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[mmcirvin]

This Washington Post article on the future of digital music has a musty smell. What is this strange "Inter-Net" of which you speak? You're saying that in the future people won't buy music in any physical format? HOW CAN THAT BE?

As usual, there is no explicit acknowledgement in the article that many people now buy CDs primarily as a source for music files that they immediately rip onto their computers and listen to that way; and that precisely because CDs are a quarter-century-old, uncompressed, unprotected format, this actually gives them more control over the music they bought than most digital download services do. Personally, I'm not so much of a fanatic about un-DRMed, lossless encoding that I can avoid the temptation of instant download sales, but it would nevertheless seem to be a fact worthy of note in an article like this one.

To get me to buy Abbey Road again, just offering it as a download would not work (even assuming that the minions of the ghost of the Beatles got over their Luddite opposition to this), because I've already got better; Paul or the walrus or whoever would have to either provide enough added value to entice me, or do something evil to make it impossible or inconvenient for me to listen to "She Came In Through The Bathroom Window" on MP3.

Then there is this paragraph:

A subscription-based service will be built into the latest version of Microsoft Windows; for between $10 and $20, users will access songs for a monthly fee but will be unable to burn them onto CDs. The only way they'll be able to listen to them is via a digital music player such as the iPod, or on a computer.

I think the likelihood of the phrase "such as the iPod" applying in the preceding is approximately nil, at least pending several more rounds of industry arm-twisting. Again, the article seems to completely ignore the WMA vs. AAC format war that is simmering behind the scenes.

Comments

[ckd]

The phrase "such as the iPod" in this context really means "kind of resembling an iPod, but sucky".

[pentomino.livejournal.com]

That's the problem with all this DRM. By buying something legitimately, you get something that's less useful than if you'd bought it illegally.

This must be why gun collectors were so pissed off about gun control.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Which is yet another reason to worship They Might Be Giants (http://www.theymightbegiants.com) (who seem to use a company called Back Office Music to handle their DRM-less, MP3-based online sales). But they're so prolific that they're also able to produce exclusive tracks for iTMS.

Actually the notion that all the cool indie bands should sell MP3s is one that comes and goes, and it seems to be re-emerging now.

[lots42.livejournal.com]

Unable to burn them onto CDs...yeah, for like five minutes, until someone cracks the encryption procedures or codes or whatever and posts the directions on Usenet.