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View Full Version : EMI offers new DRM-free option on Apple's iTunes Music Store



BarfBag
April 2nd, 2007, 07:44 PM
Apple just made a deal with EMI. DRM-Free music at twice the quality.

http://www.macrumors.com/2007/04/02/emi-apple-press-conference-coverage/

koshatnik
April 2nd, 2007, 07:47 PM
God I hate Apple's business practices. And don't get me started on that sanctimonius prat Jobs.

karellen
April 2nd, 2007, 07:57 PM
as I don't own an iPod, iMac, mac os x or any music in .aac format, I don't really care

Mateo
April 2nd, 2007, 08:00 PM
i don't even know what DRM means (except in the most abstract terms), so this means nothing to me.

junior aspirin
April 2nd, 2007, 08:05 PM
the music industry seems like it is finally learning. although i don't understand why someone would want to purchase music at a low quality with DRM over high quality with no DRM.

thing is though, they could change there mind if they dont sell, since they are going to price these DRM free files at a higher price and since non-tech people dont care about DRM and will most likely go for the cheaper option.

Seq
April 2nd, 2007, 08:06 PM
I think this is great news, and hope EMI does not stop at just the iTunes store for unencumbered music. Would be great to be able to purchase high-quality digital versions of 'big label' music through other on-line vendors without the need for proprietary software at all.

Sunflower1970
April 2nd, 2007, 09:02 PM
Awesome news. If I used iTunes and if there were an EMI artist I was interested in, I'd seriously look into buying a few non-DRM'd songs from them (even if the songs are more expensive $1.29 instead of $0.99). But, since I don't, well, I won't worry about it. I'm very glad to see Apple & Co. put into action what Jobs talked about regarding DRM earlier this year. :) A step in the right direction.

rearden
April 2nd, 2007, 09:10 PM
I think it's a totally appropriate measure, and I think the higher price is appropriate as well, if you want the extra privilege of not having DRM, then there's nothing wrong with paying a bit extra for it.

banjobacon
April 2nd, 2007, 09:19 PM
as I don't own an iPod, iMac, mac os x or any music in .aac format, I don't really care

The biggest online music store and one of the members of the RIAA are finally releasing online music without DRM. This is good news for fans of consumer rights, open source, and music. You may not use iTunes, but this is probably the first step in EMI (and eventually the other majors) releasing DRM-free music through other online stores.

billdotson
April 2nd, 2007, 09:45 PM
that is good news. What I have been doing for that DRM trash.. as I purchased ~40 songs off of walmart.com w/o knowing about DRM (I didn't even know what DRM was then!) I just burnt them all to CDs. No minor and insignificant legal issues about ripping the songs back as I just keep them on CDs. 3 CDs hold ~200 songs (all the songs I have). Speaking of I need to make backup CDs of those.. I am sure that they will probably get messed up sooner or later. Will probably hit a bump in the road and the disc will skip badly.. :(

mykalreborn
April 2nd, 2007, 09:46 PM
now if that wasn't good marketing strategy i don't know what is. of course that doesn't mean that's nice of Apple, but playing the role of the ones saving the world from drm is a smart move

Incense
April 3rd, 2007, 12:03 AM
While I don't use iTunes anymore, I think it's great that anyone buying any of these DRM free songs, should have no problem if they ever chose to move to Linux, and want to bring their music library with them. While I don't see iTunes supporting anything that is not an iPod anytime soon, it's great that their songs will.

tikal26
April 3rd, 2007, 12:25 AM
Its not that apple droped DRM, but that EMI did and that it is expected that other will int he future. I don't need an ipod or itunes to play the music I buy in itunes and that is good for everyone. I can take the song I buy in itunes into linux without loosing sound quality or havibng to rip my music.

BarfBag
April 3rd, 2007, 12:34 AM
I'm pretty excited about this. One of the reasons I keep my Windows partition floating around is iTunes. It's great to be able to legally buy a TV show (if I missed it one week), or if I want just one song on a CD.

I think somebody needs to write a Linux front-end for iTunes. It's been done before.

tikal26
April 3rd, 2007, 03:17 AM
I don;t think that the linux frontend was legal and I think that apple are not open to that possibility. I tihnk our best bet would be rhapsody sicne they have a browser support for it and have a player for the Nokia n800. I also found this e-mail last year
http://real.lithium.com/real/board/message?board.id=InstallingRhapsody&message.id=14628

and I think maybe there is small hope that we miight get a music store in linux since according to teh articel all the amarok would need would be to use the helix engine and maybe they would fix the store front end so maybe, but I am not getting my oes up. I have also seeign on the rhapsody blogs some of the devs tease us about better linux support.

Gargamella
April 3rd, 2007, 10:46 AM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6520801.stm


here it is an article on Apple I-tunes music store to start selling no-drm songs

here it is another link of a campaign against drm

http://www.defectivebydesign.org/



anyway...that's good news

Stone123
April 3rd, 2007, 11:03 AM
I liked the good old times when Linux people didn't care about Apple.

Whats going on with RH and Novell .

For some reson i find anything Apple does these days is pure selling strategy and not a customer beinifit.

koshatnik
April 3rd, 2007, 11:22 AM
I liked the good old times when Linux people didn't care about Apple.

Whats going on with RH and Novell .

For some reson i find anything Apple does these days is pure selling strategy and not a customer beinifit.

Alot of people still seem to think that Apple are worthy of attention simply becaue they are not Microsoft. Fact is, they are just as bad as Microsoft. I've never understood why people still go on about MS and Apple. I thought the point of using linux was that you never have to care about that crap anymore.

igknighted
April 3rd, 2007, 11:32 AM
Agreed. This is important news, but not because of Apple. Rather, the big news is that EMI (one of the big 5 record companies) is jumping off the DRM bandwagon. Thats one down and four to go. Once the big names start to drop DRM, it will be all over.

Man, the RIAA et al. **** me off more than anyone else... including M$ and apple...

3rdalbum
April 3rd, 2007, 01:07 PM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6520801.stm


here it is an article on Apple I-tunes music store to start selling no-drm songs

I preferred the one about Google's toilet-powered broadband service.

blueturtl
April 3rd, 2007, 05:34 PM
According to several sources one of the four major record companies, EMI, is releasing their music from hereon without any copy restrictions whatsoever:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/02/emi-apple-are-announcing-sale-of-non-drm-music/

AFAIK AAC is not an open format, but this is still a pretty big step forward on the part of the music providers. Maybe eventually the other big companies will follow.

Not-so surprisingly (after the speech Jobs gave earlier) Apple is first on the bandwagon and has struck a distribution deal with EMI. Maybe they're not that evil after all? Only problem is iTunes doesn't exist for Linux. :(

However I don't see any obstacles in the way of other music services doing the same with clients or websites also compatible with Linux. Maybe we'll even see services offering music in a variety of formats such as ogg. Who knows...

What do you guys think..? Has anyone actually bought music online? I can see one benefit, and that is not having to pay for the songs you don't like. Of course there are other ways to that as well... :-\"

Nonno Bassotto
April 3rd, 2007, 05:59 PM
They raised the price by 30% for no-DRM music. They are not saying: OK, we recognize that DRM music is not the right way to distribute and causes more issues than it solves. They are saying: it seems that a lot of people are complaining because of DRM; let's try to make some more money out of this. Absolutely to blame, in my opinion.

darweth
April 3rd, 2007, 06:10 PM
They raised the price by 30% for no-DRM music. They are not saying: OK, we recognize that DRM music is not the right way to distribute and causes more issues than it solves. They are saying: it seems that a lot of people are complaining because of DRM; let's try to make some more money out of this. Absolutely to blame, in my opinion.

Actually, the 30% premium is only for SINGLE-TRACK purchases. This is not to defend Apple or the iTunes store. :P I actually hate them both, but someone needs to report the whole story. Full-album purchases are the same price as they have always been. I personally cannot relate even REMOTELY with someone who would just purchase a single-track, so the price premium is a complete non-issue as far as I am concerned. Sure, it is kind of silly like you say... but so is buying music that way (in my opinion, of course).

Ender Black
April 3rd, 2007, 06:19 PM
I am no fan of iTunes, but it is wrong to call it a price increase. If you read the press release, you will see that the non-DRM version has a higher-quality .aac than the DRM version of the same track. So, it is like saying that Chevrolet increased the price of the Corvette when they offered the Z06 version... they didn't increase the price of the Corvette, the Z06 just costs more because you are getting more/better product.

Again, I would like to see all music services disarm their single tracks when you purchase the music... otherwise you don't really own the track. For subscription services, DRM away - since you are only renting the music.

az
April 3rd, 2007, 07:21 PM
DRM is one of the two biggest problems that stand in the way of software freedom. I am glad that this is happening. Eliminating DRM prevents users from having to chose between the content (songs, videos, whatever) and their rights to use the software that they want.

This is a major victory.

So how long do you think it will take for there to be a fully-supported, fully-functional free-libre iTunes client?

kwaanens
April 3rd, 2007, 08:30 PM
When they actually alongside the "free" version sell a DRM-ed version for 30% off, this is *not* a victory.

Wouldn't touch iTunes with a stick...

- Ketil

bapoumba
April 3rd, 2007, 10:32 PM
Merged several threads in here ;)

super breadfish
April 3rd, 2007, 11:01 PM
Don't get to excited - this is no victory over DRM. I do not call charging extra for non-DRM tracks "removal". All I see is propaganda. Apple, EMI or any of the others, they will hang on to DRM for as long as they possibly can and then longer still, this is just to counter the growing anti-DRM feeling amongst consumers.

darweth
April 3rd, 2007, 11:11 PM
You people are acting a little silly about this "charging extra" business. A full album is the SAME PRICE! There has been no price-change at all in that respect! If you buy single tracks, then you do pay a 30 cent premium. I personally think they should NOT sell single tracks at all so call me stubborn. :P As far as I can see, there is no price change.

az
April 4th, 2007, 01:03 AM
that is good news. What I have been doing for that DRM trash.. as I purchased ~40 songs off of walmart.com w/o knowing about DRM (I didn't even know what DRM was then!) I just burnt them all to CDs. No minor and insignificant legal issues about ripping the songs back as I just keep them on CDs. 3 CDs hold ~200 songs (all the songs I have). Speaking of I need to make backup CDs of those.. I am sure that they will probably get messed up sooner or later. Will probably hit a bump in the road and the disc will skip badly.. :(

It's like taking a photo of a jpeg. It's lossy. The tracks you encode back from the cd your burned are going to be of less quality than the original.


When they actually alongside the "free" version sell a DRM-ed version for 30% off, this is *not* a victory.


You have to look at the big picture. The very fact that they offer the non-DRM version is a huge step.


Don't get to excited - this is no victory over DRM. I do not call charging extra for non-DRM tracks "removal". All I see is propaganda. Apple, EMI or any of the others, they will hang on to DRM for as long as they possibly can and then longer still, this is just to counter the growing anti-DRM feeling amongst consumers.

That's the thing. It's pretty much all-or-nothing. The fear that causes the music labels to insist on DRM for digital music is that you only need to have one copy to make infinite copies on the internet. They are making it trivial to obtain high-quality non-DRM-encumbered copies available. And this without the fear that they will lose business. This is a major change of strategy for them.

tikal26
April 4th, 2007, 03:58 AM
According to several sources one of the four major record companies, EMI, is releasing their music from hereon without any copy restrictions whatsoever:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/02/emi-apple-are-announcing-sale-of-non-drm-music/

AFAIK AAC is not an open format, but this is still a pretty big step forward on the part of the music providers. Maybe eventually the other big companies will follow.

Not-so surprisingly (after the speech Jobs gave earlier) Apple is first on the bandwagon and has struck a distribution deal with EMI. Maybe they're not that evil after all? Only problem is iTunes doesn't exist for Linux. :(

However I don't see any obstacles in the way of other music services doing the same with clients or websites also compatible with Linux. Maybe we'll even see services offering music in a variety of formats such as ogg. Who knows...

What do you guys think..? Has anyone actually bought music online? I can see one benefit, and that is not having to pay for the songs you don't like. Of course there are other ways to that as well... :-\"

Now that there is no need for DRM there is nothing that stops other music services from offering them in an ogg format. I personally think that rhapsody should add a new client in linux where they can stream music and at the same times allow us to buy DRM free music

LMP900
April 4th, 2007, 04:02 AM
Its not that apple droped DRM, but that EMI did and that it is expected that other will int he future.

Yes. The title is very misleading, as Apple will continue to sell content with DRM. EMI has dropped DRM from their music and music videos, but will also continue to sell music with DRM for the same price as usual. (The music without DRM will sell for $0.30 more for single tracks, while the album and music videos remain the same price)

I hope the thread title is changed.

aysiu
April 4th, 2007, 04:06 AM
I hope the thread title is changed. I've retitled the thread.