Jobs Favors DRM-Free Music Distribution

Another anonymous reader tips an essay by Steve Jobs on the Apple site about DRM, iTunes, and the iPod. Perhaps it was prompted by the uncomfortable pressure the EU has been putting on Apple to open up the iPod. Jobs places the blame for the existence and continuing reliance on DRM squarely on the music companies. Quoting: "Much of the concern over DRM systems has arisen in European countries. Perhaps those unhappy with the current situation should redirect their energies towards persuading the music companies to sell their music DRM-free. For Europeans, two and a half of the big four music companies are located right in their backyard. The largest, Universal, is 100% owned by Vivendi, a French company. EMI is a British company, and Sony BMG is 50% owned by Bertelsmann, a German company. Convincing them to license their music to Apple and others DRM-free will create a truly interoperable music marketplace. Apple will embrace this wholeheartedly."

Comments

FTA

[roger6106]

Here's the parts I found most interesting:

Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store.

Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven't worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy.

If anything, the technical expertise and overhead required to create, operate and update a DRM system has limited the number of participants selling DRM protected music. If such requirements were removed, the music industry might experience an influx of new companies willing to invest in innovative new stores and players. This can only be seen as a positive by the music companies.

Well, Jobs gets it

[drinkypoo]

At least he understands what the rest of us understand, which is that DRM can never prevent copying. The most it can do is slow it down.

He does get one thing wrong in the article though: "No DRM system was ever developed for the CD". Not true. There are several DRM systems developed for Audio CDs. However, they all depend on the disc being placed into a computer that will pay attention to something other than CDDA tracks, which means they are ineffective on purpose-built CD copiers or computers on which the user has either disabled autorun or holds the shift key while the disc is inserted.

DRM doesn't have to be effective to be DRM...

Re:Or... read the essay.

[2nd Post!]

He actually gives a reason why not:

An equally serious problem is how to quickly repair the damage caused by such a leak. A successful repair will likely involve enhancing the music store software, the music jukebox software, and the software in the players with new secrets, then transferring this updated software into the tens (or hundreds) of millions of Macs, Windows PCs and players already in use. This must all be done quickly and in a very coordinated way. Such an undertaking is very difficult when just one company controls all of the pieces. It is near impossible if multiple companies control separate pieces of the puzzle, and all of them must quickly act in concert to repair the damage from a leak.

Are you going to read his essay or not?

Re:Yeah right... I don't believe it for a second.

[oberondarksoul]

Please read the friendly article. Jobs says that Apple have considered it before, but they're in an interesting position: if FairPlay is cracked, and remains unpatched for a number of weeks, then the record companies can simply pull their content from the iTS. Now, at present, Apple can simply patch FairPlay and push out a new version of iTunes and the iPod firmware. However, with multiple players and stores all using FairPlay, the problem magnifies: if any one of those links in the increasingly-complex chain remains weak, and FairPlay is still exposed, it leaves Apple vulnerable.

Re:mod jobs up

[C0rinthian]

However, a key provision of our agreements with the music companies is that if our DRM system is compromised and their music becomes playable on unauthorized devices, we have only a small number of weeks to fix the problem or they can withdraw their entire music catalog from our iTunes store. With a provision like this, I wouldn't want to license the shit to anyone else either.

Re:Okay, what about OS X DRM?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Is it also the record companies that force Steve to sell OS X with DRM? Do not forget that OS X is tied to Mac hardware by a "Trusted Computing Module".

Have you considered checking your facts? The most recent Macs don't even have a TPM module and no version of OS X ever used it, although some third party utilities did, in order to do more secure encryption. Macintosh computers do check the motherboard to insure it is an Apple one, but no "DRM" is in use and if you look at the code that does that it contains a "please don't violate our license by installing on other hardware" message.

Re:At least Apple is consistent, I guess...

[blzabub]

It sounds like you didn't read Steve Jobs' original message. He explains why licensing DRM to other companies would not work due to the stringent contractual requirements that the music companies have placed on Apple in regards to maintaining the integrity of the DRM system. He also explains that only 3% of the music iPods are capable of storing are DRM'd/from the iTunes store, the other 97% is likely pirated or legally ripped from CDs or other sources. So most people are not locked in since most if not all of the music on their iPods is not DRM'd.

Re:At least Apple is consistent, I guess...

[CowboyBob500]

If you read TFA you'll see that Jobs explains exactly why they don't license their DRM. It's because a requirement of their license to sell the music of the record companies is that any holes discovered in the DRM are patched within a certain time limit. He says that by licensing the technology to a bunch of 3rd parties, that there is more chance of a particular implementation of FairPlay leaking out, yet it would still be Apple's resposibility to fix the holes - but this time for more devices and software platforms. The effectively makes it impossible for Apple to submit to 3rd party licensing because they don't have the resources to be able to take on that level of responsibility.

Bob

Re:Bullshit

[Durandal64]

If Jobs wanted a consistent, all-or-nothing experience, he would make iTunes encrypt all music -- ripped CDs, MP3s from the intarweb, etc.

I said a consistent experience with the store, you blitering idiot. Why the hell would Jobs forcibly have iTunes DRM legitimately-ripped CDs? Hell, this is an argument in favor of Jobs' comments today, not against them. iTunes doesn't even offer the user the option of DRM'ing their rips, unlike Windows Media Player.

The current situation is inconsistent. If a user wants to make a MP3-CD for their car player, some of their songs can be copied (MP3s ripped from original CDs) and some can't (iTunes Store purchases).

Wrong. iTunes will simply convert the protected AACs to MP3's to create the MP3 CD.

How the fuck is that consistent? The average user doesn't understand why there's a difference. They don't know that iTunes Store tracks are encrypted, and they certainly don't know how to tell which is which. They just have a bunch of music and want everything to work the same way.

Bullshit, you retard. There's a "Purchased" category in iTunes that shows you exactly what you've bought from the store, and all music bought from the store has the ".m4p" extension. Have you ever used iTunes?