http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/ Engadget Comments for Apple to iTunes partners: feel free to drop your DRM as well http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
Though I'm curious to see how anti-Apple fanboys will flame Jobs on this... ]]>Apr 27th 2007 1:19PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 1:28PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
That said, I think Apple's plan is probably preferable to most consumers. Sadly, without the music industry's buy-in, the number of DRM-free offerings will not grow very quickly.]]>Apr 27th 2007 1:34PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:00PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:03PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:02PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:53PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
Read below.
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/riaa/riaa-drm-is-pro+consumer-gizmodo-shut-up-idiots-255832.php]]>Apr 27th 2007 2:03PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
$1.29 x 12 song per album = $15.48
Album on CD = $9.99-$13.99 online

Paying $9.99 > Paying $15.48
Archive copy > No archive copy
Higher sound quality > Lower sound quality

All this said, removing the DRM is a step in the right direction, but I still plan to buy CD's for a long time to come.]]>Apr 27th 2007 2:23PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
From what I read only the singles are jacked up in price - @ $1.29. The DRM free albums will still be $9.99.

I will look for the link that has this information.]]>Apr 27th 2007 2:36PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:40PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
Your argument is only true if every song on a given CD is a song you're willing to pay for. Given today's music industry situation, this is rarely the case.

It is cheaper to buy 10 songs you love at 99 cents each ($9.90 total) online than it is to buy a CD with 9 crappy songs you don't like and one song you do.

As for the "no archive" argument, that's just silly...who wants the overhead of 500-1000 CDs, with jewel cases, when they can buy an external USB/FW hard drive for $50 and make a perfectly good archive copy of their tunes????
]]>Apr 27th 2007 2:45PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:28PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 3:29PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Thanks for the clarification on the album prices, I didn't realize the high-quality non-DRM would still be $9.99 per album.

@johnzilla
I guess I'm sort of an album purist in that I think bands/singers create an album of their songs for a purpose, so each song is important to have even if they might not be hits. If we didn't have crappy songs, how would we know when an artist puts out good songs. ;-)

On the archive comment, I do backup music that I've ripped to an external drive, but I'm comforted by the fact that I also have a hard copy with the original CD's (I should probably box them up now that I don't use them). But even if music you've purchased is on a hard drive, there's still a chance of the HD failing. CD's should in theory never fail (at least for many many years or decades.

But like I said, for people who are going the online/digital music route, Apple is definitely leading the industry in the right direction.]]>Apr 27th 2007 2:53PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 2:48PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 3:24PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
Here is a partial list of devices that will play AAC (.m4a) files out of the box.
Microsoft Zune
SanDisk Sansa
Sony Ericsson phones
PalmOS
Nokia phones
BlackBerryMicrosoft Xbox 360

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding]]>Apr 27th 2007 3:36PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 3:29PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 3:54PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Apr 27th 2007 6:22PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.rockbox.org/) will play AAC as well.]]>Apr 27th 2007 3:54PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
The DRM-free is equally as welcomed but not nearly as exciting. Emusic.com and many other sites already allow DRM-free tracks. There aren't nearly as many options when it comes to sites selling Hi-fi songs. This will be great for the consumers.

I'm going to go ahead and shamelessly promote one of my artists;
If you are an Ituner check out:

http://ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/browserRedirect?url=itms%253A%252F%252Fax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net%252FWebObjects%252FMZStore.woa%252Fwa%252FviewAlbum%253Fi%253D217520962%2526id%253D217520808%2526s%253D143441

As for Emusic:

http://www.emusic.com/album/11007/11007842.html

I personally am a big fan of Emusic, but they don't really have any major labels.

If you want a free trial of Emusic, sign up under my link.

http://www.anrdoezrs.net/click-2356689-10364977?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.emusic.com%2Fartist%2F11762%2F11762955.html&cjsku=11762955

It helps the label out and you can download our artists albums for free; if you don't like it you can cancel. I did the free trial but, I've kept it. I'm on there as "Raetus"; drop by the forums and say hey if you sign up. If you are looking for good indie music, they have a ton -- if you are looking to buy the new Paris Hilton album... stick with Itunes.
]]>Apr 27th 2007 4:05PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
In case it wasn't, iTunes and iPod can play AAC. Apple made AAC popular by using it as it's defacto codec. iTunes Store audio is encoding using a Protected-AAC format.

AAC offers better compression over the aging MP3 format, so songs using the same bitrate will decompress/play with higher quality. This is especially true for lower bitrate audio.

]]>Apr 27th 2007 6:35PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/
Sry, yes it was a joke, you didn't list the iPod in your list of AAC compatible players.

TIA = Thanks In Advance]]>Apr 27th 2007 6:39PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/Anyway, I always thought that selling music, even unprotected MP3's is same thing as selling snow in the winter.
]]>Apr 28th 2007 6:03AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/27/apple-to-itunes-partners-feel-free-to-drop-your-drm-as-well/next month is wwdc ;)]]>Apr 28th 2007 7:49AM