Amazon is ALMOST Ready to Launch Music Store (with DRM-Free Content)

Cory already posted about this on Boing Boing before I was even awake, but oh well...

It looks like Amazon is all set to launch their online music store some time next month. Apparently they are planning to do so without DRM protection, so it is most likely that most of their catalog will come from EMI and independent labels. There is also word of a partnership between Amazon and Universal to sell classical music without DRM. Considering the fact that Universal is the #1 record label, if this little experiment works out, good things could be in store for all labels and all genres.

"Bring it on, iTunes" at Ars Technica
"Amazon set to launch online music store" on Times Online
"Why an Amazon DRM-Free Music Store Would Be a Game-Changer" on Medialoper

EMI and Apple to DRM-Free?

The Wall Street Journal is reporting (subscription required) that today, Apple and EMI will announce plans to go DRM-free with a large portion of EMI's catalog. If this is the case, things could start getting real interesting. So many questions must be raised...let's see what happens. (via The Inquirer)

UPDATE: Holler.

Developer Stardock Explains No-DRM Policy

In an article dated March 21st from Stardock's website titled "How Copy Protection Creates Pirates," Stardock Corporation Inc. extolled the negative effects of DRM and explained a current company policy to not use it.

Stardock develops and publishes video games (such as the Galactic Civilizations franchise), as well as a handful of other visual and graphical programs. The company also administrates Totalgaming.net, an online store that sells downloads of games, DRM-free, directly to consumers. The company does not employ DRM anywhere in any of the software that they release.

When Galactic Civilizations II was released with no copy protection whatsoever, some people said that we must not care about piracy. Of course we do. We worked hard on the game and hope/expect people who want it to pay for it. But there are too many times when copy protection and DRM end up hurting legitimate customers.

The company believes that, by developing software that has a high level of quality, consumers will be drawn to pay for it. Of course piracy will still occur, but by creating something that people actually want to buy, sales won't be drastically reduced by it and consumers won't have to deal with the headaches that are often a result of DRM implementations.

They have also chosen not to use DRM in their Stardock Central app (connected with Totalgaming.net to give consumers the ability to download games - like Valve's Steam), a decision they based on the multitude of problems that consumers have with DRM already.

Stardock and TotalGaming.net don't use DRM. Our delivery program, Stardock Central, uses SSD (Secure Software Delivery) which in essence functions as a way to verify that the user downloading it is who they are (basic activation) but after that, you're done. There's no DRM, digital license, net connection, etc. needed. And even if you lose your serial #, CD, etc. no problem, the automated system will resend you everything you need in email.

Stardock has touched on something I believe to be very important to the well-being of the software and media industries: consumer trust. Stardock's sales have not been negatively affected by their decision not to include DRM in their games or game distributions. They had no reason to believe that DRM will help their bottom line at all, and they acted on it.

This news update on Stardock's website was prompted by an interesting story on The Consumerist blog from March 20th. "How I Became A Music Pirate" tells the story of how Jarret, a 40-year-old man who bought his music, was driven to piracy by the DRM in the software he used to buy a Luna album from Rhino Records' online store. He runs into a problem when he realizes that the WMAs he downloaded will not play in iTunes because of the copy protection that Rhino Records uses. He eventually calls a representative and is stonewalled in an interesting, but typical, way (emphasis mine).

So I called Rhino customer support and after an 8 minute wait spoke with a representative. She informed me that the files were indeed copy protected so that I could only play them on specific music players, most notably not iTunes.

"You don't understand," I said, "These files were not copied or pirated, I actually purchased them."

"Well" she responded, "You didn't actually purchase the files, you really purchased a license to listen to the music, and the license is very specific about how they can be played or listened to."

Now I was baffled. "Records never came with any such restrictions," I said.

She replied, "Well they were supposed to, but we weren't able to enforce those licenses back then, and now we can."

The story goes on to chronicle his decision to download the songs so he can listen to them in iTunes. Just an interesting account of one person's experience with DRM that was so bad, he had to pirate the music. He tried to buy the music several times and he was never able to get what he wanted for his money. He ends with only the most fitting resignation:

Since I've resigned myself not to waste any more time with the music business, I suppose I'll have to resort to purchasing used CD's & records, or having my friends occasionally make me a copy of one of their newer CD's.

Call it piracy. Call it whatever you want. But at least I tried. I gave you several chances and you failed miserably at every level.

It's sad when a dying business is so stubborn that it refuses to work with its customers to help them give the business money.


Edit: Continuing to follow the thread at SA revealed this gem of an exchange between eight forums members:

GamingHyena: Piracy leaves the artist with 0%.
Powercrazy: You are wrong. If I download a CD of an artist I've never heard of, listen to it and decide I like. I am about 1000% more likely to go see that artist at a concert. When I pay to get into the concert I give the artist money (not 100% but much more than I would buying the CD.) If I had never downloaded the music in the first place I would have never gone to the concert.
Nodrog: When I shoplift a new bar of chocolate I am 1000% more likely to buy said chocolate in the future if I discover that I like it.
The Remote Viewer: Not analogous. If he had said shoplifting the CD made him more likely to attend a concert, then you'd have a point.
Dr. Pwn: (to The Remote Viewer) Still not analogus. If he had said that shoplifting the CD made him more likely to buy future CDs, then he'd have a point.
Al Azif: (to The Remote Viewer) It's analogous if you consider shoplifting and copyright violation morally equivalent.
withak: (to Nodrog) More like if you magically created a chocolate bar from thin air at no cost to the manufacturer of the chocolate bars.
withak: (to Al Azif) In one situation someone's property has been taken away from them and in the other it hasn't.
durasteh: (to withak) There is such a thing as intellectual property.
withak: You can't take that away from the owner though, just redistribute it without permission.
durasteh: This is known as Intellectual Property theft.
withak: And is treated differently in laws from real property theft.


(via the SA Forums)

Links:
SomethingAwful Forums Thread
Stardock Release
The Consumerist Blog post
Totalgaming.net
Rhino Records

First Movie from a Small Independent Available on iTunes

Forum Snowboards, a snowboard manufacturer and distributor, is the first company to have an independent movie listed on iTunes. "That" is a snowboard movie with the potential to mark a groundbreaking change in the way that the iTunes store works.

"That" is being sold in iTunes TV section for 1.99, along with many other television shows. This deal comes after months of negotiations which ended when Forum decided to give the new price a try.

Apple also recently inked a deal with Studio411 for the distribution of more action sports videos from the company. Action sports videos (such as ski, snowboard, surfing and skate videos) have been particularly hard hit by the decline in DVD sales, and have been actively looking for a new way to reach their classic 18-24 year-old male demographic.

(via Variety)

AnyDVD HD Update Strips Blu-Ray Encryption

Remember a couple of weeks ago when AnyDVD HD was released, and you no longer had to worry about region codes or AACS on HD-DVDs? Remember how SlySoft promised Blu-Ray compatibility in beta by the end of the quarter?

Well wait no longer. Slysoft has released AnyDVD HD version 6.1.3.0, non-beta, which strips HD-DVDs AND Blu-Ray discs of their encryption and region codes. Grab the update here if you already have a copy, or download the trial!

Thank god there's a company that cares about our right to watch movies unencumbered of unnecessary software and hardware requirements.

Slysoft
TheInq

The Economics of Why DRM is Unsuccessful

A fascinating post over at TechDirt analyzes the economics behind DRM, and why on paper, DRM is bad for business. The author compares creative content to raw ingredients for cooking, and the ways of marketing that content as the recipe. Over time, raw ingredients don't change, but recipes utilizing those ingredients do to better adapt to technological and cultural shifts. Each recipe has to be seen as an upgrade upon the last one, otherwise, it will fail as a business model.

Note that it's the non-scarce products, the recipes and the ideas, that helps expand the value of the limited resources, the ingredients. You expand value by creating new non-scarce goods that make scarce goods more valuable -- and you can keep on doing so, indefinitely. Successful new business models are about creating those non-scarce goods and helping them increase value. Any new business model must be based around increasing the overall pie. It's about recognizing that creating value isn't about shifting around pieces of a limited economic pie -- but making the overall pie bigger.

DRM is fundamentally opposed to this concept. It is not increasing value for the consumer in any way, but about limiting it. It takes the non-scarce goods, the very thing that helps increase value, and constrains them. Those non-scarce goods are what increase the pie and open up new opportunities for those who know where to capture the monetary rewards of that value (within other limited resources). DRM, on the other hand, holds back that value and prevents it from being realized. It shrinks the pie -- and no successful business models come out of providing less value and shrinking the overall pie. Fundamentally, DRM cannot create a successful new business model. It can only contain one.

DRM Causes Piracy

A couple days ago, Slash Dot linked to an article written by Eric Flint, editor at Baen Publishing, in which he attempts to lay out the case that DRM actually causes piracy instead of preventing it. Flint breaks it down in three distinct points:

1) The products they want... are hard to find, and thus valuable. 2) The products they want are high-priced, so there's a fair amount of money to be saved by stealing them. 3) The legal products come with so many added-on nuisances that the illegal version is better to begin with. Those are the three conditions that will create widespread electronic copyright infringement, especially in combination. Why? Because they're the same three general conditions that create all large-scale smuggling enterprises. And... Guess what? It's precisely those three conditions that DRM creates in the first place. So far from being an impediment to so-called 'online piracy,' is DRM itself that keeps fueling it and driving it forward.

EMI: We'll Do DRM-Free Music but it's Going to Cost Ya

The rumors were too good to be true. EMI allegedly will abandon DRM but not without a bunch of cash up front from vendors like Apple and Microsoft. How nice.

The article points to Warner's recent pressure on EMI as possible motivation. My cynical side tells me we all shouldn't have been so enthusiastic from the get-go. Or they are given his-Steveness a taste of his own medicine - "Don't look to us for why we still have DRM, ask Steve Jobs why he won't pony up the dough".

Viacom drinks the Joost

Viacom announced plans to deliver Paramount films and television shows on Joost, the advertising-funded, P2P-driven, TV-like service founded by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, the duo behind Kazaa and Skype. Joost seems to have somehow calmed the angry media giant, which recently evacuated a torrential flood of takedown notices on YouTube.

In an latimes.com article (stuck behind a registerwall) a market researcher is quoted as saying, "The Joost platform is in essence a closed system. The ability for piracy and content to be stolen is minimal."

Surely it's obvious by now that any amount of weakness in any DRM scheme welcomes widespread compromise. So how did Joost manage to convince Viacom that its DRM would be effective enough to prevent widespread piracy? Are Zennström and Friis ultimately pulling a FairPlay on a colossus of the entertainment industry?

Further reading:
Joost - the new, new TV thing (via The Register)

Who Killed TiVo ToGo?

Generally we tend to believe that newer products we buy or download, the more efficient and high tech they become. However, this is certainly not the case for the new versions of iTunes and certainly not for the latest TiVo Series3 HD.

This article that I found on Electronic Frontier Foundation website discusses the involvement of Hollywood, and the FCC on Digital Rights Management restrictions, and how this affects us as TV viewers/users. Meanwhile, the article provides basic history of the digital cable DRM and the ways in which Hollywood intruded with the FCC's proceeding to enforce CableCARD-compatible devices incorporated DRM.

However, the FCC's proceeding did place some limits on the DRM. Furthermore, the article gives us 5 ways in which TV viewers and users can fight back against the Digital TV DRM.

link :
http://www.eff.org/ip/pnp/cablewp.php
http://reviews.cnet.com/4531-10921_7-6650194.html - John P. Falcone on Cnet

MP3.com Founder Responds To Jobs

A plethora of individuals and organizations have responded publicly to Steve Jobs' "Thoughts on Music" since last week. Wired Magazine reports on one in particular by the MP3.com founder Michael Robertson, outlining four major challenges he posed to Jobs.

1. Sell MP3s on iTunes

Jobs can't sell major label content in unprotected formats, but nothing's stopping him from selling the CDBaby catalog and music from indie labels who don't mind the lack of DRM.

2. Open up the iPod to other software

Robertson wants Jobs to publish the database format used by the iPod so that other software developers can create software that loads music onto the iPod.

3. Allow other music stores into iTunes

He also wants Jobs to allow stores that sell MP3s to surface within the iTunes application (this would be easier than it might sound, since the iTunes store is basically a web page inside iTunes).

4. Make iTunes for Linux

Robertson reiterates his suggestion that Jobs make an iTunes that runs on Linux, and offers to contribute his own engineering resources -- should the project prove too expensive for Apple.

Point #1 seems improbably given Jobs' firm stance on variable pricing - he insists on a uniform experience for all iTunes users; selling DRM-free tracks alongside DRM'd major label content would result in consumer confusion - not gonna happen.

Point #2 is definitely not gonna happen. The basis of the Apple ecosystem is seamless compatibility between iPod + iTunes . . . doesn't seem likely to me.

Point #3 was by the far the most interesting to me. For instance, eMusic has the most extensive catalog of DRM-free independent music. In the world of P2P, this content is searchable alongside major label content, but in the legal download market, eMusic remains off to the side as a niche retailer. DRM-free downloads and lower prices aside, I think one centralized search engine for all content is a necessity to compete with P2P.

Point #4 - I don't use Linux, but I'm sure Cory would appreciate it.


(Via Wired)

DRM: More Bad News (super short post)

As I was browsing Wikipedia for fillable info gaps, I came across this nugget in the DRM entry:

"The use of DRM may also be a barrier to future historians, since technologies designed to permit data to be read only on particular machines may well make future data recovery impossible - see Digital Revolution. This argument connects the issue of DRM with that of asset management and archive technology."

It's a consequence I hadn't thought of; and one I find especially disheartening...

Warner Music Group Executive Responds to Jobs' "Blog Post"

While EMI contemplates offering music DRM-free, Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr. responds to Jobs' "Thoughts on Music" with some harsh words and an endorsement of DRM.

(via washingtonpost.com)

The Slow Death of DRM

I came across this interesting article on Digg which gives a cursory overview of the history of DRM and its upcoming demise. Here's the preface:

The DRM walls are crumbling. Earlier this week, Steve Jobs called on the major record labels to allow online music sales unfettered by digital rights management restrictions.

Today, the Wall Street Journal disclosed that EMI is in negotiations with several digital music services to sell unprotected MP3s of its catalogue. Jobs was motivated at least in part by legal actions against Apple in Europe and the US as discussed below. But whatever his motivation, Jobs is right: DRM has been a disaster for the recording business. This article will outline the brief but sad history of DRM, the current legal attacks on it, and the reasons why the recording business would be far better off without it.

Should be a good, short read.

Via The Register.

DRM is Dead. Long Live DRM.

There is a great article over on the Freedom to Tinker blog about how many of the major labels are getting ready to release their music DRM-free.

Itself a response to a NYTimes article, The Freedom to Tinker guys astutely point out two very important things. Firstly, a huge fuss is being made over allowing MP3s to be 'unrestricted' (i.e. sans DRM). In reality, MP3s (and almost every other creative work) are protected by copyright law, the granddaddy-of-them all in terms of content security (theoretically speaking). This use of questionable rhetoric in turn leads to the second interesting point: in the minds of record labels copyright law was simply not enough - a more closed system (DRM) was a necessity to thwart 'untrustworthy' consumers.

As such, why would you sell anyone something they can't be trusted with? Record companies have continually told everyone (consumers and artists alike) that consumers can't be trusted with 'unrestricted' MP3s, that the few who purchase such 'unrestricted' files will simply distribute them freely. As a result, a culture surrounding the 'untrustworthy consumer' (whether correct or not) has been perpetuated by the very companies that now will attempt to sell 'unrestricted files' to 'untrustworthy users'. Getting consumers to be trustworthy will be doubly hard than it should be and getting artists to feel comfortable selling unprotected MP3s will be equally as difficult.

Corporate short-sightedness again rears its ugly head. Had the recording industry , in the words of the FTT folks, "embraced the Internet early and added MP3 sales to [their] already DRM-free CDA (Compact Disc Audio format) sales, they would not have reached this sad point. Now, they have to overcome history, their own pride, and years of their own rhetoric."

Norwegian Consumer Council Declares Fairplay Illegal

The ombudsman and Norwegian Consumer Council have agreed - Apple's Fairplay DRM is illegal in Norway, citing a lack of interoperability between iTunes purchases and competitor's portable devices.

"It doesn't get any clearer than this. Fairplay is an illegal lock-in technology whose main purpose is to lock the consumers to the total package provided by Apple by blocking interoperability," Waterhouse told OUT-LAW.COM. "For all practical purposes this means that iTunes Music Store is trying to kill off one the most important building blocks in a well functioning digital society, interoperability, in order to boost its own profits."

Given Apple's ongoing issues surrounding DRM in France, there seems to be mounting pressure from European consumer groups for Apple to open up iTunes in Europe. It will be interesting to see how Apple would react to a court mandate to remove Fairplay from their products; after all, I can't imagine that iTunes Norway contributes too heavily to Apple's bottom line (i.e. not at all) - so would Steve comply or just shut down the store? The music industry can't control him - since when does Norway have any clout?

(via Out-Law)

Links:
C|Net News
Mac Daily News
MacNN

Wired's Leander Kahney: Why I Want a Locked iPhone

Today, Wired's Leander Kahney posted an article about why he wants a locked iPhone, an argument in obvious contrast to Cory's earlier post. Kahney's post certainly brings up valid and engaging points, the central notion that the iPhone is a consumer phone, just as the iPod was a consumer mp3 player, and by keeping it all in house, Apple can ensure a successful user-expierience.

Kahney agrees with what most see as gross exaggeration by Steve Jobs that one phone could take down the whole Cingular network if infected by malicious third-party software, but does note that it could take down one phone, and in Apple's mind, that is damage enough. Kahney claims that Apple long ago ceeded the 'bussines market' to Microsoft, and instead is attempting to capture the entertainment-consumer market. In such sense, 'user experience', as Kahney puts it, is absolutley key.

While I agree with Kahney to an extent, I find his rhetoric worrisome. Yes indeed, power-users may still gravitate towards products such as the Blackberry and the Treo while users looking for a simple yet powerful interface will gravitate towards the iPhone. Perhaps they won't intend to use it to download third-party software, but isn't the fact that they can't a little disturbing? In his book From CounterCulture to CyberCulture, Fred Turner outlines how computers went from the Orwellian manifestation of all social-ills to the utopian savior of generations. Assuming that the user doesn't know how to use his product, and thus restricting their use, seems like a very large step backwards, especially from a digital trend-setter such as Apple.

Blu-Ray DRM is Useless Too

How much money did they spend creating the DRM for HD-DVD and Blu-Ray again?

"The plaintext exploit used to partially crack HD-DVD a couple of weeks ago was brought to bear on Blu-Ray by the same gents this weekend—and it worked a treat."

Via Wired.

President Bush Signs Anti-Pretexting Bill Into Law

President Bush today signed into law a bill that outlaws Pretexting, or the act of posing as someone else to discover personal information. This is a technique often used by the MPAA to find out from a given ISP the personal information of alleged filesharers.

Pretexting began to come into the public light after the investigation by and eventual resignation of Patricia Dunn, a chairwoman of HP. The scandal that ensued was enough to drive media acceptance of the story, and from that point this bill was introducted (and passed) in the house in February 2006.

As was expected, there was a large backlash when this bill fully cleared congress in December, with the MPAA arguing that it needed the ability to use pretexting "...to stop illegal downloading." Lobbiests paid by the MPAA were confirmed to have been lobbying against the bill.

(via arstechnica)

Linux Creator Echoes Schneier

Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, recently went on record calling DRM "hot air", claiming it "actually makes it harder for people to do what they want to do" with their computers and in the long run, is incredibly unsuccessful. Torvalds went on to argue what is essentially Bruce Schneier's point in The Futility of Digital Copy Prevention, that although DRM exists to halt consumers and computer-aficionados alike from doing waht they please with their purchased bits and bytes, breaking DRM is and always will be a surmountable obstacle. In this light, Torvalds claim that DRM doesn't "really matter that much" seems appropriate - although perhaps mildly dangerous in terms of rhetoric. (via slashdot)