Again with the DRM’d music
04 Nov 2006I want to buy a CD right now. I’ve heard an artist I love, I want to hear more of it, and I can’t buy it online. Well, I possibly could (though as an artist on an Australian indie label they’re probably not exactly available through URGE or iTMS) but certainly not in any instantly-gratifiable way. Which is really the rub, isn’t it?
If I bought DRM’d music, I could have it now. If I wait a few days, I can have it DRM free. This applies as much to obscure artists on indie labels as it does to top 40 hits: even so-called ‘enhanced’ CDs are close enough to Red Book spec that you can rip the guts out of them to beautiful lossless FLAC files without much difficulty.
That’s what’s so bloody illogical about this whole conundrum: I can still get content in better-than-iTunes quality without DRM. I just can’t have it now.
Why not just let me have it now as an MP3 (OGG or FLAC would be nicer, but I’d settle for less ;-)) whilst I wait for the CD to arrive? What about this model doesn’t make sense? I would buy so much more music if licensers played to my at-computer (or, in this case, in-room at-radio) impulse buying tendencies. I doubt they’re ever going to get it.