Warner rejects end to DRM systems
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Warner Music rejects Apple's call for the removal of copy protection software from music downloads.
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The Warner Music Groupâs announcement is the recording industryâs latest move away from its reliance on digital locks to reduce piracy.
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'NO copy protection - respect the music' stamped on !K7 discs
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(InfoWorld) - The head of Warner Music Group defended the use of DRM (digital rights management) with digital music on Wednesday in an apparent response toÂ recent criticism from Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Jobs roiled the music industry last week by suggesting in aÂ letter published on Apple's Web siteÂ that the music labels are to blame for the fact that music from Apple's iTunes music store can only be played on Apple's iPod music players -- something Apple has been criticized for. "DRM and interoperability are not the same thing," Edgar Dorfman Jr., chairman and CEO of Warner Music Group, said in a speech at theÂ 3GSM World CongressÂ in Barcelona on Wednesday. "We believe in interoperability," he said. "Consumers want it and should have it. We at Warner, and I hope the rest of the music and content industry, will make it as easy as possible to achieve interoperability." Jobs said last week that Apple uses a proprietary DRM system because the music industry requires it to fix any failures in the technology in a short amount of time. If Apple shared its DRM technology it would not be able to meet that requirement, he said. Dorfman did not mention Jobs or Apple by name but his remarks appeared to be in response to the criticism. Apple hasÂ come under fire,Â particularly in Europe, for its DRM technology, which ties its music stores to its players. Apple isn't alone, however. Microsoft and Sony also operate digital music stores that require customers to play the music only on their own music players. iTunes is the biggest digital music store, however, and the second largest, eMusic.com, only sells music that has no DRM. Jobs also wrote that he would prefer to sell music without any DRM protection. That's a concept Dorfman doesn't think is up for discussion. "I don't agree that intellectual property should have no protection. We should all agree that intellectual property deserves some measure of protection," he said. "But that is distinct from the issue around interoperability." Today's music protection environment isn't ideal, Dorfman admitted. "There can't be so much protection that we create a poor consumer experience. We need to work to find perhaps a better balance than works today." Â
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Executives from Nokia and Philips published an open letter today calling for the European Commission to consider scaling back, if not eliminating, imposing levies on digital recording media and playback devices, including DVRs and MP3 players. But the alternative may be a hard sell: increased DRM.
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A report says that NBC Universal and Paramount are backing away from their exclusive commitment in the wake of Warner Brothersâ endorsement of the rival Blu-ray format.
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Warner Music Group said on Wednesday that any possible takeover offer for EMI, the struggling British music company, would be in cash and not shares.
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Apple CEO Steve Jobs has made a surprise call for the end of digital rights management technology, which is designed to stop copyrighted music from being shared illicitly. Jobs says Apple would sell only DRM-free music on iTunes if it could.
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Warner Music Group Corp.  said on Tuesday it decided against bidding for British rival EMI Group Plc , two days before a deadline to submit an offer loomed.
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Scribd anti-piracy system blocks uploading of content if the text matches material in its system provided by copyright holders.
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A federal appeals court on Thursday  delivered a stinging blow to the anti-piracy efforts of major  movie studios and music companies by ruling several Internet  file-sharing software companies are not liable for copyright  infringement.
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Warner Bros. Entertainment said Friday it will release movie discs only in the Blu-ray format, becoming the latest studio to reject the rival HD DVD technology and further complicating the high-definition landscape for consumers.
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Britain's EMI Group Plc  has rejected a 2.1-billion-pound ($4.1 billion) cash takeover proposal from Warner Music Group , saying on Friday it was not in the best interests of its shareholders.
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Microsoft has rejected the idea that its deal last year with Novell ties it to the new General Public License Version 3 (GPLv3).
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StreamCast, which owns the Morpheus P2P Network has formally asked the US Supreme Court to reject requests made by the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) to revisit lower court decisions
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Amazon.com has added songs from Warner Music Group to the range it sells as MP3 files without DRM (digital rights management), the companies said Friday.The online retailer&#160;launched its music download service&#160;in September and now offers 2.9 million songs without copy prevention technology, including tracks from Warner, EMI, Universal, and 33,000 independent record labels -- although it has still not won over Sony BMG, the only one of the music majors still insisting on the use of DRM.Warner said it also planned to offer album bundles including exclusive tracks through the Amazon service.The move is a blow to Apple&#39;s iTunes Store, which has only persuaded EMI and a handful of independent labels to let it offer their tracks in the&#160;DRM-free iTunes Plus format it launched in May. The rest of the songs available through iTunes come with digital limitations on where they can be played, or how many times they can be burned to a CD.Three formats dominate the market for online music sales: MP3 and AAC, which are both open formats, and WMA, a proprietary format owned by Microsoft.MP3 files do not include provision for DRM: music recorded in that format will play on most digital music players, many mobile phones, and in software readily available for all the major operating systems, including Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux, opening up a huge potential market to Amazon and to other online music stores such as eMusic dealing in unprotected MP3 files.AAC is the format Apple chose for its iTunes Store. Most of the 6 million tracks in its catalog come wrapped in a proprietary DRM layer called FairPlay, although EMI and independents such as Sub Pop, Nettwerk, IODA and The Orchard also allow it to offer higher quality AAC recordings without DRM. The DRM-encumbered tracks will play on authorized iPods, iPhones, PCs, and Macs -- but won&#39;t play on digital music players from other vendors. Unprotected AAC files will also play on many mobile phones, PCs running Linux with the appropriate software, and even Microsoft&#39;s Zune digital music player.WMA files without DRM will play on PC or Macs using Windows Media Player, and some phones and digital music players -- although typically not on the same ones that play AAC files. Microsoft has also introduced a range of DRM systems enabling online stores to sell locked WMA files -- and later abandoned some of them, leaving a certain amount of confusion and doubt about whether devices and songs branded &quot;PlaysForSure&quot; really will play for sure.Industry executives expect initiatives such as iTunes Plus and Amazon MP3, which remove the DRM locks placed on music downloads by an earlier generation of music services, will encourage consumers to buy more music.Warner believes that giving consumers the assurance that the music they purchase can be played on any device they own will only encourage more sales of music, it said Friday.It may also persuade music-buyers to look at other brands of digital music player such as the Zune range from Microsoft, ending Apple&#39;s dominance of that market segment.With the locks off the music, Apple also faces the prospect of a price war with Amazon, which offers 1 million of its MP3 tracks for just $0.89, compared to the $0.99 Apple charges for all its tracks. Before the launch of Amazon MP3, Apple also charged a $0.30 premium for tracks in the iTunes Plus format, which is recorded at a higher quality than the DRM-encumbered versions. Other Amazon tracks sell for $0.99.
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By Jefferson Graham  LOS ANGELES -- Record labels have consistently rebuffed calls by digital music executives to sell songs online without copy-protection restrictions.