Rhapsody + XBMC

Posted on July 11, 2006

Ok I have had one comment asking me about this and I responded but it’s worth its own entry so that I don’t have to repeat myself:

Even though Rhapsody is a UPnP Server, they actually use a DRM on top of it. A secure protocol must be established between a device that wants to stream from Rhapsody and Rhapsody for it to let it stream the content. The content is encrypted when it is being streamed to the device and only the device can understand how to decrypt it. A similar but different method is used by Windows Media Connect to stream protected content to ‘compatible’ devices. (A similar method is also used by iTunes and the airport express although this has been hacked).
XBMC cannot and will most likely never (legally) stream Rhapsody content, Windows Media protected content or any Premium content acquired on a Music store for that matter. The reason is that being open source, it cannot meet the robustness requirements imposed on device manufacturers by the Rhapsody service or the WMDRM-ND spec (which is what WMC implements to let you stream to compatble devices content acquired on other stores like Yahoo or Napster).
Sorry.

ps. On the flip side, if you wish to use Platinum in your device and wish to support Rhapsody, this is totally possible (and already supported) if you wish to get a commercial license for Platinum. I released it under a dual license (GPL for open source projects and Commercial for closed source projects). Please contact me directly here for more info.

2 Responses to “Rhapsody + XBMC”

  1. Stephen
    Jul 12, 2006

    Thank you for taking the time to respond. I apologize again for my stupidity on this subject. So are you saying that it is possible to play Rhapsody through the Xbox with Platinum? I guess I need to do some research on what Platinum is and how to make it work on my Xbox.


  2. Sylvain
    Jul 12, 2006

    No need to apoligize. Yes it is possible. I have it working but I cannot release it to the public for legal reasons unfortunately. Sorry.



Leave a Reply

Categories

Archives