DRM on audio CD's abolished

This is translated from a Dutch news article on http://www.nos.nl/nosjournaal/artikelen/2007/1/8/080107_kopi...

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Record companies have stopped protecting audio CD's with DRM, which makes copying music a lot easier.

In 2002 Bretelsmann (record companies BMG, Arista and RCA) were the first to use DRM. Initially this was done on CD's that were sent out as promotion to music stores, radio stations and music reporters.

Later on all CD's from those companies were DRM'ed so people could not play the CD's on their computer anymore.

Computers running Windows even crashed when people attempted to play such CD's. The objective was that people could not easily copy CD's at home to sell to friends or distribute through the internet.

NVPI

Other record companies also started using DRM but over time, one after the other stopped DRM'ing their CD's, according to NVPI, the Dutch branche organisation for the music industry.

On her website the organisation reports that EMI is the last publisher to abolish DRM. "The costs of DRM do not measure up to the results".

The DRM software has to be renewed constantly to fight cracking. In addition it didn't work very well.

Protected CD's could sometimes not be played on devices that were supposed to play them, such as some car CD players.

Criticism

There was more criticism on the security. In 2005 Sony BMG had to recall millions of CD's due to it's DRM technology. When people would try to play it's protected CD's on their computers, it would install software without notification or confirmation.

Virus writers used Sony's DRM technology weak spots and could even open up back doors into a user's computer, giving full access to hackers.

Another complaint came from consumer rights organisations. They complained that people could not copy CD's for their own private use while that is legally allowed [in The Netherlands].

Brein

By abolishing DRM it has become easier to publish mp3's on the internet. Yet, Brein [Dutch RIAA] does not worry about an increase in illegal mp3 distribution.

According to Tim Kuijk from Brein DRM had no effect at all on the ammount of mp3's published on the internet. "Uploading and downloading of mp3's is here to stay, unless DRM technology is improved".

"Honest people will always be honest people and DRM doesn't stop people who have ill intentions anyway".