Japan's Cell Phones May Get DRM, At Music Industry Behest

An anonymous reader writes "The Japanese Music Industry is currently in talks with Japanese cell phone providers to introduce a new anti-piracy system in all cell phones in Japan. This new system would make DRM software mandatory in all cell phones; this would connect to a DRM server on the Internet whenever the cell phone user would try to play a song. The song would only play if the response of the server would be positive. Otherwise no song would be played. The system raises several questions and concerns that the Financial Times article did not address. These include ripped legally bought music and music that has been released under a CC license or similar. Who would pay for the costs of the DRM checks, and what would happen if no connection could be established?"

Comments

user would pay for all costs

[postmortem]

you think that some global company would rather "decrease their profits and shareholder value"?

Yet Another Sky Is Falling

[mr_stinky_britches]

Defective by design, as usual. I'm sure firmware hacks/mods will be created if this were to be implemented on a wide scale. No worries, really.

Re:Yet Another Sky Is Falling

[Anonymous Coward]

No, not really, most people don't want to deal with hacking their phone... but then again most people with music on thier phone in Japan bought it over-the-air anyway, since the interface to the computer isn't usually all that convenient and most people don't have computers.

On the other hand, and people with computers and/or a lot of music probably already have iPods (or similar), so they won't much care.

As far as passing costs onto consumers, sure, they can raise the prices, but demand will fall, meaning it will cost the phone companies.. which gives them an incentive to resist it.

Re:Yet Another Sky Is Falling

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, for most of the 1990s/early 2000s, personal computers took a distant second to mobile phones/PDAs in Japan for personal internet access. The degree of dominance changed while I was living there, but as late as 2007, most people people were still using their mobiles/cells for SMS/text messaging, email, and searching for information. It was just a very different set of expectations about what form data needed to be in to move to/from individuals.

Most net cafes in Japan evolved from "manga-kissa": cafes where people could get a drink and read magazines in a semi-secluded booth for a bit. Rather than a single room with 15-40 PCs wedged into it, net cafes in larger cities in Japan have evolved into places where a person can rent a little bit of privacy with added amenities. It's not uncommon for people to pay JPY1500 for a package that allows them to stay from 11PM to 6AM in a cubicle with access to magazines, comics, PS2/3 games, DVDs, a net-connected PC, reclining office chair, and access to a shower. But for a lot of people the net access is far less important than the chance to sit down in a little bit of privacy, and maybe get cleaned up before they go back to the outside world.

Aaaaaanyway, the point is that different people have different expectations of how tech and data should be presented, interacted with and controlled.

Good Lord!

[chef_raekwon]

the skillz market for hacking phones just went up again. when will these music industries/RIAJ/RIAA/etc ever learn from Amazon/Ebay/etc? Its all about customer experience. This may be the same reason why top100 music generally licks balls.
my 2 cents.

Re:Good Lord!

[Drakkenmensch]

When a comment on slashdot contains the words top100 licks balls and gets a 5 - insightful rating, you know that the RIAA painted itself into a corner that may never dry off again.

No connection?

[fucket]

What if you're on the subway and you want to play a song? You know, like 75% of all people do everyday on their way to and from work.

Re:No connection?

[chetbox]

What if you're on a plane? There's no coverage there and it's one of the places I'm most likely to want to listen to my music.

Re:No effect whatsoever

[0123456]

The technology will go into place, be pretty much invisible, and provide enough benefits for legitimate users that no one will cry except for people who aren't connected in any way to Japan.

In what way will this provide _ANY_ benefit to legitimate users? They can already play their music, so they will see no benefit from having to 'phone home' to verify that they can, and will see significant risks of being incorrectly refused the right to play music they've been given or paid for.

Users can only suffer from this nonsense, because they can only be denied the right to do what they've been doing up until now.

You know the answer

[acehole]

"Who would pay for the costs of the DRM checks, and what would happen if no connection could be established?"

If anything the last decade has taught us about the modus operandi of music industries is that they simply dont care and want their dollars. Who would pick up the tab for the check? The phone user. What would happen if there was no connection? No music.

Re:No effect whatsoever

[socceroos]

Bullcrap. Your premise is all up the creek. Telecom companies are not going to upgrade their infrastructure just because the music industry wants DRM everywhere. This has never happened in the past and it will not happen in the future. You're basically saying that the only reason that Telecoms are going to upgrade their networks is because they have deliberately increased the traffic themselves, not because of demand?!?!?

If this technology is getting implemented invisibly then why did it make front page news on slashdot?? Phail. Not even Echelon has been implemented invisibly.

Are you really telling us that because some people download pirated material we are not going to get any service upgrades? If not then why do you equate having phones without DRM with a free life in squalor?

Lastly, why on earth do you think that this isn't going to cause problems? DRM has caused major disruptions everywhere else it has been implemented. Do you think the Japs have the miracle fix for DRM that the rest of the world has been missing?

will fail

[xigxag]

All these hypothetical examples are beside the point. If the music industry wants this implemented, it will likely happen.

But even so, it won't work. Japan's music industry is even more moribund than the US industry. It got fat and comfortable charging for singles the equivalent of what US consumers charge for albums, and for albums, the equivalent of US$30 or more. Meanwhile it pushes the same arthritic set of superstars that have dominated their pop scene for 10, 15, 20 years or more. The end result is that the cost of entry for unknown acts is too high, new music suffers. Japanese consumers have grown accustomed to buying albums used and ripping them. Locking mobiles will just increase the sales of walkmans and ipods and will make it more of a no-brainer to circumvent DRM'ed music.

JASRAC Strikes Again...

[Xin Jing]

I remember living in Okinawa back in 1993, JASRAC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JASRAC cracked down (and again in 2006) on club owners that played pre-recorded music at bars and nightclubs and profited by selling drinks and food to customers. Some clubs faced retroactive fines in the tens of thousands of Yen and were forced to close down. Just outside the gate near Kadena was the 'A-Sign Sound Bar' that used to play requests, the entire side of an album, man those were good times. Ah, the good old days: Okinawa and lots of Orion beer.