KEY POINTS:
US retailing giant Walmart has joined the trend towards dropping digital rights management from songs with many of the downloads from its music store now DRM-free
Tunes from the EMI and Universal will be offered in mp3 format at a bit-rate of 256kbps (not as good as CD but okay for casual listening), without any software layered in to stop customers giving the music away. Previously, Walmart offered song downloads in the WMA format with DRM which excluded its customers from playing songs on the iPod (which only takes downloads from iTunes and Microsoft's Zune player, which only accepts downloads through its associated download website.
In offering DRM-free tracks, Walmart follows iTunes, bnut goes further by adding Universal songs (Apple only dies DRM-free EMI tunes at this stage).
But it's clear where the industry is heading. As Ars Technica put it: "DRM isn't yet dead in the music business, but it has a nasty, hacking cough".
Walmart is the biggest music retailer in the US, possibly the world, so its DRM-free push signals the way forward for the industry inm general.
Sony BMG and Warner are yet to throw off the restrictions of DRM but it's really only a matter of time before they do. And as the music industry searches desperately to find a new business model that will stem its losses to free download websites, Universal thinks Google's Adwords could be its saviour.
It will buy Adwords for its artists that send web surfers who click on them to the download website gbox. The site has some nifty social networking tools that may provide an attractive alternative to iTunes for gen Y-ers.
Meanwhile, back home, DRM remains a feature of all the major download websites. Digirama is also going after younger customers, starting to sell rechargable music download cards that can be topped-up like pre-piad phone cards. This gets around the problem of under 18 year-olds not having credit cards. The cards can be topped up using the Eftpos network.
Would you buy more music online than you do now if it was DRM-free?
