Sony BMG and Radiohead boost DRM-free music

Rating: Faith in the handset as a music player
restored
by Tony Dennis

To me, two seemingly unrelated events
have restored my faith in the mobile handset as a music player: -
Sony BMG’s decision to sell DRM-free MP3s via Amazon; and Radiohead’s latest
album topping the US charts.

Both mean that sense has finally
prevailed and it’s going to be much, much easier to download tracks I
like to the mobile phone of my choice. Basically, people want to play
their music where they like and not how the music industry tells
them.

I recall writing a brochure on transferring music to the
handset for Samsung UK many moons ago. The company’s lawyers had
kittens. Essentially the only legal activity at the time was to
acquire MP3s from unsigned bands via web sites like Lemonrock.

Yet
the music industry stuck by its DRM guns and then wondered why music
sales were declining. The litmus test is – can I play this in my
car? If you can, then you go for it, but if not, forget it.

So
back in the golden days, it was common practice to copy LPs to
cassettes for car use. The modern equivalent is ‘ripping’ CDs and
putting the results on a memory stick.
Sony’s change of hearts
means that I culd know get MP3 tracks from artists such as Annie
Lennox and The Zutons without taking the massive security risk of
linking up to a peer-to-peer file sharing network.

And DRM-free
MP3s don’t hurt sales. Radiohead’s In Rainbows album went to No: 1
despite the fact that it had initially been offered for free via the
internet here.

The catch is that the Amazon MP3 site  is still in
beta and only available to US customers. Never mind, because it’s
obvious that owners of – say – Sony Ericsson Walkman phones are a
prime target.

So eventually it will all filter down to me and I
won’t have to resort to a friend with Limewire to obtain the music I
want to put on my phone.

Related News:

1. Nokia signs Sony BMG to Comes with Music
2. DRM-free mobile music site Dada offers Christmas bonus to new subscribers
3. Datz targets musicphones with DRM-free MP3s
4. Mobile phones should be car stereo compatible
5. Mobile music search and discovery: three questions with Victor Fredell Sony Ericsson’s Content Acquisition Manager for music