All Posts Tagged With: "drm-free"
Wal-Mart DRM Music Will Cease to Play on October 9
Walmart began selling DRM-free tracks in its music store in August of last year. 13 months later, the mega-corp has decided to follow the footsteps of so many others and hit the kill switch on its DRM management servers.
As noted in an e-mail to customers, Wally World will be making the final transition into a fully DRM-free MP3 store on October 9th, and in order to keep those DRM-laden files playable on anything, it’s recommended that you burn protected files on a CD on the double.
EMI Launches New Era Of DRM Free Music Downloads
In a move that’s sure to have both positive and negative ramifications EMI Group announced they would be offering their digital catalog for sale over the internet via Apple’s iTunes and other online retailers DRM Free. Music would be offered at a higher fidelity without the digital rights management software for a premium price of $1.29 instead of the typical .99 cents. You’ll also be able to get a full album for the same prices as a lower fidelity copy-protected album.
It’s a bold move and one that’s long time coming. The consumer market spoke long ago and it look slike EMI at least is starting to listen. Where this goes will be interesting to watch but Eric Nicoli, CEO EMI, said that consumers would pay a higher cost for DRM Free music and that unrestricted tracks outsold their restricted counterparts 10 to 1. That’s no real surprise, I for one would pay a bit more per track to get an unrestricted copy. I think the offering is even more attractive if I can purchase the full high fidelity album for the same cost.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs who was present for the announcement made the lofty prediction that by the end of the year, half the songs on iTunes would be offered DRM Free.
All I can say is, it’s about time.
