NewsFactor fumbles PyMusique story

Speaking of PyMusique,
Kimberly Hill over at Yahoo News/NewsFactor completely fumbles a story about DVD Jon's latest bit of hackery, writing that what he's done is "nothing new". Her source? Nitin Gupta, a grossly misinformed analyst with the Yankee Group who says that what DVD Jon did was to "automate functionality already available to strip off songs' DRM protection." Sorry,
but that ain't how it works. Actually, tracks purchased using PyMusique never have any DRM in the first place. The app takes advantage of the fact that when you buy something from the iTMS, the DRM is only added to the tracks
after you've purchased and downloaded them. PyMusique conveniently neglects to wrap the file with any copy protection, leaving you free to copy it as many times as you wish.

Gupta then also claims that Microsoft's DRM was broken, including the DRM used by Napster. Also not true. There have been some rumors about this, but as far as we know Windows Media DRM 10 has yet to be broken (that's not to say it can't or won't be). What Gupta is confused about is the widely-publicized story from a few weeks ago about how you could use a WinAmp plug-in to record Napster To Go tracks with your soundcard. The "hack" has nothing to do with cracking DRM,
it's a bit more like taping a song off the radio (you're not getting a perfect digital copy or anything). You can argue over whether what DVD Jon has done is a good thing or a bad thing (pretty much everyone agrees that it violates the iTunes terms of service), but if you're going to do a story decrying the "froth and fury being generated in the press" over PyMusique you sort of have an obligation not to contribute to that froth and fury with misinformation of your own.