Universal, Sony and Zune
p2pnet.net News:- “… Zune to Zune sharing feature may not be available for all audio files on your device”. It’s a get-out statement from Bill and the Boyz on Zune’s DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) consumer control wireless sharing abilities, and it’s quoted in Zunerama item which in turn points to an earlier post from Jason Dunn on ZuneThoughts, which states:
Unfortunately, as people began to share music off their Zunes (purchased from the Zune marketplace or part of Zune Pass), they were met with error after error about the songs not being able to be shared – the group as a whole found Zune song sharing to be a disappointing experience. One frustrated person commented that she had read 50% of the music in the Zune Marketplace was unable to be shared due to DRM restrictions. She was unable to recite the source, and I didn’t have any proof one way or another. That number seemed quite high to me, but given how evasive the Zune team is on this issue, I had no understanding of how big the problem was.
The “evasive” bit links to a YouTube video. Under it is an elderly comment which says:
i have seen many interviews with matt jubelirer (product manager of zune) and he is a jackass who always dodges the real questions and doesnt seem to know much at all about a product which he is in charge of! i dont understand how microsoft gave this guy such a high ranking and important position in charge of the product which will be so valuable to microsoft in competition against apple.
How bad is the Zune DRM problem? Of eight Top 30 songs Dunn tried, “only five were allowed to be shared – that’s a 38% failure rate,” he says. “If you factor in the two KT Tunstall songs, seven of the total ten songs were shared successfully (a slightly better 30% failure rate).”
He goes on:
Although my test was limited, I believe buying from the Top 30 songs list mirrors the behaviour of many Zune Marketplace buyers – and as such, if 38% of those songs aren’t available for sharing, it makes the already crippled wireless sharing even less useful. Which songs can be shared, and which songs cannot, is a decision made by the music companies providing the music to the Zune Marketplace – so the lessened functionality of the Zune lies with them. What I cannot excuse, however, is the fact that the Zune Marketplace doesn’t clearly indicate which songs cannot be shared – it’s a “buyer beware” scenario right now, and I believe that only hurts the Zune platform as a whole. Microsoft needs to clearly indicate which songs can be shared, and which cannot. Anything less simply isn’t honest.
Interesting, especially considering the observatins come from someone who’s a Zune admirer.
Back to Zunerama, the author says using his Zune Pass subscription, he pulled the top 50 songs from Zune Marketplace, created a playlist, “and attempted to wirelessly send the whole playlist to my wife’s Zune”. On completion, “a message appeared on my player: ‘Can’t send some songs because of rights restrictions. 29 of 50 songs sent to Carrie’s Zune’.”
Demand your money back? Organize a class action lawsuit?
None of the anove, says Zunerama which, in the last of three thoughts, opines, “Some is better than none. As underwhelming as the 58% is, I need to remind myself… that figure is still 58% higher than would have been possible on any of today’s iPods. This is a groundbreaking music sharing approach, and it will only get better from here.”
But rather than improving, could it get worse? With the venal members of the Big 4 Organized Music cartel, Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, in the driving seat, it could.
“We wanted to know from what record label those artists are associated with,” says Clickzune.com, going on, “We were surprised to find that Universal, who signed an aggressive deal with Microsoft by grabbing a royalty for each Zune sold, does have a lot of artists cut in the ‘Zune sharing prohibited’ list. Sony Music is also limiting the Zune sharing for a few of their artists.”
Of the 50 songs tested by Zunerama:
Universal Music Group
Prohibited Zune Sharing: Gwen Stefani, Snow Patrol, Eminem, Blue October, JoJo, Jay-Z;
Accepted Zune Sharing: Nickelback, Nelly Furtado and Maria Careh;
Sony Music
Prohibited Zune Sharing: Beyonce, Weird Al Yankovic (not sure if song is from Sony) and Ciara;
Accepted Zune Sharing: Shakira, Wyclef Jean, The Fray, Christina Aguilera, John Mayer and Brad Paisley;
“We can`t really make statistics from this brief analysis, but clearly the price paid by Microsoft and the Zune buyers is still not enough to satisfy record labels,” declares Clickzune, adding, “When I hear that that Microsoft is going to re-question the 3 days/3 plays DRM scheme with record labels, I don`t believe they will get any better than what we already have.
“DRMs as we know them are not going to survive; everyone knows that and even Bill Gates said it. Record labels are still complaining about online piracy but are constantly pushing the users to a point where they are just defending themselves and are given them arguments to morally justify the illegal piracy.”
Talk about Zune Toons …….
Also See:
Zunerama – Wireless sharing – 58% of top songs are sharable?, January 19, 2007
ZuneThoughts – Zune Marketplace Song Sharing: A Test, January 15, 2007
Clickzune.com – Universal and Sony Don`t Like Zune to Zune Sharing, January 19, 2007
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January 20th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
Anyone stupid enough to BUY music laden with DRM gets what they deserve! I don’t feel sorry for these fools one bit!
January 21st, 2007 at 9:26 am
At least Apple had the balls to be the ones behind the decisions of their FairPlay DRM and their iTunes Store, and didn’t back down when the industry wanted more restrictions and higher payments. Microsoft could have easily countered the industry’s wants buy stating that the already crippling DRM placed on shared songs is sufficient enough, and had no obligation to be the RIAA’s bitch. The DRM makers are just as terrible as the DRM implementers for supplying the DRM in the first place, just as a crack dealer is just as bad as a crack buyer, or, in the record companies’ eyes, a file uploader is just as bad as a file downloader.
January 22nd, 2007 at 10:25 am
I guess we couldn’t have expected much more from a site named ‘Zunerama.’
A DRM-crippled wireless-sending implementation is NOT better than nothing. Never knowing if it’ll actually work is one thing, but when you throw in that what keeps it from working is the RIAA deciding that you don’t have fair use rights to something you purchased after all…
Oh well. I’m sure it’ll be hacked soon enough to allow unlimited sending, and then maybe it really WILL be a feature…