EMI goes DRM free

Following up on Cameron's post below, it is true... It seems that EMI has abandoned DRM across their entire catalog.

From the press release:

EMI Group CEO Eric Nicoli today hosted a press conference at EMI's headquarters in London where he announced that EMI Music is launching DRM-free superior quality downloads across its entire digital repertoire and that Apple's iTunes Store will be the first online music store to sell EMI's new downloads. Nicoli was joined by Apple CEO Steve Jobs. The event also featured a musical performance by The Good, The Bad & The Queen.

Read the full press release here

I can't think how this will be anything but positive for not only EMI but also Apple and the entire music appreciation community. The songs will be higher quality ACC files that have no DRM, available on iTunes.

Further down, the release says

EMI Music today announced that it is launching new premium downloads for retail on a global basis, making all of its digital repertoire available at a much higher sound quality than existing downloads and free of digital rights management (DRM) restrictions.

What does "new premium downloads" mean? Will they truly be releasing their entire catalog or will it be only new songs and some of the better old ones? Or is that just the name of their service?

Do note that the drm free songs will be $1.29 which is an interesting compromise for the freedom that you should have with the $.99 songs.