
If you're one of the few who get to buy from the
iTunes Store
from over here and have tried out the new DRM-Free stuff called
iTunes
Plus, don't feel like you got off easy and can share the music with im
punity.
Apple, wily old fruit that it is, apparently embeds yo
ur account name and email address deep in the innards of the song file, so that
if you do pass it around, it'd be a simple matter to track it back to the sour
ce.
TUAW reports that your account information is encoded onto the
m4a file when you purchase the song, and if you're comfortable hackin
g into
Terminal, there are detailed (and slightly intimidating
) instructions on how to find the information on their
site. Alternatively, jus
t highlight your song in iTunes and use Get Info, and there'll be "Purchased By
" information there.

I have one iTunes Plus song
in my possession at the moment, the free cut "Ooh La" by
The Kooks re
leased this week, which is embedded with my info. No one yet knows if you can h
ack into the file and remove the info, or if the old trick of burn-and-re-rip w
ill strip it out. I'll give the second option a shot, but I'm not too comfy wit
h Unix to try out the first one.
Then again, this shouldn't really be a concern, because we never had any intent
ion of sharing our downloads anyway, right?
Right?
UPDATE 6-9-07:
Apparently our account names and email addresses have always
been embedded in there, ever since. Oh. Ok. You learn something new everyday.<
/em>
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