“The approximate 300,000 people who’ve picked up a copy of the Backstreet Boys’ ‘Never Gone’ might not know it, but they’re part of a growing skirmish between the record labels and digital music master Apple Computer,” Ben Fritz reports for Variety. “Both Sony BMG and EMI are rapidly increasing the number of copy-protected CDs they release in the U.S. CDs with the protective technology prevent users from posting them on the Internet and allow users to burn only three copies onto other discs, which themselves can’t be copied again. Sony BMG is already selling about half its discs with the technology, while EMI releases its first this summer.”
Fritz explains that because the discs use Microsoft’s Windows Media DRM technology, they prevent consumers from transferring songs onto Apple iPods which currently holds about 80% of the U.S. market. This is a ploy to force Apple to “open its proprietary iPod and let others sell antipiracy-protected songs that work on the device,” Fritz writes. “iPod owners who buy one of the growing numbers of copy-protected discs are likely to chafe at the incompatibility. The question is, who will they blame? If it’s the labels, Sony BMG and EMI may have to back down. But labels are clearly hoping it’s the other way around.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Purchase your CDs carefully. SonyMusic feedback: http://www.sonymusic.com/about/feedback.cgi
Related MacDailyNews articles:
New Song BMG copy-protected CDs lock out Apple iPod owners – June 01, 2005
Once again, the record companies bite the hand that feeds them…
Basturds ! What if you download it from i-tunes? Or maybe you can’t download it from i-tunes.
If the CD doesn’t work with iPods, return it for a refund. Complain that it won’t copy to your iPod. Don’t forget to make a duplicate of the CD first before returning it.
Back Street Boys? Who cares?
And then, you can figure out later how to strip off MS’s DRM scheme.
It may only be Backstreet Boys now, but better stop it in its tracks before it proliferates to all CDs.
All those worried about playing a Backstreet CD on their iPods raise your hand!
How can Record labels think this will work ?
The ipod market share should dictate, not the other way around.
My family alone has 15-20 ipod’s in it, knowing this I will never buy another Sony or any other record companys CD taht I cannot put on my iPod. And I feel the Gov’t should make the record companies list system requirements like computer software does. If it doesn’t say iPod compatible I wont buy it.. hope you’re following along SONY & all others.
To Eric:
Have you ever tried to return an opened CD whether it be a game cd or music?
You can’t…
You can return it for another one saying it’s defective then return the unopened one. Not thatI’ve ever done that LOL
Just buy it from iTunes – for way less than the stupid CD would cost.
Not sure if this uses the same protection scheme as the Dave Mathews Band’s latest CD, but if so, Playlist mag had a workaround – play it on a Mac. Seems the copy protection scheme only worked on Windows. Sony Music’s really stupid.
Here’s an article about it:
http://playlistmag.com/weblogs/todayatplaylist/2005/06/rearviewreality/index.php
Can you buy it on i-tunes?
I’ve got the answer: NO COPY PROTECTION.
The music industry continues to bite the hand that feeds them and Apple was forced to play along to begin with. I’m pissed that the music I buy on iTunes can only be used on a computer or iPod. There are a ton of possibilities if the files were not copy protected with Fairplay. And yes I know about burning a CD to get around the protection, but that is hardly consumer friendly. If they’re going to use copy protection then they should create a standard and use it across the board for all consumer devices.
Come on, the same songs are now found at the Apple iTunes store for download. Better yet, the iTunes store offers more songs and bonus material than the CD does! It’s only the poor saps who don’t own or know how to use and iPod that actually visit a music store to purchase a CD. The only reason I would visit a local Music retail shop would be to find music you can’t find in the iTunes store. Companies know the market is changing and Apple controls the new method of distributing legal music. Let them continue creating all sorts of new encryption for their tangible products, it’s the online buyers who now control the market.
Will they play on my 10 year old CD player? How about the one in my car? Nether of these players have Windows DRM. I don’t get it.
If I wanted a disk that would only play on a windows machine I”d buy my tunes from Napster.
I can’t even remember the last time I bought a CD. So, I guess I could care less what they do. As long as the songs I want are on iTunes I’m a happy girl!
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” />
this is to protect the labels from the release of the tracks onto p2p networks, with a 2ndary result being it blocks loading onto an ipod. just buy it from itunes and rip it to cd to clear the drm and rip it back. bingo no drm, no worries.
Return, return return. Be sure to buy at a store that sells iPods, Circuit City, Best Buy….. It doesn’t work on something they sell in there store they will refund or mark the disks that won’t work. No piece of music is that important. Perhaaps the store should not carry the labels with a problem. If no one buys them they won’t.
Some consumer activist group should make them put stickers on the CDs: “COPY PROTECTED – This CD may only be copied three times and is not compatible with the iPod”. Let’s see how many they sell then.
“There are a ton of possibilities if the files were not copy protected with Fairplay.”
Care to name a few of these “tons” of possibilities? What else do you want to do with the music beside play it on the computer, a CD, or on your iPod? Upload it on P2P, perhaps? If that’s your game, then there are still plenty of technical options outside of burning to CD and re-ripping.
Other music services use DRM, too.
Bought the (Dual Disc) CD and it rips into iTunes (and my iPod) fine – because I’m on a Mac. BUT, this is a potential problem for those of us who like to manage our own music – If they labels can force Steve to include features in iTunes 5.0 that watch for their protection “flags” we could have the same FairPlay usage terms automatically applied to CDs that we rip.
By the way, the CD is clearly labeled as “not conforming to the compact disc format and may not be playable on all CD players”. It does not have the Compact Disc logo on it. I think that might protect them from returns…
Treating customers as thieves infuriates me. Good news that this doesn’t work on a Mac.
Once I purchase music, I should be able to do what I want to shift the space, time or whatever allows me access to my purchased content. If I want to put a movie/song I bought onto a server or iPod at my house to access whenever I want, then that should be my right.
As a note to why this is a bad idea, my wife has a workout DVD that she uses frequently. Unfortunately it does not play correctly, but wasn’t obvious until months after she bought it. According to the **AA thinking, we would need to buy it again. Why should I pay again because they are too cheap to press the DVD correctly the first time? This is not acceptable.
Unfortunately, iTunes is not the complete answer until they start selling CD quality songs.
There is always a hack around any obsticle.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” />
I have not bought a CD since iTunes was launched, the record companies are fools. They can spend billions to stop piracy, and some hacker can find a workaround in 10 minutes.
They should make The Backstreet Boys CD’s only play on Mars, they suck.
The backstreet boy’s are getting old enough to stop being called boys anyway. Should they have gone away by now ? they must have naked pictures of all the major record exec’s
So long as I can download it from iTunes WHO CARES (Yes you can get this piece of shit album on iTunes) the same thing was going on with “Velvet Revolver” people complained and the record companies made it available.
CDs are becoming a thing of the past…..I only buy them from used “Record” stores (the few that are sill in business) for old out of print CDs that have NO DRM.