VirginMega.fr non-DRM downloads
p2pnet.net News:- Another major company is turning a jaundiced eye towards DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) Consumer Control.
Britain’s EMI is thinking about dropping it and now in March, French download site VirginMega.fr will supplement its 192k Microsoft Play[not]ForSure WMA-only tracks with more than 200,000 mp3 256k downloads.
And they’re not poisoned with DRM CC.
“France is the first country where a full-DRM store adopts MP3 on a large scale,” says Djing.com. “Other French music stores, such as leading indie music store NeoMusicStore, chose to sell music without DRM from the start but all other stores wanting to sell music from major companies (Fnac, Orange, and all Loudeye-powered stores) chose the MS technology for their complete catalogue so far.
“As Apple is keeping its market share and Microsoft is starting selling its own device with a new DRM system (even if Zune isn’t yet available in France), making PlayForSure obsolete, music stores are looking for alternatives and MP3 seems to be the only one to offer interoperability and thus open the whole digital market.”
VirginMega doesn’t allow users to, “search based on file format,” says the story, adding, “too bad we’d say, that would be the way to show the big 4 that that’s what the consumers want”.
V2Music, “should be one of the first indie labels available in MP3 format,” says Djing.com. “Previously, [the] French government tried to impose interoperability which led speculation whether it could force Apple to withdraw the iPod or iTunes from the French market.”
Also See:
dropping it – EMI to drop DRM?, January 9, 2006
Djing.com – VirginMega adopts DRM-free MP3s on its music store, January 18, 2007
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January 18th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
FnacMusic http://www.fnacmusic.com/ is also selling unprotected mp3 and they offer a direct access to the “catalogue mp3″