Former Apple Exec Speaks Against DRM

Wysz writes "Mike Evangelist, former Director of Product Marketing for Apple's "Pro" applications, has blogged his thoughts about DRM. Like many of us, he is offended by the fact that the record labels and movie studios treat their customers like criminals. While he notes in the comments section that iTunes is the best of the worst, he admits to using third-party tools to remove the DRM from iTunes tracks."

Comments

Good luck!

[sg3000]

I've been a big buyer of prerecorded 'media' for over 35 years. I have two or three hundred vinyl LPs, several dozen 45's, a hundred or so audio cassettes, and roughly 60 prerecorded reel-to-reel tapes. They are jammed in my closet with a couple hundred VHS tapes, 450 CDs, and 500-odd DVDs.
From this day forward I will never spend a another dime on content that I can't use the way I please.

Easy for you to say; you've already bought everything!

Just kidding.

Seriously, good luck with that. I'm sure, like when Homer Simpson told Moe that he wouldn't buy any more "Flaming Moe's", Apple and others will be able to hear your "You just lost yourself a customer!" declaration over their excited, yelling customers and ringing cash registers.

...with every day that passes it becomes more and more obvious that the greedy bastards who run these media companies prefer to treat me (and all their customers) like criminals

You know how just about every department store puts a don't-steal-me tag on the clothes that has to be removed before you can wear it? They're treating you like a potential criminal, too. Just something to think about before you boycott an industry that takes irritating measures to keep their stuff from getting stolen.

For what it's worth, although I avoid buying CDs that aren't real red book Compact Disc (I want to rip my music with no limits), I have no problems with Apple's DRM.

Re:Good luck!

[BridgeBum]

At least the department store removes the tag after you buy it.

Re:Good luck!

[Buddy_DoQ]

Yeah, but when you pay for a shirt at the store, they take that protection off before you take it home. DRM big music style on your shirt would be like saying you can only wash it in our coin machines, and you can't pass it down to your kid brother years on down the road. Nor could you legally rip out the collar tags that keep sticking up, adding unnecessarily to your geek factor. It's one thing to prevent theft, it's another to treat consumers like slime.

Re:Good luck!

[borawjm]

not if you steal it.

Re:Good luck!

[Anonymous Coward]

Having trouble with your reading comprehension?

Re:Good luck!

[Alpha_Traveller]

Sometimes they even give you a hanger.

Re:Good luck!

[schwaang]

At least the department store removes the tag after you buy it.

Not in the RFID future.

Re:Good luck!

[IAmTheDave]

You know how just about every department store puts a don't-steal-me tag on the clothes that has to be removed before you can wear it? They're treating you like a potential criminal, too. Just something to think about before you boycott an industry that takes irritating measures to keep their stuff from getting stolen.

Yeah, but once I buy the clothes, the tag is taken off, and that article of clothing is mine to do with as I please - including changing it, cutting it up and mixing it with other cut up clothing, or even buying material and duplicating it. Heck, entire clothing industries exist around copying expensive clothing.

So you see, they try to prevent me from stealing it while in the store, but I don't have to agree to some license when I get home to wear the clothing, nor does the clothing give me some virus that makes my whole body itch if I wear the clothing in some fashion that is not approved of by the clothing manufacturer.

So there is a difference there...

Re:Good luck!

[Wildcat J]

This doesn't really contradict you, and not that it's a major hassle, but some stores (Banana Republic, J. Crew to name two) actually have the security sensor sewn into a tag on the clothing. They deactivate it at the register, but you're left to cut it out yourself when you get it home. A little interesting factoid; your point still stands.

-J

Re:Good luck!

[nospmiS remoH]

But, like another poster said, if you buy the pants they remove the tag. If you steal the pants you are stuck with the tag. That makes sense.

In the case of the CD content, if you buy it you have to deal with the DRM problems. If you steal it you actually get a better product that you can use as you please. They actually only treat paying customers like criminals. And they don't see that. Very sad indeed.

Re:Good luck!

[hackstraw]

Oh really. Everybody knows that you say?

In a retail store that enables tags like the GP mentioned? Yup.

Employee Theft 48.5% $15.1 billion
Shoplifting 31.7% $9.7 billion
Administrative Error 15.3% $4.8 billion
Vendor Fraud 5.4% $1.7 billion

From another source:

According to the University of Florida 2002 National Retail Security Survey, employee theft was estimated to be responsible for 48% of store inventory shrinkage. That represents an estimated employee theft price tag of about 15-billion dollars per year. This astounding figure makes employee dishonesty the greatest single threat to profitability at the store level.

The study found the average dollar loss per employee theft case to be $1,341.02 compared to $207.18 for the average shoplifting incident.

Or another

Employee theft made up 42.7 percent of the total losses, shoplifting 34.4 percent, administrative error 17.6 percent and vendor fraud 6.3 percent.

I have never heard of any data to the contrary, but _everybody_ might not know that as you implied.

Re:Good luck!

[bigpat]

That boils down the Music industry's position pretty well. They don't want you to "steal" the music after you buy it.

Re:Good luck!

[CokeBear]

You know how just about every department store puts a don't-steal-me tag on the clothes that has to be removed before you can wear it? They're treating you like a potential criminal, too.

Fortunately those tags are removed at the time of purchase. I would have no problem with DRM if it was removed by the seller at the time of purchase.

Re:Good luck!

[Khaed]

I've worked in retail. The stores say that employees steal more than anything. I've worked a place where a manager had to walk employees out to be sure they didn't snag something. So I'd just like to add evidence, from experience, that "everyone" does know that. At least everyone even remotely involved.

Re:Good luck!

[Catbeller]

"You don't buy the music you buy permission to experience it."

No. I bought the music, the media it was recorded on, and the right to copy and remix it any way I like. What I don't have is the right to copy and redistribute without permission from the *copyright* owner, which is NOT the same as the owner of the music. Music is not property, and it cannot be owned any more than an idea can be owned. The idea of illegal redistribution was envisioned to be illegal CD manufactories and suchlike, NOT Joe Suburban copying records onto tape.

I have fair use rights to copy the music for personal use, which by common law for over thirty years meant, among other rights, the right to make copies and share it with friends. Music companies have tried to outlaw this, but legislatures and courts had skillfully ducked around finding such copying "unlawful". Up until recently, the infraction was a civil one, not criminal, which meant the infringer was liable for civil damages limited to actual monetary damages caused to the copyright holder -- less than a few bucks per album copied. Record companies didn't bother suing people for dozens of dollars, so massive copists like Metallica's band members, who copied thousands of other people's albums from vinyl to tape when they were young and poor, got away clean.

Now, with skillful placement of bribes to congressmen and a 30+ campaign to put Federalist Society judges on the bench, it's criminal to copy music, and the "damages" per individual copist is judged in the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars -- obvious horseshit.

I don't mean to drown out your other points, as they are worthy. But we can't let them own this "license to experience on the correct media" meme. To win a semantic war, you can't let the enemy redefine the terms of the argument.

Re:Good luck!

[Total_Wimp]

At least the department store removes the tag after you buy it.

Lets take this a little bit further.

A department store decides to leaves the anti-theft tag on it's clothes permanently to prevent people from copying it's designs. You go to the store and buy a baseball cap. You take the cap home and your wife thinks it's cool too, but the tag jumps in the way and refused to let her put it on her head. Your daughter finds a hack to let her wear the cap, but the damn thing is watermarked so the store can tell it's "stolen". The store sees her wearing the cap and sues you.

You deal with the lawsuit and throw away the hacked cap, but you liked the cap so much you buy a second copy. You wear it regularly for a while then put it in a drawer and only wear it occasionally. When you decide to buy a new house and move, the cap refuses to let the movers take it out of the old house. It also refuses to let the new owners of the old house use it. It sits in the garage and is useless to anyone.

You still are pretty charmed by the cap so you buy a third copy. Since you've been going bald for a few years, it's nice to have your head covered up on summer days. After watching infomercials late at night, you decide the Hair Club for Men is the thing for you. You're really happy with your new "hair" but you still want some cover so you go to put on the cap. It refuses to go on your head.

You are PISSED! You've bought three copies of that F**KING cap and now you can't even use it, just cause you have new "hair". You swear to never buy another cap from that GOD D**NED company. But the cap really has a lot of sentimental value so you end up buying a fourth copy anyway.

Yep, DRM is just like those little tags

TW

Re:Good luck!

[Dun Malg]

Now, with... a 30+ [year] campaign to put Federalist Society judges on the bench

Totally in agreement with you on the general argument, but I'm not sure what the above means. The Federalist Society has only been around for 20 years, and it's mostly an organization of libertarians and "Eisenhower conservatives" who dislike the over-reaching of the federal government. I certainly wouldn't say that the expansion of federal copyright law is in any way something they'd condone.

Re:Good luck!

[rtb61]

Get a hanky, tie and tie a knot in each corner and pull that on your head ;-). Welcome to the creative commons, set yourself and others free, share to be fair :).

more difficult to abide by today

[yagu]

From his blog:

From this day forward I will never spend a another dime on content that I cant use the way I please. If I cant copy it to my hard drive and play it using the devices I want, when and where I want, I wont be buying it. Period.

I agree. This has been my philosophy for a long time. Unfortunately, you can only find out after the fact you've bought something with crap built in. If there is any disclaimer at all on the packaging, it's microscopic (look at the recent Beastie Boys CD). The first thing I do with a new CD is rip it, verify it plays on all of my PC's, and all of my CD and DVD players. If it doesn't, I return it. (And, yes, I even erase the ripped music.)

Re:more difficult to abide by today

[Lumpy]

I have no problem avoiding that crap. But then I only buy CD's from second hand used CD stores to support a small local business and stick it to the RIAA. He let's me test and look over carefully every CD I buy right there at the counter. but then I learn about a crappy DRM'd CD way before I'm going to buy it.

The store owner also keeps up on it and put's warning stickers on CD's that have that crap with an "WARNING THIS IS AS/IS because the Record company crippled it with anti-copy" he also only gives 1/5th the purchase value when you bring in a DRM'd disc.

I'm betting that right now he would not touch any of the Discs in the sony rookit list.

you dont have to have that new release right-fricking-now. Wait about a month and it will be in the used shops for much less.

Re:more difficult to abide by today

[afaik_ianal]

Where in the hell can you return an opened CD these days?

I've done it a few times at various stores in Australia. I just take it back and politely explain that it doesn't play in my CD player (I normally don't bother mentioning that my CD player is PC based), and they normally just give me store credit.

Only once have they argued that "you can't return CDs", at which point I explained that nowhere on the product is it referred to as a CD (they can't for licensing reasons, right?), and that I bought it in good faith, thinking it was a CD. They got the manager, who gave me a store credit.

Re:more difficult to abide by today

[Chris Burke]

See how many employees laugh at you!

It's a game! My record is fourteen. By the way, it is cheating to not wear pants, which I wish I had known beforehand.

It's all DRM..

[grub]

iTunes is the best of the worst

That's like commending Syphilis for not being AIDS.

Re:It's all DRM..

[VATechTigger]

at least I could easily remove syphilis from my "system". Plus, it usually has a bigger disclaimer, like warts, on the box. Although I really hate to see warts on any Box i plan to use and enjoy, at least I can pass it up.

Re:It's all DRM..

[mblase]

That's like commending Syphilis for not being AIDS.

Bad analogy. STDs want to be shared with other people.

He removes it...

[gregbains]

Yet I bet it comes with more protection next release.

Let us use OUR downloads as WE want. That means any player, any time, as long as I own it. Until then I will download for free or rip from CD.

Re:He removes it...

[(startx)]

Yet I bet it comes with more protection next release.

It already has. Hymn and JHymn are unable remove the FairPlay "protection" from videos and music purchased from iTunes 6. Videos can only be downloaded in iTunes 6. Want to downgrade to iTunes 5 to buy your music? Too bad, once you buy something from the iTMS with 6, you can no longer use 4.x or 5 to make purchases. Hello DRM!

Re:He removes it...

[(startx)]

Or you could, you know, not be a duchebag and read the post.

I don't steal music. In this case, I'm refering specifically about buying it, and then being able to play it on something other than my laptop. Jhymn is the only way to play music I have paid for on my Slackware desktop, or my mythtv box in the living room. Your analogy is terminally flawed. It isn't akin to breaking into someone elses locked car. It's closer to if you buy a car, and then the manufacturer controls the door locks remotely so that you can only drive it at certain times, on certain roads, that only they approve, so you change the locks.

Ass.

In other news...

[Private Taco]

...former Apple Exec sued by the RIAA...

Resistance is futile

[phpm0nkey]

The fight against DRM cannot be won. Visions of a future where media companies and other copyright holders kowtow to consumer demand and release all of their content in an unprotected format to be infinitely copied are ludicrous. The only reason this occurs now is due to the consumer technology gap. If I buy a Britney Spears CD, it has to work in the CD player I bought in 1990. Companies can't implement any real DRM without breaking backwards compatibility.

Expect this to change, soon. Your content will be encrypted at the source and will only be decrypted by the hardware, at the last possible phase, using your personal key and with proper authorization from the license server. As long as we put copyright law on the books, technology will be developed to allow it to be enforced. Live with it.

Re:Resistance is futile

[Hatta]

The fight against DRM cannot be won.

The fight for DRM cannot be won. Anything that can be listened to can be copied, and it only takes one technically savvy person to circumvenct it once, and the whole world can get it.

If things continue the way they have been, you can expect a full fledged War on Copyright Infringement just like our current War on Drug Users. It will be accompanied by a similar loss of personal freedoms, and be just as effective (i.e. not all).

Re:Resistance is futile

[Florian Weimer]

The fight against DRM cannot be won.

There is a solution: create a pool of free content.

Of course, right now, this mostly works for texts. Wikipedia, for example, evokes fears in publishers that only free content is passed on. More and more, their allegedly superior products are simply not relevant in public discussion because nobody is willing to pay the price for professional editorial review, DRM or not.

Sure, decent recording equipment is not actually cheap, and audio files need more bandwidth for transmission, but these costs continue to decrease. There is an answer to this, of course: playing devices which only play encrypted content, and not unencrypted, free content. But I doubt it will get as far as that because it is a very significant restriction on free speech.

Re:Resistance is futile

[edraven]

Here's the thing about cryptography. It's designed to allow A and B to communicate without C being able to understand what's being said. The flaw with DRM is that B and C are the same person. You don't have to worry about all the cryptographic chains of trust, because the desired end result is still that the user should have access to the data. Data you have access to, you can copy. It's just that simple. DRM is an attempt to have one's cake and eat it, too. It's a perpetual motion machine.

Re:Resistance is futile

[mrchaotica]

There are alternative copyrights out there (GPL, Creative Commons) that give the end-user certain rights, but the original author/publisher/creator still retains the copyright. However, GPL and Creative Commons have yet to be tested as being "legal" copyrights.

Those aren't "copyrights", those are "licenses." Also, the GPL at least (I don't know about CC) does not give the end user any rights, nor does it take them away (which is why calling the GPL an "EULA" is inaccurate). The GPL only gives additional rights to people who distribute the program, and/or make derivative works. Those two classes of people aren't end users.

The end user is free to completely ignore the GPL. But that doesn't mean they can give the program to their friends; at that point the GPL applies because they're not an end user anymore.

So until GPL and/or Creative Commons are tested, the copyright laws will stay on the books.

No, whether the GPL and CC licenses are valid licenses or not, copyright law won't change. All that would happen is that we'd see if the GPL is allowed to grant those extra rights.

Here's the funny thing, though: all these people who talk about "testing the GPL" somehow seem to think that if it's invalid, people will suddenly be allowed to distribute GPL'd programs without also distributing the source. This is false. If the GPL is invalid, people won't be able to distribute the program at all. Ironically, if someone is sued for "violating the GPL," challenging the license won't help them!

The only other way is to get the copyright laws changed to strengthen the Fair Use clause. Personally, I give that a snowball's chance in Hell of happening given the power of the entertainment lobby groups.

Or you could submit a bill to eliminate copyright entirely (the Constitution only says that Congress may make copyright laws, not that it must, I think), but that would only have a snowball's chance in the sun itself* of passing.

Nevertheless, that kind of thing is exactly what I hope for. Maybe we'll have a chance once the "piracy" (i.e. civil disobedience) destroys the power of the companies that make up the entertainment industry, so that they can't afford to pay lobbyists anymore.

*According to Dante, Hell isn't actually all that hot, depending on which circle you're talking about, so a snowball in the sun has even less of a chance than one in Hell.

Disturbance in the Matrix

[mysqlrocks]

he is offended by the fact that the fact that the record labels...

Did anybody else notice the disturbance in the Matrix?

Re:Disturbance in the Matrix

[Scrameustache]

disturbance in the Matrix?

Glitch.

Glitch in the Matrix; disturbance in the Force.

in Canada...

[m0rph3us0]

Personal music copying is legit, and bought and paid for through media levies. Why would I ever buy from Apple/other DRM music provider for an extra 99 cents what I've already bought from my friends on BitTorrent. Faster, better selection, and a more flexible format.

Re:in Canada...

[naarok]

Actually what I think you are describing is not legal in Canada.

You can only make copies of the original and those copies can only be for your personal use.

If you borrow a CD from a library, you are allowed to make a copy of it to use. You could then lend the original to a friend and they could make a copy and return the original to you. You then return the original to the library. You, your friend and the library now all have legal copies of the music. You could also buy a CD and lend it to a friend for them to copy.

You can not borrow a CD from the library, make a copy, and then give that copy to a friend to copy, because that would not be copying from the original, but from a copy.

It sounds stupid by I'm pretty sure that is how it works. The requirement to copy off the original constrains the possibility of mass distribution.

Now, back to the above post. In the case of BitTorrent, you are effectively copying from a copy, not from the original, and thus it is not legal.

Re:in Canada...

[Dixie_Flatline]

No! NO!

It is NOT legal because you've paid for it through levies. It's legal because IT'S LEGAL.

Those levies are a red herring. It would be legal even without the levies. It has been for years. Don't bring those into this. They're just a money grab.

Don't use the levies as an excuse, either. Not only have they stopped collecting levies on things like iPods, but paying for things beforehand like this aren't an excuse for bad behaviour. If you buy bullets with a levy on them to compensate families of shootings, you aren't allowed to go out and shoot people.

The only thing that you have to say when talking about downloading files in Canada is that it's legal. End of story. Any other justifications just weaken your position.

Burn Him!

[Shadow Wrought]

he admits to using third-party tools to remove the DRM from iTunes tracks.

Where art thou RIAA? He voluntary admits it and all! Sue! Sue! Sue! I hear there's an attorney named THompsons whose case just went away. Maybe he can help you out...

Only Apple...

[Anonymous Coward]

Would hire "Mike Evangelist" as Director of Product Marketing.

I hear their CEO really gets the 'Jobs' done...

Department store tags vs. DRM

[Senes]

When you buy clothes from a department store, the tag is removed and you are free to wear alter, and lend out the clothing however you see fit.

When you buy media with DRM, you take the tag home with you so it can tell you how to use the product you bought and try to get you in jail for shutting it up.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[Golias]

When you buy clothes from a department store, the tag is removed and you are free to wear alter, and lend out the clothing however you see fit.

That's because their shirt can't instantly become six billion more shirts, which you can give away for free (or sell for next to nothing, like AllofMP3.com does) and take away any reason for anybody else to buy one from them.

Selling recorded music is a multi-million dollar industry, the owners of which surely don't want to just give up, just because technology has made it fantastically easy to rip them off.

If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music. (And no bullshit answers about giving it away and making their money off concerts and t-shirt sales. Suggest a solution which doesn't involve simply giving up all that sales revenue.) If you can't come up with anything better than what's out there now, why would you be surprised that they can't either, and are desperately experimenting with so many bad ideas?

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[Golias]

I can't imagine spending more than $50 to copy many items, a shirt might be less than a few dollars. On the other hand, copying a CD costs about $500 ($450 for the PC, $40 for the CD-R drive, $10 for the pack of CDs).

That's got to be just about the most stupid analysis I've ever seen in my life.

Cost of producing six billion shirts at $50 a pop: $300,000,000.00

Cost of producing six billion music tracks via torrents: $450.99

($450.00 for the PC plus $0.99 for the track download from the iTunes Music store. If you can find a server to start the torrents from, your bandwidth cost can be $0, because you can just use the free Wi-Fi at a library or coffee shop.)

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[theStorminMormon]

If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music. (And no bullshit answers about giving it away and making their money off concerts and t-shirt sales. Suggest a solution which doesn't involve simply giving up all that sales revenue.) If you can't come up with anything better than what's out there now, why would you be surprised that they can't either, and are desperately experimenting with so many bad ideas?

This seems a little over-the-top to me. Consider this example. Ford has just "invented" the assembly line. It's now possible to build cars extremely cheaply. In other words, the cost or reproduction has gone down by an order of magnitude. Let's say there had been car-makers before that, but they made custom cars to order, one at a time. They would see this sudden new method of production as a threat, and try to artificially maintain inflated prices. Would they be justified in shutting Ford down?

I'm well aware this analogy doesn't really work, but there are elements of it that are important. Firstly, the real change here is in production. Music distributors DO NOT MAKE MUSIC. That's what bands do. So when you buy a CD from a Warner or whatever, you're not paying Warner for the music, you're paying Warner for the CD. Of course, you're also paying Warner to market the CD, you're paying them to possible promote the band. And part of your money is actually going to fund the band itself.

So essentially the music industry has become a big middle man. They don't make music, they promote and distribute it. But now they are no longer needed for distribution. The method of production has gotten cheaper and anyone with a PC can do it. They arguably don't need to promote it either - with the internet it's possible to disseminate information for free - or almost.

So before you, or anyone gets all high and mighty about "they make a living selling music, blah blah blah" you have to ask yourself - are they really needed any more? And if not, then why should we keep them around? We don't keep blacksmiths around either. Of course the industy has a vested interest in keeping itself alive, but that doesn't mean we have to roll over and let them extort money from us when they no longer really have much to offer us.

So what should replace this business model? Clearly bands need to get paid or we won't have full-time artists anymore. So money needs to change hands. That is clear. I'd recommend dropping the price on physical CDs considerably - like $5 bucks a pop. If the good is sufficiently elastic you'll make the m oney back in increased revenue. Shift to an online model. There are plenty of sites that want to sell music cheap. Reduce the price for an mp3 to 10 cents or something. Share the profits more equitably between distributor and band. There you go. Let fan sites handle promoting.

That may or may not be the perfect solution, but here's the key point. It's not the consumer's job to come up with a new business model. And if the currrent business model has become irrelevant, we don't have an obligation to develop a new one before pointing out that the current one is irrelevant.

Let's be realistic. Change is inevitable. The industry can fight it, and be crushed eventually, or they can downsize and reinvent themselves. Painful, yes, but nothing like the alternative.

stormin

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[Digital Vomit]

Selling recorded music is a multi-million dollar industry, the owners of which surely don't want to just give up, just because technology has made them completely unnecessary.

There. Fixed that for you. ;-)

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[killjoe]

"That's because their shirt can't instantly become six billion more shirts, which you can give away for free (or sell for next to nothing, like AllofMP3.com does) and take away any reason for anybody else to buy one from them."

By the same token you can not produce a shirt and then replicate for pennies while selling each one at $20.00.

What this points out is that music has been overpriced for years. The cost of production has kept going down without corresponding reduction in price.

the so called "piracy" is simply the market nomalizing itself.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[Golias]

If someone discovered a way to effortless create / duplicate food,

Already exists.

Step 1. Bury seed corn in the ground.

Step 2. Wait a few months.

It doesn't yield as much food as if you tend to it all year, but it works.

More to the point, food producers don't have any claim of intellectual property over the food they sell. If you can find a cheaper way to produce it, they must either adopt your method or go bankrupt. Even if there ever was a patent on soybeans, it ran out about 6,000 years ago.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[Jherek Carnelian]

If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music.

Easy.

Q: How has the internet changed things?
A: The cost of distribution is now effectively zero.

No smart business will even try to charge for something that is free. Even if they have a 300% markup, 3 * 0 is still ZERO.

Q: What's left to charge a markup on?
A: Labor costs.

The cost to create the album, book, movie or video game is where there is still opportunity to charge a mark-up. So, forget all about copyright which is (primarily) about controlling distribution. There is no value in distribution any more.

Instead, sell all the creations as work-for-hire to the public domain. Yes, let the public pay for the cost of creation plus whatever premium you can milk from them. If it costs $500K to produce an album, then ask for $1M up front from the public at large. Let the people pay whatever they think such an album will be worth to them. Take all those payments, put them into an escrow account and when it hits $1M you get to work. When you are done, release the finished album to the public domain and collect your $1M in payment.

This can work for the same reason that the cost of distribution is now zero - the Internet. The cost of collecting payments from millions of people is approaching zero too. We still need the right financial infrastructure to do it efficiently, but technically all the pieces are already available.

Q: How does "work-for-hire to the public domain" benefit the content creators?
A: It substantially reduces their risks by guaranting the return on their investment up front.

Q: How does "work-for-hire to the public domain" benefit the consumers?
A1: They will actually own the results - no worries about breaking the law to share with friends.
A2: They have much more of a say into what kinds of entertainment get created - not advertisers, not studio execs, but the actual consumer gets to vote with his dollar before production which is far more effective than "voting" after the production is already finished.

Q: What if not enough money is collected to reach $1M?
A: Lower the asking price, or give up and return all the escrowed money or spend some money on hype to encourage more buyers. This is the epitomy of a free market, no government involvement required at all.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[shawb]

It's not a valid point. One of the most common test for a logical construction is to replace another conclusion but follow the same logical construct.

The argument that he is putting forth is:
It's okay to do whatever you need to do to keep a job.
The music execs need to put DRM in music to keep their job.
Therefore it's okay for the music execs to put DRM in music.

Now, you change the argument, but keep the same construction.
It's okay to do whatever you need to do to keep a job.
Guards in Nazi concentration camps had to kill thousands of people to keep their jobs.
Therefore it's okay for guards in Nazi concentration camps to kill thosands of people.

Note that I'm not equating the use of DRM to the atrocities commited in World War II, I'm just using it to disprove the logical construction used. And I personally don't really care if music companies want to include DRM, so long as it is disclosed to the consumer prior to purchase, or the consumer can return the merchandise once they find out about the DRM. DRM in and of itself isn't evil; it could be mitigated to allow for fair trade, even though I don't know of any CDs that put the DRM info right on the packaging and I know for a fact that you can no longer return a CD except for defect in manufacturing.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[shawb]

The record companies don't subsidize musicians anymore. Generally all of the costs associated with recording, promoting etc are a loan to the musician. If the record company doesn't get that money... the musician is screwed out of anything coming to them, and are in financial debt to the record company, with interest.

Maybe some musicians are able to get a good enough contract where this isn't the case, but they generally can't argue for that kind of contract unless the record company is sure that it'll be a hit. Not to mention, large record companies are signing fewer and fewer new acts sticking with proven cash cows.

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[theStorminMormon]

All you've succeeded in doing is creating a boo-hoo story for the VP in charge of the Sony Music dvision. And it's legitimate. But it doesn't change the fact that when the market changes in fundamental ways some business models do not survive. Period. You have this HUGE industry that was essentially created to solve a problem: distribute music to consumers. At the time of creation the only method of distribution was physical. It was expensive and time-consuming to create phonographs, 8-tracks, cassettes, etc. So now you have this huge corporation that was built up around the fundamental problem: create physical media to distribute music.

Then along come computers and the internet. Now you can make endless copies of the music (digital files) and you have a method to distribute them without significant additional overhead (peer-to-peer over the internet). These are the facts of life. And it means that the entire music distribution infrastucture has become an out-dated dinosaur.

You seem to want us to understand the plight of the Sony VP. But that's not really relevant. The problem isn't that people are stealing music. That's a symptom of the greater problem: there's no longer a need for giant distributors with extensive physical capital to fulfill. And that is not anybody's fault. That doesn't make stealing OK. But everybody not stealing is not going to suddenly eliminate the market inequities.

The problem is that we're going through another economic revolution. Just as tremendous social upheavel accompanied the Industrial Revolution, this economic revolution from physical media to digital media is going to cause huge waves (maybe not AS huge, that remains to be seen). And just as some labor groups fought the onset of the Industrial Revolution, the physical media conglomerations are going to fight this revolution. But they have just much chance of winning as the Luddites did of banning machinery and factories.

We're completely wasting our time, efforts and money if we try to either prop up a failing and antiquated system or try to divert attention from the underlying flaws. The world has changed - and the only prudent thing we can do is try to change with it. That goes for you, me, and Sony VPs everywhere.

-stormin

Re:Department store tags vs. DRM

[theStorminMormon]

If you're asking questions like this, you're not understanding what's going on. That's likes saying at the dawn of the textile industry, "OK, so all the home-weavers just quit and the guild folds. Now all the factories with buggy prototype machines and no trained work force just have to somehow make a profit. Bet you're in favor of artificially high prices now!"

I'll explain the analogy. The current record labels are dinosaurs, and their time has come. The market can no longer support them. But this is a PROCESS. It's not like you can just hit a switch and say "OK industry, change" and expect an instant turn over. The record labels have the resources to stick around for a while, and the new business model that will replace them is not ready yet. This doesn't change the fact that the old business model won't work anymore.

And the artificially high prices, in this case, are going to be the result of DRM (if it succeeds). Consider diamonds. Until the 19th century they were very rare - and thus valuable. In the 19th century, however, vast diamond deposits were found - mostly in Africa. The DeBiers family realized that if diamonds were no longer rare, they would no longer be valuable as jewelry - and thus they bought up the vast majority of the diamonds and mines available and then released only a controlled amount to the public. So even though diamonds, as raw material, are relatively common they are rare on the marketplace. They have succeeded in maintaining this artificial scarcity for over a century. It only worked becuase they paired it with an equally successful marketing campaign.

Whenever a new diamond mine of sufficient size to threaten their contol is opened they can flood the market - temporarily dropping the prices and financially ruining their competitor - then buy up the mine once the owner is crippled. Then they restore prices to previous levels by drying up the supply lines.

DRM does effectively the same thing. I'm ignoring the issue about who a song belongs to for now. The question of price is related to scarcity. If music is scarce - meaning you have to go to a store and buy a CD to get one then the price stays high. It's like diamonds vs. cubic zirconium. The knock-off isn't as good. So as long as there is a difference in quality between the "real" thing (CDs) and copies (tapes of CDs) then the prices can remain high. (Plus tapes are not free either.)

But if suddenly there are EXACT copies (MP3s, CD burning with CDs getting really cheap) then the supply shoots through the roof. But if you managed to clamp down on that excess supply - via DRM - then you can drag it down to the original level and continue to charge the same price. So as far as the record labels are concerned DRM has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with "rights". It's about supply - as in supply and demand.

But of course DRM also has to do with "rights" and we can't ignore that side of it. Artists do create the songs, and thus they should have some ownership and control rights. At the very least, they should have a way to make money off of their music.

There are two approaches to this dileman. If you're a hard-core capitalist you say "tough luck. either the market's there, or it's not". I think that this is laregely true. If musicians suddenly couldn't make money or control their art and we had a mass exodus of musicians then people would realize they're going to have to pay more just to support the artists.

The thing is, we don't have to let the market work that way. We don't have to wait for musicians to all starve to death to realize that if we want good music we have to support musicians.

But the only reason to think that supporting musicians means supporting record labels is if we buy into the record label PR machine. Just like the diamond industry managed, in the space of a few short decades, to introduce a foreign tradition to Japan (diamond engagement rings after WWII) so successfully that the landscape of a culture was changed (the tradi

criminals?

[heatdeath]

Like many of us, he is offended by the fact that the fact that the record labels and movie studios treat their customers like criminals.

Well, I'm not sure why he would be offended, since most of their customers *do* display a propensity to steal their music.

It's like being offended that walmart has stolen goods detectors at the exits.

Re:criminals?

[egypt_jimbob]

But Wal-Mart doesn't put stolen goods detectors in your house.

What I dislike...

[Psionicist]

What I really dislike about DRM is the general consensus that everything actually will have DRM in the future. Even many hardcore geeks at Slashdot seem to reason DRM is here to stay and, if anything, we should try to use the lesser of all the evils. Well, I don't agree (and I didn't vote for Bush either, *shrug*) and the sooner the consumers unite somehow and nicely tell the record- and movie industry we don't want their freaking DRM the better.

Microsoft, being a maker of software based DRM-solutions, plays along nicely by reinforcing the record/movie industry's "threat" that they are "forced" to use DRM if future content should be playable at all in the future. This is _untrue!_ Even if many content industries want DRM, it's not needed, and we shouldn't give up and let them have it that way. Think about it, if a CD can be played in a stereo, even if the stereo has some kind of DRM, any competent taiwanese manufacutrer should be able to create a player for the computer, regardless if RIAA, MPAA or Microsoft likes that or not. That's the way it should be.

I am worried someday, somewhere, some freaking moron political figures will rule the computer is an "entertainment device" and must be managed with DRM (think Vista, Trusted Computing etc). That's the day we are all fucked, even if don't actually listen to music or watch TV.

Re:What I dislike...

[jacksonj04]

To be honest I wouldn't care about DRM if there was a universal standard for everything. If I buy a CD track over iTunes I have no problem with it being DRMed on the condition that I can also play it on anything else, be it a 'Windows Media' device or my TV or my phone.

Saying you want new music to always be backwards compatible is like saying you want all new music to play on an old vinyl deck. With DRM at least there is a record of "this person has already bought this, so in fact we *can* authorise this download without charging them again".

If I buy a video with this 'universal DRM' why can I not for example go to my friend's house, plug in my username and password and it appears in my 'media list'. Steam does it for games, why can't the same be done for media? And whilst they're at it I would appreciate a way to add all my old media and games to the list as well.

Re:What I dislike...

[Trepalium]

I see you mised these very nice bits of legislation that were recently discussed.. They want to force all computer devices that deal with analog to digital (or vice versa) conversions to implement CGMS-A and VEIL. It's not the first time, either. Every few years, they whine to their bought and paid-for lawmakers (such as Senator Fritz Hollings) and get them to put up a bill that would force the electronics industry to do what the MPAA/RIAA wants, and that spawns lobbying from these industries to get the law shot down.

Evangelist?

[booch]

Come on. Are we really supposed to believe that they had a Director of Product Marketing named Mike Evangelist? And I suppose they've got an engineer named Dave Engineer too. And users named Joe Sixpack. And an HR guy named Steve Jobs.

Keep Buying Music, Avoid the RIAA

[tyler083]

http://www.magnetbox.com/riaa/

3rd party tools?

[CFrankBernard]

I only know of one tool: hymn (Hear Your Music aNywhere) (formerly called PlayFair) http://hymn-project.org/

Summary nearly as long as the article

[jfengel]

And I refuse to buy any CDs that won't fit in my tape deck!

I suppose it's interesting that a former Apple guy should be taking a stance against Apple's current policy, but this isn't a particularly well-reasoned article. He's basically fed up with format change, and he's ticked off that there are things he thinks he ought to be able to do with the new format (copy it freely to every digital device) that he can't do.

There's nothing new in this article. He's trotting out the usual complaints about DRM without addressing the usual responses. The usual responses may or may not be adequate, but the article is less "Here's a new argument against DRM from a guy who knows" and more "Yet another guy is pissed off."

Re:Summary nearly as long as the article

[jmorris42]

> He's basically fed up with format change, and he's ticked off that there are things he
> thinks he ought to be able to do with the new format (copy it freely to every digital
> device) that he can't do.

No, it isn't the format change. We all know that is unavoidable. This is different. This is THEM assuming total control. In the past, all media was essentially free. You could loan it to a friend, make a working copy (dump an LP to tape for the road, etc) make mix tapes, etc. You couldn't make and sell copies, not because of a technoligical restriction but simply because, well it is illegal. Not anymore. They want the right to dictate where and how you will play it, how long you can play it and eventually will insist on the right to charge you by the play. Unless we say NO, right now.

Re:Summary nearly as long as the article

[radish]

There are a few differences between this and a regular format change.

1) A format change has an upside. Typically - better quality, or more features. Vinyl sounded better than wax drums, tape allowed recording, CD sounded better than vinyl, etc. A CD with "copy protection" offers me nothing more than a regular CD, in fact - it offers me less. Unless you count a rootkit as a bonus.

2) A format change requires repurchase of equipment and media for technical reasons, not political ones. I had to rebuy my LPs on CD because my record player doesn't have an appropriate laser pickup. The only reason I can't play my girlfriend's iTunes downloads on our living room hifi (with networked audio player) is that someone at Apple decided I shouldn't be allowed to. There is no technical reason whatsoever, just policy.

3) A format change is voluntary. I still have records, I still buy records. I'd like to still buy regular CDs, as would (I think) most people. That's becoming increasingly difficult. NO ONE IS ASKING for this format change. It's not voluntary.

My DVD thinks I am a criminal

[Datagod]

What I really like is that how you go out and fork over $20 for a new DVD, then as soon as you put it in the player you are forced to watch a short video telling you such crap as "You wouldn't steal toys, you wouldn't steal shoes, why would you steal a movie?" I own the stupid thing, and they make me so mad I rip a copy just to get rid of their garbage. And by the way, "Own it now!" is their line...so I guess if we own it, we can do what we want with it...

DRM = Big Brother

[TheZorch]

Does the name George Orwell mean anything to you people. Wake up and smell the coffee! Big Brother is coming, and we need to stop it now before its too late. I'm serious...stop laughing dammit...ok now I'm ticked! Seriously though, we as Americans and citizens of other Free Nations need to stand up and say that "we will not allow corporations to take away our rights and freedom no matter what". Send a clear message to the RIAA, boycott their products, and spread the word that you can boycotting them and why. All that's needed to start a landslide is a single pebble. Are YOU that pebble? Think about it.

Re:DRM = Big Brother

[Darth Maul]

Sorry, but the cynic in me just realizes the fact that people are too stupid to know what's going on, so before we know it all media and computers will be DRMed. Say goodbye to using media as you wish (portable players, computers, etc) and also hobby coding on your computer. Only "approved" software will run. But it will creep in as "protection" from virus, malware, etc.

People are idiots, and won't know what's going on until way after it's too late.

Sure, the few of us that get it can boycott all we want, but everyone else is still buying rap "music" and britney spears albums. They don't care what rights they have to give away in return.

Why is it...

[flyinwhitey]

Why is it that someone hasn't proposed a reasonable alternative to DRM.

The record companies want to make money, people want to control their stuff. So instead of bitching about it, then bending over and taking it, why doesn't someone come up with an alternative.

It seems like the extremes of this discussion are all I ever hear anymore. What is being proposed by people who see a business opportunity in a good compromise that satisfies everybody? Is there such a thing?

DRM not always bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a developer who contributes both to closed and open-source projects and I don't see the use of DRM is necessarily a bad thing. There are an awful lot of people who are being hurt by content/software piracy these days and the mac platform is http://www.macserialjunkie.com/>no exception. Apple (and nearly every other developer I know of) is aware of this forum and the thiefs that hang out there. Moreover, everyone expects the problem will only get worse as the market share increases.

I agree that DRM isn't the whole solution to this problem, but I don't think it should be dismissed outright. What is wrong with wanting money for working?

"Customer?" Hah!

[mrchaotica]

...but as a customer...

But you're NOT a "customer." You are a consumer. Calling you a "customer" would imply that you actually deserve respect, and we can't have that!

Now shut the fuck up and go join the rest of the sheeple at the mall.

Sincerely,

The RIAA

Re:Calling all editors!

[Quiet_Desperation]

That sentence may be technically correct, but the double "fact" in that sentence is throwing me off. Fix it!

Hang in there, trooper. It's like one of those bucking bronco rides. It takes practice. Eventually you'll be able to handle a triple or even a quadrupled phrase smoothly and cleanly.

Slashdotted text

[Stephen Samuel]

I got a DB failure, so I'm putting up the body text from the site.

if you want to read the 75 or so responses posted to his blog, you're out of luck here...
________

The latest episode in the war between music companies and their paying customers (the one where Sony decides it's OK to surreptitiously take over your PC so you can't make a copy of the music you thought you bought from them) has finally pushed me over the edge.

I've been a big buyer of prerecorded 'media' for over 35 years. I have two or three hundred vinyl LPs, several dozen 45's, a hundred or so audio cassettes, and roughly 60 prerecorded reel-to-reel tapes. They are jammed in my closet with a couple hundred VHS tapes, 450 CDs, and 500-odd DVDs. (Mercifully, I skipped the 8-track, Betamax and laserdisc formats.)

< image > media closet
Part of my media collection

I have to believe the record companies and movie studios would consider me a good customer. But with every day that passes it becomes more and more obvious that the greedy bastards who run these media companies prefer to treat me (and all their customers) like criminals. They continually expect us to pay more for less, and even then they are not satisfied. They want to pretend to 'sell' us their product, but they don't want us to actually have it. Well I've had enough.

From this day forward I will never spend a another dime on content that I can't use the way I please. If I can't copy it to my hard drive and play it using the devices I want, when and where I want, I won't be buying it. Period.

They can all take their DRM, and their broadcast flags, and their rootkits, and their Compact Discs that aren't really compact discs and shove them up their bottom-lines.

boycott is probably the *ONLY* way to stop them

[Stephen Samuel]

This happened before with games and other software in the '80s They tried some seriously intrusive copy protection and found that it just angered their good customers and cut into sales, so now copy protection on games is pretty pedestrian and generally kept minimal.

If people walk away from DRM media, and tell their friends to do the same thing, then they'll go away. Period. If people blindly let themselves get suckered into this process and put up with it, then they'll continue to get shafted.

You get what you put up with. it was true when workers struck against nasty employer tactics in the '20s and '30s and it's true now with DRM. When people stopped putting up with the nasty stuff, the laws finally got changed to something that recognized the source of the unrest.

Re:boycott is probably the *ONLY* way to stop them

[Ahnteis]

Actually, game copy protections are once again getting seriously intrusive.

I've purchased several games that have refused to run without a NOCD patch due to who-knows-why.

Yeah, way to treat your paying customers.

Sadly, all I can do is send a complaint to the company because copy protections aren't exactly printed on the packaging, and stores don't take returns.

Re:Arrrgh Analogies!

[vertinox]

It's like being offended that walmart has stolen goods detectors at the exits.

No. It would be more like if Walmart put a goods detector in your house to check to make sure you weren't bringing in competitor goods or in fact making use of your goods in ways they did not want in order for you to pay twice for them.

Oh noes! It looks like you just used the plunger to clean the bathroom upstairs and it clearly states in the EULA that the plunger you purchased at Walmart must be used only for the licensed bathroom downstairs!

In that scenario, I would be very offended.

He should become a producer

[cryfreedomlove]

I understand that this guy wants to live in a world where entertainment data (audio CD, DVD, downloaded audio, etc) is released without DRM. He can create that world today. All he has to do is produce content that everyone wants and release that content with no DRM at all.

The best way to win over the hearts and minds of the people is to live your life as a shining example of the good behavior that you want emulated. That's going to be much more effective world change for DRM than whining in a blog.

I have a solution

[freeweed]

If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music.

Ok, here's one: sell music without DRM. CDs, mp3s, DVDs, whatever floats your boat.

CD burners have been available for nearly a decade now. Mass copying of digital music has been feasible, and known to your average Joe, for years now. Broadband is pretty standard in most countries. Yet people still buy CDs by the millions.

Why?

Because the vast majority of people are honest. They'd LIKE to pay for things. I know it's easy to assume everyone is out to steal from everyone else, but the numbers simply don't reflect this. Mass copying of free digital music has been available and easy to use for years now, and yet people still buy CDs by the truckload.

You're always going to lose some sales due to piracy, sure. Maybe even a decent percentage (10-20%). But overall, most people are quite willing to give up some money for a quality product. Don't believe me? Here in Canada, copying CDs for personal use is 100% legal. Most interpretations of the law say that sharing/downloading mp3s is also 100% legal. Yet CDs still sell, and sell well. Record stores aren't going out of business in droves, people still have a collection of CDs in their cars, and the music industry is still making a profit.

Should copying be illegal? Maybe. That'll stop the casual users. DRM will never stop the dedicated. They're just not interested in buying your music. Short of not releasing it, you'll never stop these people. But the masses will happily pay for unencumbered mp3s.

It's kind of like bottled water. Water is free, right? Then why is bottled water a multi-million dollar industry?

Convenience. Imagine a music store with everything, and no DRM. I'd be paying thousands every year for music at the rate I chew through it, even though I could easily get it for free. DRM doesn't stop music from getting onto P2P networks, and it never will. All it does is stop me from buying music from iTunes, etc.

Re:I have a solution

[Total_Wimp]

I'm one of those generally honest people you speak of. I buy CDs regularly and I avoid "file sharing." I have hundreds of albums worth of MP3s that came straight from the CDs I bought.

I'd like to buy music online, but I'm faced with some problems. I prefer higher quality music than iTunes offers. They don't have a choice of spending a bit more for better quality; it's just one size fits all. Then there's the fact that I have to use their media players to play my music. My cell phone and PSP will all of a sudden become useless as music players unless I go through the cumbersome burn/re-rip process that will give me even lower quality than I started with.

Even though I'd love the convenience of downloading, I still have good ol' CDs. I can get universally playable MP3s at any quality I want. I'm happy. Except now they're putting DRM on those too. I can no longer assume that the CDs I buy will ever be playable on my PSP without jumping through a whole grab-bag of hoops. I have to explain to my teen-age daughter that the reason daddy's computer is chock full of hacking software is just so I can listen to the music I legally bought in the store.

And the worst part is that if I really was a "file sharer" the music companies have not stopped me from sharing their music with my favorite P2P client. All they've done is made an honest guy's music listening experience an exercise in frustration.

Thanks.

TW

Tipping Point

[rlp]

I reached the same conclusion about three years ago. I've not bought any CD's since. I did try out iTunes and bought a few tracks on-line. The trouble with iTunes, is that it was a hassle to move the music to my MP3 player or to create mix CD's for my car. Possible yes - but ultimately too much trouble. So, I cancelled my iTunes account.

I think with the Sony Rootkit and the publicity it's been getting, that we're reaching a tipping point. Music sales are down. People are already frustrated that they can't use music that they paid for, in devices that they paid for. Now they have to wonder - is this going to damage my PC? Expose it to malware and possible attack? The industry shot themselves in the foot years ago. They are continuing to do so, and have switched to heavy caliber weapons. It will be interesting to see how well music sells this holiday season.

Having does not mean using

[SuperKendall]

What I really dislike about DRM is the general consensus that everything actually will have DRM in the future.

While I think most devices will have some form of DRM, I am not as worried about devices having DRM as having to use it.

I don't care if Blu-Ray has the most ass-backward DRM the universe has yet devised - as long as I can burn my own content on a Blu-Ray disc and play it using that player, and give it to other people to play. Similarily while the iPod supports DRM it also supports ways to use the iPod that involve no DRM whatsoever. The DRM does increase device cost but that is an up-front and one-time cost I can roll my eyes over, and watch as at times that cost becomes too great and prevents adoption of what would otherwise be a good device.

As long as there is a path for free content to flow through a system I am not as worried about DRM because it lets media producers willing to relinquish controls compete on the basis of freedom to use media. If mainstream media becomes locked down too tightly, new avenues of media will spring up that are more open. You can see that today with online movie sites, even with news video fed from various bloggers. Not all producers of media are interested in a total lockdown of thier work, and those people will have the benefit of a wider natural distribution rather than having to pay people to take something.

"Piracy==lost sales" and other myths

[c0d3h4x0r]

First of all, piracy does not equate to lost sales. The vast majority of people who consume pirated software/music/movies are people who couldn't/wouldn't pay the retail price in the first place. There's a simple reason that piracy is mostly rampant on college campuses: students are poor.

Secondly, since when did the purchase of a CD change from "owning a copy" to "being licensed to experience the content"? I haven't seen a licensing agreement printed in any of the CDs I've bought. When I buy a DRM-unencumbered CD, I am owning that copy of the content. I can (and will) do whatever I want with it. Just because iTunes comes along and starts "licensing" the content in DRM-encumbered form, that doesn't mean that the nature of purchasing a raw CD has suddenly changed.

Thirdly, the entire public debate about copyright law, DRM, the DMCA, piracy, etc, all really boils down to one simple thing: what is ethical is not the same as what is legal, and vice-versa. The government is supposed to serve the people by refining the law until it accurately reflects what is ethical. Unfortunately what we have right now is a body of law that is radically divergent from what is ethical. Throughout history, whenever the government and the law have gone against what is ethical, civil unrest has resulted and has in fact been the only way to set things right. Digital piracy is just the latest form of civil unrest. Since the government is clearly in the pockets of rich special interests, piracy is the only form of civil unrest and demonstration the public has left at its disposal. So from an ethical stance, piracy is a good thing because it is the only counter-force fighting to swing the law and government back toward what is ethical.

Maybe is it time considering netlabels ?

[Soundshake]

Check these out:

http://www.phlow.de/netlabels/index.php/Main_Page
http://www.archive.org/audio/netlabels.php
http://numia.scene.org/n2/yellowpages.php
http://www.rowolo.de/labels
http://www.acowo.org/labels.php