Norway Declares iTunes Illegal

[mausalot]

Yes, DRM has to go. Get something like Quick Time fair use program at least allows you to strip DRM, but it may not be legal. But then again, it may be. I hate defending the record companies, but they have to pay for all the bands that fail -- that's millions of dollars in producing, advertising, and overhead that the sucessful acthave to subsidize. Many performers see the most money early on from touring, not their royalties. That said, the record companies certainly force new performers into draconian contracts.

 

[surur]

Its funny that Steve Job's recent post basically mirrored my own, in that CD's are sold without DRM, so why hobble digital distribution with the cursed technology?

Surur

 

[marcol]

I am in the music industry, and still plenty of my friends do it. I know a few people who have iPods that will "borrow" CDs from people whenever they find one that they don't have, so that they can upload it to their iPod. That is illegal. And while such violations will never be widely prosecuted since they cannot be monitored, there will continue to be a push towards ways of preventing this through the digital encoding process.

Do you have any evidence at all that this harms overall sales? It seems to me that the record industry's argument rests on the logic that because someone has copied a CD illegally that means they've lost the sale of one CD. I don't think it's half so simple as that. Sharing music helps get music noticed (think of it as a sort of advertising) and helps keep the whole industry alive. An example: I illegally copy the debut CD by a certain artist, listen to it and like it. I'm then 1) much more likely to buy the artists second CD, 2) much more likely to give the first CD as a gift, and 3) there's a fair chance I'll buy the first CD for my own use too. Sure, sometimes illegal copying will result in a net loss of sales, but sometimes it will result in a net sales increase. I don't have any stats relevant to this (I'm not even sure that it's possible to quantify it since it will often rely on subconscious effects) but I'm pretty sure that the logic that says 'one copying = one lost sale' is nonsense.

 

[marcol]

As I said before, music sales steadily increased until several years ago, and since then they have steadily decreased. Care to explain why this sudden change? Is listening to music becomming less popular in the last few years? I don't think so.

There are a mass of variables at play and it's extremely difficult to say, as you seem to be, that just one is decisive. I would note, however, that the real decline is in music delivered by CD and that this is mostly, but not completely, offset by increases in (legal) on-line sales:

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/media/article1350160.ece

It's hard to ignore the fact that the decline has coincided with the switch from a medium that (mostly) has unrestricted copying (CD) to one that makes copying much more difficult (DRMed AAC, MP3s, WMA). I'm not saying that I know that this is the reason for the sales decline, but it is at least a plausible explanation. Since you seem certain that you know the cause of the decline, perhaps you could explain how you know that the limitation on copying isn't a factor in reduced sales.

 

[marcol]

I'd pay for NON-DRM high quality tracks.

Me too.

 

[copernicus]

European Consumer Chief Swings at Apple

Link.

 

[kazuya888]

I don't think the ban will effect on Apple's profit, since Apple cleary doesnt make BIG money only by iTunes