Universal Music Group’s DRM Free initiative. Thanks, but its just not good enough

Updated August 13th

Did the recent surge of DRM Free blog posts earlier this month inspire Universal Music Group to step into action? I wouldn’t say this blog clearly influenced it, but I was following a small group of bloggers who posted about their DRM free lifestyle and how it has worked for them.  If you don’t know by now, New York Times reported that UMG is testing the waters for DRM Free music. However this test will last until mid Janurary.

The Project

What we do know is that the music will go on sale August 20th, and will be sold offline in Best Buy, Walmart, Rhapsody, Amazon, and directly from the recording labels themselves such as Defjam. Universal will sell tracks on gbox.com. One of the main points behind this MP3 project is to not sell music on iTunes. Its not really a huge blow for iTunes anyway, its just that at this point in time, the iTunes name is synonymous with the iPod. iTunes is already known for selling music that works only on Apple products. However, by creating a new online store, Universal can advertise a name that is synonymous to “buying mp3s”. Universal Music Group is testing the waters to see if a store can thrive without the use of iTunes.

The Speculation

Universal Music Groups MP3 campaign will end around Janurary, making this whole project somewhat pointless.  I believe what may happen is that Universal Music Group will take the stance that if not many people buy the songs, then Mp3s aren’t a profitable business venture. The RIAA will boldy pronounce their, “I TOLD YOU SO!” press release as we get sent back to the sue-happy  lawsuit carnival. What I really want Universal to do is fully embrace the project. Yes during the few months of selling Mp3s, sales won’t be great as expected, but I believe the general public may not understand how good the store will work out for them. It will take a huge ad campaign, lots of good customer service, ease of use, and some radio promotion to get the buzz out there. I want to hear DJs say, “you can download this song at blahblahblah dot com”, and MTV, Fuse, and others place an easy to remember link to download the song during a video.  

The Rebirth

If however this project fails, don’t take up the defense for DRM music. Start all over, releasing only new artists to MP3, then, slowly increase the  music library when you figure out what music people download. After a few years we can have a store who’s name will be the #1 source of buying DRM-Free music.