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To unseat iTunes as lord of digital music, challengers are falling over themselves to strip copy protections off music.

Apple's iTunes still wraps most of its music in digital rights management software, and the latest to try to exploit this perceived vulnerability is RealNetwork's Rhapsody. The music service, which has up to now focused on renting music through subscriptions, is expected to announce Monday that it will start selling DRM-free songs.

This means that Rhapsody's music will play on iPods and many other digital players. In addition, Rhapsody has teamed with Verizon Wireless and will offer customers with specific V Cast phones the ability to download unprotected music.

By selling downloads, Rhapsody opens its service up to two important groups: those who don't like subscription services, and owners of devices that were once incompatible with Rhapsody.

But increasingly, one can't help but catch a whiff of staleness surrounding open-MP3 offers. Besides Amazon.com, others offering at least some DRM-free music are Wal-Mart and Napster. MySpace also has plans to offer MP3s.

Amazon began offering open MP3s last September and there hasn't been much movement of the needle. Amazon's digital music store is growing but not at the expense of Apple, NPD Group said in April.

The issue of DRM only counts when iPod owners can't play iTunes music on other devices they care about. Which ones are those, you ask?

That's the point. There aren't any.

I'd be really steamed at Apple CEO Steve Jobs if my iTunes music were incompatible with some must-have cell phone, home-entertainment system, or car stereo. If there were something that his DRM-scheme locked me out of, then I might look for an iTunes alternative.

I don't have this problem because there isn't anything that compelling out there. The big digital home-entertainment system that will enable me to throw video, music, and photos around my house, still hasn't arrived.

When I'm at home and don't want to listen with headphones on, I plug my iPhone into speakers. As for cell phones, U.S. consumers just don't listen to music on them. The sticking points, such as memory, battery power, and poor user interface, haven't been worked out.

Remember, Apple didn't become an all-powerful music company just because of iTunes. Jobs was successful because of the total package: the player as well as a great music store. He made it easier to find, buy, and listen to music. And now, many of us are accustomed and comfortable with iTunes.

To pull us away, somebody has to offer a great new device and service that can do all these things and more. Or else why jump?

All this is no easy task, of course. (See Zune).

Verizon Wireless has upped the ante in its efforts to take on Apple's iTunes store in the digital music market by offering DRM-free music for all purchased music plus a new subscription service. But will it be enough to make a dent in Apple's dominance?

On Monday, Verizon Wireless will announce the revamped V Cast music store, which will be loaded with digital music that is free of the pesky digital rights management encryption on all songs that are purchased through the store. Verizon is joining Amazon as the only other digital music distributor that will be selling DRM-free music from all four of the major record labels, including, Sony BMG, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, and The EMI Group.

The company is also offering its first ever music subscription service courtesy of its relationship with Real Networks' Rhapsody America service. Verizon announced it was partnering with Rhapsody last year. And through this partnership, the company has redesigned its music store and the V Cast user interface.

The new service clearly puts Verizon Wireless in a new category when it comes to digital music. Verizon cell phone subscribers as well as nonsubscribers can download the DRM-free music onto a PC and sync it to any MP3-enabled device for $0.99 a song. Songs can be purchased over Verizon's cell phone network onto a Verizon phone for $1.99 a pop. And the new V Cast service also allows Rhapsody subscribers to sync their phones to the subscription service, much the same way AT&T subscribers can access the Napster subscription service.

But even though it has potential to become a major player, it's still unlikely that the cell phone company's moves will have much impact on market leader Apple. Instead, experts believe that Verizon is much more likely to help grow an already underperforming market.

"The issue isn't whether Verizon can take down iTunes," said Russ Crupnick, a senior analyst at the NPD Group. "But rather, can it help grow the market? And I think the answer to that is yes. Verizon is very well-positioned for that."

The music industry is in dire straits. Sales of CDs have been plummeting over recent years, and the industry hasn't been able to make up for the losses through digital distribution. Apple is by far the leader in digital downloads, hitting the 5 billionth song download mark from its iTunes music store just a couple of weeks ago. According to Crupnick, over three-fourths of the full music tracks downloaded come from the iTunes store. Amazon is a distant second, with other players such as Wal-Mart trailing even further behind.

So far, freeing music downloads from DRM protection hasn't done much to move the needle. Amazon and Wal-Mart have been offering DRM-free music for almost a year, and they still lag behind Apple. The reason for this could simply be that Apple is so far ahead in terms of market share that few people have reason to see DRM protection as a problem.

"When you have 80 percent market share on Apple devices," Crupnick said, "there isn't much demand from people to get unprotected music. They don't seem to encounter any issues with it."

Ed Ruth, director of digital music for Verizon, said that the company is simply trying to offer customers choices.

"Of course we recognize that Apple has done a great job," he said. "They have helped tell the digital music story quite well, and they've tilted the ecosystem in one direction. But in some ways they have trapped people into one experience. And that's the problem we're trying to solve."

Meanwhile, Verizon could also have an uphill struggle in getting people to use the Rhapsody subscription service, which costs about $15 a month for unlimited access to millions of songs. In the online world, only a small niche of music aficionados use services like Rhapsody and Napster. And so far, the model hasn't proven to be much more successful in the mobile world. AT&T has been offering the Napster music service, and even though the company hasn't published figures on how many customers are using the service, analysts say it hasn't been a runaway success.

But some analysts think that a service that does a good job of integrating Verizon's V Cast with Rhapsody could help attract new users to the subscription model.

"If they can make the experience of Rhapsody on a handset complimentary to what they are already doing with V Cast, I think it will make Verizon a stronger player by attracting new music subscribers," said Susan Kevorkian, an analyst at IDC.

While Verizon may never be able to beat Apple in the online music game, there's reason to believe that the company could beat out its fellow cell phone carriers and other music downloading services for market share. And in such a nascent market, Verizon still has an opportunity to make a significant amount of money from its music store and help move the carrier away from simply being a phone company.

Verizon claims that record labels have told it that in terms of revenue, it is already second to Apple when it comes to the money that is made from full track downloads. And in a recent survey of Internet users conducted by NPD Group, Crupnick said that over half of the respondents had heard of the V Cast music service. This was higher than awareness for music services from other cell phone companies such as Sprint Nextel or AT&T. But it was also higher than some well-established music brands, such as Microsoft's Zune music store, Rhapsody, and Napster. Still, only about 7 percent of the respondents said they had ever used the V Cast music service to download songs.

But Crupnick believes this consumer awareness could someday translate into growth for Verizon's V Cast service. Verizon also has other attributes that some of these other music distribution channels don't have. In addition to selling full track songs, Verizon is also able to help the record labels monetize the same songs in multiple ways by selling ringtones, ring-back tones, and wall papers of the artists. The company has even begun working to help produce some albums using a mobile recording studio.

What's more, Verizon has access to a wide variety of music playing devices, something that Amazon and Wal-Mart don't readily offer themselves. And it already has an established billing relationship with most of the customers that will likely use its site to download music. All of this bodes well for Verizon. But is it enough to really challenge Apple's dominance?

The answer is probably no. But it could be enough to make it a strong alternative. At the end of the day, Verizon's Ruth said that it's all about forming good relationships with the music industry and providing a great service to customers.

"Our approach is to be as good a partner to the music industry as we can be, " he said. "And we always keep the customer experience and expectations in mind when designing and delivering the service. I think we've done that so far and as a result have earned the trust of our customers."

Apple is working on an application aimed at letting people remotely control iTunes in the home via their iPod Touch or iPhone, according to a report on MacRumors.com.

The application is described in information included with the iTunes 7.7 pre-release version that was made available to developers on Thursday.

According to the MacRumors report, the application will "presumably" allow people to play back their iTunes audio with the help of Wi-Fi.

The report offers these details from the developers pre-release version, based on the "Read Me" area of the iTunes installer:

Use iTunes 7.7 to sync music, video, and more with iPhone 3G, and download applications from the iTunes Store exclusively designed for iPhone and iPod touch with software version 2.0 or later. Also use the new Remote application for iPhone or iPod touch to control iTunes playback from anywhere in your home--a free download from the App Store.

Such an application would add momentum to Apple's unveiling of its iPhone software development kit in March.

UPDATE: To include Starbucks' response.

Turns out what people want from Starbucks is the caffeine jolt and maybe a morning bun. The country's largest coffee chain is giving up on much of its music offering, including iTunes gift cards.

According to Silicon Alley Insider, Starbucks is planning to carry only four CD titles at a time in it's stores by September.

"We're shifting how music is merchandised in the store," said Bridget Baker, a Starbucks spokeswoman. "There's going to be a concentrated selection as we refocus on our core business."

Seattle-based Starbucks once fancied itself as an entertainment center where people sipped coffee and grooved to the latest tunes. The company's dreams of branching into music has had a troubled past.

Remember the Hear Music media bars, the in-store CD burning service Starbucks began offering in 2004? That didn't go anywhere either.

Starbucks isn't giving up on music completely. The chain will continue to offer the free Wi-Fi access to Apple's online music store, Silicon Alley reported.

In March, The New York Times reported that each Starbucks store was selling only two CDs a day on average. Starbucks said its music unit was selling more than 4 million CDs a year.

I'm sure it's just a lucky coincidence, but one day after the brilliantly profane George Carlin passed away, Slate published an article on profane band names.

I haven't heard any of these bands--I tend to avoid bands that appear to have put too much time into their names, thinking that they're trying to cover up bad music--but Psychedelic Horse**** intrigues me, especially since I've seen so many bands whose music fits that description perfectly. (Note: I have no idea what CNET's policy on swear words is, but I don't want to create extra work for the copy editors in case I guess wrong, so the asterisks are mine.)

Profane and proud: R.I.P. George Carlin.

(Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

This brings to mind a problem I've had with a particular Neil Young song, the third track on his 1990 album Ragged Glory, which also appears on the live record Weld. On the back of both albums, the title appears as "F*!#in' Up." That's also the official title in the CDDB (formerly Gracenote) database that lets programs such as iTunes automatically populate fields with song information when you rip a CD.

I imagine Neil or his record company was trying to prevent underage listeners from stumbling across this word on the CD when flipping through the Neil Young section in record stores. But this creates a problem in the digital era: if you really want to hear that song, and you try to search by title, you have to remember the precise sequence of characters used to replace the letters--if you search on "F***in' Up" or use the real word, you'll get no results. The solution, of course, is to go into iTunes and change the file information so the real word is included.

The lesson: if you're going to use profanity in a band or song name, do it proudly.

The path to world domination is paved in round numbers, especially big ones like this: 5 billion.

The face of the iTunes store.

(Credit: Apple)

That's the number of songs that have been purchased and downloaded from the iTunes Store, Apple said Thursday. (Actually, for the record, the press release says "over 5 billion.")

That shouldn't be surprising, of course. Apple's iTunes store has long overshadowed the rest of the music download scene. Rivals have launched many an assault, but even e-commerce competitors as savvy as Amazon.com still face quite an uphill battle--sales of songs at 9-month-old AmazonMP3, the No. 2 digital music store, are only a tenth the volume of those at iTunes, according to market researcher NPD Group.

Apple is, in fact, the largest music retailer in the United States, period, having pushed past Wal-mart Stores earlier this year. And it seems to be making a healthy profit from its iTunes operations. No wonder many a politician is toying with the notion of taxing digital downloads.

The company also said on Tuesday that iTunes customers are toting up purchases and rentals of more than 50,000 movies per day.

LOS ANGELES--Apple's upgraded iPhone didn't inspire fear in at least two of the biggest subscription music sites--even before they learned that the device wouldn't let people download music via the new 3G network.

"I'm not trembling," Anu Kirk, Rhapsody's director of product management, said Monday at the iHollywood conference. "I'm sure they are going to sell a lot of second-generation iPhones. It's a fantastic product but they can't take over the United States with just one carrier."

Kirk was speaking on a panel discussing the mobile music category and specifically about cell phones as music players. The discussion took place as Apple CEO Steve Jobs was introducing the new iPhone 3G at the Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.

Kirk doesn't think the iPhone 3G can duplicate iPod's success, at least not with just AT&T as the phone's only carrier. Any debate about the iPhone's dominance over music apparently has to wait.

The mobile version of the iTunes music store will remain accessible only over the phone's Wi-Fi connection, according to CNET's Donald Bell, who wrote cited Apple's iPhone 3G product page. Bell wrote that "it does seem like Apple has missed an obvious opportunity to allow users more ways to purchase music."

Rhapsody and Napster already enable many iPhone competitors to download music over 3G. This had to come as welcome news to those companies as rumors swirl in the music industry that Apple is considering whether to launch a subscription service.

In March, the Financial Times reported that Apple is considering an all-you-can-eat plan in which users would receive free access to iTunes "in exchange for paying a premium for its iPod and iPhone devices. Sources told CNET News.com that the music labels would agree if Apple shared revenue on device sales. So far, nothing has come of it.

And nothing will--or at least that's what Kirk thinks anyway. His suspicion is that Apple won't enter the subscription business because it conflicts with the company's prime goal of selling hardware.

"Apple's model is to get you to buy a bigger device every 18 months or two years," Kirk said. "You fill up your iPod, you go, 'Oh, I'm going to buy the new iPod with twice as much memory.' In a subscription world, the size of your device matters a lot less cause you can swap out the content. In a world like that the consumer has a lot less incentive to buy a bigger device."

Subscriptions aside, is Apple choosing to ignore cell phones as music players at this point? It wouldn't be missing out on much.

The U.S. consumer has largely ignored their phones as music machines. Kirk noted that the sector is hobbled by the lack of memory in most phones to store music and the high costs. These often include paying for cell phone and data-service plans on top of the music.

Not what you would call a good deal.

Last week, my wife's Dell Inspiron decided to stop printing to our wireless HP all-in-one. It was apparently a problem with the spooler, whatever that is. At that point, I had two choices: leave it alone and hope for a miracle, or fix it and perform some upgrades I'd been putting off.

Let me back up and explain something. I hate working on my wife's computer. Whatever I do inevitably screws something up, it takes way longer than I would like, and well, let's just say, my wife is impatient when it comes to technology.

It's OK for a doctor or dentist to poke and prod her, but when I poke or prod her computer, she acts as if I do it for the pure sadistic enjoyment of screwing up her peaceful existence. ... Read more

Apple is in talks with the largest record companies as it attempts to boost the iPhone's offering of ringtones and other musical content, according to a report in The New York Times.

Citing several unnamed music industry executives, the Times said that negotiations are "very active" and a final deal has not been set.

A final deal may come after June 9, when Apple CEO Steve Jobs speaks at the company's developer conference, the paper reported. That is when some expect Apple to announce the coming of the next-generation iPhone.

In addition to beefing up ringtones, Apple is also looking for rights to deliver songs from iTunes to iPhones over the cell phone broadband network, according to the Times. The labels are asking for more money for this kind of delivery, the paper reported.

Here's what the music labels are looking at: Apple is not only the country's biggest music retailer but is also becoming a force in mobile phones. If the record companies ask too much money for ringtones and other features, they risk losing sales to the growing number of iPhone owners.

Ringtones are a sweet deal for the labels because they typically are shorter versions of songs but retail for the same price--sometimes higher--of a full song.

But Apple is up against a determined group. The big music companies have signed a score of deals with other music retailers and cell phone companies. It's often written that the music industry doesn't want to be beholden to any one distributor. The top labels want greater flexibility with setting prices on iTunes.

If a deal can't be reached, Nokia and other cell phone makers could gain an important advantage over the iPhone.