After intensifying waves of criticism, late last week Sony BMG decided to take a time out. “We stand by content protection technology as an important tool to protect our intellectual property rights and those of our artists. Nonetheless, as a precautionary measure, SONY BMG is temporarily suspending the manufacture of CDs containing XCP technology. We also intend to re-examine all aspects of our content protection initiative to be sure that it continues to meet our goals of security and ease of consumer use.” (More on XCP here.) The company still plans to copy protect all major 2006 releases.
Beyond the rootkit problems, my sister ran into another facet of Sony BMG’s DRM when she tried to move songs from a new Neil Diamond album to an iPod. She tried the convoluted suggested workaround that involves converting formats, making a new CD and then moving to iPod only to be informed she needed a license. She gave up. Sony BMG suggests frustrated users contact Apple with complaints and as much as I believe in interoperability would it be awful of me to suggest Sony BMG not create a new class of CDs that aren’t buyer friendly? Monday’s USA Today even includes the EFF list of hobbled Sony BMG titles, surely not the kind of non-shopping list a record label wants to see. Artists aren’t thrilled; Jeff Graham reports that The Foo Fighters, Dave Matthews Band and Switchfoot “have posted notes on websites decrying restrictions and offering tips for how to skirt the system.” Inside Digital Media analyst Phil Leigh says that the hassles could send users to file-sharing networks. One interesting note from USAT: EMI is planning a song-sharing feature that will let people email a link to friends who can then download a song and listen to it for a limited number of times before it goes poof.
More from the NYT (reg. req.) Understatement of the day: “I think we’re still waiting for the development of D.R.M. that finds ways to satisfy both consumers’ needs and producers’ needs.” — David Sohn, general counsel, Center for Democracy and Technology.
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