The good news: At least in this article the studios/labels don't express any interest in Microsoft's DRM, which Microsoft seems determined to keep locked into the Windows OS.
Well that's it for the good news, now for the bad:
First, in terms of competition for Apple, so far there hasn't been any, just the usual pathetic, non-innovative, knock-off de jour of iTunes from a host of media and software companies that should have known better. Worse, the studios/labels idea of "competition" usually boils down to higher consumer prices and greater, more restrictive DRM.
Second, no matter how interesting the technology, any company that wants to inject itself into the DRM business and target the iPod has to be insane to try and go forward without having Apple's (read: S. Job's) expressed consent to do so. Apple will always insist that the key to it's success (particularly with the iPod) in the media business is the tightly integrated ecosystem that it developed around iTunes, the Music Store, and the iPod. Targeting the iPod alone (either by a competing player or by a DRM gateway) is satisfying at best only 1/3 of the consumer experience Apple has established. Software (iTunes) and access to media (the Music Store) are carelessly glossed over by the roster of instant wannabes who apparently still have a terribly myopic view of how Apple achieved it's success with the iPod. And no one is more keenly aware of that than Apple.
Right now, Navio is a hardware/software update away from being a footnote in DRM technology history. Trying to do an end-around (reverse engineering or otherwise) to the iPod in order to pitch your product to media content providers isn't going to go very far without Apple's expressed blessing.
In order to get Apple's blessing (not to mention interest), I think you're going to have show Apple in no uncertain terms that you are going to add value to Apple existing business. No one to date has apparently done that and it doesn't look like anyone has spent a microsecond trying. That's okay if you have a spectacular concept waiting in the wings that would make the iPod/Music Store/iTunes system look pale by comparison, but no one has come close to that. In the final analysis, it just doesn't look like anyone is interested in competing with Apple, at least in real-world terms. All that's left is the me-too crowd, and they don't have a clue, let alone any original ideas.
