Mobile Phones Open New Front In Music Piracy Rhetoric

It was only a matter of time before it began in earnest…the music industry has started sprouting off about piracy with mobile phone handsets. “Martin Higginson, the chief executive of Monstermob, told Music Week: “If piracy on the internet was a tidal wave, this is going to be a tsunami.” Aside from the fact that the numbers they always quote for the loss caused by piracy have little basis in reality the article points out that files can only be shared by Bluetooth (one song at a time) or memory cards, which require face-to-face contact and are no different from the way kids have been trading songs since recordable cassette tapes were introduced…saying it’s going to be worse than the internet is ridiculous — one-to-one is far less a threat than many-to-many. And that’s not to mention the DRM which will be put on the handsets whether it’s a good idea or not…I’m guessing these stories are only being circulated so the industry can justify the DRM measures being put in place which will result in consumers having to buy the same song to play on different devices. (via Ringtonia)
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