Mac OS X Leopard - ARCAism

Figure 14-4. The iTunes Store in iTunes
CHAPTER 14 APPLE APPS INCLUDED WITH LEOPARD 259
To buy music from the iTunes Store, you must first sign in with your Apple ID (if you have
a .Mac account, that info is also your Apple ID unless you’ve previously registered using some
other information).
iTunes Store files, DRM, and iTunes Plus
Traditionally, all the files you purchased from the iTunes Store were “protected” using a method of Digital
Rights Management (DRM) called FairPlay. As far as DRM goes, FairPlay is fairly lenient, allowing any purchased
files to be transferred and played on five different computers (the same five for all purchases, and
each computer must be authorized). It also allows a playlist with that song to be burned to seven audio
CDs, allowing unlimited syncs to iPods and iPhones, and the ability to stream the items to Apple Airport
Express and Apple TV.
Still, traditionally, all the items you could buy were protected by DRM, which disturbs some people
who feel insecure about the fact that Apple controls how their items are used. (Some are disturbed for
valid if not paranoid reasons, some for nefarious reasons, and some for seemingly purely politically idealist
reasons.)
Recently, Apple has reached agreements with some publishers to distribute some items not only
free of DRM, but also of a higher quality than traditional iTunes music files. These files are called iTunes
Plus files, and are common 256 Kbps AAC files. They tend to cost a bit more than the traditional DRMprotected
files, but if DRM bothers you, it’s the way to go (I think it’s worthwhile for the added sound
quality).
By the way, the iTunes Plus files do contain embedded information about who purchased the file,
which should not bother anyone who wishes to use the files legitimately, but could be used to help identify
people who are taking their purchases straight to Pirate Bay or some other file-sharing system.