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EMI, DRM and other acronyms

EMI is dropping DRM from their iTunes sales. EMI is one of the 'major' labels and carries acts like Coldplay and the immortal MIMS. Here's EMI's press release; here's Apple's. This is, at least partially, in response to Steve Jobs' urging the four major record companies, including EMI, to abolish DRM encoding on digital music files. Ah, but here's the rub: the new DRM-free EMI music will cost an extra thirty cents at the iTunes Music Store. That includes not only interoperability, but (supposedly) higher sound quality.

Giving consumers the choice of the more expensive interoperable file or the DRM-encoded one at the typical ninety-nine cent price point is an interesting way for EMI to test the waters. As a consumer of digital music, I will probably continue to go for the cheaper versions for two reasons: 1. I don't have an MP3 player at the moment; 2. though I'm a huge fan of pop music I'm not a big audiophile, and the regular iTunes downloads are good enough sound quality for me. I think most people will probably make the same choice because iPods dominate the MP3 player market, and there's little reason to pay an extra $3 for a ten-track album if you aren't putting an iTunes download on a Zune or the like. The equation may change, though, with the increasing popularity of MP3 phones, a market Apple hopes to dominate but doesn't yet. If I have an LG Chocolate phone in a year but want to download the next Phoenix album (EMI artist) from iTunes, I'm going to have to get the interoperable files.

How does the law play in? Well, as Jobs notes in his "Thoughts on Music" column linked above, "[s]ince Apple does not own or control any music itself, it must license the rights to distribute music from others, primarily the 'big four'. . ." In other words, it will be up to Sony BMG, Universal, and Warner Bros. to follow EMI in cooperating with Jobs. You can lead the music business to the digital revolution, but you can't make them drink it in until they themselves decide to.

Posted by at April 2, 2007 11:42 AM in Current Events