EMI Music is the only major label taking the necessary steps to make their entire digital catalog available free of digital rights management (DRM). This means you can burn music without buying an iPod. A pretty serious move for a major label, considering that only a few months ago all the majors were shunning the mere thought of DRM-free music. EMI is also creating "higher quality" DRM-free music by pairing up with Apple's iTunes Music Store for $1.29 a track. Pricey?!? And just to show you that the deal has been approved as "cool" they got EMI popstars the Good, the Bad & the Queen to perform two songs at a conference this morning in London. Ka-Ching! Steve Jobs has been propising that DRM -free music will help difital music downloads and sales in the presently stalled music economy.
So what makes DRM-free music so much better at $1.29 a song? Nothing.
The new "premium" versions of EMI's digital catalog will simply "complement the existing DRM-protected songs that iTunes is already selling." Steve Jobs called the EMI move the "next big step forward in the digital music revolution" but declined to reveal the details and negotiations with other labels
to anyone. Jobs also says that half of iTunes' catalog could be offered
DRM-free by the end of 2007.
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