Steve Jobs: Apple would embrace DRM-free music 'in a heartbeat' - Page 3

To a good extent, probably all of our opinions and the rest of the iPod fan base.

You continue to look at things through your same colored lenses. There is absolutely nothing inconsistent between these two statements. The law calls for gov't interference in the content owners rights - that does amount to state sponsored piracy - the current statement calls for the content owners to give up those right voluntarily, their right and what Apple believes is the best long-term business decision. All of these discussions are totally bent by the underlying asumption that consumers have a right to unencumbered music. I've never seen that as law.

Only if the end result is more piracy.

Why would the government forcing DRM to be interoperable result in more piracy, whereas record companies choosing to remove DRM completely would not?

The "state sponsored piracy" claim was nonsense then, and it still is now.

Why is it so hard to understand that the government taking rights away is different than owners of those rights giving them away. If the gov't takes away your right to freedom, which I believe is ensconced in law in a few places, by putting you in a small locked room for even a week, I believe you'd agree that that's quite different than you choosing to stay in that same small room for a week to protest the unfair distribution of music, even if you would have done it in any case.

Maybe all's fair in love and war, because the content owners often use their money interfere with copyright law, to buy legislation that extends copyright to unreasonable lengths of time and adding draconian measures to boot. Fair use is codified into law in many places, with some give and take based on interpretation, but the trend is on taking away from those fair use rights as much as possible under the guise of curtailing piracy.

Requiring that media not be encumbered by artificial restrictions doesn't violate the copyright owner's copyrights that I can tell, they still own the rights to the work.

That's all very well and good; unfortunately it utterly fails to address the point that I was making. In addition, it takes a rather one-dimensional view of "freedom" and its relationship with the law. The law limits people's and companies' freedoms in many ways, usually with good reason: e.g. companies are not "free" under law to have people murdered etc. etc. The law curtailing people's or companies "freedoms" is not always a bad thing.

Again:

How does a government forcing interoperable DRM result in more piracy?

Given you buy iPods and DRM protected songs from iTunes perhaps the analogy isn't very apt. Don't like the terms don't buy a product and companies, regardless of size, will change to meet consumer demand as driven by a fair and free market.

Don't like DRM, don't buy DRM restricted products. The issue will resolve itself when the companies see no revenues.


This is a far cry from legislation in France. 3 years later you'd expect more progress than what happened to Apple in France.


Say what? AFAIK there hasn't been a response yet. If they really wanted Apple to open up Fairplay they'd have forced the issue in France. They didn't.


Who else would it be? Its not like Apple released a root kit or had lawyers suing 10 year olds for downloading mp3s. Its not Apple adding anti-piracy systems to CDs.

Vinea

That depends what you mean by 'unencumbered music' and 'consumer rights'.

Most sensible participants in this discussion aren't arguing for a free for all, just no less rights than currently exists with CDs and to bring the balance back away from the record companies to the consumers.

Jobs is appearing to be standing on the consumer end of the see-saw now whereas the other end has the big 4 majors sat there with Microsoft. It remains to be seen whether Jobs is putting any effort in or ready to jump off his end of the see-saw and rocket us consumers skywards.

Oh what a chameleon we try to address, keeps changing colors. All I was addressing is that the charge that the two statements are inconsistent, they are not. Again, to paraphrase you, your missing the point. The open letter addressed your question directly, in Apples opinon, and I think supported by acutal cases such as CSS on DVDs, interoperable DRM will be totally ineffective for the reasons explained, and with which I agree. Therefore interoperable DRM is in effect removing it. The owners of those rights disagree with your assertion that removing DRM with NOT result in additional piracy. I'm not arguing either side of that issue, just that its currently within their rights to both have that opinion and to act on it accordingly.

No, it required opening up FairPlay to other companies. Real consumer advocacy is no DRM but these all want FairPlay opened up. Gee, does that strike you that these "private" and "consumer advocacy" efforts are in fact commercial in origin?

As I said, America bashing by Europeans. Corporations perhaps and not citizens (but enough of that happened these last few years too on both sides). But you know, I'm pretty tired of the Europeans beating on Microsoft, Boeing and now Apple. Somehow working on contracts for the USG delivering product is "subsidies" which are vastly different than the direct launch aid subsidies given to Airbus.


It was state sponsored piracy...but of a different sort. Piracy of the iTunes ecosystem by European companies.

Vinea

This is something we can actually discuss. At what point in time would you like to establish the "consumers' rights". How about when CD's were first introduced? That's not too long ago and I was actually alive then (just so I'm clear that is sarcasm). When I bought my first CD and player I didn't have capability, or was it the right (oops there goes that sarcasm again) to make perfect copies of that CD. The technology didn't exisit but I could take the time and pain to make an analog copy at 1x speed which, for most low end consumer stuff sounded crappy. It that how you would like to define consumer's rights? Rights vs capabilities?

Again, I agree with Jobs letter and getting rid of DRM on music, everyone will benefit. I'm just not willing to be hypocritical to get there which is what, in my opinion, calling for the 'consumers rights' is. Given the choice we all have, as Jobs points out, I really can't see how my rights are being curtailed.

Still you do not get it. Let's take it one step at a time; let's kick off with me asking you some questions, and in few posts' time, we will get to the bottom of this:

Do you agree that:

1.) The statement that came out of Apple last year concerning the proposed French legislation, labelling it as "state sponsored piracy", implied that Apple believed that government-enforced interoperable DRM systems would result in more piracy.

2.) That going by the open letter from Jobs, that Apple consider no DRM at all would be "a good thing" for everyone involved: Apple, consumers and the record companies.

3.) That Apple believes that piracy is not "a good thing" for Apple or record companies, and presumably in the long-term, not good for consumers either.

For the record (npi), Universal is now owned by NBC, which is owned by GE. Vivendi sold it off in 2004 (or thereabouts).

OK I'll play

1) I believe that is only part of the intended meaning, but lets say OK.

2) I believe he is saying that 'no DRM' is, of course, good in the short term for consumers and he believes in the long term its good for the record companies.

3) I don't agree with this as stated. Note that Jobs only mentions piracy once in his letter he doesn't comment other than to say the DRM does not "halt" piracy. Given that DRM is used on so little percentage of the content out there current DRM could not possibly "halt' it. Your statement as written inverts the logic in the letter. All that is said, heavily paraphrased, is the DRM is worse for Apple and the record companies than no DRM. This is a business based statement. If I had to guess (and its only my guess carrying all of my biases of course) I would guess that Apple (read Jobs) believes that piracy is irrelavent if a good commercial solution is offered.

There's a misunderstanding of what Jobs meant by the term "state sponsored piracy".

He didn't mean more piracy of music.

He meant that the state would be forcing Apple to do business with companies that they had rejected doing business with. Licensing software, and possibly hardware designs, to entities Apple had rejected doing business with in that fashion.

That would be the same, in Apple's eyes, as those companies taking what they needed from Apple, and throwing Apple a bone for it.

State sponsored piracy, yes.

Here is my 2¢.

Take out DRM from iTMS, and watch the popularity of P2P filesharing skyrocket again, and it will probably be bigger than before. Before anyone goes to buy a song, or CD they will first fire up the latest filesharing app that everyone is using and check to see if has been uploaded. New Releases from iTMS within minutes will be there "so why pay for them" will be the mentality again. iTMS exclusive songs. Yeah right. Your filesharing app has them uploaded the day they come out. Freaking worst possible idea ever. Watch Apples iTunes sales start to fall dramatically the first quarter, and they will keep falling.

Thanks melgross. This is the other half of the meaning. I actually think it was aimed at both to some degree but then, we'll never know for sure.

Good stuff.


Great.


Good.


This response appears to be attempting to pre-empt where I am going to take this. Are you saying that Apple thinks that piracy is a good thing for record companies? Really, I thought 3.) was the most no-brainer question of the three that I asked.

If that is all they meant by the term, then that statement and Jobs' open letter are not at odds with one another. The term would also then make sense. But if it was referring to piracy of music, it didn't make sense.

Are you suggesting that the iTunes exclusives aren't on P2P networks?

I really don't think your predictions are realistic because the prediction conveniently ignores that most music being sold is unencumbered by DRM, and even the DRM on protected CDs is bypassed quickly enough to not be considered much of a hurdle to P2P.

Where your logic falls down quite substantially is that pretty much all the music available through iTunes is already available via P2P. Selling DRM-free music from the iTS would therefore make no difference for most of the content. Not sure about the "iTunes exclusive" tracks, but your post seems to be talking about all tracks, not just the exclusive ones. In any case, even the exclusive tracks can be burnt to CD, ripped back (or have the DRM removed by other means) and then uploaded.

It all boils down to the fact that some people are dishonest, and some are not. Offer a high-quality service with good content, and reasonable prices, and people will choose to use it over p2p.

Sorry, really wasn't trying to pre-empt anything, just be clear. Still willing to play

Consumers never had the rights they have taken now with recordings. Never!

When recordings first came out, around the turn of the 20th century, there was no way to make a copy. That remained true throughout the next 50 years.

While recording from records was difficult, in the beginning, after WWII, with only open reel recorders, in the "good old days", and easier, but poorer recordings, made from cassette later on, today's copying is almost nuisance free. Perfect copies is the norm, and copying an entire album might take no more than a couple of minutes.

That does change things. To all intents, that does amount to having 'unencumbered music' and 'consumer rights', even if it isn't recognized by law.

I understand why content companies want DRM. I don't always agree that it works well, or is even, in the long run, beneficial.

I also recognize that Jobs has been against it for a long time.

The only reason why content companies didn't have DRM in the original cd specification was because it wasn't practical, and there was no need for it. I can tell you that it had been discussed.

No one could have predicted just how widely available, and cheap, copying devices, and media, would become in the new computerized future.

I get it, I just don't buy it. The lock-in to iTunes is an advantage that snowballs over time. Buy a few things from iTunes, and you'll want to get an iPod to play them. Buy an iPod, and you'll want to buy from iTunes rather than some other service. It's an edge, and even if you believe it's a a small edge (I don't), we're talking 100 million ipods out there and a few billion tracks sold. With those massive numbers, even a small edge is important for them going into the future. I simply don't believe that Jobs would want to give that up just because it's so hard to keep up the DRM. Yeah right.

Apple has a very good chance of becoming the MS of online entertainment media for the next several decades. And really, even more than MS, because they are the exclusive providers of not just all the content, but also the hardware. It's like they would be MS and IBM combined for this market. There's no way these business people at Apple are serious that they want to risk that just to appeal to dorm-room DRM freedom fighters.

I agree, but having read it a couple of times, and having read most of what Jobs has said over the years about DRM, I believe my statement is the correct one.

Coming from a business perspective, that of a partner in two companies over the years, one of which made audio equipment, my views of piracy mirrors what I think his are.

My logic does not fall because all the songs will come without DRM so there is no need to buy CD's to burn everything to and re-rip them every time you want to upload them. Hassle free is the key. People will be more aware that the entire public will have a massive catalog of DRM free music as it used to be.

Popularity of free downloads will rise exponentially.

I believe that the "lock-in" is an assumption that has never been proven.

While I agree that there are people who have hundreds, and even thousands, of iTunes bought content, those people are in a small minority.

Most people who buy content are younger. They don't know about, nor do they care about, higher quality music sorces, or means of playback. For that large majority, re-recording a song bought on itunes for a different player would not result in diminushed playability. I've done that for people. They go away happy. And unlocked AAC sounds the same as locked AAC. All legal and all.

Even with the hassle, seemingly every commercial recording is already available on P2P, whether or not it was on a CD or had encryption. So it gets on to the P2P networks a few minutes earlier is immaterial.

No. I'm in the UK. We've never had the right to make a copy of a CD or any other copyrighted work other than for the purposes of review, quotation or comment. This is all we're allowed under what we call 'Fair Dealing' and what the USA calls 'Fair Use'. If my understanding of US law is right, that's also the case in the USA. However, you have legal precedent that expands on your right of 'Fair Use' to include personal copying.

Copying from one format to another is not what this is about. You can do that already with iTunes. Your argument is made of straw.

The rights that are being fought for here are the right to take your music file and be able to PLAY it on any manufacturers player that supports the file format. With CDs I can take a CD and play it any CD players from JVC, Sony, Linn, NEC, Phillips etc. With a digital music file I'm generally stuck with Apple only software/hardware for the song I've bought. Similarly, if I buy a song on the Zune store, I can only play it on a Zune.


See above.

Spot on.

I'll add 'fast and easy to use'.

Anyone who has spent any kind of time trying to get something off the p2p networks or via bittorrent knows it takes forever, is often incomplete, with a virus, not what it says it is, mangled by record companies or porn.

Do you want to spend your evenings trying to download crap off of p2p or 10 seconds finding exactly what you want on iTunes?

(Actually, I'd rather buy the CD from Amazon. I can generally wait a few days. )

Interesting. I've not seen it put that way and every commentator I've read has taken it to be 'of music' instead of Apple's business. But the latter does make sense given Jobs' essay.

Commentators are too quick to jump to conclusions. As none of them have run a business, they have no idea what a business person would consider to be important.

That's obviously shaking out now since nobody is buying DRM'd content, sales of digital downloads has slowed dramatically at 3% of the total music sold and sales of music overall are falling.

Sales of iPods and digital downloads are way behind the USA in Europe. Plenty of people don't want that crap here. More people are complaining about it too.

I have to ask, why aren't American consumer bodies complaining too? Do you just let American business walk all over you?



LOL! If there's ever somewhere to delay something, it's the EU. That's why most of the American tech companies like asking for injunctions in Europe against other American companies. See who's behind Microsoft's current woes in the EU. Hint - they aren't European companies.



They didn't have a direct challenge to supply non-DRMed content back then from Apple.

See http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/te...erland&emc=rss for the reaction from the music industry and Microsoft so far.


The Norwegian Consumer Council also came out and said (paraphrasing) - "Ok, it's the record companies fault Apple has DRM but Apple are still the one selling the crap so Apple are who we're going after". And they're right to do it too. Under consumer law (in Europe anyway) your contract is with the shop keeper, not the manufacturer.


No. But now that Apple has accused the record companies of being the ones that want DRM, if it's found out that Apple wants it or wanted it and as someone else wrote he's just 'blowing smoke' knowing full well that the record companies won't call his bluff, then he's playing a sly hand.

Because Fairplay is not a hassle for most folks and we're not quite as adverse to IP owners actually owning their IP. Folks have pushed back on RIAA's heavy handedness and sometimes its mildly annoying like when Disney decides to put some movie back into its vault but for the most part if the DRM just works it shouldn't be a problem (ie rootkits don't work and they suck...problem).

That's hardly letting businesses walk all over us.

As far as no one buying DRM'd content I didn't see any massive drop of DVD sales in Europe.


The Universal Music Group, the Warner Music Group and Sony BMG Music Entertainment declined to comment. Only EMI said anything and that was to try to push the blame back on CE manufacturers. EMI might as well not bothered to comment.


So what? Going after Apple isn't going to result in anything more than Apple killing their Norway site. That hardly helps the consumer. So much for consumer advocacy...self-inflicted boycott through legislation for everyone that doesn't agree with their position. Nice.

Better to work on root causes which isn't at Apple's doorstep. Not that no DRM is ever likely from any studio. Digital theft does occur even if they exxagerate the economic losses. If "managed copy" works well enough that would be just fine.


DRM isn't part of the core business model beyond keeping the studios happy. What is part of the core business model is making things work smoothly for their users and they manage that pretty well.

Vinea

I don't understand your definition of "shopkeeper".

If you are saying that the "manufacturer" isn't held up for blame, then you are also sying that Apple shouln't be. They are the manufacturer as well. How does one separate out the two parts? The shopkeepers are also the stores selling the iPods, and gift certificates.


This goes back to the first part. If, as I believe it to be true from everything the music companies have said, and the actions of the other contents providers have shown, Apple had to use DRM despite their own preference, Apple's statements on this matter are true, and the EU groups are the ones blowing smoke.

They SHOULD go after the recording companies. That would end the question at the source of the problem. But they won't. They won't want to damage EU companies.

It's not an assumption, it's a fact: iTunes music works with iPods and iPods work with iTunes music.


I think the fact that someone had to ask you to reencode their iTunes-store music for them makes my point perfectly.

Again, I just need to ask you to look at the big picture here: What benefit is it to Apple to have DRM? It encourages people to stay with iTunes/iPod. What benefit is it to Apple to get rid of DRM? Absolutely none. This letter was purely PR because they're involved in a threatening legal case in Europe over this. That's all.

I guess I thought that they would buy the argument that DRM actually
decreases sales, relative to DRM-free. That was part of Steve's point
in his letter.

Also, if the Label middlemen were eliminated, the cut for the musician
could be increased, Apple's cut could increase or stay the same, and
the price to the consumer could stay the same or decrease.

win/win/win

One of Steve's points in his essay was that more music would be sold if it
were offered DRM-free. This would mean Metallica would make
more money. Clearly many musicians would not buy Steve's
argument, just as the big labels don't.

On the other hand, it is not fair to make a blanket condemnation of all
musicians, based upon Metallica. There are many examples of professional
musicians engaging in charitable activities, which I believe to be well
motivated.

The majors' model for distributing music is being made obsolete
by digital downloading. A record deal from one of them may not
be seen to be the biggest prize forever. In fact it may be seen
as giving a middleman, who contributes nothing to the creative
process, way too much of the revenue raised from the music.

I walk in to a record shop and talk to Jeremy behind the counter who sells me Kylie Minogue's latest album on the Parlephone label. As I've used above, Jeremy is the 'shop keeper', Parlephone are the 'manufacturer'. In European law my contract of sale is between the shop keeper and me, not Parlephone or Kylie Minoque. Parlephone are under no obligation to me and neither is Kylie.

I get home and find the CD won't play on my CD player. Since the contract is between myself and the shop keeper I take it back to the shop to exchange.

I get another CD but that doesn't play either.

It turns out the CD has some kind of DRM on it that my CD player doesn't like. I take it back to the shop and explain that the CD isn't following the spec for CDs and doesn't play on my CD player which only plays proper red book CDs like Phillips designed it to. Clearly* the manufacturer of the CD, Parlephone, is at fault but that is irrelevant between me and the shop keeper who have a contract. He is supposed to sell goods that are legal and fit for the purpose intended. He in turn has a contract with Parlephone but that's for him to argue about, not me. And much as I'd like to chastise Kylie, it's not her fault either.


So, moving to Apple, Apple here is the shop keeper and the only contract in dispute is between the consumer and Apple. That's what the Norwegians are saying. It's up to Apple to argue with the record companies and that's what Jobs is doing. It's not really the Norwegian Consumer Council's issue which legally is with the shop selling goods. The Norwegian Consumer Council are arguing that the goods sold (iTunes songs) are illegal in Norway. If it goes to court it'd have to be Apple in the dock, not the record companies.




No. it's a matter of legal process. They can only go after the party that has the contract with the consumer. It's got nothing to do with protecting EU companies. Norway aren't even in the EU.


* ok smartarses, I had the choice of buying a Debbie Gibson CD with no DRM on that would play but that's not the point.