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For six years, the Internet Nexus served as my technology blog, but I've since started blogging at the SuperSite Blog instead. If you're looking for the blog, please head there. --Paul

Monday, July 26, 2004

RealNetworks introduces Harmony, enabling consumers to buy digital music that plays on all popular devices

Real: "RealNetworks, the leading creator of digital media services and software, today announced Harmony Technology, the world's first DRM translation system to enable consumers to securely transfer purchased music to every popular secure music device. Harmony Technology frees consumers from the limitation of being locked into a specific portable device when they buy digital music. Now consumers can build their library of downloads secure in the knowledge that it will play on virtually whatever device they choose. 'Compatibility is key to bringing digital music to the masses,' said Rob Glaser, founder and CEO, RealNetworks, Inc. 'Before Harmony, consumers buying digital music got locked into a specific kind of portable player. Harmony changes all that. Thanks to Harmony, consumers don’t have to worry about technology when buying music. Now anyone can buy music, move it to their favorite portable device, and it will just work, just like the way DVD and CDs work' ... Harmony technology will be demonstrated for the first time on Tuesday July 27th at the Jupiter PlugIn conference in New York City. Beginning on Tuesday, a beta test version of RealPlayer 10.5, the first consumer product to use Harmony Technology, will be available at www.real.com/harmony. Harmony Technology will be available later this year in other music products from RealNetworks including Real’s market-leading Rhapsody subscription service. With Harmony Technology, RealPlayer Music Store supports more than 70 secure portable media devices, including all 4 generations of the iPod and iPod mini, 14 products from Creative, 14 from Rio, 7 from RCA, 9 from palmOne, 18 from iRiver, and products from Dell, Gateway, and Samsung. Generally speaking, Harmony supports any device that uses the Apple FairPlay DRM, The Microsoft Windows Media Audio DRM, or the RealNetworks Helix DRM, giving RealPlayer Music Store support for more secure devices than any other music store on the Internet."

I can hear the lawyers sharpening their pencils as I write this.

[ Posted at 1:45 PM | Permalink ]