Throughout the Music 2.0 conference in Los Angeles, Digital Rights Management (DRM) was the main topic being discussed as a result of it being used by most music labels and causing all sorts of headaches with consumers. During the discussion, Albhy Galuten of Sony reckons DRM itself is not the main issue or enemy, however it is how it is applied that causes the problems, such as causing interoperability issues, particularly between different player brands and online stores. For example, DVDs can be played on pretty much any make or model of DVD player, so for most consumers who only want to playback their DVDs, the CSS protection (DVD's DRM) does not get in their way.
However, when it comes to an online service, DRM causes major problems, far worse than even the Blu-ray vs. HD DVD format war. For example, music bought on MSN Music cannot be played on an iPod. To show how easily DRM is abused, Microsoft designed their Zune to not be compatible with MSN Music, but instead requires consumers to repurchase their tracks at the Zune Marketplace, an obvious example of where DRM is used to unfairly treat paying customers instead of pirates.
The issue with DRM interoperability and restrictions on music has come to the point where European governments and US consumers have already tried suggesting how DRM such as that used by the iTunes music store unfairly restricts how and where consumers may listen to their music. Just recently Yahoo started trialling MP3 tracks free of DRM from popular artists such as Jessica Simpson, Norah Jones and Jesse McCartney. At the conference, Yahoo Music President David Goldberg mentioned that their experiments went extremely well with there being a lot more to come. While he does not expect all music to suddenly become available in the MP3 format, he predicts that a significant portion of Yahoo music will be in the DRM free MP3 format by Christmas.
Basically, going by the discussions, there are only two ways to solve the issue - either eliminate DRM completely or agree on a single DRM which is interoperable with all players and all online music stores. Albhy Galuten of Sony is working on developing interoperability standards through the Coral Consortium, although it is unclear how long it will take for interoperable DRM to come into effect.
If Yahoo does succeed in releasing most of its music as MP3s, hopefully this will out to be a major success to teach Apple, Microsoft and others offering DRM-only based music stores a lesson. On the other hand, the price of digital online music is still a significant issue with consumers expecting music to be sold cheaper online due to the lack of a physical item, not to mention no retail store, shipping, replication, warehousing and other costs associated with physical CDs.
Thanks to our moderator Hemispasm for letting us know about this news, who added: I am not sure how to intepret this move, if it is true that is. I have always been skeptical as far as the moves of the movie/music industries and RIAA is concerned as they always seem to say one thing but do another. Could it be that they finally realized they are falling down an endless pit? If so, there must be some people with a brain over there afterall.
