Founded by the likes of HP, Philips, Matsushita, Sony,
Samsung and Fox, the Coral Consortium Corporation focuses on creating an open
technology framework that facilitates interoperability among content
distribution channels that use different Digital Rights Management (DRM) technologies.
In response to Steve
Jobs’ open letter on DRM, Jack Lacy, the president of Coral, published an
open letter of his own to the iPod man. The letter invites Apple to use Coral’s
Interoperability Framework, which would allow iPods to “interoperate
immediately with Microsoft based Janus devices and services, and with OMA (Open
Mobile Alliance) based devices and services.”
“We think that your engineers will find it very
straightforward to integrate this framework into your iTunes service,” Jack
Lacy wrote to Steve Jobs.
Lacy also addressed Jobs’ issue of security concerns should
FairPlay be opened by saying, “Of course the secrets in FairPlay remain safe -
adopting the Coral technology does not require you to share them with anyone
else.”
Furthermore, to set aside any of Jobs’ concerns over what he
calls the “big four” lords of music, Lacy lists EMI, Universal, Sony BMG and
Warner all as members of the Coral Consortium who support the organization’s
efforts.
It appears now that Apple has been given several different avenues
to explore in its battles with DRM. Which route the iPod maker will take,
however, remains to be seen.