SillyDog701

[Antony]

Although Apple's FairPlay (DRM) is flexible enought that most users will never run afoul of it, there are always some extremists demanding everything open. In April this year, Apple iTunes Store started [sdt=13219]selling EMI's DRM-free music at higher quality[/sdt].

The New York Times reports that the Universal Music Group is going to sell part of its catalogue DRM-free for the next few months to gauge consumer interest. However, the DRM-free music will not be available through the world's leading legit music service store - iTunes Store.

The effort is likely to be seen as part of the industry’s wider push to increase competition to iTunes and shift leverage away from Apple, which wields enormous influence over prices and other terms in digital music. A month ago, Universal notified Apple that it would not agree to a new long-term contract to sell music through iTunes.

Universal's unprotected music will be priced at 99 cents.

News source: Universal Music Will Sell Songs Without Copy Protection (The New York Times)

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[Don_HH2K]

Personally I feel that Universal's move away from DRM is a step in the right direction.

I don't have an account with The New York Times. Did they make a mention in the article what format they'd be distributing in, and for that matter, how they'd distribute it?

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[Antony]

I don't have an account with The New York Times.

Just click "skip this advertisement" and you can read the article.

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