In case you missed it, SpiralFrog, an ad-supported music site, shut down. It had been up and running since September 2007, offering DRMed music for free to its customers. The music wouldn’t work on Mac OS X, iPods, or Zunes which would explain why it wasn’t all that popular.
The website shutting down proves to be an issue for that who used the service. While the website was in use, the users had to log in once every 60 days to let SpiralFrog know their account was active, and to renew the license on the DRM. Now, with the website gone the users have only a maximum of 60 days to actually listen to their songs before they stop working. Oh, the joys of DRM.
Of course, with a completely ad-supported site, it makes sense why the record labels would have required DRM, but it is quite unfortunate for the consumer. It prevented the playback of the music on certain devices, and now won’t work at all in two months or less, depending on when they last renewed the license. It is doubtful that the average consumer really knows anything about what DRM is or does until they can’t use their files again, which is really unfortunate. Amazon and iTunes have moved to entirely DRM-free, meaning there’s no issue for those who buy all their music from those sites. But, those who rely on ad-supported services like SpiralFrog are out of luck once they close up shop, which can’t be a great feeling.
Read [CNet]
We need to make everything as user friendly as possible. Today's society does not want to take the time to learn something new so if it is not dummy proof they don't want it