Perian allows you to play more media file types via Quicktime, they recently updated to version 1.0

You can grab it here.

From TUAW. very interesting that the DRM free iTunes tracks contain the purchasers name in them! DRM may be gone, but there are some traces in the songs. I'm sure this can be stripped out somehow, but the data is there from iTunes.

Sure, you can now download music from the iTunes store without DRM but that doesn't mean you should just willy nilly start sharing that music with your friends. For one thing, it's illegal. For another, your account information is embedded into that m4a music file. Don't believe me? Try this yourself.

1. Launch Terminal. You'll need to be comfortable at the command line to perform this check.

2. Navigate to one of your iTunes plus downloads. If you have a US iTunes account, you can download the iTunes plus "Ooh La" single of the week.

3. Use the UNIX "strings" command to look at the text in your data and grep to search for your name. e.g.
strings 01\ Ooh\ La.m4a | grep name
Alternatively, open all the strings in TextEdit:
strings 01\ Ooh\ La.m4a | open -f.

Bottom line: DRM-free doesn't mean that Apple suddenly supports piracy.

The current version of iTunes, 7.1.1, has been cracked by the creators of QTFairUse6. QTFairUse6 allows for you to strip your iTMS-purchased songs of their nasty DRM. Currently, the software is only for Windows, so us Mac OS X users will have to wait until someone makes a version for us. Chances are Apple has already been informed and iTunes 7.1.2 is in the works as an update. So if you hate DRM and want to be a pirate, download QTFairUse6 and get strippin’. Official Site/Downloads

From CrunchGear


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Many Mac & iTunes users aren't fans of subscription music services, they say that they prefer to purchase their music from the iTunes store. Well, some times you just don't know how good the alternatives are until you've tried them. Subscription music services are fantastic. I used to subscribe to Napster, and an a current subscriber of Rhapsody. It is amazing! I can listen to endless ours of music every month for around $10. It would cost me a literal fortune to buy all the music that I 'rent' from Rhapsody.

I don't have a lot of confidence that Apple will offer a subscription based music service. I have the same take on it as I do with Apple offering a PVR, Apple wants to sell you songs and shows and movies not help you record or subscribe to it.

Here is the link to the article talking about the rumored iTunes Subscription service on the way. I'd love to see it happen, maybe if iTunes offers subscription music then all the naysayers out there would actually try it and realize how wonderful it is.

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Flip4Mac's WMV addin for Quicktime is wonderful. Perian is a similar addin for Quicktime which enables playback of AVI's, FLV (Flash Video), etc. it's a great addition to QuickTime so that it is more video format agnostic.

Definitely check out this wonder free addin.

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FairGame is a DRM stripper for the Mac for iTunes DRM protected files. Here is my story of trying it out and the outcome.

My first MP3 player was a Rio 500, it wasn't the greatest player of all time of course, but for it's day it had some mojo. One of the Rio 500's capabilities was it's ability to play Audible.com audio files. I quickly fell in love with Audible.com. At that time my membership was only $13.50 per month for any two audiobooks - a great deal compared to today's $22.50.

I stopped subscribing when I upgraded to a Rio Nitrus, which did not have the capability to play Audible.com files. Even though I no longer subscribe to Audible.com I still have full access to all of the audio books which I bought during the time I subscribed.

I've been using my Rio Carbon MP3 player for the past two years, and I recently decided to re-listen to one of the funniest books I've ever read (listened to), the book is Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates by Tom Robbins. I decided that in a rare move, I wanted to relisted to this book. But I didn't want to listen to it at my computer - I needed to strip the DRM from this book which I legal bought rights to so that it could play on my Rio Carbon MP3 player.

After a little searching on the web I ran across FairGame. I tried to run FairGame on my purchased Audible.com Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates file, but it errored out. Damn! From what I gathered, I thought it was going to work. I'd like to try it on an iTMS purchased music track, but alas I don't buy music from iTMS. Has anybody else tried FairGame? Did it work for you on music? what about Audible.com?

I ended up playing the Audible file on iTunes and captured the playback with Audio HiJack Pro, then used AudioSlicer to split it up into smaller files where there were blank passages in the audiobook.


Tell us what YOU think.
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I was wondering what to get my wife for Christmas, I didn't have anything noteworthy for her yet. But it occurred to me that she's been getting out running more often lately. So I'm taking a chance and I got her a 2GB silver iPod Nano, or as I like to think of it - an "iPod Mini Mini"). To round out the package I got the Nike running adapter for the Nano, a Marware adapter to fit the Nike sensor to any pair of shoes, and a Marware arm/wrist band to wear the iPod for running.

This present is a bit of a risk for me. You need to understand that my wife is a bit of a technophobe. She's never used an iPod, or any MP3 player. I'm banking on the fact that the iPod should be easy enough for her to use, and that she digs the 'personal trainer' aspect of the Nike addon.

I'll report back some time after Christmas when she's had time to try it out. I'm certainly interested to see how it works out.

By the way, I'm covering my bets by getting some jewelry for her too.

Tell us what YOU think.
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I wrote about a great iTunes addin back in September, Gimmesometune. I use it and really like what it adds to iTunes. Of course Gimmesometune will automatically fetch cover art for you, making CoverFlow a nicer experience, but what I really like is the information window that it displays when tracks are played.

The developer recently wrote me and let me know that he's included a suggestion that I made to him, and it will now also fetch Lyrics for you! Sweet, that's awesome, thanks Matt.

Take a look at the website for all the information.

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Last week MacSeven.com reader Mark from Toronto wrote complaining about Album Art only being available from iTMS with an account, he didn't like that he had to give Apple a credit card when all he wanted was album art.

I did a bit of research on this topic and found a very elegant solution, and one which has a much higher success ratio than iTMS in getting Album Art. It does take longer, but works really well and it doesn't use iTMS.

There are two applications necessary to make this happen, well, really one application and one AppleScript.

GimmeSomeTune is a great application that has the ability to grab album art (cover art). The image below is what GimmeSomeTune shows when a new track plays on iTunes.

You can set the preferences to grab Art if it is missing. Click here to see the setting to make so that it grabs your album art. Whenever you play a song or album without art, GimmeSomeTune will fetch it for you.

Now for the AppleScript to help you grab all your album art. Needle Drop from Doug's Apple Scripts will let you play through your library for X seconds per track.

Step by Step Method for grabbing your missing album art.
1) Install GimmeSomeTune
2) Set GimmeSomeTune to download album art
3) Fire up iTunes and start it playing from the first track in your library.
4) Run Needle Drop and tell it to play each track for 10 seconds, starting at (enter any number you like, 0 is default)

Needle Drop will advance to the next track after 10 seconds, repeat until the end of your library. And for each track played, GimmeSomeTune will try to fetch the correct album art.

The only albums I'm having trouble with it grabbing as a group are those with "Various Artists" as the group name. If you have any suggestions on how to get those to work please let me know.


Your Comments appreciated.
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Reader Mark from Toronto sent in a rant about Apple. He was very upset that Apple was promising album art, but it hinged on having to sign up for an iTunes Music Store (or whatever they're calling it now) account.

It doesn't bother me having to sign up for the iTMS account. Take into account that Apple gives you iTunes for free, they are giving you the Album Art for free, just just need an account with their online media store to access the album art. Since the album art comes from the online media store - I don't see the problem here...

So far I'd say it got about 60 - 70% of the covers for my cd's - which isn't a very good rate in my opinion. But it's a good start.

I've been super busy and haven't really had time to play with iTunes 7 yet, other than to have it scan all my music for gapless music, and download album art. The new album art cover view is really slick. Great moving buying that technology. I'm a very visual person and I dig that interface.

Unless I'm missing it, I think it's a real shame that Apple didn't give iTunes 7 another album view, which would just fill the screen with album art, and you could scroll around to see stuff, sort of like a Flickr page with a bunch of picture thumbnails.

Your Comments appreciated.
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