Yahoo offering first DRM-less big-label album

Call it caving in, call it giving up, but I like to call it getting smart. Recording company executives are finally realizing that people will never stop file sharing. Yahoo is hoping that by offering the first DRM-less album (by Jesse McCartney), people will go buy the album. I dare say they will. If people know they can do with their music what they want, they are more likely to buy it than an album with ultra-restrictive DRM and a smattering of grape jelly. Let's say hypothetically, in a perfect DRM-less world, what would happen? Would people share songs between each other, yes. Will they get a majority of their music from other people, maybe. My thought is that people will still go get music from online stores (at least new music) because it is more convenient than hitting up a friend for a particular song. So, if the recording companies are willing to give us DRM-free music, the only real problem is file-sharing applications. I like the p2p interfaces I have seen, but no one has figured out a way to use that clean interface that loads fast and is customizable with "legal" content. Not Apple, not Microsoft, not anyone. I am still waiting for this type of interface in a music store, no graphics and all kinds of cruft, I want a simple interface that I can use to download all my music (like the old Napster) but at least for now I can be happy with DRM-less content. Not that I like Jesse McCartney, but you know what I mean.

Tags: digitalmusic, downloads, DRM-free, Jesse McCartney, JesseMccartney, music, news, recording, Yahoo