February 07, 2007

February 06, 2007

In 2006, under 2 billion DRM-protected songs were sold worldwide by online stores, while over 20 billion songs were sold completely DRM-free and unprotected on CDs by the music companies themselves. The music companies sell the vast majority of their music DRM-free, and show no signs of changing this behavior, since the overwhelming majority of their revenues depend on selling CDs which must play in CD players that support no DRM system.

So if the music companies are selling over 90 percent of their music DRM-free, what benefits do they get from selling the remaining small percentage of their music encumbered with a DRM system? There appear to be none. If anything, the technical expertise and overhead required to create, operate and update a DRM system has limited the number of participants selling DRM protected music. If such requirements were removed, the music industry might experience an influx of new companies willing to invest in innovative new stores and players. This can only be seen as a positive by the music companies.

Apple Could Sell CDs and Bundle Music with iPods: The old agreement (at Sections 1.3 and 4.3) seemingly prevented Apple from selling music on physical media, such as CDs, even though it could sell music through the iTunes Store. On paper, this seemed like a simple limitation: Apple could sell music-playing hardware like iPods, but it couldn't sell you the discs full of music to play on the iPod.

Apple's iTunes Store - the subject of the 2003 lawsuit - successfully stepped around this limitation by using the Internet to distribute music, but it left Apple with two major limitations: Apple couldn't pre-install music on iPods, or otherwise sell it on any physical medium, such as discs. This was one of the reasons that the prior U2 Special Edition iPods didn't actually include U2's music - Apple's contract with The Beatles forced you to buy it separately online.

February 05, 2007

"We love the Beatles, and it has been painful being at odds with them over these trademarks," said Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs in a prepared statement. "It feels great to resolve this in a positive manner, and in a way that should remove the potential of further disagreements in the future."

Neil Aspinall, manager of Apple Corps, said the company was glad to resolve the dispute. "The years ahead are going to be very exciting times for us. We wish Apple Inc. every success and look forward to many years of peaceful co-operation with them,'' he said.

The settlement resolves what had been a major roadblock to Apple's efforts to make the Beatles catalog available on iTunes. The joint statement didn't address whether Beatles songs would be available online.

Let's review how many copyright violations I have committed. First, I'm using a published work in a synchronous performance with my video, so I would need a sync license from the publisher. Next, I would need master rights from the record company. I edited the piece (I used the beginning in the end and did a few cuts on the beat, then shortened the work and left out 80% of the song), so I would need permission to edit the master. I would also need public performance rights because it's being "broadcast" on YouTube. And lastly, I would need to pay a mechanical royalty for every download. But how?

Believe it or not, as a consumer, there is absolutely no way for me to obtain any of these rights. There's no button to click in iTunes, no publisher's site to visit, no way to find out who owns what. In fact, iTunes doesn't even tell you who the composer or the publisher of the song is. All you can find out from the metadata is that it was from "The Best of Van Halen Vol. 1" and that the work was copyrighted in 1996 by Warner Bros. Records Inc. . Anyone want to try to send them an email or call the main switchboard. I tried this morning and didn't get very far.

Now, I'm not selling this piece, so there is no commercial value being lost here -- is there? Of course there is. If I was told that to use the piece in a video I needed to pay an extra $.99 or some token amount, I would have been happy to do so. If I was told that I could not use this song with some special warning, I would have been happy to find an alternative. Unfortunately, there is no consumer education being done at all. (Unless you count the lawsuits that the RIAA keeps bringing against consumers as educational.) In the "year of self-expression" how many millions of dollars are the recorded music companies leaving on the table by not licensing music to consumers for personal use online?

February 02, 2007

February 01, 2007

Black Eyed Peas Will.I.Am likes nothing more than rushing straight to the internet after a gig - to catch fans who posts illegal clips of their show on the web. The 31 year old says, "I check MySpace and I look on YouTube to see who posts up phone clips of the show first. They get arrested."

Eventually, more than two-thirds of the roster had piled on and turned this team into baseball's official iSquad. Every player gets his own custom set of videos loaded onto his personal iPod, sorted by date, hitter, pitcher and opponent -- and updated every week or so.

"The great thing is, it's so easy to use," said Jennings, who became a happy iPod convert in a hurry. "It's such an easy thing to have access to. You can go to Best Buy and, by that night, you can have all your starts for the last four years on there."