With record companies (how quaint that they are still named after technology no longer used) increasingly desparate for increated profits that they feel naturally belong to them, they are working to make it more and more difficult for customers to use their product. We already have millions of customers willingly let Apple and its iPod restrict use of the music they've purchased.
Here are examples of what corporations are doing now, and what you can expect in the coming years:
- CDs with software that monitors your listening patterns and copying behavior.
- Rental music that limits you to listening to your music collection as long as you pay the monthly fee, which will increase over time.
- Lobbying governments to eliminate the "fair use" and "copies for personal use" aspects of the Copyright Act.
- Attempts to plug the analog hole.
- Music distributed with usage licenses as restrictive as today's software, which will include a clause allowing record companies (or their designated agents) to invade your home looking for copies.
- With ads infecting DVDs, I fully expect ads to invade music CDs soon; ads that you cannot fastforward past.
- Record companies will conspire to eliminate CDs (as they did with LPs) to force technology with greater restrictions.
All of these tactics fall under the acronym of DRM -- digital rights management. This technical term means that record companies get to decide how you listen to the music you purchased.
The time to guard against DRM is now. Here are some tips: * Maintain a DRM-free computer. Download DRM-free software -- such as older versions of Qunitessential Player (converts between MP3, WMA, and WAV for CDs), AR Wizard (records any input, such as from LP records and cassette tapes, direct to MP3), and CDex (semi-automatically converts music CDs to MP3 collections). * Given a choice, do not use any Apple (AAC) or Microsoft (WMA) formats. Convert and store all music in MP3. * Do not use digital music players in proprietary modes, such as Microsoft's PlayForSure or Apple's iTunes. Do not purchase music players that lack an MP3-only mode. * Before buying a music CD, look on the back for logos or statements that indicate the CD restricts copying. Making backup copies is your legal right. * Turn off autoplay on all your computers, so that CDs and DVDs cannot automatically install DRM software -- secretly or with your naive permission. * Convert you aging record, cassette, and 8-track collections to MP3 format. Make more than one backup, and store one set off-site. Seeing the look in the eyes of customers buying up the sexy Apple Nano and video iPods, it reminds me of characters eyeing the golden ring in Lord of the Rings -- the ring of evil that that rules them all. The characters didn't care what the ring did to them; they coveted it.
Comments