France's National Assembly approves iPod DRM bill
By Marc Perton 
posted March 21st 2006 1:13PM
posted March 21st 2006 1:13PM
By a margin of almost 100 votes,
France's National Assembly has approved a bill that could
force Apple and other companies to open the DRM used by their online music stores to other companies. At issue isn't
DRM itself but interoperability. The law, if passed by France's Senate later this year, could require Apple to open its
FairPlay DRM system to music players other than the iPod. If Apple refused, the law would allow consumers to use
software to transcode the music into other formats, stripping the DRM in the process. The law would also apply to other
DRM, such as Microsoft's PlaysForSure, but Apple has the most to lose, both because of its large share of the market,
and because of its "razor-and-blades" business model, which closely ties the iPod to the iTunes Music Store.
Apple has thus far refused to comment on the bill.
"Don't get me wrong, I am not against Apple. I think Apple's iPod is a great product and their iTune Music store provides excellent service. I just want a little more flexibility with music files that I purchased. I believe that consumer should be able to play their legally purchased music files in any MP3 player they choose"
Don't we all? But then the iPod wouldn't even be around, and this whole topic would be moot. And without the iPod, I'd hate to see how worst DRM would be right now....
Fair play and consumer rights in the digital age? The only true way that can happen is if entertainment finds a new way to make money. Maybe they should start taxing everything, they get 60% of all iPod and other MP3 player sales.
There, then you can play whatever you want on whatever, AND you can file share it to everywhere...
@Nathan G
"I love the analogy i heard, DRM is like buying a brand new lawn mower from home depot then before you leave the attach a device that only lets you use it on wednesdays and sundays..."
Thats really stupid because you can play your music like every fucking day hellooo!! You just can't mow your neibours lawn, or borrow your mower to others as-is, not a good analogy.
I am both France and US-educated and I really think this is a stupid law that does not make sense on any standpoint. Those lawmakers debated without even understanding the business nor the technology. An artist is free to decide whether he wants his product to be drmed or not period. At some point, they wanted to ban subscription-based models like Napster because they thought revenue sharing is too complicated. They should leave the business to business people. The choice is left to artists: drm or no drm on their content.
Why dont they do the same for movies then ? :)
I can't believe how fanatical some people are about the ITMS. Basically the ideal outcome of this french initiative (if you can keep your jingoism in check for a second) is to have interoperabillity, which in essence would translate to one DRM model.
This legislation if it comes to pass is more of an issue at present to the other vendors than Apples ITMS, as the ITMS offers the best online store experience at present. So it allows all the Creative, iRiver etc users to purchase from the ITMS.
It would promote competition, and also keep Apple on its toes, which given Steve Jobs often homeogenised notion that he know's what we, as a whole, should and should not want (ie no one wants to watch video on the go..., or people want to own their music etc) is not a bad thing.
Considering everyone I know who has an iPod did not purchase theirs based on the availability of the ITMS (in fact a large proportion don't even have the ITMS in their country) I personally find it odd that people are so hellbent on defending the ITMS, as though its this iPod sales driving force, and that Apple will be somehow affected if they didn't have this monopoly.
Well to defending the ITMS is pretty defending fair pricing in this digital age.
It's why we have 99 cent songs. And seeing how Jobs like it's that way and the Music mogals don't...Sounds like it's a good thing for us all.
And uniform DRM is nice...but fair prices is better.