Sony has completely gone over the line. Their actions take DRM to depths even lower than I ever thought possible. The paranoia of the music industry baffles me. They continue to take steps to alienate their customers. There is a reason why Apple’s iTunes is a runaway success. The DRM is reasonable and can be easily understood by users. Apple balances the interests of protecting IP without making content completely unusable. On the other hand, Sony literally attempts to take over your computer.
I believe that no one at Sony really intended to install virus-like software on user’s computers. I’d wager that engineers simply got too clever for their own good and Sony executives didn’t understand enough about the technology to realize what they were approving. At least that’s what I hope happened. What it does do is put us all on notice.
I’ve written about this before. I can only hope that companies like Apple continue to succeed and that the approach taken by Sony and to some degree by Microsoft continue to fail. I keep hoping to see some major artist break the mold and blaze a trail for a new way that allows everyone to enjoy music and for artists to be paid.
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