Sony's Idea of DRM-Free Music 370
edmicman writes "Leave it to Sony to mess up DRM-free music downloads. What is the point of DRM-free tracks if you still have to go to a retail store to buy them? From the Infoworld article: 'The tracks will be offered in MP3 format, without DRM, from Jan. 15 in the U.S. and from late January in Canada... The move is far from the all-digital service offered by its rivals, though. To obtain the Sony-BMG tracks, would-be listeners will first have to go to a retail store to buy a Platinum MusicPass, a card containing a secret code, for a suggested retail price of $12.99. Once they have scratched off the card's covering to expose the code, they will be able to download one of just 37 albums available through the service, including Britney Spears' "Blackout" and Barry Manilow's "The Greatest Songs of the Seventies."'"
thepiratebay (Score:5, Funny)
coming soon to a bittorrent client near you...
Re:thepiratebay (Score:4, Insightful)
Non-paying people get a BETTER product all-round than paying consumers.
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a complete misunderstanding on Sonys part on how basic economics work:
An illegal copy basically is a COMPETING PRODUCT, with no limitations, for a better price.
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Although Sony should study the rest of your and GP's comment to end the stupidity, your last sentence reveals an alarming lack of either scruples or thought.
I mean, would you accept the availability of low-cost stolen car stereos and GPS-devices as a valid argument for why the electronics manufacturers should lower their prices?
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:thepiratebay (Score:4, Interesting)
And I would happily buy a car stereo (or GPS device) that retails new for $200 for $50 at a pawn shop - assuming that I'm fairly certain the owner of the pawn shop was not knowingly in receipt of stolen goods.
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Let's see, cheap entry-level hosting let's say with DreamHost is $6/month, and that includes 5TB of bandwith. The average song is aproximately 5MB, so this works out to a million songs downloaded for $6. So not only does it not cost -pennies- per track, infact it doesn't even get close to a single penny for a track.
Instead, you can serve up 1500 tracks -- and pay a single penny for the bandwith consumed by all of them in sum.
Physical distribution over
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Informative)
Once you realize the differences here, the situation becomes a purely moral one. Is it ethical to share what you have with others, if doing so deprives you of nothing? What about the corporate music industry? Is it ethical to deny these major labels a profit on something which can be so easily reproduced with such a miniscule amount of labor?
Musicians, on the other hand, are different. They are the ones who create the art. Even so, however, that does not mean that the creation of this art fits the established definition of "labor." Any musician who plays or sings for the love of it, which is as it should be, does not view what they do as labor. Creating music is not the same as an eight hour day in the cube farm. It is not a chore. It is something done out of love and often necessity. You could compare it in some ways to why Open Source and Free Software developers do what they do. It is like an addiction.
Still, artists should be compensated accordingly for their live performances, and donations in exchange for copies of their recordings would also be nice, though not necessary. The issue is that musicians are regular people as well. They should not be treated as some sort of royalty and end up millionaires. They should be able to bring in enough from their music to support themselves, of course, but twenty cars, four mansions and a private jet is absolutely ludicrous. Also, what most major artists make is a drop in the bucket when compared to what the music executives take. Food for thought, that.
To wrap it all into a neat little bundle: Cheap recording equipment, along with peer to peer and other technologies made possible by the ubiquity of the Internet, should be utilized to cut out middle-men completely. The antiquated music industry should be completely destroyed and replaced with a system that allows free copying and trading of music. Artists would become popular by, what a novel idea, the people deciding whether or not to listen to them. They would support themselves via live performances, merchandise if applicable, and donations from fans.
Buisinessmen should not have control over an art-form.
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I honestly can't believe people even consider this an ethical question. Lots of stuff is made with miniscule effort, that doesn't mean the person who makes it doesn't deserve to be paid. Go take an economics class.
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Being that I am a working musician, I know exactly how much I put into every song that my band creates. It is a different type of "labor," however. It is a labor of love. If we (I am assuming from your signature that you are also a musician) ceased to receive any form of monetary compensation for the work that we do, would you still do it? If your answer to that question is in the negative, then you are not playing music for the right reasons, and I suggest you quit.
I
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Non-paying people get a BETTER product all-round than paying consumers.
Um, on the other hand, never mind.
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Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:thepiratebay (Score:4, Funny)
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Informative)
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There, fixed that for ya.
From the summary:
To obtain the Sony-BMG tracks, would-be listeners will first have to go to a retail store to buy a Platinum MusicPass, a card containing a secret code, for a suggested retail price of $12.99. Once they have scratched off the card's covering to expose the code, they will be able to download one of just 37 albums available through the service, including Britney Spears' "Blackout"
Some are so unangry that they have editcountitis (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:thepiratebay (Score:4, Interesting)
Not every country has the ridiculous fine/damage levels as the US. This means that in some countries, you could get caught without being indebted for the rest of your life.
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Insightful)
What annoys and at the same time greatly amuses me is that if you walk into a store and steal a CD and get caught, you have a choice of paying a small misdemeanor fine or can demand a criminal trial where you are presumed innocent until found guilty of a misdemeanor and pay a relatively small fine.
But if you infringe copyright by downloading you will be offered to pay a several thousand dollar settlement or go to civil court where you are presumed giolty and have to pay up to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
If we didn't have the best legislators money could buy would our laws be so brain-dead? I've said it before, when they start writing respectable laws I'll start respecting the law.
That hooker I paid last night really sucked (journal coming soon). But she didn't suck as much as Sony.
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Interesting)
http://torrents.thepiratebay.org/3823582/Barry_Manilow_-_The_Greatest_Songs_Of_The_Seventies.3823582.TPB.torrent [thepiratebay.org]
http://torrents.thepiratebay.org/3958971/Britney_Spears_-_Blackout_(2007)_Dance_%5BBYANOUS%5D.3958971.TPB.torrent [thepiratebay.org]
Seriously though, when Sony decided it was ok to include a rootkit with their music I think they did not realize just how much damage they were doing to their brand.
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Seriously though, when Sony decided it was ok to include a rootkit with their music I think they did not realize just how much damage they were doing to their brand.
The rootkit fiasco may be well-known and unpopular amongst Slashdot readers, but I'm really not convinced that it's had that significant an impact amongst the public in general.
I bet that the majority haven't heard of it, or at least have forgotten most of the details (including Sony's involvement), and that most of the others don't consider it that big a deal, even though they should.
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Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Funny)
The "Encyclopedia of Crap that Never happened" (not to be confused with the O'Reilly factor) will attribute it to Sony's "It's cool to be old and curly-haired" campaign, but we'll both know the real reason.
I hate you more than you'll ever know.
Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Informative)
Amy_Winehouse-Back_To_Black_(Deluxe_Edition)-2CD-2007-UKP
Alicia Keys - As I Am [2007][CD+SkidVid_XviD+Cov]192Kbps
Top 40 singles Uk 06.01.2008 DHZ.Inc Release
Ministry Of Sound The Annual 2008
Kanye West - Graduation (2007) 224kbs
Timbaland-Present_Shock_Value_(Deluxe_Edition)-2CD-2007-SMO
Juno Soundtrack
Alicia Keys - As I Am (2007) Soul And R&B [BYANOUS]
Lupe Fiasco-The Cool (2007) Rap & Hip-Hop [BYANOUS]
The_Killers-Sawdust-2007-404
Daft Punk - Alive 2007 + Encore [Splitted into tracks]
Britney Spears - Blackout [2007][CD+SkidVid_XviD+Cov]192Kbps
Billboard 2007 Year End Top 100 Charts (Pop 100 and Hot 100)
Rihanna - Good Girl Gone Bad [2007][CD+SkidVid+Cov]192Kbps
Linkin Park - Minutes To Midnight [2007][CD+SkidVid+Cov]192Kbps
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss - Raising Sand (256Kbps)
Foo Fighters-Echoes Silence Patience & Grace[FullCD+Video][320kb
Top 1000 Pop Hits of the 80s (4.32gb)
Leona Lewis - Spirit [2007][CD+SkidVid_XviD+Cov]192Kbps
Radiohead - In Rainbows
Top 40 singles hit 40 Uk best of 2007 DHZ.Inc Release
The Rolling Stone Magazines 500 Greatest Songs Of All Time
Michael Buble - Call Me Irresponsible [2007]
Birdman - 5 * Stunna
Wyclef_Jean-Carnival_Vol_II_Memoirs_Of_An_Immigrant-2007-404
Tiesto-Club_Life_037-Cable-12-14-2007 -Legal-Ups
Bob Marley Discography
Gorillaz-D-Sides-2CD-2007-OURLEADERiSSiTEOP_ORLY
OneRepublic-Dreaming Out Loud[FullCD+Video][320kbps]-FiNsTeRc
Now That's What I Call Music 68
I would have to call that a fairly random selection of commercial rubbish. for more alternative music it's still easier to get it from a shop or on-line. And yes, I did once leave my PC on for a wek trying to download one album.
Re:thepiratebay (Score:4, Funny)
Open your firewall then. The albums will download about 10 times quicker.
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I once waited 6 weeks for someone with the last 10 MBs of a TV episode (this was of course completly legal home made TV show).
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That illustrates something I've been trying to say here for a long time, and that is that downloading isn't that damned convinient. Pirate Bay or Morpheus are good for indie music, but if you're looking for the top 40 the easiest, cheapest, and still legal way is to plug your radio's headphone jack into your sound card, sample a top-40 station [kuro5hin.org] and spend five minutes showing EAC where to make the cuts.
If you live in St Louis you can ha [kuro5hin.org]
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Re:thepiratebay (Score:5, Funny)
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Not that that seems to make much difference for dutch law, hosting a torrent here is just as illegal as hosting the data. In fact *pointing* to a torrent is already illegal !
failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Failure...with a twist (Score:5, Insightful)
Kind of like how release dates for most games are tied to the physical retail releases.
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Barry Manilow and Britney Spears! (Score:5, Funny)
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You have to go to a physical store... (Score:3, Interesting)
Some other shops have got it right, like my local Virgin Megastore who let you pick any cd or 7/12", scan the barcode at a listening station and listen to it before I buy the physical cd... if I can't even do this in their stores, then they've got the completely wrong idea and are so disconnected from their own customers that I really feel quite sorry for them.
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Unless he was talking about some weird and obscure nonstandard format, probably dating from the early gramophone days. But far more likely that he's just confusing 7" singles and 3 1/2" floppies.
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Twelve inch discs used to be just albums, played at 33 1/3 rpm. But the rise of dance remixes meant releases were put on 12" discs to be played at 45.
Or, if you were John Peel, just play everything at 78 rpm [google.com] and say "I think I played that at the wrong speed..."
Here's a better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Best idea (Score:5, Insightful)
That is, if any music Sony put out was even worth downloading.
Re:Best idea (Score:5, Funny)
Granted, if you drive or use public transport you probably won't get much exercise. And if you live in the city then it'd probably be better for you to stay inside.
Plus I have to spend money.
Shit, your way's much better. I'm going to do that instead from now on.
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You know, whenever I read this very statement I'm reminded of some PR shill trying to confuse this really shitty thing (not to mention, criminal act) which a Sony subsidiary pulled off.
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Britney Spears (Score:5, Funny)
Congratulations! (Score:3, Funny)
Dear Sony (Score:5, Funny)
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Subject? (Score:2, Funny)
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---
Contronyms: for people who are chuffed by antonyms
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Great move (Score:5, Insightful)
[...] first have to go to a retail store [...] they will be able to download one of just 37 albums available through the service, including Britney Spears' "Blackout" and Barry Manilow's "The Greatest Songs of the Seventies."'"
Uhh... great artist selection, there. If I have to walk down to the retail store and then choose between Britney and Barry Manilow, I would rather save my hard-earned money.
Within a couple of months Sony will "accidentally" leak the sad numbers of their non-DRM trial to select members of the press, who will then write scathing opinion pieces about how the rampant piracy is so widespread that even removing DRM can't help the music industry.
--Bud
Imagine if these dorks (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh, bummer.
Think of it this way (Score:3, Funny)
37 albums (Score:2, Insightful)
In contrast, online retailer Amazon.com offers 2.9 million DRM-free tracks in MP3 format from the catalogs of EMI Group, Warner Music Group, Universal Music and a host of independent record labels. Apple's iTunes Store has around 2 million DRM-free tracks in the AAC format supported by its iPod and many mobile phones. No store visit is necessary to download those tracks, and an album typically sells for $9.99 or less.
i don't think it's a smart move from sony.. but hey....at least there's not spyware in it...
Let me see if I have this right... (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah. Right.
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DRM free doesn't mean Sony couldn't (or wouldn't) place a unique key in the MP3 header. Your 8 year old daughter places a copy of the downloaded file in a public location and then Sony can track you down and sue your rear-end off.
Personally, I find the idea of watermarked files acceptable. If I illegally share an mp3 to a hundred thousand people, then I should be prosecuted. The professional pirates would be able to remove the watermark anyway (or, would probably rip the stuff from the cds themselves), and the home user would be able to listen to their mp3 on any mp3 player, or recode it for a non-mp3 player, without drm getting in the way.
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If you bought that Barry Manilow cd and dont like it, you can sell it to a "Used Music Shop".
With the fingerprinting, they are also attempting to prevent resell.
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Your 8 year old daughter places a copy of the downloaded file in a public location and then Sony can track you down and sue your rear-end off.
But, even if the files are stamped or watermarked, since the sale is based on a physical card with a number (which you can pay cash for), there is no easy way to track where it came from. They could track it to which retail store sold the card, but that's about it.
If they really wanted to be able track who uploaded their music, they would be doing on-line sales like everybody else.
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I'm deliberately conflating them to provoke the debate. ;)
While there's 16 bits per channel of data, if only 13 or so of them are actually being used, is there any point in ripping more bits of discrete information than are actually present? For example, at what bit rate can you encode using 'lossy' compression that doesn't actually lose any information in the decoded result?
It because if you then upload... (Score:2, Insightful)
In Summary (Score:5, Insightful)
- US and Canada only
- retail Brix-N-Mortar visit required
- Purchase a "Card with secret code"
- Card enables download of one album from a selection of 37 (another album means another visit and another card)
- TFA says "MP3 format" but for all you know it's encoded as mono@32kbps with literally zero info in the ID3 tags
- For all those hoops you just jumped through, not significantly cheaper than just purchasing the CD
- does this work on Linux? MacOS? BeOS? AmigaOS? (before you whine about "it's just a download" you've *all* had some site you went to where it simply did not work on "your OS and browser of choice")
Or you could read the short version: MultiNational MegaCorp with a History of fair-use violating DRM enforcement and downright corporate shenanigans (rootkit, anyone?) releases DRM-free program more difficult to operate than the-clock-on-your-vcr and of actual negative value to end-customers.Consensus seems to be that 6 months from now SonyBMG will issue an "I Told You So" press release claiming they went all out to allow DRM-free downloads and nobody wanted it.
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MONO?
Next step:
Re:In Summary (Score:4, Insightful)
There are quite a lot of people saying this and it may well be true but it makes no difference, it's the buying public they are now trying to shoehorn into something they don't want not just a bunch of people trying to justify peer-to-peer but their actual buying customers that they are now alienating.
Take my wife (please) - would never dream of pirating anything and is completely technophobic. Yet when she cannot put the CD she just bought onto her MP3 player, she sees no reason for me not to get it from a torrent site. She has even started saying some things we've said for years, only last night we watched a DVD and when that irritating "you wouldn't steal a handbag or a car so why steal a DVD" unskippable advert comes up she points out the obvious - why is that on a DVD I bought?
Point is, I think that everyone is starting to get pissed off with being treated as a criminal.
Did anyone think Sony would REALLY go DRM-free? (Score:3, Insightful)
Get used to it, though. If blu-ray wins the HD format war, you're going to be seeing a *LOT* more aggressive DRM than this.
Sony's clever plan (Score:4, Funny)
Sony Continues to Amaze (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's make our product:
* Hard to get
* More expensive than the (legal!) competition
* Packaged in bundles consumers don't want
* Install dangerous malware on our customers' computers (and get sued)
Sony once again proves adept at charting a beeline directly for the scrapheap of history. About what you'd expect from the company that thought up the "Ringle".
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I don't see the problem with this... (Score:3, Insightful)
Buy a card from a retail store? Fair enough. That seems reasonable.
Limited selection of music... well maybe they just want to test the waters. Although it sounds like the lack of quality (Britney Spears wasn't good even when she WAS good) may mean they are trying to purposefully set the program up for failure.
None of this is unreasonable to the customer, and I'd do it to buy legal, DRM-free music.
Except for the fact that this is Sony, which I have determined NEVER to give any money to again. These are the unrepentant bastards who infected millions of computers with rootkits (their executives should have gone to prison for that, but the corruption of the current government is for another discussion), put self destruct sequences in the Blu-Ray player specs, sell DVD's that won't play in many DVD players, shut down Lik-Sang, made digital music players that ONLY used a proprietary Sony music format, screwed the early adopters of HDTV (Blu-ray players won't work with non-drm'd inputs)...
Sony is a bunch of asshats. Fuckem.
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What the do you mean "they're doing something right"?
Are they bollocks - it's dearer than a CD, with a poor selection and inconveniant to obtain - they are wither testing the waters or most likely trying to put themselves in a position to say they have empirical evidence that no-one wants DRM free music.
You are right about when they get it right, but they have done nothing here to be praised for.
Spears (Score:2)
Scratchcard are fine (Score:3, Interesting)
How many Barry Manilow fans have no credit card? (Score:2)
Look on the bright side though, Britney is now with Barry.
Re:How many Barry Manilow fans have no credit card (Score:2)
Re:How many Barry Manilow fans have no credit card (Score:2)
There definitely might be research that shows the average Barry Manilow fan owns 2.4 cats, 1.7 Big Mouth Billy Bass Singing Fish, 7.2 beige polyester shirts and believes that using your credit card online can cause sterility...
Presumably, the initial list of albums is more of a systems test than a serious launch - you probably could get those on CD in a decent convenienc
I'm looking forward (Score:3, Insightful)
Folks that can't handle it, like obviously Sony-BMGs management, should really stay clear from an Absinthe bottle.
Propping up existing distribution chain (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't know if this is good or bad. On one hand, it may keep a music section in retailers a bit longer, providing a place to walk in and lay hands on a physical album set. On the other hand, that extra middle-man keeps the cost of music slightly higher. I think this is a fairly responsible thing for Sony to do, because it will help prevent a drastic change which could be detrimental in the short term.
Dan East
Worst of both worlds (Score:2)
Why is this weird? (Score:2)
The retail chains has many of the record companies by the nutsack since a vast amount of records and movies are sold through these chains. Also, I would speculate that those chains would object to Sony-BMG selling the music to the consumer directly.
Hence this "compromise".
Better idea (Score:5, Funny)
Smart thinking...cadrs mean kids, gifts, etc. (Score:2)
The whole list (Score:5, Informative)
The initial slate of Platinum MusicPass titles is as follows:
Platinum MusicPass Albums with Bonus Material (slrp $12.99):
Alejandro Fernandez, Viento A Favor
Alicia Keys, As I Am
Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing
Backstreet Boys, UnBreakable
Barry Manilow, The Greatest Songs of the Seventies
Bob Dylan, Dylan
Boys Like Girls, Boys Like Girls
Brad Paisley, 5th Gear
Britney Spears, Blackout
Brooks & Dunn, Cowboy Town
Bruce Springsteen, Magic
Calle 13, Residente o Visitante
Camila, Todo Cambio
Carrie Underwood, Carnival Ride
Casting Crowns, The Altar and The Door
Celine Dion, Taking Chances
Chris Brown, Exclusive
Daughtry, Daughtry
Elvis Presley, Elvis 30 #1 Hits
Jennifer Lopez, Brave
John Mayer, Continuum
Kenny Chesney, Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates
Martina McBride, Waking Up Laughing
P!nk, I'm Not Dead
Santana, Ultimate Santana
Sara Bareilles, Little Voice
Sean Kingston, Sean Kingston
The Fray, How To Save A Life
Three Days Grace, One-X
Tony Bennett, Duets
Platinum MusicPass Compilations (slrp $12.99)
Various, 70's POP HITS
Various, ROCK OF THE 70's
Various, SENSATIONAL 60's
Various, COUNTRY GOLD: THE 90's
Various, 80's POP HITS
Various, CLASSIC ROCK
Various, Everlasting Love
Expanded MusicPass Titles (slrp $19.99 versions which include the complete album, bonus material, plus choice of one additional album from that same artist's rich catalog of recordings.)
Kenny Chesney, Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates
Celine Dion, Taking Chances
What's the difference? (Score:2, Insightful)
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The key word there is "music store" - specifically one which has the CD you want in stock. If the Sony idea takes off then your local "Kwik-E-Mart" (or non-fictitious equivalent) can sell the cards - just like Apple already do with iTunes cards.
Everyone Meet Up At The Stores (Score:2)
So there was a brand called Saunny you say ? (Score:2, Interesting)
And still the PS/3 fanbois.... (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm the customer, let me tell you want I want (Score:4, Insightful)
At first I just downloaded but naturally every year or so I'd get a crash or something would happen and I would lose my collection. All the current stuff you can find at decent quality but not necessarily stuff from two or five years back. And not all rips are the same so I eventually found myself just buying the CD's just to rip them myself at higher quality. I never bought CD's before this. I fell into the pattern of downloading the new stuff and buying at least 2/3 of the stuff within a couple years by shopping for used CD's in stores and online. Usually paying no more than like $7 a CD but remember that chances are I only like 2 songs on the disc. I buy my music, maybe not how the music industry would me to; but non the less I do, it's on my terms and it works for me.
Want do I want? Electronic per song transferable digital licenses. And with those access to the music companies online computers to download the music. And I want the FTC and FCC involved so that the licenses are locked in and guaranteed so that when the technology and protocols of the digital licenses change they are guaranteed transferable to the next technology. And songs are not locked into one account or device(as they are with apple), your free to sell and transfer the per song licenses to someone else in the free market. And it would be nice if the licenses covered all relatively close versions of the song sung by the same performer so they can't charge you again for acoustic, karaoke, different file formats, or higher bit quality. In other words you own the rights to listen to that song and your entitled to all versions of it. That would be worth something.
Missing the point of physical cards (Score:3, Insightful)
Similar to Wii Points, XBox Live Cards and iTunes cards,
this is so that people without access to a charge card can still participate by paying cash money at a local merchant.
Not everyone has a credit card to use on the Internet.
Barry Manilow??? (Score:3, Interesting)
Rewriting history... (Score:3, Informative)
That argument eventually won favor with Apple [...]
You mean "that argument eventually won favor with EMI". Apple was MAKING that argument to the music industry before they even opened the iTunes Music store, according to the Rolling STone interview with Steve Jobs just a few months after the iTunes Music Store opened:
More recently, after EMI finally made the break:
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Re:Hurray! (Score:4, Funny)
Oh Sony, you came and you took without giving,
You've taken it all, oh Sony.
Misspent youth with only AM radio.