Michael Robertson will announced details of his new music company, MP3tunes, at an upcoming Open Source conference next week. Robertson intends to launch a service that offers music which is free of any rights management, or DRM. He emphasised that MP3tunes would give consumers interoperability and choice. Currently, there are very few services online that offer users music free of DRM; AllofMp3.com, a service based in Russia, offer Mp3 downloads alongside other formats.
Robertson said "When I started MP3.com, the term 'MP3' was an obscure acronym recognizable only by geeks. Back then, we had to battle for the legality of MP3 players. But because of those early efforts, consumers now have a spectacular array of portable players to choose from. Today, certain market forces are trying to drive consumers away from MP3 towards proprietary systems, which lock out some consumers and force everyone to buy a particular company's player or software program. I wanted consumers to have more options, so I felt compelled to re enter the music space to bring the limelight back to MP3."
The service will undoubtedly fill gap for consumers who want similar rights with their music online as offline. Exactly how favourably recording companies will look on the service is unknown; indeed, what content the service will have when launched is also unknown; recent history would suggest that these companies won't be especially enamoured at the idea. Apple faced a tough battle with the recording industry when they started their iTunes service. The music industry allowed Apple to offer its content on the basis that Apple ensured there was a rights management system in place ot prevent piracy.
In other news, music bad boy "gone good" Napster is offering a new service geared up for mobile music players. Called Napster To Go, Napster will offer unlimited downloads for a monthly fee. The service will be launched with a blitz of publicity, including a $30m ad at the Super Bowl this Sunday. The Napster To Go service will offer a strikingly different option for users who want more freedom (and better value) than the current industry model offered by Apple.
View: More info | Napster Homepage
Robertson said "When I started MP3.com, the term 'MP3' was an obscure acronym recognizable only by geeks. Back then, we had to battle for the legality of MP3 players. But because of those early efforts, consumers now have a spectacular array of portable players to choose from. Today, certain market forces are trying to drive consumers away from MP3 towards proprietary systems, which lock out some consumers and force everyone to buy a particular company's player or software program. I wanted consumers to have more options, so I felt compelled to re enter the music space to bring the limelight back to MP3."
The service will undoubtedly fill gap for consumers who want similar rights with their music online as offline. Exactly how favourably recording companies will look on the service is unknown; indeed, what content the service will have when launched is also unknown; recent history would suggest that these companies won't be especially enamoured at the idea. Apple faced a tough battle with the recording industry when they started their iTunes service. The music industry allowed Apple to offer its content on the basis that Apple ensured there was a rights management system in place ot prevent piracy.
In other news, music bad boy "gone good" Napster is offering a new service geared up for mobile music players. Called Napster To Go, Napster will offer unlimited downloads for a monthly fee. The service will be launched with a blitz of publicity, including a $30m ad at the Super Bowl this Sunday. The Napster To Go service will offer a strikingly different option for users who want more freedom (and better value) than the current industry model offered by Apple.
View: More info | Napster Homepage
This story was held and subsequently re-run to check for accuracy.
For the most part DRM allows you to do the legitimate thing you should be able to do with music. I bought content from both Napster and MSN and have it loaded on all 3 of my computers, I can burn it to a CD I can transfer it to a media player. I can’t give copies to all my friends or share it on the internet, but I should not be able to do that anyway.
I really only have two big wishes that I would like to see DRM allow. One, I think you should be able to use DRM music as the sound track of a home movie. I don’t think people will be encoding video files just to share their music, it is easier just to do a “burn and rip” if you really need to break DRM. Two, I would like to be able to use the MSN messenger to stream music to friends. This is something MS talked about two years ago, but I haven’t heard anything recently. If they fixed those two things I would have no complaints at all with DRM.
Uh, that is patently false. Obviously you really don't do any serious filesharing for a few years uh ?
I’m not sure what MSN uses as a music source, but in some cases the MSN music actually sounds better then original CD’s uncompressed sampling rate.
the mp3's noobs have encoded with the like of music match, on fast setting do indeed sound like crap. i still marvel at downloading 256kbps mp3's and having them sound worse than properly encoded 96kbps mp3. people who know what they are doing can get great sounding mp3's from 192kbps, but as already pointed out it's still mp3, and as already pointed out there are some good FLAC and Monkeys Audio lossless usenet sources which are losslessly compressed.
I’m not sure what MSN uses as a music source, but in some cases the MSN music actually sounds better then original CD’s uncompressed sampling rate.
It would be a bit hard to find 384+ bit rate MP3s since the maximum bitrate for an MP3 is 320kbps. And he is incorrect. Most music release groups now use the Lame 3.90.3 codec with --alt-preset standard, which only truely trained ears can differentiate from the source unless it's an obviously difficult sample to compress. It uses VBR from 32kbps to 320kbps and is very intelligent in its attempts.
Also, the MSN music doesn't sound better than the uncompressed original CD's. Say hello to the placebo effect. Compressed audio cannot sound better than its source. That's like saying that a movie you downloaded off the internet looks better than the real DVD. You cannot surpass the original source in quality. In all likelihood, the music's volume has probably been increased which causes you to perceive an increase in quality.
"A VBR WMA file peaking at 280 is the next best thing to mathematically lossless." According to whom? Please don't pass off your opinions with no factual basis as a legitimate argument.
- the spelling nazi.
Thanks for catching those errors.
Stop paying subscription, music stops working. What a load!
Napster gives you both options. You can either buy each song at 99¢ a piece, or use their subscription service. If you don't like the idea of a subscription then buy each some one at a time; it is your choice.
If you are really into listening to all the latest music, then a subscription would be better for you. If you have a hand full of albums that you want to have for the rest of your life, then buy them (either online or as a CD).
That's a bit strong and patronising.
ta
What I think is a great idea tho, is DivX VOD (Video On Demand). You can rent a DivX movie for like a dollar, and then watch it on your PC or DivX compatible DVD player!
FREE MUSIC!!!
Speaking of which, anyone else catch the news post from Bink's site? If not, here's a quote:
To the growing frustration and annoyance of Microsoft's management, Apple Computer's iPod is wildly popular among Microsoft's workers.
"About 80 percent of Microsoft employees who have a portable music player have an iPod," said one source, a high-level manager who asked to remain anonymous. "It's pretty staggering."
The source estimated 80 percent of Microsoft employees have a music player -- that translates to 16,000 iPod users among the 25,000 who work at or near Microsoft's corporate campus. "This irks the management team no end," said the source.
So popular is the iPod, executives are increasingly sending out memos frowning on its use.
Pretty interesting. In the battle for portable music, one man is fighting to get people the freedom to choose what they want....and when you do, there's another one out their trying to suffocate that freedom.
Yeah that is pretty scary, but I don't think Jobs will get away with it.
As for that "article" on Wired, I'd suggest you read this:
Scoble
Dude, what you want and what the content owners want is different! All this is going to be is another MP3.com with lesser known artists who already have their content out on other sites. This is a waste of time just like anything else Robertson has been up to lately. This guy doesn't understand business clearly. He wants to change for this Lin' crap marketing an easy way to obtain and install what is already mostly free software. Now he wants to support the MP3 format by starting a music store that will have tracks in the format, yet no major label is going to sign up to sell music this way. It's stupid.
People don't get it. Microsoft is not the one pushing DRM. It's the labels. Microsoft, realizing there is business here, is trying to make sure that it is their DRM standard once they do.
ABC and a half!
1) I'm just too damn tight fisted
2) Most music these days is bloody awfull
This isn't going to work, simply because the music industry isn't going to go for it. It is everything that I, the consumer, want in an online music store. If they get major labels to sign deals, I will no doubt use this as my very first online music store. I won't use any of that other crap due to how much I disagree with DRM. At this point, it seems like a shot in the dark, however. Until this thing really takes off, i'll continue to just buy CDs and rip them to my computer.
Best of luck to these guys!
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