Comments on: DRM becomes the ‘D’ Word

By: Hip Hop Klamotten

Hip Hop Klamotten — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 15:40:34 +0000

There are no great crossover artists putting out great tunes across the whole cd. So no one is buying cds for the most part, seeing the cost as rather expensive considering all the filler stuffed in. Much to the chargin of the cartels, people are saying so with their wallets when they do buy. The old model is broken.

By: Portrait artist

Portrait artist — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 10:04:32 +0000

Interesting topic. Are you aware that stores users’ names and emails in its DRM-free music offered through iTunes? Why? Apple refrains from making any comment. I thought it was a good news when Apple removes any copyright protection on music, allowing users to playback music on virtually any device if they purchase the the more expensive DRM-free version of the song. But why is there a need for Apple to include the information with each song?

By: MP3 Players

MP3 Players — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 04:40:26 +0000

It’s very difficult to believe what record company executives tell us these days. I read a story just today about Prince’s attempt to give an album away for free through a London paper. At least one executive was quoted as saying that this act was unforgivable and would result in Prince being essentially blackballed from working with any production company in the future. This means that the unremitting greed in the industry cannot even abide an artist who is willing to give out free music – it isn’t the artists who are dictating these higher prices. It is the record companies themselves. Your point about the basic distribution costs for the companies rapidly approaching zero is but another example of this same kind of greed. Until more artists decide to boycott the current systems will change happen, and I’m not sure if any such migration is possible, at least in the near future.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 15:35:10 +0000

“And where are the Beatles?” Much as I loath big music I think the lack of some big names in online music catalogs may not be directly due to the recording industry. I think the artists are refusing to have their music released digitally. One reason, is I believe they get less money per song than they do from CD sales. (note earlier where I say “directly”). Another issue may be unreasonable fear of piracy(Sorry Paul, all your stuff is already on p2p). I think if the music industry(fat chance) would up the per song % paid to musicians for digital sales and artist would deal with reality(your stuff is going to get pirated) you would see more big names on ITunes. Is this likely to happen? Don’t hold your breath.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 14:35:47 +0000

Customers who have already purchased EMI tracks will only pay the 30â‚µ difference. It’s not like they have to pay full price for the same thing.

The Zune plays AAC, although in my opinion you’d have to be pretty stupid to purchase a Zune. All the other manufacturers could easily send AAC support for customers’ existing players through a firmware update (and I imagine they will, given Microsoft’s stab in the back with the Zune Marketplace). The player is not inherently limited to a particular format; it’s up to whether the firmware supports it, just like a computer can play any format with the right software. If not supported through official firmware, free/open source firmware can always be written for a player to achieve this. Rockbox, for example, allows all iPods to play Vorbis and FLAC formats (as well as Theora with the video models). The vast majority of iPod users use Windows, and already have to reformat their HFS+-preformatted iPods to FAT32. If iPod customers are willing to put up with this, I don’t see why everybody else won’t be.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 08:19:14 +0000

Transcoding in this particular case means converting from one audio format to another. Since we would likely be dealing with lossy formats (for example aac to mp3) there would be a further reduction in quality , first from the compression to aac then further loss caused by compressing to mp3. It only gets worse from there. The only way to avoid this is to use no compression or lossless compression.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcoding

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=transcoding&btnG=Google+Search

Interesting history:
Back in the early 90s the effects of transcoding killed minidisk and DCC. DCC stayed dead, but minidisk just kind of migrated into a niche market. Guess nobody wanted to pay $700 for cassette quality back then. There was a time when you could go into a “record store” and buy prerecorded DCCs and minidisks as well as CDs (but not records). That shows they marketed these formats directly to consumers, not just professionals. CD-R was very expensive and ultra-new back then too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Compact_Cassette

You just wait until sales of lossy compressed tracks flatten out. They’ll start pushing lossless and wanting you to repurchase your music AGAIN. Let’s just demand lossless NOW, download it ONCE, and be done with it forever.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 05:12:51 +0000

You are correct. The rising price is just a vain attempt to offset the basic law of diminishing returns. Any increase in price in an attempt to gain back money loss will only lead to greater money losses. These pin-striped shiny suits at the RIAA are all MBA’s…that is, Master’s of Business Atrocities. Their degrees are better for squeezing than Charmin’s…but for some reason smell worse before they’re used.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 00:48:43 +0000

What they don’t want to hear is that the DRM makes the offer useless. That’s why no one is hitting the iTunes in major amounts. They also don’t want to hear that it is over priced at the old price of 99Â¢. Raising the price won’t bring flocks more people to buy. With the low quality bit rate these offerings are in, they still aren’t worth the 99Â¢ price much less a higher price.

The days of hits in the Top 10 staying for months at a time are over. There are no great crossover artists putting out great tunes across the whole cd. So no one is buying cds for the most part, seeing the cost as rather expensive considering all the filler stuffed in. Much to the chargin of the cartels, people are saying so with their wallets when they do buy. The old model is broken. Charging more for less isn’t going to work either. Until they get the message they will continue to go downhill.

Wonder if they feel their imminent doom coming?

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 23:12:38 +0000

not sure but transcoding is a lot easier than removing drm…

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 20:24:21 +0000

If EMI wants to sell music without DRM why not just cut out Apple and sell .MP3s, .FLACs, and .OGGs on their own website?

This is a step in the right direction, though.

By the way, what other players besides an IPOD will play a file directly in an AAC format without transcoding?