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If you want to be regarded as a jerk in your industry, follow the lead of Thomas Hesse. The world as a college dorm? MMMM, beer.

Just give up already.....

Music execs are greedy, have always been greedy, and will always be greedy. It's in their blood. That's why they became music execs in the first place.

Good Take MDN. You can't go back. Besides, people that steal, will steal, why punish the majority that doesn't steal music!

80% of our music sales are DRM free.

We cannot enter the digital age with DRM free music.

Yes, we are extremely stupid.

Is it any surprise to find yet again that Thomas "rootkit" Hesse of Sony has no respect for his own customers and no interest in listening to them and selling them what they want?

Sony is so boneheadedly stupid it's just not true. At one time they *owned* the market for portable players with the Walkman. They threw it away when the shift to digital audio players came along, because their DRM was so aggressive and unpleasant that no one wanted to know.

Sony seems incapable of learning from experience.

BTW, can someone tell these dorks that the music on CDs *is* digital? CDs are *not* an analogue format.

Would that be the ebb tide or flow tide?

It would be a rip tide!

Warner and Sony-BMG are starting to sound like the cigarette company executives - they can't see what the rest of the world can see, since they need to believe the lie to get/keep their jobs.

Magic Word: 'keep' as in jobs

Newsflash: the whole world already is "a college dorm." Do we have to fire up Transmission to prove it to you?

When I read this, what popped in my head was the song "Transmission" from Joy Division, which also would make for a good take on record industry morons who can't accept reality:

Listen to the silence, let it ring on.
Eyes, dark grey lenses, frightened of the sun.
We would have a fine time living in the night,
Left to blind destruction, waiting for our sight.
And we would go on as though nothing was wrong.
And hide from these days, we remained all alone.

"Because that’s what a no-DRM world looks like--it’s a world in which all product can just be cloned without limitation.'"

To avoid such a scenario, Industry execs are contemplating a new form of vinyl that disintegrates as it is played...

"Other online music retailers say they're worried that following Apple's lead will confuse customers who may already be baffled by a crazy quilt of restrictions that envelop the industry."

So keeping hundreds of different DRM schemes is confusing but having no more restrictions on your music will make it more confusing.
It's going to be like "Let's see, can I burn it on CD? Yes. How often.... No restrictions. OH NO I don't have that many CD's, what am I gonna do? Maybe I should delete this song or I will get confused that no error messages are popping up. Yay, just get rid of stuff that does not try to keep me from enjoying my music!!!"

Hey, has anyone heard of a set date when the DRM-Free EMI music will be available? The only thing I've heard so far is "some time in May"... being May I would like to know when.

"obsolescence of its business model"

- duh. That has been the objective all along.

The music labels don't want to confuse consumers with what, no restrictions? Take the comparison: you may only burn disks of a playlist seven times (depending on the label), share on up to five computers, can't play on all devices, you owe the labels your firstborn, and sit in a corner eating your Christmas pie -- all for one low price of $14.99/month for a 'Plays for Sure' subscription through Naps..er...eMus..er, um, whatever...

No restrictions is definitely easier to understand.

Wise words from Edgar Winter:
"The mountain is high, the valley is low,
And you're confused 'bout which to go,
So I flew in to give you a hand,
And lead you into, the promised land.

Come on and take a (DRM) free ride,
(DRM) free ride,
Come on and take it by my side,
Come on and take a (DRM) free ride!

All over the country, I'm seeing the same,
Nobody's winning, at this type of game,
We gotta do better, it's time to begin,
You know all the answers
Must come from within.

MW: free - HAH!

umm.... wait??? are the labels going to offer me a way to put some drm on the cd's i just purchased and imported into my itunes??? hopefully... i'm soooo confused as what to do because there isn't any drm on those tracks!!! HELP ME!!! I NEED DRM!!!

f that! i look forward to the day i'm not limited to burning a cd from itunes x amount of times because burned cds just don't last in my car.

maybe it's time just to skip the cd all together and go straight from my ipod to my car stereo.

DRM free music is stupid!

"The music industry simply has to solve the content security problem or risk the obsolescence of its business model."

Okay, to anyone with half a brain this sounds like, "If we can't create a perpetual motion machine, our goose is cooked!"

I think I would be more willing to follow the guy who is saying, "We can't create perpetual motion machine but we can make money without one."

P.S. So I can't copy and paste from a comment box in the new site design, nor can I use the arrow keys, and the only editing key that works is the 'delete' key? You gotta be kidding me, this really sucks. If it happens to be some buggy state my browser has gotten me into then I apologise, but if not then you guys need to change this RFN.

@ TMF

Love it ... keep rock n roll alive !!

Steve Jobs is brilliant. He has set up a win-either-way situation for Apple.

If this bid with EMI to make music DRM-free is NOT successful, no problem. He maintains the status quo, but Apple stops (or deflects) all the stupid criticism about DRM (particularly from government officials in Europe). Apple can say, "See. We want to get rid of DRM and that will solve all your 'inter-operability' concerns. But the record labels are blocking it. So go annoy them instead of us."

If it IS successful, Apple gains new clout in the music industry. The DRM criticism becomes irrelevant. And the iTunes Store has increased revenue and profit from selling songs for 30% more.

iPod sales will remain the same either way. Whether music is bought on CD or downloaded from iTunes (or stolen over P2P), people still need a place to carry the files and play them. You can pirate music pretty easily, but you can't "pirate" an iPod.

Yes, TMF
They are not making albino hippie Texan musicians like they used to.
Unless you count Johnny.
And then you are through.

(Roy Orbison wasn't a hippie, I don't think. Pale, though. And Michael Jackson's visit here doesn't count....)

Music industrys real problem ain't lack of DRM. It's lack of good music.

Give me new Jimi Hendrix, Hanoi Rocks or Guns n' Roses...

All I see is Idols crap.

"Boy bands are trash - I listen to Johnny Cash and GrandMaster Flash" -Kid Rock