Those looking forward to the upcoming release of Apple’s iPad and planning to use it as an e-reader may be a bit disappointed to hear that Apple plans to use DRM on all the books in the Apple iBook Store. The company will use FairPlay, the DRM system once used for songs in iTunes. Like more »

The main reason the I am not really interested in the Barnes & Noble nook is due to the fact that I have locked myself into the Amazon world in terms of ebook purchases. Of course, that is due to the DRM that comes with the Kindle ebook purchases. Honestly, its something that I have more »

Although so many people get movies streamed right to them a host of different ways, occasionally, some do still venture forth into that old brick and mortar building called a video store. So, there you are, it’s a Friday night and you go to your local Blockbuster, grab a movie, dreams of relaxing with some more »

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 more »

It seems like a never ending story doesn’t it? People are downloading music and not paying for it. Naughty, naughty. The industry has their panties in a bunch over the fact people are downloading music illegally. Threats ensue. “We’re gonna get you all.” “Oh no you won’t, pirating will live forever!” Yawn. Be real guys, you’re never gonna “get them all.” And times are changing when it comes to music. Even many of the artists recognize this fact, the labels are starting to, now we just need the Music Cops to see it as well.

Raise your hand if you remember the Spore SecuROM fiasco. The community backlash, and the resulting huge amount of pirated copies of the game that became available. You’d think that somebody would try to create a form of copy protection that both copyright holders and consumers can be okay with. Apparently the people at CD Digital Card didn’t get that message.

CD Digital Card is trying to bring 2 Geeks In A Lab’s Global Garde copy protection to mass market. Apparently the code is small (only about 250 to 500 KB), takes only five minutes to install, and is supposed to be invisible to consumers. According to the press release it’s currently hailed as “the holy grail of anti-piracy and copy protection.” In other words: the bane of those who simply want to access the content that they paid for, or those who want to pirate it.

A New York District judge has dismissed EMI’s copyright infringement lawsuit against MP3Tunes CEO Michael Robertson. In November, 2007 14 record labels affiliated with the EMI filed the suit, claiming MP3Tunes’s internet locker service encourages copyright infringement. The service, which has 150,000 customers, provides personal, password protected accounts known as lockers that allow all music stored in them to be shared between PCs, game consoles, DVRs and cell phones.

The judge has allowed the suit against the company itself to proceed. It will eventually determine if it is permissible for music to be stored in cloud services the way documents and photos are. Interestingly enough, EMI has not sued the similar services offered by Microsoft, AOL or BT. Robertson believes that the reason behind that is that EMI decided it would be easier to make an example out of his small company.

Well, apparently SanDisk feels Joe Public likes their music hands on. This thinking may well be what led to their new line of music-filled microSD cards. They managed to pull in all the big record labels like Sony BMG, EMI, Universal and Warner. Although, I’m not sure what the labels were thinking with this one. The songs on the 1 GB cards will be DRM-free MP3s that are encoded at 320 kbps for the record.

The first stores they have in on the deal are Wal-Mart or Best Buy. So, you simply stroll into one of those two stores, nab your rockin’, grooving, bopping-loaded slotMusic, and pop it into your phone, and voila…you’re set. However, if you are one of the millions who would simply rather get your music by downloading it, then this little slotMusic thing is pretty useless.

Nokia is poised to release its new “Comes With Music” phones on October 17th in Britain. The phones will come with a subscription music service that will allow users to keep any song they obtain through it for 12 months. The service will come with every phone, with nothing mentioned about payment. So far, three major studios have signed on for the project: Universal, Sony BMG and Warner Music Group. Seems like a fairly good push to start with.

According to the Reuters reports, the music companies are hoping this will diminish the popularity of Apple’s iTunes Music Store. I don’t see why, but music publishers don’t seem to really like Apple too much lately. Maybe they don’t like making slightly less money? iTunes is the biggest music seller out there at the moment (well, in America at least, not too sure about worldwide), but this Nokia subscription plan may take a bit away from that. If the iPhone and other lower-end phones have shown anything, it’s that people don’t mind listening to music on cellphones.

There are a few problems with the service that can be a bit off a turn-off with the service, though…

“The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to five years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.” So says the warning on all movies released since early 2004. Well, granted many get a bit of a chuckle every time they pop a movie into their player and see that flash across their screen knowing they’ve just downloaded it from somewhere on the ‘Net, but still…it’s the thought that counts. And apparently, the thought of RealNetworks is that they want to make it a little easier for their customers to burn those dvds; since they are coming out with a new product called RealDVD which allows users to burn a digital copy of the movie of your choice…ummmm..legally? Guess that remains to be seen. Because there hasn’t been enough chatter about the whole piracy/fair use thing lately.