Recently in Music Category

When I heard/read/whatever about the upcoming release of In Rainbows, I was overjoyed. For one, it was a new Radiohead album, which was, in and of itself, good news (they're pretty reliable when it comes to releasing great albums), but even better, it was going to be (practically) free! (If you're reading my blog, then you surely have at least an idea of why this album caused a stir, but if you want to know more, read this.) I was hoping that it would be the start of a music revolution, finally ditching the big labels, releasing albums for free, or at least for reasonable prices. I figured if any band could do it, it would be this one - they have a huge following, and can get away with just about anything.

As time passed, however, I quickly realized that it was only because Radiohead was Radiohead that they could pull it off (letting listeners download the album online and set the price, that is). It wasn't a formula that would work well for everyone, at least not yet. If bands didn't have millions of fans that were desperately anticipating a new album, then they weren't going to have a fraction of the luck their predecessors did.

After reading a short article entitled "Radiohead Offering Was Insincere, Industry Is Inept", which is based primarily on comments made by Trent Reznor - founder and creative force behind Nine Inch Nails (also one of the first to ditch his/their label) - I was less impressed with Radiohead's move with their recent album. Reznor brought up the points (of which I was already aware, but reading about them in series made more of an impression) of the band only releasing medium-quality (160kbs) tracks while Amazon and iTunes both offered 256kbs, going back to the record labels to put out the traditional album, cutting off distribution of online material after the previously mentioned release, and using their innovative sales method more as a marketing tool than a means to help out listeners. What they did was definitely a move in the right direction, but as the article points out, being who they were (Radiohead), they could have done better.

First thing's first. Let's establish exactly what we're talking about here. DRM is an acronym for "Digital Rights Management". "What's that mean?" you ask? I think About.com does a splendid job of explaining the term in a concise and understandable manner:

DRM is used by digital copyright owners to control who gets to access and copy their work. In particular, DRM gives programmers, musicians and movie artists some ability to remote control how people can install, listen to, view, and duplicate digital files. Although DRM is a broad term describing many different technical formats, it always involves some form of digital padlock on the file. These padlocks are called "licensed encryption keys" (intricate mathematical codes) that prevent just anyone from using or copying the file. People who pay for these licensed encryption keys are given the unlock codes to use the file for themselves, but are usually prevented from then sharing that file with other people.

Alright, so we know what DRM means, but now you might be curious of exactly how the technology is affecting our lives. Referring back to About.com (because it does an exceptional job of summarizing the subject), DRM is present in any of the following situations:

• You are using a WMA file;
• You are using an ACC file;
• You need specific software or specific music player hardware to play the file;
• You are limited to how many times you can download;
• You are limited in number of hours/days you can download;
• The number of different computers you can download to is limited;
• The number of times you can burn a CD is limited;
• You need a special password and/or logon ID before you can play the file;
• You need to reply to confirmation emails before you can play the file.

(Note: For this blog post and tomorrow's debate, we'll be focusing primarily on DRM's effect on music, as it is the area experiencing the most impact.) If you listen to music on a regular basis (as most of us do), it's difficult to avoid contact with DRM. And odds are you've been furious, or at least frustrated, with some of the limitations it's placed on your media. I think we can all agree that few of the items included on the above list cause us to jump up ecstatically and shout for joy. They're mostly just irritating and inconvenient.

Worst of all, DRM is incredibly ineffective and doesn't even come close to accomplishing its purpose (controlling access to, limiting uses of digital works, essentially protecting the illegal duplication of copyrighted material). There are plenty of well-known ways around DRM's, but those aren't even necessary for many people to obtain illegal copies of music. It only takes one individual to buy and rip a CD or crack a DRM, and then he/she can make it available to the rest of the Internet for free download. The organizations and companies promoting DRM are concerned with pirates, but this tech-savvy group still has a bag full of tricks to bypass the technology. Really, the people being punished most severely are those who legitimately purchase music. They might not even understand why they can't burn their newly purchased audio tracks to a CD or play them in their brand new Zune.

There's certainly no shortage of arguments against DRM, and I could go on for quite a while. However, because we've limited (for the sake of time and ease) tomorrow's debate to one main "offensive" argument per group, I'll direct your attention to that for the rest of this post...

In current practice, DRM usually translates to customers being bound to the company from which they've purchased music. Being Penn State students, most of us are aware that downloading from Ruckus, Napster or Apple's iStore will get you files that can only be played through the system that provided them. As mentioned before, this is hugely restrictive to customers. Just spent $12 on a new album from Apple's iStore and now you want to burn to to a CD to play in your car? Think again. That's a big no-no in the DRM world. Perhaps you downloaded a few tracks from Napster on your living room PC, and tonight at the party you're throwing, you want to play those tracks on the Mac you keep in your basement. Well, unfortunately Macs don't support Napster, so it looks like you're out of luck again. See where this is going? The trend is moving toward buying into a company rather than the music they provide. During a time when (almost) everyone is moving toward consolidation and universal standards, DRM's are tearing them apart.

There's going to be a point where people simply won't take any more. Those who used to purchase all their music legally are starting to resort to piracy and cracking DRM's, because the limitations are going too far. Organizations can't expect customers to continue to tolerate all of these imposed regulations, telling them what they can or cannot do with music that they legitimately purchased. Regardless of how much effort and money DRM-supporting organizations throw into the problem, it's not going to work. Music is a huge part of people's lives, and now that we've grown accustomed to certain freedoms with multimedia, there's no going back. As soon as everyone realizes this, we'll all be better off.

 

Before today, I had only been about 95% opposed to the RIAA's extreme anti-piracy tactics. After all, artists do make a (very small) part of the profit from legitimately purchased music, and they deserve all they can get…unless, of course, they’re Metallica or another group of pretentious [insert noun of choice] that have a knack for generating excrement.

It appears, however, that I might not have any reason for keeping my opposition level below 100% for long, as the RIAA (along with Apple, Napster, and the like) has officially given up on feigning any concern for artists (you know, those people that are responsible for the part of the product we actually care about). The RIAA wants to take the absurdly low 13% royalties that artists receive now for digital sales and drop it down to less than 9%. Apple, Napster, and company are shooting for 4%.

If trends in music distribution continue (becoming more digitalized), we may someday reach the point where online revenue is the only income that artists receive from recorded music. If this is the case and the bullies get their way, then artists will be making practically no profit from album/track sales. That’s understandable, though, isn’t it? I mean, think of the huge investments record labels need to drop into the physical capital and labors involved with mass-producing digital music. Oh, well... I suppose there really aren’t any costs involved with that. As far as I can tell, all the cash is going into advertising and the pockets of executives.

While this looks like a bad thing for artists and those that support them, it might just be the beginning of the solution. If royalties are dropped low enough, artists will quickly see that giving up the vast majority of their profits isn’t worth signing on with the big labels. They’ll release material independently or through smaller, more reasonable labels. In either case, prices should go down and what money is spent will be more directed to those who deserve it. At least we can hope this is how it works out.