DRM-Free Music Spells Trouble? 634
digitaldame2 writes "Many opponents of DRM have been overjoyed at recent efforts to free media from its grip. But PC Mag Editor-in-Chief Lance Ulanoff believes the whole world has gone mad. His view is that our digital economy will collapse this way, and it could be followed by countless others. 'The music industry's moves have been terrified reactions to staunch the bleeding of millions of dollars in revenue down the drain. For maybe a year, music companies thought they had the situation under control, but then album sales tumbled. Retailers, musicians, and some music-industry execs thought DRM was the culprit, and they soon joined the chorus of consumers calling for its head. Now consumers are getting their wish, and the music industry will continue to crumble. Giving up control of content and giving it away free are not rational ideas in a market economy, yet everyone's cheering.'" Is the removal of restrictions from our media really that big a deal?
I stole more music before the internet (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh well (Score:5, Interesting)
So what's best? (Score:2, Interesting)
For the past 6 months of reading a barrage of articles painting the ultimate end of the CD and continued surge to online music, why should we NOT jump into the online music pool? DRM or not.........
My Ignorant Opinion (Score:3, Interesting)
Removing DRM won't cause the music companies to collapse any faster than they would with DRM, because motivated individuals will always find a way to break the secret codes.
The question is, will piracy eventually kill the music industry as we know it today? I think it probably will, because honestly, nobody wants to pay to listen to Brittney Spears, they just want to listen to it because MTV made it look cool.
The music companies are damned if they do and damned if they don't, in my opinion, because people are going to pirate anyway, with or without DRM. Even with the draconian powers the DMCA and like-minded laws give them, it's not feasible to sue every pirate, even if they can convince the FBI to go after the pirates for them.
Honestly, I feel kind of sorry for the big music companies. But only as sorry as I feel for the buggy-whip makers of old. It doesn't help their case that they brought Brittney Spears and such to the masses either. But my point is that a new paradigm always has winners and losers, and you can't expect the losers to feel good, especially when it's their whole livelihood they're losing out on. Of course, you can't just let them break your whole legal system in their death throes, so even though I feel sorry for them, I think the best thing for all of us would be just to shoot them and put them out of their and our misery.
How to sell magazines... (Score:3, Interesting)
2) Identify current trend or view.
3) Propose opposing view.
Profit
Like many other posters have already mentioned DRM by-and-large simply doesn't work. Which makes any post-epiphany antithesis, well, rhetoric. We aren't going to have another HDMI incident with our audio and people will get it from one market or another (if paying is too restrictive and cumbersome we've already seen the results).
But hey, he got on Slashdot.
Re:Remember when horses were the only way to trave (Score:3, Interesting)
The moral of this story is: technology. It will force change. Either keep up with it, or remove yourself from the market. Music doesn't have to be paid for - not any more, and no longer will we have to worship the few and provide them economic sustenance, so that they are only able to do it, when the many can do it, themselves.
Are you talking about content generation or distribution? Even if the RIAA goes away, we would be paying artists directly for the music. Unless this really isn't about DRM, but about getting shit for free.
Hippie? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah. I can't figure out who ANYONE could make MONEY charging people RECURRING fees for CONTENT.
I mean, who would pay good money a month for a stack of dead trees?
Whoops, did I switch "magazine" and "music" again?
How old is your daughter again? Oh yeah, failed to mention that. Let me guess, three tops. Hippie? Dude, you're stuck in the 80's, aren't you? Well, at least you didn't use the C word.
DON'T FEED THE TROLL!
Okay, enough making fun of the naysayer, on with the facts:
1. "Consumers" (I really HATE that word) are willing to consume that which is good. The "digital content" folks are in trouble because their content sucks. Rather than admit their faults, they prefer to point fingers. In one sense, the bonehead is correct, DRM-free won't stop the bleeding, but that's because the bandaid is in the wrong place. Radiohead is a good example, people are willing to pay money to support content they like. Duh!
2. DRM-free has value to Consumers because DRM restricts that which they previously enjoyed.
3. Audio quality isn't the issue, if higher quality is desired the demand will be there. Otherwise, non issue.
Re:My Ignorant Opinion (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:DRM is pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
The reason that DRM is breakable today is because computers are not owned by the content distributors (yet). If said content can be played on a computer, then it can be "freed" by that same computer. If you can play it, somewhere you have an uncompressed, unencrypted stream, that should be able to be exploited.
Computers, however are being "owned" more and more by "Big Content". Vista's DRM integration, Protected pathways is a prime example of this. How long before noone owns a comptuer anymore and all the computers are leased from a few companies that basically turn your computer into an overpriced [HD]DVD player that plays games and runs Word, in contrast to the current "open" nature of current computers.
Just look at history... (Score:5, Interesting)
Prior to the commercialisation of the recording industry (which began in the 1910s/20s but only really took off after WW2) the only way the common person understood music was in the context of someone, usually THEMSELF, playing it. On an instrument. That wasn't plugged into an amplifier.
And at the time, there were musicians, and some did very well (Salieri wasn't poor, nor was Handel) but even they had a tiny tiny fraction of the kind of wealth exhibited by the ruling classes at the time. Musicians were still, basically, hired hands. They might be rich hired hands, but not like what we know today. The important point is the context: you knew music as a performance, not as a recording.
Due to the exigencies of technology, music became a commodity, and in classic capitalist fashion, the material costs were reduced to a minimum - finally, they evapourated as data into the interweb thingie. So, now they're trying to put a meter on something that the interwebs have always had a complex and contradictory relationship: data itself. The record companies are not in the business of selling music. They sell CDs. If the CDs had recordings of dogs barking, or were flat out silent, it wouldn't matter to the record companies, as they (in theory) sell what people want.
What people want is music. What people want is something for nothing. What people want is to wish upon a star and get everything they ever dreamed of, and if they can't do that, then they want the music that takes them there....
The music biz started with printing sheet music in the 19th century. It will die trying to sell data. It was an interesting ride. But now the amusement park is closed. Time to go home and make your own music.
Give up on the star system. Make your own, and support the art made by your friends, your family and your neighbours. Give up on this hallucination of Commodity Culture. Learn to play an instrument, and learn to play it well. work with other musicians, and through your own competence and intelligence you will create the hope this world so desperately needs.
and, in the process, go piss on the grave of the music business.
RS
Crumbling industry? Yes and no (Score:5, Interesting)
You say that as if it's a bad thing!
The CURRENT music industry will crumble. As it should; It's built on a 100-year-old business model of scarcity and limited distribution which screws both the artists (lousy contracts, "breakage") and the customers (CDs costs pennies to manufacture but cost much more, 30-year-old titles selling for more than new releases, etc.) and frankly the industry just doesn't add any value. Its not efficient, it doesn't discover or develop substantial new talent, etc. The gig is up. The CURRENT industry is turning out bland pop stars and the public is finally tired of the mediocre "product", the lack of value, and are moving on.
However, there's a new music industry that is forming. It doesn't rely on brick stores and (so-called) talent scouts to "sign" and "develop" talent. You might have heard of it. It's called the Internet. The internet allows musicians to reach the public directly, at low cost, and high convenience. IOW, it provides value at a lower cost. The music cartels do not. Capitalism is working here -- it's weeding out inefficiencies. Cartels lose.
Some sort of music industry will exist simply because people enjoy being entertained with music and are willing to pay for that, however the current model is well past being feasable.
Re:Wow, way wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
And why is this a surprise? They can sell a couple of hundred tickets at a tenner each at a folk club once a year, times perhaps twenty or thirty dates. Most folk clubs are run on a shoestring, and an artist will get a substantial proportion of the door, but let's say it's only fifty percent. Twenty or thirty thousand pounds a year isn't a king's ransom, but it's a living wage, as their expenses are minimal. Throw in some CD sales, perhaps the odd song on a bigger artist's album (one of the guys I'm thinking of does session work for Nanci Griffith and has had a song of his on one of her albums), the occasional small festival: it's a living. They won't get rich, but they didn't ten or twenty years ago, and their ability to email their fans for free means they can sell tickets far more easily than twenty years ago, too.
Artists like this were always reliant on this model, and never sold records in quantity (you couldn't get them in shops), so it's hard to see how their position has changed. Artists who couldn't sell a few hundred tickets times twenty dates weren't selling records either, and for them it was strictly a hobby.
At the big end, someone like Springsteen doesn't give a stuff about record sales. Yes, he reputedly splits the take evenly with his band, but they're grossing something like three million pounds a night in stadiums, and can tour in those for months on end. Say they only get 33% of the gross, so a million a night split ten ways is a hundred thousand pounds. Times a sixty date tour. That's not poverty if they never saw another penny from record sales.
Thirty years ago, musicians toured to support record sales. Now records support tour sales. Markets change. They could always get a job in a shop if they don't like the lifestyle.
ian
Not quite... (Score:4, Interesting)
The reality is that DRM or not, people who wanted to get music for free could get it and people who wanted to share their music could share it. So long as there existed a high quality non-DRM'd format (CD's) or some ability to remove decryption, then DRM was pointless.
I think there is some truth to your point though about on-line sales increasing. I know that I had been hesitant to buy a lot through iTunes for the risk that I'd not be able to play the music elsewhere (or just the hassle of having to license multiple computers with Apple). Now that I can get high quality DRM free tracks from iTunes and Amazon I am far more willing to buy music.
I don't see any negative effect because it's not like DRM was keeping the music off P2P networks in the first place.
Re:How to sell magazines... (Score:3, Interesting)
Did he realized that he was giving away his article DRM-free ? This must be the end of the news print industry!
Re:DRM is pointless (Score:3, Interesting)
The whole problem is related to an outdated business model of ripping everyone off, the labels in other words. I've developed and sold my software for 30 years and could care less about piracy. Actually it makes software known. In the old days dBase was considered to gain much of it market share and recognition initially from piracy, so it seems helpful. It's not like these people would buy from you anyway. Plus it gives legit people a chance to check it out before buying. Now all I do is OSS and I love the model. It's a great facilitator for offering additional services for those who don't want to be bothered.
The labels are crying piracy because that's what they have been doing for all these years. As musicians in general points out you can't make money on CD's unless you get really big numbers. Then labels don't chase after good musicians or make sure there is quality music available. They are too focused on money to see the forest, so to speak.
After 20 years the market is saying enough is enough. We are not going to accept DRM on top of it all.
Mind you these labels actually lobbied for legislation that would allow them to wipe out a computer remotely if they thought it had pirated music on it! No checks or balances, just wipe it!
That kind of an attitude is entirely in line with their general attitude towards artists. The old saying of knowing others the as you know yourself, or some such, comes to mind.
If these real pirates were to go out of business I would not come to their funeral. It would however open up the doors for much better labels to spring up. Labels who actually did not just think of themselves but tried to be an asset. That attitude is far more popular with people and would quickly gain foothold.
Oh noes (Score:4, Interesting)
As a composer and musician, I ask: so
The "industry" (think once more about that word, and what it has meant to *music*) was an anomaly built by pimping pop to teenagers with enough money to buy vinyl. It consumed as many lives as it made dollars. The "star" system, the "underground economy", the proliferation of radio stations choosing what is "worthy"
Good riddance. Music never needed the cigars, the usury, the chains or the money. I look forward to new Woody Guthries running amok in the countryside, new Dylans popping up in depression coffeehouses. As for all the people who've made a very good living from the creativity of others: go sell Amway.
Re:DRM is pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:DRM is pointless (Score:4, Interesting)
I never made any judgments (good or bad) about what that market would be like, just that recorded music wouldn't be a commercial product anymore. I think it's an open question whether that's good or bad.
It's entirely possible that I could, if I wrote a book. (Not likely but possible.) Not that anyone reads books anymore, but it's still possible for successful authors to live off of book royalties. I don't know about you, but I like books and I think authors should get paid for writing them. I'd rather have that somehow tied to how popular the book is in the market, than have that based entirely upon what some rich financier wants to commission, since at least the market would allow for a greater diversity of books and make it more likely that something I would want to read would get published.
Now, you might say (in analogy to live concerts) that authors should support themselves through public book readings. That's stupid because no one goes to public book readings anymore. Plus, a lot of people who are very good at expressing themselves in the written word are interminably boring in person (in particular, myself.)
If we want to reverse the analogy, I think we can agree there's some recorded music that, for whatever reason, the bands can't perform live. Maybe the band is pretty awful on stage even though they can record something decent. Maybe the music is too sophisticated for a band to perform live if it's recorded with, for instance, two simultaneous guitar parts recorded by a single guitarist, or multiple layers of vocals. Maybe it's electronic music which wasn't made with instruments at all, so the only point of performing it "live" would be to run the same synthesizer-and-sequencer program over bigger speakers. Maybe some of this music would still exist, maybe it wouldn't, and I don't know how to judge whether it would be a big enough loss to worry about. But it merits greater consideration and more serious discourse than all-capital letters, repeated punctuation marks, and knee-jerk reactions are suited for.
Re:Wrong question... (Score:5, Interesting)
>No, there's no question about that, it most certainly will.
To suggest that removing DRM will increase piracy is pure falacy, and you know it or you would have followed up that opinion with some kind of supporting example. You didn't.
OK, here's the REALITY.. a perfectly everyday sequence of events:
1) Someone buys band XXX's CD
2) They rip it and put it on PirateBay
Now are you really going to suggest that a DRM free version on iTunes will CHANGE the dynamics of this very real scenario?
No it won't.
If you counter with "well, that's because CD's don't have DRM" then I'll counter that with "so fucking what.. fine, OK, you can record the album using LINE OUT or HEADPHONE like the old days"
DRM is futile unless you carry the concept all the way to the human brain.
Nope... Perhaps purchased music is dying for OTHER reasons, and piracy is just a boogeyman. Here are some reasons people buy less music:
The RIAA hates the idea of "albums" in the first place. They want SINGLES.. and they better not exceed 3 minutes one second.
It's all about radio play. There will never be another Tommy, The Wall, 2112 or Operation Mindcrime due to these RIAA member policies. Why are you surprised then that people fall into this mindset, and ONLY BUY $1 SINGLES?
(Hmm... $1 iTunes single vs $17 CD... ohmygod we lost $16 to piracy!!111)
When people buy, they are buying singles because everything else is contractual filler.
The RIAA literally discourages diversity.. they want formula based music that can be predicted... high dollar investments leaving little to chance.
The RIAA members sat on their ass regarding technology... "stereo" has been around since the 1930's, yet even CARS are capable of 4 and 5 channel sound... but they still publish in stereo. The best concert CDs are BluRay DVDs.
There are even pirate trading groups who specialize in creating AC3 5.1 channel sound from CD audio, because folks are dying for better mediums.
Digital radio on my cable box.. good enough for me. There's also this thing called XM/Sirius... yay, more music you don't have to buy!! That's not piracy... the RIAA licensed this out and the ubiquity of freely listenable music this music IS accounted for, and folks don't care to buy what's still on the radio.
Plus most people are in debt to their eyeballs, and multimedia content is easy to clip from the budget. I don't know anyone who still buys 1 album per week now (or 5 per week, or more) on a regular basis. Years ago that wasn't the case (disclaimer: maybe I'm not a whippersnapper anymore).
It will be a GOOD thing if the music industry contracts because it's a cartel that exists to bloat its ranks with middlemen who were obsolete 20 years ago. Read the 1998 Salon article on RIAA piracy of the artists, written by a very articulate Courtney Love.
Things will settle down, but maybe the record labels will be WEAKER than the artists for a change. (Although content wise, I don't see much of a music revolution while Clear Channel controls so much of the airwaves).
The whole "US Economy will be ruined" by open music is a scam. The same people spouting this belief have simply overvalued their personal investments in the RIAA member companies. If the economy goes down the toilet because of $2 DRM free downloads at iTunes, maybe it was too frail to begin with (and maybe those same DRM cheerleeders shouldn'd have cheered all our manufacturing jobs overseas, to the benefit of no one but themselves).
I respect Lance Ulanoff, But.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Now consumers are getting their wish, and the music industry will continue to crumble.
The sales/downloads of Guitar Hero tracks is making Activision rich. http://www.joystiq.com/2008/01/21/guitar-hero-franchise-passes-the-1b-mark/ [joystiq.com]
Notice that the top downloads do not include todays Pop or Urban Crap (oops) Rap artists.
The RIAA/Studio over priced music model will decline. CD sales suck, not because of the DRM (that sucks too), but because the product (Music) stinks. I want to buy Lordi's CD but can't find a US seller anywhere. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6VzdtmrP6Y [youtube.com]
When can Lordi sell me their tracks though Nintendo/Microsoft/Sony? The future will be Music tracks from Band to Fan (Me).
Not the current model of Band, Expensive Studio, Distribution Conglomerate, Store to Fan tracks.
Enjoy,
Re:Mod parent up (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:DRM is pointless (Score:3, Interesting)
Do you think this is an acceptable tradeoff? If so, why? Because I think that's kind of paradoxical: it would mean that culture is suffering so that you can have easier access to culture. And if that's not an acceptable tradeoff, isn't the purpose of the law to rectify these kinds of imbalances?
Re:Proof by Confusion (Score:2, Interesting)
Besides the politician buying and other forms of thuggery these crooks have engaged in, I'll tell you another reason why I don't feel sorry for these guys. As a teen in the mid-eighties, I thought about how neat it would be to have music on a computerized device that was entirely solid state. Given the state of things then I knew it was impractical but given enough memory, miniaturization, and processing power music without physical media was obvious to me even then. After all, digital sampling was starting to be used to create music wasn't it? Roll forward ten years or so and "mp3 files" are just starting to get going by word of mouth. At that point, there was still time for the industry to figure out how to ride that wave. Instead, they stood on beach and first wagged their fingers and then started desperately firing heavy weapons it. The tsunami barely noticed and didn't care.
Re:Mod parent up (Score:1, Interesting)
Speaking of "sense of entitlement", how about guys like yourself that feel entitled to any and every piece of digital content they can get their paws on without payment? Yours is the most selfish generation in history, and you have the gall to call out producers on their "sense of entitlement"? Good God.
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)
This theory is not true for more and more people in the world with every passing day. It is already untrue to me. Books are large, heavy and vulnerable to damage or loss or just your normal wear & tear. Digital books are not subject to that, you can make a backup (see DRM and the whole thread) and keep the book intact in almost all circumstances. You can search in e-books; they have as much color as the author wants; the access devices can read it to you if you are not in position to read yourself. If the DRM allows, you can copy and paste quotes from an ebook without retyping and risking some unintentional misquote. Everyone on the planet has access (maybe for pay) to any e-book since storing a copy is practically zero cost to a publisher. Infinite number of copies can be made (by the copyright holder) without any drain of finite resources of the planet. Paper is not free, far from it; paper mills are polluting environment and eating trees. Paper books are also not interactive, you can't download a corrected version - and all books have errors. E-books also allow you to add comments to the content without damaging the book itself.
As far as I know, the old school still maintains that reading on paper is easier. Well, if it's easier for them then they are welcome to keep reading on dead trees. For me it is just as easy to read on an LCD. Resolution of modern LCD is good enough for any reading I ever do. Add anti-aliasing and hardly anyone with a normal eyesight can tell a difference; it may even be easier to read on a common LCD as opposed to some junk paper that they tend to use in paperback books. Lighting is also important; it is sure easy to read a font printed on a 2,000 dpi printer on a perfect paper, in perfect daylight. But reading a newspaper in a typical room, printed on a worst paper ever, with ink that smears on your fingers, illuminated by a light that is somewhere on the wall - this is not a good reading environment. In such a case (of which I believe there are plenty) a good reader with controlled brightness of the screen, guaranteed no-smear ink, nice smooth font will easily exceed paper in usability.
This is one of the strong points of the OLPC initiative, by the way. It is very difficult to distribute tens of millions of textbooks to children every year (just as difficult as to collect the previous year's undamaged books from them.) And if you want to study something else, above and beyond the standard course, forget it - the student may never find the right book if the nearest library is 1000 miles away (or only 100 miles, but without a car and fuel it might be on the Moon with the same effect.) Many countries have more than one language, and that is another level of the problem with paper books - you never know where they are needed and how many. Electronic textbooks can be distributed for free to anyone who wants them, and there is no incremental cost per copy, and there are no "unsold copies" to be disposed of. Any country who buys OLPC can afford electronic textbooks.
Mod parent down (Score:3, Interesting)
And that is in many respects cheap, because I didn't have to go to school. Your average photographer spends an obscene amount of money on gear, usually working around 60 hours a week, trying to make a living at it, and you're suggesting that you strip away the protection which allows these people to actually make a living at this. There's often times travel money involved and money spent making sure that the copyrights are being respected so that there's return on investment. Advertising, accounting, image management and careful study to keep ahead of the competition. It really isn't a glamorous field to be in, and definitely not posh.
It's all well and good to say that copyrights are evil, or that it's an entitlement, but ultimately it's the fans of the work that suffer when the work is no longer available, or it is available in limited quantities due to some hippies wanting to free the media.
The problem with copyright isn't that it exists, the problem is that it typically extends for too long. Allowing an artist to profit from his or her own work for life isn't an unreasonable proposition.
Re:Mod parent up (Score:3, Interesting)
I still buy countless books & music - but I cheer everytime these insulting abusive ...people... gets their comeuppance
I believe over time we will find the direct to market model will put as much money into the hands of the whole genuine creative chain, as the current copyright profit skimming cartels do at present
Fewer big pop stars is fine by me. (Score:2, Interesting)
Big is dead, and that is a good thing.
Same old story (Score:4, Interesting)
The music industry was horrified that people could record their friends LPs onto cassettes instead of buying more LPs. They tried (and failed) to sue the manufactures for selling equipment that specifically designed to allow easy copyright infringement (LP->cassette or cassette->cassette) (OK, the quality went down a little, but most people did not care).
They blasted us with "Home Taping is Killing Music". I, and all my friends, taped and taped, off radio, off friends LPs, off library LPs and: guess what ? Home Taping did not Kill Music. There are *still* some artists making a fortune in the music industry, many are still struggling, Pink Floyd are *still* making money off their back catalogue. The sky has not fallen !!
Re:Mod parent up (Score:3, Interesting)
You clearly have no clue. Without copyright, you have NO RIGHT to demand who can and can't sell your book, your work is public domain therefore ANYONE can print it. Shrinkwrap makes very little odds if someone buys the book second hand, 'never read the EULA' on the front and goes ahead and copies it down word for word.
Maybe you could invent another method 'better than copyright'? Maybe a big burly guy could come with the book, and if you try to republish it, he'll beat the crap out of you. Yeah, that's better than copyright.