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Yahoo Exec Speaks Against DRM
AWhiteFlame writes "Dave Goldberg of Yahoo spoke against DRM on media files last Thursday at the Music 2.0 conference in Los Angeles. From the article: 'According to attendees, Goldberg pointed to the experience of eMusic, which offers its subscribers access to MP3 files without any digital rights management attached. Rights management restrictions have created a barrier for consumers, he said, making it a hurdle to transfer music to portable devices, and creating incompatibility between music services and MP3 players ... A Yahoo spokeswoman said that Goldberg was 'basically trying to move the industry forward,' and wanted to prompt industry-wide discussion about what the consumer experience is."
...considering Yahoo's music service uses a propretary media player (Yahoo's) with a propretary DRM implementation (Microsoft's) on the subscription model where your music is all deleted when you cancel your subscription... by DRM.
My 3D Texturing Skinning work (under construction)
...DRM will only hit the buffers when ordinary users realise they're paying for their own shackles. At the moment I suspect it's still only a tiny minority of users who care about this issue, so "the market" still makes it worth record companies' while to impose DRM. Hence, while Emusic is a great service, it only has quite a limited selection - and even more limited if you live in the UK, and run up regularly against "This is not available for download in your country" notices even on Emusic.
Goldberg was 'basically trying to move the industry forward,' and wanted to prompt industry-wide discussion about what the consumer experience is."
The consumer experience is basically no lube, no reach-around.
The music industry thinks that everyone is a pirate. "Rights management restrictions have created a barrier for consumers" while having absolutely no influence on people who pirate music. Short discussion, huh?
We have to deal with the real world as it is. ...I mean, as we and our buddies made it.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
I never understood the whole "DRM" idea.
In the day of the tape/casette/VCR players, nobody would cry about people with tape/casette/VCR recorders because they copied some music/movies from a rental service, or TV, or the radio.
I wonder what would happend if EVERYTHING got DRM-enabled, and "piracy" would all but dissapear.
Who the frag would even BUY some (?crappy?) music AT ALL if they never heard a single verse, nor seen a single scene, etc.
I'd have to argue internet piracy has BOOSTED sales of crappy stuff.
Because they spread it around to stupid morons who actually enjoyed it.
I say go ahead, DRM-ize everything.
Talk about shooting your own foot...
By reading this signature you agree to not disagree with the post you just read.
I wonder if he really cares, or if he is just advertising for eMusic. Heck, if eMusic has a wide song base, I would buy from them over a DRM'ed source with better quality.
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.-TJ
My cousin purchased a CD from EMI Music, but since he doesn't have a Discman, he tried to rip the music to MP3, however the CD wouldn't let him. It came with some software to rip the music to WMA format. Then he tried to load the music to his iPOD, which is also supposed to convert the WMA to MP3 I think. But it didn't allow him because the music was copyright protected. Stuff like this just screws the consumer.
The problem EMusic has is that it is impossible to browse their catalogue unless I sign up for a "free trial".
I don't want to sign up for anything unless I know WTF I am going to be able to buy. I find most people fit into the same mindset. You need to know what artists are available before you are going to jump into this new unknown site.
Just another reason to use one of the more 'grey' sort of download sites ...
From what I've heard, they have more format and bitrate selection, and are cheaper. Anybody know of a good one, and can I trust them with my credit card number?
It would be great if yahoo is planning that MP3 music downloads in future. I am tired of burning music from itunes to cd and ripping it back to mp3 with a loss in quality as well.
They called me mad, and I called them mad, and damn them, they outvoted me. -Nathaniel Lee
Obviously theres a big 3. ... ? before the profit, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
I think this touched upon one key part though the portable media player market. While the growth seen there has been tremendous, it has been largely focused on one product the iPod. Dont get me wrong I love my iPod and think it is an excelent designed product but there are some other items out there that have caught my eye but I would not be as interested in because they dont play well with the music collect that I have bought (stupid me) and my computer (a mac, although remarkably usually less of an issue). If there was an open format without DRM i might be able to explore some of these items, and might end up with another one or two MP3 players, i had to ditch last two MP3 players because they didnt work with iTunes.
Now that the consumer perspective has been voiced, my reality is that I dont see any of these companies removing the DRM anytime soon especially since it promotes sales of its own product (iTunes and iPod is the perfect example). I dont pay for music, and all the MP3 i have i have created (or acquired...) so they are in a format I can work with. Nice idea of all the companies playing nice with each other and the consumer but I am quite skeptical at the same time. it is in their best interest for the time being to continue with the path they have created.
30% Troll, 50% Underrated, 10% Interesting
Score:5, Troll
Is it me or does it sound like Yahoo! is making some sort of apology for their man daring to suggest DRM is bad? It's a shame that DRM seems almost inevitable now, despite the high profile debacle last year of Sony's rootkit and patches, it doesn't seem to have translated into a public awareness of what DRM is and how it restricts you. iTunes for example, seems to be doing rather well, it just reached its billionth download.
A lot of music stores have been having difficulty competing with the iTunes Music Store, and with good reason, iPods are hip, and the only Store guaranteed to work with the iPod is the iTMS.
However there is another way, if Yahoo's store sold, instead of DRM encumbered MS only files, un-DRMed AAC or MP3 files, these would work fine with the iPod, they could sell them at a lower cost than iTunes and compete with Apple.
Of course the RIAA will never allow them to do this, because non-DRMed music is bad, right?
They cried all the way to the supreme court! This is verse 900 of the exact same song.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
The only way I'll pay for downloaded music is if its lossless (wav,flac) and if it costs significantly less than the CD. If the artist only has 1 good song they aren't worth giving any money to. If they can produce an album where I like at least half the songs, and don't hate the rest, then I will buy the music. If the download doesn't cost less than half of what the CD costs, then I don't see where I am getting a better deal.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
"basically trying to move the industry forward..."
and change the issue to "DRM vs. piracy" etc. etc.
instead of the ususal "turning over critics of the chinese government to authorities" etc. etc.
i don't care
Just once I'd like to see someone in the digital-media-has-no-value-and-should-be-free crowd invest two full years of his life pouring everything he has into creating something digital.
Then I'd like to see him upload it to a p2p server, turn his empty pockets inside out, shut his pie hole, and walk away.
Did his two years have any value?
I would like a clarification- are people unhappy at the recent attempts at DRM implementation or the entire idea of DRM?
If digital media has little or no vaue, why do so many people want it?
If you want it, pay for it.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Basically, the consumer experience is that if you are law-abiding and buy your music, then you have all kind of limitations and problems, in exchange for your money. If you make an unlicensed copy then you have a very nice free file with no strings attached. I reminds me of the old dentist joke that said that there was a dentist that had in his waiting room a sign stating that pain-free treatment was 30 dollars, but painful treatment was a hefty 600 dollars. When the patient asked if there was an error, the dentist said no, those were the right prices. Patients of course opted for the painless and cheap. So that's the choice the consumers are facing now.
What? The joke's punchline? Well, the dentist simply started treating with no kind of pain killers, of course the patient felt a lot of pain and started crying aloud. Then the dentist said "No cries, no cries or I'll charge you the full "Painful" fee".
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
Sadly, the Slashdot eds decided not to run my story about the Gowers Review calling for evidence as of yesterday, so since it's directly relevant I'll mention it here.
For those who don't know, this is a government-ordered review into the current state of intellectual property, and whether it needs amending in light of new technologies, easy distribution over the Internet, etc.
The review is concerned with several quite general questions, quite a few specific issues, and any other comments interested parties care to make. Among the specific issues explicitly mentioned in the call for evidence (available on the web site linked above) are:
So, if you're from the UK and you've ever bitched on Slashdot about the unfairness of DRM, the media cartels gaining ever longer "temporary" protections, the daftness that format-shifting is illegal even when the industry is happy to sell you equipment that all but requires it to be useful, the use of patents to create a barrier to entry for OSS, or any number of other IP-related issues, stop complaining on here and write to the Gowers Review to make your case. You can bet the big businesses all will be.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I have no problem paying for music, as a matter of fact I pay for everything I listen to (excluding a total of I believe 3 songs that I could not find for purchase on CD that I managed to find online). I only buy real CDs however, I refuse to purchase songs online because of restrictions and other issues. I have two mp3 players in my possesion, one that's older than dirt, only plays unrestricted mp3s, my other is a Rio Karma. If I were to pay to download music I couldn't play it on my flash based player. Is this fair? If I could buy music online that would play on all of the things I want to play it on, I would gladly purchase it online.
(NOTE that it should cost me less than CDs, and considering that a good number of my CDs were purchased through clubs, such as BMG, even iTunes prices don't come close. 8.99 as compared to 3.99. 5 dollars more for restricted junk)
Someone's going to be formerly a Yahoo Exec in 3...2...1...
That's fine, then there is no need on any P2P box for any non-Linus Torvalds created files.
1. Not everyone feels the way Linus does.
2. It's a big croc to try to make others feel guilty for wanting to feed their kids by charging whatever the market will bear for their products.
Here's a headline you will never see:
P2P server brought to it's knees due to vast demand for open source..
Cogito Ergo Sum
wanted to prompt industry-wide discussion about what the consumer experience is.
Consumer experience? Consumer experience?!? Look, the corporations are the corporations because they know what makes a good consumer experience. They wouldn't be so rich, and they wouldn't be running this country if they didn't know what was best for us. Now buy what they tell you to, the way they tell you to, and quit your bitching. Why can't you people just see it their way?
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
That's exactly the problem-- there is no way to both let one use it anyway he wants AND have any kind of controls for the product's creator.
If one doesn't like the way a given DRM is implemented then he should not buy the product.
However, not liking a DRM implementation is NOT a valid reason for going all out to enable lots of people to steal the content.
This all goes back to whether or not digital data has value similar to other physical products like cars, boats, or steak dinners. Of course it does.
If digital data (in any form) had no value, why would so many people be willing to steal it?
Cogito Ergo Sum
I just read at telefono that Nokia has an iPod-killer phone that's having some serious delays? The culprit? Microsoft's DRM is harder to port than they had originally thought.. http://telefono.revejo.org/article/7/nokia-n91-del ayed-due-to-microsoft-drm
The people have already spoken regarding this matter, and it shows in today's immense popularity of file swappers and format converters.
We want free music that can run on all devices (PC, portable players, cell phones, etc.)
We're sick of getting gouged by $20(or more) CDs with little, if any, worthy content. Does anyone remember how we were told CDs would go down in price after they became more popular than tapes? Well, that point arrived 10+ years ago! So until I see musicians starving on the streets, I'm not giving any more money to a business full of crooks.
That's fine, then go download dead european composers music to your heart's content.
But if it's hacked software or copyrighted music stay the heck away from it.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Basically, DRM is a fact of life. Given that people can download and upload any file free of charge, etc, it needs to be done, otherwise files get swapped around etc.
What needs to be done is a format used which has good quality at a decent file size (something like Musepack would be ideal), a DRM scheme added to it and lots of plugins released for lots of players on lots of different OSes. Maybe something like Steam could be worked out, so that the plugin talks to the client, makes sure the music is authorised and then lets it play. If there was enough platform support, this could go a long way.
Of course, the media being what it is, I doubt something like this would happen.
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
That's the problem--- it's rarely for one's own personal use. If even one disgruntled socialist uploads the digital product to a P2P server the horse is out of the barn.
Until honest people police the nairdowells there will be DRM.
Therefore there will always be DRM to thwart pirates.
Cogito Ergo Sum
This is surprising, given that the media companies do seem to be taking the Goldberg approach to DRM.
Big ones, small ones, some as big as yer 'ead!
Give 'em a twist, a flick o' the wrist...
There are ways to distribute data over the internet securely to devices that also lock down the data.
You are correct people want to distribute the way they used to--- and with the internet they can give away the product to the planet and totally subvert the owner's ability to be paid what he should.
Let the market decide.
Cogito Ergo Sum
This article is talking about allowing *PAYING* users to use their music as they please, not about giving users music for free.
I own a Treo 650. It is my only portable device other than my laptop. It will stay that way until I replace it wholesale with another PDA/phone combo.
I will willingly pay for music, under one condition - it will play back on my Treo. This means no DRM. I HAVE purchased music from iTMS during the periods where PyMusique worked, and I have never made the un-DRMed purchased tracks available to anyone else.
If it won't play back on my Treo and can't be played under Linux, I won't pay for it. It's simple as that. If both of those conditions are met, I will (and have) paid for my music.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
yes, the consumer experience sucks. thank you for broaching the subject with your peers in denial. it's not fun being called a criminal just because you want to listen to the music you like with ease. and to not be called a criminal means you must jump through so many hoops, such that being a "criminal" looks more attractive. one beings to wonder then if the real criminals aren't sitting in the board room next to you. so many thanks to you, David Goldberg
thank you,
the consumers
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
this guy a month before he's found in a ally with a bullet in his brain pan.
and for yahoo...
this news is good to hear on a number of levels.
1. It shows people in the search industry are in tune with the resistance against DRM, and understand that DRM is anti-consumer
2. It shows that Adam Smith's invisible hand and black box are still applicable to the online music industry
A Yahoo spokeswoman said that Goldberg was 'basically trying to move the industry forward,' and wanted to prompt industry-wide discussion about what the consumer experience is."
awesome, now we need to make sure that as the debate over DRM inches into the mainstream, the context and framing of the issue stays where it should: protecting consumer rights
Thank you Dave Raggett
Perhaps they should get a job that attempts to better society.
And who decides what is a valid attempt to better society-- why isn't the job I choose satisfactory? In America I DECIDE FOR MYSELF and my paying customers affirm or deny my choice- not people who want to steal my works.
The Open Source community has helped to drive the cost of computers down by providing lower cost computers. This then allows greater access for people to reach the internet and perhaps improve themselves by learning more.
What? At no time have I or anyone I know purchased a computer (at CompUSA or Best Buy or anywhere) that had a little tag stating "you save 10% because we use open source!" Further, Ma and Pa Kettle isn't going to the computer show to purchase hardware and then downloading a free OS. In the real world this doesn't happen.
Society needs alot LESS "artists" and alot more Teachers, Engineers, IT folks, Programmers and Scientists.
Who again is deciding what society needs?
In the United States mostly it is the consumer. And those caught with their hand in the P2P cookie jar may well get slapped with lawsuits as have been showing up in the news recently.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Yahoo, however, prohibits the download of songs with the string "allah" in them.
Remember kids, with great power comes great opportunity to abuse that power
Someone at Terry Semel's office is going to rat the poor bastard out for speaking his mind. The guy should start looking now because *if* he makes it to another review, it won't be pretty.
There goes those damn computer nerds spoiling the Industry. Well, it ain't gonna happen at Yahoo. That's for sure.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
I just bought my first MP3 player 3 days ago and believe it or not I am a techie. I just never needed a portable player. (When I jog, I listen to the river, birds and the sound of my fat arse wheezing)
bought a few songs from Yahoo music. wma format. tried to move it to my laptop via an SD card. no go.
had to burn to CD and then re-rip into MP3.
DRM is bad for the environment!
...because if its existance keeps the RIAA happy and off my back, that's a good thing. There will always be a way to remove the DRM via questionable means, but only the nerds will know about it. Let the people who just accept DRM blindly be, and continue to circumvent DRM as necessary.
Too bad there's no link from www.emusic.com
Me making a copy of some data you possess does not deprive you of that data.
...) for the information they create. Imposing artificial scarcity on their creations is not the answer.
So it's not stealing. It might be illegal under the current laws, but it's not stealing. Stealing means taking something that someone else owns, and DEPRIVING them of it.
The true meaning of "information wants to be free" is that *everybody* can have a copy of the data and *everybody* can benefit from it.
DRM is an artificial attempt to make digital data more like real property. But why would we want something with all the drawbacks of real property when we could each have a copy of the information and equally benefit?
The marginal cost of reproducing digital data is very close to zero. It only makes sense to not share data, if the information it contains has more value when only a limited set of people possess a copy. (e.g. stock trading data). For something like music, you having a copy of the music has no effect on how much I can enjoy my copy. Therefore it makes no sense for society to use DRM or whatever, to try and enforce limitations on that copying.
Maybe we need a mechanism for society to compensate creators of interesting or useful information (e.g. musicians and artists, journalists,
I'm not going to buy a song I've never heard.
You can hear the song fine on the normal radio or XM radio or even yahoo music-- free. If you want the high quality/fidelity version you have to pay for it.
Matches are free.
Matches are not free. Although they be at no cost to you, they are in fact a marketing device designed to get you to buy flammable products such as cigs, firewood, etc. Their real cost comes out of the marketing budget of the company selling the flamable items. When you buy the flamable items a fraction of the gross goes to pay for the matches.
Further, if you go into the convenience store and grab ALL the matches for yourself you will likely get a foot in your behind. They are for eveyrone, not just you.
Water is free.
No, only rain is free. Normal water you have to pay for. It has costs associated with it such as laying the pipes that carry it or the cute plastic bottles holding it at the convenience store.
Who am I and where do I work? I am a consumer in the real world. And I vote with my dollar.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Will someone please mod the GP back up. Although you might not agree with him/her, I thought it was a reasonable question from the point of view of an artist whose music is being copied on P2P networks. What is the point of a discussion around here if you can't listen to both sides?
I've refrained from using terms such as bit-torrent because their reputation can be determined by others; not me.
The people hopping mad at me about these posts sure seem to be the ones who think they should fully control what they can do with a product once they have access to it.
That control is between them and the product's creator. If they don't like the rules they should not buy the product. What's so tough to understand about that?
Cogito Ergo Sum
Please explain to me, then, why every VCR you can buy in stores has a Macrovision circuit, which causes the video signal to become intentionally degraded if you use a Macrovision signal (like a rental VHS tape played on another VCR, or a DVD player) on the line input - and not necessarily only if you happen to be recording that signal on the VCR. This is the same as DRM and it's worked its way into just about all the consumer-level VCRs out there, and it's been around for ages.
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand
I am an emusic subscriber and I think it's a great idea. I like how I can get the standard mp3 format without any DRM. The bit rate is one thing that is kind of weird. It seems like it is different for ever song. However, it is always good usually in the 180-200+ range.
The other thing I really like about eMusic is the pricing. I pay $9.99/month for 40 songs. That's $.25 per song. It's even better if you do the $19.99/month for 90 songs, just over $.22 per song. Another cool thing is it remembers what you download and you can download it again later for no charge. The site is really well done also.
That said, the biggest problem with eMusic is the selection. They add new music all the time, but they have virtually no mainstream music. For the most part, that is ok with me. They do have a lot of Jazz and Classical and music for lots of other genres you don't normally hear on the radio. Great for trying new music at a low cost.
As a producer of digital media I would love to protect my investment.
But I do appreciate peoples desire to move it from one device to another.
I would make this wager, for most people on this site the only good DRM is no DRM. Most want stuff-for-free. So posting anything other than that will get one hammered most of the time.
Cogito Ergo Sum
I pity the poor people who don't understand enough Chinese to use Yahoo! China MP3 search and download because Yahoo has got it right in China. Free, and it's got to be legal, right? It's Yahoo that's doing this, the RIAA would have attracted attention to this a long time ago if this was illegal. Try it with the help of babelfish or something, and see if you like it. It covers a whole lot, and will most definitely have what you're looking for. Bonus- no threat of being sued! This is the direction that Yahoo may be taking with the discussion, but maybe not...
OSx86 FTW
There is an open, DRM-free format. Its called OGG. Some players even support it. But you, like almost all consumers, aren't willing to buy them because they don't work with the piece of software you want to use. The companies know this and lock you in to their products to protect their revenue streams. DRM is just another mechanism for this.
Nothing's free, you have to give a little to get a little. In your case, you gave $$$ (ipod) to get compatability with a piece of software and the DRM that comes with it. Others are willing to give compatability to get open, DRM-free capability. Although they are the minority. As to why they are the minority and not the majority, that is beyond me....I for one won't pay for my own shackles.
Me making a copy of some data you possess does not deprive you of that data.
It's the uploading to a P2P server or sharing with one's friends that does deprive the author of revenue. So that is the sealing aspect.
The true meaning of "information wants to be free" is that *everybody* can have a copy of the data and *everybody* can benefit from it.
Info wants to be free? Which communist manifesto does this come from? Information is a product just like my car. Steal the car, go to jail. Steal the data, there should be the same result.
The marginal cost of reproducing digital data is very close to zero. It only makes sense to not share data..
Whoa, now you are deciding for all authors how much money they are allowed to make? What if some random guy showed up at your job and said your efforts add marginally to our happiness, we are therefore reducing your pay to 25 cents per hour.
Bet that wouldn't fly too far. Now you understand how content owners feel.
Maybe we need a mechanism for society to compensate creators of interesting or useful information.. artifical scarcity..
We already have a mechanism: the marketplace. If honest people like something the vote with their dollars. If honest people do not like something they don't buy it. The only scarsity that exists is when one's wallet runs empty.
I promise you, if you open your wallet the music will be there waiting.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Thats a pretty dumb question. I own two. I've had my 3rd generation for about 2.5 years now. I use it everyday in my car. I've ripped my entire CD collection and have it stored on my iPod. I've also purchased music from iTunes Music store, although I now choose not to go this route due to DRM. I prefer the CD because of a better sound, no DRM, and the ability to resell it.
I don't know what you mean about not backing up music that is on your iPod. My music is already on my Mac. And its copied to my iPod. If the iPod fails, the music is still on my Mac. If I lose the music on the Mac, I can always get it off my iPod back onto my Mac.
http://www.allofmp3.com/
Upload it to a P2P server, and people will hear it. If it isn't pure shit, they will open their wallets and beg you for more.
Once it's uploaded to the P2P server it has become free. There is no need to open the wallet for something they can get.... FREE.
Back to your original point, I'm not going to buy a song I've never heard.
Using this logic you wouldn't buy the follow-on work I produce either because.. you haven't heard THAT yet either. So again, you want it free.
At this point one would have produced two works desired by people and realized nothing for it.
How do we do it? Volume!
Cogito Ergo Sum
the way music industry decides to sell files is really none of this guy's business. He can bitch about it, but at the end it is the music industry's decision.
You can't handle the truth.
Holy crap. Maybe now we'll start seeing things that DON'T hurt to use.
I think it should be required that corporate execs spend a week without a charge card and 'only' $1000 in cash. Their goal is to use their own service as much as possible in one week. See how many times they have to call tech, etc. I think it would be a good test of their own infrastructure: put the top at the bottom and see how far they get before they want to stab someone.
.cig - what you do after winning a good flame war
You don't see where you're getting a better deal because you're not a moron.
I do see your point on music.
In my case it's small-time commercial software- but the realities are the same-- P2P sharing of hacked code = loss in profits. Therefore I've got to implement my own DRM.
In the long-term, if I did make it big, the law being developed now will benefit little software guys too.
Struggling? Yes, that describes our little company. Struggling but happy nonetheless.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Here's my "consumer experience":
I stopped listening to music. It's too much hassle. Between bullshit restrictions on what players I can buy to go with what music stores and what artists are on what website and who does what with their precioussss intellectual property, FUCK IT ALL.
Beethoven, perhaps the greatest musician of all time once said something along the lines of he dreams that there should be but one big warehouse where all the artists of the world can drag their art to and come away with what they needed.
That's called the internet people, his dream has come true but you so called "musicians" and "record labels" have botched it. I don't listen to new music anymore. It's too hard for me to get some tunes that are still true to the spirit of music and art. I have my small collection of rock and roll and jazz and classical and I do just fine popping it into the car once in a while.
So ROCK ON Yahoo! man, I hope they listen to you. (disclaimer: I hate Yahoo and worship Google)
Hey, Hey, Hey. Moderators, let's be careful out there. These are real questions that deserve legitimate answers.
Any given legislator/ jurist will have similar questions, and the better they can be answered, the better they can make the right desisions. Moderating the question away won't help anyone.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
What I decided to do was to offer MP3's at around 260-270 kbps. If you can tell the difference between that and lossless, .. you should be an audio compression engineer.
david
BTW, have you bought my compilation yet? It'll cost ya 1 lousy buck.
http://www.bitworksmusic.com/
odd tunes for odd times
BitWorksMusic.com -- odd tunes for odd times
Bullshit, it's my decision. When the "music industry" makes something I don't want, I don't buy it. It's easy enough to get good quality music from artists and publishers who are not pigs. See Magnatune and Internet Archive Live Music.
Microsoft, Apple and others who make hardware that sucks will see similar results. OK, Apple sucks less but it's not good enough to only be a small pain in the ass. My next music player will have random playlists, ogg playback and standard data exchange so that free software can write to it. Here that? It's the sound my wallet makes when I keep it in my pocket.
DRM is stupid. Treating your customers like criminals is bad business. It won't work and no one's going to buy it.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I've been dancing on the head of a pin here. I did commment on mucic but I specifically mention digital content and digital media. In this I'm referring to software- something also under assault by P2P and folks who think they have every right to redistribute it as they please.
This is why I've had to implement my own DRM and the law being determined for digital media now may very well also affect my small company.
And we do have the inherent right to protection of our digital property-- and therefore to realize revenues from it's regulated use.
Cogito Ergo Sum
My experience anyway is that companies have gone to war against the consumer/customer. Sooner or later people will start to realize this and fight back the only way we can - by not buying, or buying as little as possible from "devil companies". They call some of us devil customers, well, it goes both ways.
This is actually quite a stretch, since the artist is first of all potentially loosing the chance to gain money. He has no moey taken away, hence why it is known as potential revenue, and even further why the DIE_HARD pro-IP crowd gets blasted since this is a great logical fallacy that can only serve to perpetuate the fallical "right to profit" instead of the more realistic "right to try and profit" that dominates the real world.
All he said is that the cost of reproduction is near or at zero. I did not see it as "this should nessecarily be the price", unless you are on a serious propaganda trip.
Awww horse-shit... this is just trying to sneak in the logical fallacy that no money = no music... give it up. Supporting those who create the works of art is definately a fine thing and the right thing to do, but for god's sake, works will still be created regardless of price, laws, or lack therefor, always has been done, alwauys will be done, just a matter of probability.
and you, sir, are a language bigot.
They gave away 100 free songs for downloading WinAmp once, I signed up and checked out the music. They have lots of "other" type stuff, but they did have the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack(which was nice during the holidays.) Anyways, unsubscribing was hassle-free, I clicked unsubscribe in the Account, and it was done. Very nice.
Consider you bought 100 cds, at an average of $15 each - that's $1500.
Now consider you put that $1500 in a savings account and collect 4% on it. You'll get back $60/year which is exactly what yahoo music costs.
So assuming prices/rates dont change, it costs the same to buy 100 cds outright or to lease unlimited music for the rest of your life.
My tastes change pretty frequently, so it's a better deal for me to lease my music. That may not be true for you.
All it will take is one phasing out of a popular, legal mp3 player to catch companies with this DRM stuff. When the general public finds a product that they like better than the iPod and tries to migrate to it in the masses and it doesn't support their DRMed iTunes music, they will revolt. When they revolt, the government will step in, and require the DRM be removed from digital music. So basically someone needs to come up with an idea that is strong enough to kill the popularity of the iPod and drive the mass market away from iTunes for this to happen. Get to work!
Cheesy Movie Night
It's quite possible to understand something without 100% agreeing with it, which is what you seem to have missed.
i am a soviet space shuttle
"Rights management restrictions have created a barrier for consumers, he said, making it a hurdle to transfer music to portable devices, and creating incompatibility between music services and MP3 players"
Apple's Rights management restrictions have created a barrier for consumers, he said, making it a hurdle to transfer Yahoo DRMed music to iPods, by creating incompatibility between music services and iPods.
Vote for Pedro
Yep. Personally, I think net companies like Yahoo and Google probably have more credibility with net consumers than record labels do. They probably could make some impact by providing a good music service, but clearly stating that the big labels chose not to participate because they wanted to restrict user's ability to play the music they pay for. Together with the new competition from the labels that were co-operating, that could change the industry noticably.
Well, now they Yahoo is against DRM, I guess its ok they are helping to send Chinesse to politcal re-education camps.
It's only the Yahoo Music Unlimited music jukebox that has the DRM restriction.
Irony = only the Yahoo "Music Unlimited" has the DRM restriction!
cpeterso
OK, how do you define quality?
Look, it's very simple.
Until my $10^H^H 15^H^H 20 (inflation, you know) buys me a live, in-person, on-demand performance by the artist no matter where I'm located, I am not buying into this "recorded" music line of crap. For 1/5 to 1/10 the price of a honest-to-goodness ticket (well, ignoring the +20% processing/handling fee) for a live performance, they want me to buy this inferior, static (and static-filled!) recording? What a racket. My highly-evolved sense of hearing can't stand resampling of any sort. The subtleties induced in the very cells of the body by harmonic frequencies in the 100 kHz - 10 MHz range define true music, and I will not stand for this insult from the aptly-named "recording" industry.
Now, those video-thingies on the iTMS are pretty cool though... I ponied up my $22.89 for the Schoolhouse Rock collection. That's money well spent!
Which publishers considering DRM have not already published this way? The choice is already clear.
The question is will you go out of your way to get an illegally cracked version of the originally DRMed file?
What about the alternate sources of media did you not understand?
The general response is also already clear. People return DRM'd music and music sales continue to plummet. Microsoft and Sony have irreversibly damaged their own and everyone in the industry's reputations with schemes that don't work. People are not buying it.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Not my life. I'm not handing control of my computers over to anyone for entertainment. I'm also not going to be buying any dissapearing files or renting music from pigopolists.
Given that people can download and upload any file free of charge, etc, it needs to be done, otherwise files get swapped around etc.
Electronic networks are the real fact of life. The phonograph and it's industry are obsolete. Those who cling to the old model will be outsold by those who move on. There's more ways to make money than selling physical coppies of crap hyped on ancient, and equally obsolete, broadcast networks.
The less money going to pigopolist, the more money there will be for content creators. Witness Magnatune and recording friendly bands on the internet archive. More money will make more content and everyone will win.
People with bad attitudes make bad product. The alternative publishers are already just as good or better than the pigopolists. The difference is going to become more obvious.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...for various reasons, I get Yahoo! Music for free, and I found the DRM restrictions so onerous that I uninstalled it a few days later. For FREE it wasn't worth it.
That's not just about Yahoo!'s player; it's the DRM that's the problem. I listen to mp3s on the road via iPod through my car stereo, and in the living room via a slim devices product -- if I get a DRM'd product, I can play it one place and not the other. That's just nonsense, and so I stick with CD ripping.
Has been, and still is (I just checked), wholly dependent on ActiveX and IE.
Try to listen to any Launchcast station on music.yahoo.com in Firefox and you get this:
Error
Sorry, we do not support Netscape on the Windows platform.
Error Code 25 - 0
http://ymusicblog.com/blog/2006/02/25/dave-goldber g-to-record-labels-no-drm-please/
ian
I think you mean:
;)
"Isn't this the one that gets defeated by not running Windows ?"