Latest Technology News:
Technology news from around the world subscribe to our RSS feed.
EMI to remove DRM from its music
03/04/07 - The record label that owns the rights to music by artists such as Lily Allen and Robbie Williams is removing DRM software from its digital music. EMI will make them available as 'premium' tracks which will be higher quality and more expensive.They will be available first on iTunes from May and then from other online music stores shortly after.
The music giant, which is the third biggest record label in the world, said it would be making every song in its online library available without DRM.
Digital music that still contains the anti-piracy technology will continue to be available on iTunes as well.
This announcement means that once brought the 'premium' tracks can be shared around different brands of player with ease, something that DRM prevented.
When announcing the move, EMI chairman Eric Nicoli, said that the move followed demand from consumers, but that it did not signify that the company had given up the fight against online piracy.
"We have to trust our consumers. We have always argued that the best way to combat illegal traffic is to make legal content available at decent value and convenient."
The move follows an open letter written by Apple boss Steve Jobs in January calling for DRM to be scrapped.
Mr Jobs was sat alongside Mr Nicoli at the announcement and he said: "This is the next big step forward in the digital music revolution the movement to completely interoperable DRM-free music."
"The right thing to do is to tear down walls that precluded interoperability by going DRM-free and that starts here today," he added.
Mr Jobs also predicted that by the end of 2007 over half the tracks available on iTunes would be free of DRM.
Analysts now expect other record labels to do the same and remove DRM from their tracks.
Mark Mulligan, from Jupiter Research, said: "Other retail partners have to come to the party because they can't be seen to be offering an inferior product."
Mr Nicoli also advised that EMI was continuing discussions with Apple Records in an attempt to make Beatles songs available online saying that they were "working on it"
Link to this news article using the url below:
http://www.pulsewebhosting.com/news/emi-to-remove-drm-from-its-music/68/
Published Date: 2007-04-03 14:43:02Subscribe to our RSS News feed:
Web Hosting RSS
