “For all we know, it could be something the FCC made them put in so that it doesn’t interfere with whalesong.”
The EFF raises a great point, actually, wondering why more reviewers have not seized on Apple’s proliferating instances of hardware DRM: “If it were Microsoft demanding that computer peripherals all include Microsoft “authentication chips” in order to work with Windows (or Toyota or Ford doing the same for replacement parts), … reviewers would be screaming about it.”
In the final analysis, however, if Apple is in fact, as Boing Boing put it, “attempting to eat the headphone industry whole,” the company will lose. Consumers have the last vote and to the extent it may seem Apple products are stifling competition, raising prices and limiting choice, Apple’s tiny devices will go unsold.
There are already many many alternative music players on the market for consumers to choose from – some of the best even made by Apple itself – making the new shuffle a stillborn product if consumers perceive an inability to use it as they see fit.
Posted by Lonnie Lazar in Apple, Hardware, News, Opinions, iPod | Comment on this article
Wow lots of speculation in that piece…. lets see what Apple have to say about it before jumping of the deep end about consumers jumping ship and Apple dying a miserable death.
Steve, on March 15th, 2009 at 3:30 pm
Yes, before we decided on the demise of Apple because of some chip someone found…
Joseph I'm a Mac, on March 15th, 2009 at 7:46 pm
It’s total DRM. It’s digital, and without it you can’t play your songs on the new iPod…
Heh
Ryan, on March 15th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
Are we sure this is an authentication chip, or is it merely a communications chip? Having three buttons on the cord, with only one extra conductor on the plug means that somehow the three buttons need to be encoded for the Shuffle to know which button has been pressed.
popcorn, on March 15th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Its a simple multiplexing chip. All the signals only have 4 wires to play with so some functions must share a wire. That means some kind of chip is needed for decoding/encoding the signals.
Lance N., on March 15th, 2009 at 9:21 pm
Dumb article. Total speculation. Lots of F.U.D. (fear uncertainty and doubt). If it’s not Barak Obama trying to scare us about the economy, it’s this site trying to scare us about Apple.
Julio Iglesias, on March 16th, 2009 at 4:12 am
How about we find out what it actually does before we get our pitch forks out?
Internet “journalism” is so embarrassingly bad sometimes.
Sinister Joe, on March 16th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
@Sinister Joe, et al: Yes, internet jornalism *can* be embarrassingly bad sometimes, however, in this case, it’s completely appropriate to question Apple’s intentions, especially in the light of today’s confirmation by thrid-party headset makers that the chip in the new apple remote headset does perform an authenticating function. My personal belief is that Apple’s going down this road will doom the shuffle to irrelevance. Others will disagree. That’s what makes a horse race.
Lonnie Lazar, on March 16th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
@Lonnie, again. Even your followup is wrong.
http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2009/03/16/manufacturer-confirm.html
“Sources at a headphone manufacturer confirmed today to BBG that new iPod headphones do use a proprietary chip available exclusively through Apple.
However, it’s described as a “transmission” chip, suggesting that its role is not authentication or digital rights management, even if the result is to encourage manufacturers to pay an “Apple Tax” to license technology that allows their products to be used with iPod equipment.”
AND
“Update 2: Just spoke with Apple. There is no encryption or authentication on the chip, so clones could conceivably be made, just not with “Made for iPod” official certification. And now we know!”
You have a large following of reader’s, I’d be checking your sources before speculating again.
Steve, on March 17th, 2009 at 1:42 am