Will This Be The Year DRM Dies?

There’s been a little (perceived) snowballing happening in the digital rights management discussion space lately… and it’s very interesting!

Steve Jobs wrote an open letter claiming that the iTunes music store would “drop DRM” if the record labels didn’t require it.

Yet another study was released showing that file sharing has almost no statistical impact on music industry sales.

And a survey conducted before Jobs’ comments discovered that a majority of music industry executives hate DRM, too… and believe they could sell more stuff if they didn’t have to deal with it.

So… why do we still have DRM? How close are we to a complete re-think on how music and other media is distributed online?

I can dream that it will happen this year, but that’s probably over-optimistic. What I will predict is that a major music provider will do more than just talk about this… they’ll begin to offer for-fee downloads of their catalog in unencumbered, drm-free, universally accessible MP3 format.

Wait and see..! And when the day comes, join me for a little happy dance.

Possibly related posts:

1. DRM Meets Multi-Level Marketing = Unholy Alliance!
2. Happy New Year, Apple

There's been a little (perceived) snowballing happening in the digital rights management discussion space lately... and it's very interesting!Steve Jobs wrote an open letter claiming that the iTunes music store would "drop DRM" if the record labels didn't require it.Yet another study was released showing that file sharing has almost no statistical impact on music industry sales.And a survey conducted before Jobs' comments discovered that a majority of music industry executives hate DRM, too... and believe they could sell more stuff if they didn't have to deal with it.So... why do we still have DRM? How close are we to a complete re-think on how music and other media is distributed online?I can dream that it will happen this year, but that's probably over-optimistic. What I will predict is that a major music provider will do more than just talk about this... they'll begin to offer for-fee downloads of their catalog in unencumbered, drm-free, universally accessible MP3 format.Wait and see..! And when the day comes, join me for a little happy dance.