DVD Jon, the Norwegian who as a teen hacked the encryption on DVDs has done it again. This time he has slayed Apple’s Fairplay encryption that prevents iPod users from playing music downloaded from places other than Apple’s iTunes.
Monique Farantzos, managing director at DoubleTwist, the company that plans to license the code to businesses, has said that “What he did was basically reverse-engineer FairPlay…(which) allows other companies to offer content for the iPod.”
Jon Lech Johansen has now made it so that rivals can now license his technology and sell competing products to the iPod for use with iTunes. Since iTunes basically rules the market for legal downloads, a more than 88% share, this could spell a turning point in its iPod player having exclusive control over them . It also means that alternative music download services could offer music for purchase to play on Apple’s iPod’s as well.
With the recent release of Microsoft’s Zune, the so-called “iPod killer,” this development could mean that it could potentially be enabled to allow users to download music from iTunes as well as Microsoft’s fledgling Urge. This is most significant because Urge has yet to catch on and iTunes has a wealth of followers. In addition, Urge has yet to offer video downloads as is the case with iTunes offering TV shows, movies, and more. 
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I wish him luck….it is about time apple had some competition in the ipod department!