The DRM arms race continues. A couple of weeks ago I told you about Requiem, a DRM removal tool for iTunes. At the time Requiem 1.7.3 was out, and since them 1.7.4 was released, and they worked on the latest iTunes, 7.7.1.
Well, today Apple released iTunes 8 and have changed something which breaks Requiem. This back and forth has been going on for a long time, as I covered, so it is too early to say if this is the end of Requiem, or if the community will be able to update it to work around whatever change Apple has made.
There may yet be a new version of Requiem released which restores functionality under iTunes 8. Or some brand new tool could emerge from the community, just as Hymn, myFairTunes, QTFairUse6, and Requiem have. The best thing I can recommend is keeping an eye on the Requiem thread at the Hymn forums for new news.
In the meantime, if being able to remove the DRM from iTunes purchases is important to you, do not upgrade to iTunes 8! As long as you continue using 7.7.1 (or earlier builds) you should be able to continue using Requiem. The real question is how aggressive Apple will be in pushing users on to iTunes 8 by making it a requirement to download content. They’ve done this in the past, forcing users to upgrade before they can purchase newer content.
No matter what, I’m sure the dev community is already actively looking for ways to crack iTunes 8. DRM really doesn’t do anything to stop piracy, and it is especially stupid when the same music is available from other stores, like Amazon, as DRM-free MP3s.
