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A Redmond-based software company says it's time for RealNetworks to let music streams flow freely.
Streambox has developed a way to hack through RealAudio encryption so users -- not content owners -- can decide when, where, and how they listen to downloaded music.
Alongside MP3, RealAudio is the most widespread format on the Net for music listening. Unlike MP3, however, RealAudio files have built-in security so that distribution can be controlled by the content owner, who can decide whether a song or event can be downloaded, streamed, or simply previewed.
The Streambox ripper hacks through RealNetworks' security layer, allowing users to decode RealAudio and G2 streams and save them to a hard drive in either the MP3 or the Windows Media Audio format.
Bob Hildeman, CEO of Streambox, said consumers increasingly view their computers as entertainment consoles, so giving them storage and portability choices is a big business opportunity.
"We're looking at over 3,500 Internet TV and radio stations that we've searched and indexed [on the company's multimedia portal, StreamSearch]. On the product side, we have developed a decoder technology that decodes RealAudio and G2. We've included that technology into a product called Streambox ripper, which converts RealAudio, G2, CDs into MP3 and WMA [Windows media audio] formats."
"Download RealAudio and RealMedia files as easily as you would any other file, then reap the benefits of clean, unclogged streams straight from your hard drive," the site promises. So what happens to Real's security layer when Streambox gets ahold of the files?
"It [the Streambox ripper] navigates through their encryption process," Hildeman said. In other words, it strips away the encryption that protects the file and its distribution rules, and turns it into transferable media.
Is that legal?
Peter Zaballos, a spokesman for RealNetworks, said "our media system is designed to allow the author to be the determiner of whether or not content can be saved, and our license agreement supports that. If anyone is doing something to undermine that [licensing], then it would be a violation of our license agreement, and we would want to pursue it."
Since the Streambox decoding technology was developed independently of RealNetworks, Hildeman said the company hasn't violated any licensing agreements. As he sees it, if a music file is out there on the Net people should be able to listen to it in their preferred format.
To address copyright protections on files that run through its applications, Streambox is building its own digital rights management system. Thus, Hildeman said, if content owners are concerned about the distribution rules associated with their files on the Net, they can call Streambox and sign up for the service. Streambox is among the growing group of companies that have created entertainment portals that specialize in helping people find music, video, and other multimedia files on the Net.
The music industry has threatened some MP3 sites with copyright infringement, since many MP3 files are pirated copies of music. The decoding and transfer of RealNetworks' popular streams could also prompt new regulations for online music distribution.
"Real has contacted us directly, knowing that this will be an issue," said Jeff Bonforte, CEO of I-drive, which lets users store multimedia files in virtual storage lockers.
Travis Kalanick, vice president of strategy at multimedia portal Scour.Net, said "[Streambox] had better be careful. They do walk a fine line, but they are still on the right side of the line ... at least right now. Let's say you just don't like Real streams. I believe it is the consumer's right to be able to choose their file type. Getting a decoding application and doing it themselves is a question, though."
The Streambox technology could challenge several other areas of Internet regulation, too. For example, the US government is considering anti-circumvention laws that would prevent people from bypassing the rights of copyright owners by decoding or removing security from files.
Groups like the American Association for Computing Machinery have argued that criminalizing the circumvention of copyright rules would hurt research into computer security. In other words, hackers couldn't break down security applications to find their holes.
Likewise, the US Senate is still debating international copyright protections, sponsored by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), that are designed to enforce international copyright protections in cyberspace.
"[Streambox] would be one of those things, like a patent where it takes a lawsuit to figure it out," said I-Drive's Bonforte. "Stripping off someone's license is probably circumventing ... but I support it because I think saving Real streams is one of the great things that people want to do. I know why people don't want them to, but it's kind of annoying when ZD Net has a stream that we want to hold on to. If ZD put their commercials in it, why should they care?"
Ironically, Streambox has stayed on the sidelines in the MP3 search debate. Hildeman said the company's search engine does not return MP3 files.
"We're trying to wait for the industry to settle and when that time comes we will support MP3," he said.
