The digital rights management debate moved to the mobile space Tuesday as delegates at the GSMA Mobile World Congress heard a RealNetworks senior executive call for DRM-free music to be made more widely available.
While all four major labels have experimented with DRM-free music online, most mobile downloads still come with some form of the technology.
"DRM remains important for subscription models, but the issue is when you buy (an a la carte) track from Verizon or Vodafone it's very difficult to get it to play on something else," Larry Moores, senior vp global product management at Real, said during the "Fight for the Right to Make Money" panel. "If you want to fully enjoy the experience (of that track), you have to buy it three times. Well, the market's voted (against that) by stealing music."
However, Brian Levy, vp and chief technology officer for communications, media and entertainment at Hewlett-Packard, said going completely DRM-free would be "an over-reaction" (...)
Levy predicted that the model of locking in users to one device eventually will prove "unsustainable."
"DRM-free is only an interim solution," he said.
"The problem should have been solved last year," Moores said. "But it's a business problem, not a technology one. DRM-free content is an ongoing experiment, and the expectation is that (sales) volume is going to increase and start mitigating for declining physical sales. If that isn't occurring a year from now and free sharing of music is running rampant, DRM could come back. The dream won't happen unless we generate revenue today."
Obviously the industry wants to make money, but has no clue as to how to prevent piracy and DRM-free tracks from cannibalizing their market.
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