RSSUniversal Goes DRM Free, But Not on iTunes
By Ed Oswald | Published August 10, 2007, 9:49 AM
Universal said late Thursday that it planned to start selling music tracks from its artists in MP3 format for a limited time, however not through Apple's iTunes Music store. Also a surprise in the announcement: Google plans to begin selling MP3s directly from its search engine, BetaNews has learned.
The move from both Universal and Google is a clear shot across the bow of Apple, which has a near stranglehold on the digital music industry. It also seems to indicate that digital rights management may be on its way out with record executives.
"The handwriting for DRM is on the wall," Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg remarked. "Universal is using this to clearly poke Apple with a sharp stick."
Universal denies that it is attempting to shut iTunes out or force some contractual changes. Rather, it will use the service as a control group to measure the success of the offering.
Universal will make the tracks available through the Web sites of the artists themselves, as well as selected online retailers. The tracks will be available from August 21 to January 31, 2008. Among the retailers to offer the MP3s would be Amazon, Wal-Mart, Best Buy, RealNetworks' Rhapsody, among others.
A surprise mention on this list is Google, which up until now had not entered the digital music business. The search company had been offering videos for sale, but the Universal music tracks would be a first. According to sources, the MP3s will be available to buy directly from its search results pages using Google Checkout for payment.
All songs will be offered for 99 cents -- cheaper than the DRM-free tracks iTunes sells from EMI for $1.29 USD. While Universal itself will offer its songs in MP3, other services would be free to use any other DRM-free format of their choice. The label said it also plans to try out other ways to distribute its music throughout the rest of the year.
Who wants to go around to different band websites and give all your information to each and every one of them. Please just stick with iTunes.
I also don't know why you would not want to sell your best product at the Number 3 Music Store in the United States. To me this sounds like they are goimg to set this up and when no one buys it say that we don't want DRM free music. Unless your biased against Apple iTunes is the easiest way to buy music. As for doing promotional stuff Apple has done it before. They had a bunch of videos you got for free if you bought the swimsuit issue of Sports Illistrated. As for different prices for different songs I say who wants to worr about if the song is $2.00 or $0.50. They will always price the good songs high and the not as good songs lower.
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|maybe because they can just sell it in more ways? sell it from #1, #2 store rather than #3 store?
Only apple fanboy would against this.
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|I'm not saying don't sell it elsewhere. It sounds like they want to sell DRM Free songs from anyone but Apple. They sold a billion songs in 6 months. Why would you shut them out?
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|Probably because they're MP3's and not AAC. iTunes probably wanted AAC (to lock you into iPods) and Universal didn't. It's smarter to use MP3's because then it'll work with all 'MP3' players.
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|I think it's purely a question of control. Record companies don't like how powerful Apple has become in this sector.
--->I also don't know why you would not want to sell your best product at the Number 3 Music Store in the United States.
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|Why would anyone want to use the iTunes software? It's very slow and crashes a lot (at least under Windows). There is much better software like Windows Media Player 11 for example. The only missing piece is DRM-free music from MTV's URGE music store. Otherwise, I have had absolutely no trouble finding the music I want on URGE.
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|yea
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|rah
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|what
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|It would be nice if these DRM Free tracks were also lossless...
I still prefer purchasing the CD and making my own lossless flac image+cue archive and lousy AAC tracks for playback on my iPod.
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|or Zune.
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|Yeah, I'd jump on the first music store to offer Flac downloads (if prices were cheaper than CD's).
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|Nice!
not that i'm going to buy anything (there is simply no good music made today by any given label) but it is good to see that someone is sticking it up to iTunes. especialy after all those puffy lectures about how the music shoud be DRM free by Jobs.
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|I find it funny that Universal is offering the DRM free tracks at a cheaper price, when they've been b****ing at Apple for their low prices.
Rolleyes...
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|Actually they havent been against apple's low prices, but against Apple's "only one price" model. They want to be able to discount songs as well as charge a premium.
Discounting songs is a great "marketing tool" and can also make "some money" rather than "no money" for less popular music.
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|what a blow to iTunes Music Store...we haven't seen the last of this!
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|The fact that they are not using iTunes as a distribution point isn't that surprising. They constantly mention DRM-free MP3 as the format of choice. I've never seen Apple issue MP3 as a format in the iTMS. EMI's music although DRM-free is still AAC and not as widely supported. MP3s offered through services that aren't bound to specific players (i.e. iTunes/iPod) seems like a logical step in testing the waters for such a step forward for the music labels. The real question will be whether these are 128 kbps MP3s or better.
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