Apple Set to Deploy FairPlay Digital Rights Management on iPad eBooks?
The Los Angeles Times reports that Apple is planning to bring back its FairPlay digital rights management (DRM) technology for use on eBooks made available through its iBookstore for the iPad.
Veteran iTunes customers will recognize the locks as FairPlay, a digital rights management software that once limited how many times digital songs can be copied onto different computers. (Apple phased out FairPlay a year ago, and now sells unfettered tunes.)
Next month, Apple will be dusting off those digital cuffs for books, according to sources in the publishing industry.
According to the report, many but not all publishers are likely to take advantage of the FairPlay technology in order to combat piracy of their content. O'Reilly Media, publisher of technical books and an outspoken critic of DRM, is one publisher likely to eschew such an implementation. Apple has remained silent about its DRM plans for its eBook content, although it is clear that control over content usage is highly desired by most publishers.
Apple's iBooks application and iBookstore will take advantage of the open EPUB standard for electronic books, but such files can also include a wrapper such as FairPlay to restrict usage of the material. Adobe has also deployed a DRM solution for EPUB content known as Content Server, but Adobe's and Apple's solutions would not be compatible with each other, allowing Apple to pursue its own integrated eBook ecosystem much as it did with FairPlay-wrapped iTunes music and the iPod before making the shift to DRM-free music last year. FairPlay continues to be used, however, on TV show and movie content available through the iTunes Store.
Popular Stories
Apple released iOS 18.2 in the second week of December, bringing the second round of Apple Intelligence features to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models. This update brings several major advancements to Apple's AI integration, including completely new image generation tools and a range of Visual Intelligence-based enhancements. Apple has added a handful of new non-AI related feature controls as...
Wednesday December 18, 2024 11:39 am PST by
Juli CloverApple is no longer planning to launch a hardware subscription service that would let customers "subscribe" to get a new iPhone each year, reports Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Gurman first shared rumors about Apple's work on a hardware subscription service back in 2022, and at the time, he said that Apple wanted to develop a simple system that would allow customers to pay a monthly fee to gain...
Contrary to recent reports, the iPhone 17 Pro will not feature a horizontal camera layout, according to the leaker known as "Instant Digital."
In a new post on Weibo, the leaker said that a source has confirmed that while the appearance of the back of the iPhone 17 Pro has indeed changed, the layout of the three cameras is "still triangular," rather than the "horizontal bar spread on the...
Wednesday December 18, 2024 10:05 am PST by
Juli CloverElevation Lab today announced the launch of TimeCapsule, an innovative and simple solution for increasing the battery life of Apple's AirTag.
Priced at $20, TimeCapsule is an AirTag enclosure that houses two AA batteries that offer 14x more battery capacity than the CR2032 battery that the AirTag runs on. It works by attaching the AirTag's upper housing to the built-in custom contact in the...
The current Apple TV 4K was released more than two years ago, so the streaming device is becoming due for a hardware upgrade soon. Fortunately, it was recently rumored that a new Apple TV will launch at some point next year.
Below, we recap rumors about the next-generation Apple TV.
Bloomberg's Mark Gurman last week reported that Apple has been working on its own combined Wi-Fi and...
Blackmagic today announced that its URSA Cine Immersive camera is now available for pre-order, with deliveries set to start late in the first quarter of 2025. Blackmagic says that this is the world's first commercial camera system designed to capture 3D content for the Vision Pro.
The URSA Cine Immersive camera was first introduced in June, but it has not been available for purchase until...
Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro eleven years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted through a period of widespread discontentment with the Mac lineup.
The redesign took the Mac Pro in an entirely new direction, spearheaded by a polished aluminum cylindrical design that became unofficially dubbed the "trashcan" in the Mac community. All of ...
Apple is planning a series of "major design" and "format changes" for iPhones over the next few years, according to The Wall Street Journal's Aaron Tilley and Yang Jie.
The paywalled report published today corroborated the widely-rumored "iPhone 17 Air" with an "ultrathin" design that is thinner than current iPhone models. The report did not mention a specific measurement, but previous...
