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May 16, 2007

Another Break In The Wall: Amazon.com to Sell DRM-Free Music

Duncan Riley

27 comments »

amazon.jpgAmazon.com have announced that they will be launching a digital music store later this year with one particular feature that is sure to bring a smile to many: the store will only sell DRM-free MP3 music files.

As with Apple in April, EMI Music’s digital catalog will be key to the new Amazon DRM-Free offering.

It’s a great step forward for consumers. Having every song and album available exclusively in the MP3 format and DRM-free will mean no more hassles with compatibility and ownership. Buyers will know that once they buy the music, they own the music and are free to use it on anything, anywhere for personal use.

The decision is also another step in bringing down the DRM wall. There may have been a lot of interest and discussion in relation to Apple’s announcement in April, but it’s easily forgotten that as the most popular destination for legal digital music, Apple is also the biggest seller of DRM infected music. Amazon selling only DRM-free music sends a message that a leading retailer is willing to back consumers over big business and that a digital music business can be built and continued using only DRM-free products.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 8:43 am and is filed under Web 2.0 News & Ideas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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Comments

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  1. OnBeingP

    May 16th, 2007 at 8:57 am

    This definitely a step in the right direction. We want more freedom to do whatever we want do with thing they purchase.

  2. Hari

    May 16th, 2007 at 9:14 am

    Definitely agree with you, that a great decision by amazon.

  3. Sylvain

    May 16th, 2007 at 9:14 am

    DRM-free at 0.89 or 0.99 would be very competitive !

  4. DinoHorse

    May 16th, 2007 at 9:19 am

    Absolutely a great decision. Big players like Amazon are important in promoting DRM-Free music. ♦

  5. awesome

    May 16th, 2007 at 9:27 am

    do we know if there is an external service powering this or is this home-grown by Amazon?

  6. djbadtouch

    May 16th, 2007 at 9:53 am

    If they are smart they won’t try to be the “kings of the music portals”. This game is all about syndication of links to drive volume.

    It will be interesting to see how they tie into music blogs and music aggregators like nonstopriot.com and hypem.com. The bloggers are already writing about the music so wouldn’t the next appropriate action be to make a purchase?

  7. Chris

    May 16th, 2007 at 10:24 am

    That’s cool. They’ve been selling DRM-less music CDs for a decade now.

  8. Jay

    May 16th, 2007 at 10:47 am

    Ahhh, very clever post title, there’s a song titled “Another BRICK in the Wall” by Pink Floyd, I like the song.

  9. Dexter Zaf

    May 16th, 2007 at 11:20 am

    Yeah, that song is very cool. Good that Amazon decided to do this. Now.I want to do whatever I want with my music.

  10. pallet jack

    May 16th, 2007 at 12:29 pm

    Great decision by a great company -

    - Amazon is going in the right direction ..

  11. john griffin

    May 16th, 2007 at 12:40 pm

    I think a positive side note to the events unfolding is that EMI, one of the major giants in the music business, is open to offering digital music without the built in restrictions. i agree with the sentiment that amzn is moving in the right direction. Big fan of s3 as well.

  12. brian andrews

    May 16th, 2007 at 1:38 pm

    As others have said, this is good news for consumers. Another option for low cost, DRM free music is a good thing.

    I haven’t read through the Amazon info but will they be create a seperate “music store” or will you be able to combine standard purchases of books, DVDs, a blender and a few song downloads? That could be an interesting offering.

  13. Taume

    May 16th, 2007 at 4:06 pm

    “Our MP3-only strategy means all the music that customers buy on Amazon is always DRM-free and plays on any device,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com founder and CEO.

    http://news.taume.com/Technolo.....abels-1265

  14. Eric

    May 16th, 2007 at 4:26 pm

    I like Amazon. I really, really do. I think they’re by far and away the most innovative and technologically adept company on the web today. (Yes, more than Google). And they deserve big kudos for this one; they’ve held out for a long time so they could do it DRM free.

    This is also what the RIAA needed to do from the beginning to really fight piracy. What really separates Amazon apart from iTunes is that Amazon has the associates program - which gives thousands of bloggers, web site owners, and would-be pirates a stake in *selling* mp3’s rather than implicitly (or explicitly) endorsing piracy. It’s game changing, and I expect to see a big shift in the net’s culture as a result of this.

    That said, this also highlights what a steaming pile of crap Unbox is, and it’s a shame that they couldn’t/wouldn’t have held out to strike the same deal for movies and TV shows.

  15. Nerchi

    May 16th, 2007 at 4:52 pm

    “do we know if there is an external service powering this or is this home-grown by Amazon?”

    This is a homegrown amazon.com service. The bottom line is Amazon.com feel they hold all the cards here: For the second time (iTunes being the first) a company will not bow to label pressure to the detriment of the consumer experience, and kudos for that.

  16. Matt

    May 17th, 2007 at 3:13 pm

    Wonderful news. Let’s hope the other major labels get on board sharpish too.
    Personally I’ve been buying my online music exclusively from http://bleep.com/ for the last few years, purely because they’re DRM-free. Nice to see the majors catching up!

    Can’t be long now until iTunes launches its DRM-free range - wasn’t it supposed to be some time in May?

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