With only one new product revelation, a rather unattractive $2,799 MacBook, this year’s Macworld keynote was nothing like we have been used to. It could only have been described as a disappointment until Philip Schiller, who replaced Steve Jobs, revealed DRM-free iTunes. According to Schiller iTunes will be entirely DRM-free with over 10 million songs at the end of the first quarter of 2009.
The iTunes Plus section should already feature 8 million songs DRM-free. The pricing of the songs has also gone through some changes. iTunes has now three price points for songs - 69 cents, 99 cents and $1.29. 69 cents is for older releases and $1.29 for new hit songs.
Most of the albums will still be priced at $9.99.
iTunes Plus allows users to upgrade their songs to new higher quality DRM-free versions for 30 cents per song or 30 percent of the album price for the whole album. iTunes Plus uses 256kbps AAC audio format.
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Beginning on December 31st, 30GB Microsoft Zunes around the world began freezing up and complaints flooded in from worried users who were concerned their media device was broken.
The software giant looked into the problem and concluded that the problem stemmed from 2008 being a leap year. The Zune’s internal clock had failed to switch over to the new year, and the software bug caused the devices to lock up.
The problem was ‘fixed’ however yesterday when Microsoft advised all Zune users to let the battery of their device drain out and then turn it on after 7 am on Thursday.
“Wait until the battery is empty and the screen goes black,” the company said, “Then power up the devices, but only after 7 a.m. Eastern time on New Year’s Day Thursday. No other action is required.”
Users may have to re-sync their devices completely today however, to restore any DRM files that come with
copyright-protected songs.
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Nokia has announced the availability of the Nokia N96 with Comes With Music service in the UK, marking the first time the service will hit the region.
The unlimited downloads from the store come with Microsoft’s PlaysForSure DRM and is licensed to only the phone owner.
The N96 offers 16GB of internal memory and has expandable memory via MicroSD for another 8GB meaning the thousands of tracks can be played back using the phone.
The company calls the service “a revolutionary program that enables people to buy a Nokia device with a year of unlimited access to millions of tracks from a range of great artists - past, present and future. Once the year is complete, customers can keep all their music without having to worry about it disappearing when their subscription is over.”
