DRM stands for digital rights management. It claims to protect digital media from piracy. However, DRM does nothing to stop copyright pirates. The main purpose of DRM is financial. It prevents lawful user from making back up of purchased music and enjoying music on third-party players. It may also cause some security issues, because DRM controls your computer, automatically connects to Internet. DRM just likes a coin which has two sides. Well what is its future ?

 

In 2006, Bill Gates told his opinion about drm , he said that he didn’t hide the fact that he think DRM isn’t workable, and actively support DRM-free music alternatives such as eMusic and Amie Street. The rise of illegal or quasi-legal options like AllofMP3 and BitTorrent ensure that users have plenty of options when it comes to DRM-free digital music.” Gates didn’t get into what co

uld replace DRM, but he did give some reasonably candid insights suggesting that he thinks DRM is as lame as the rest of us. Gates said that no one is satisfied with the current state of DRM, which “causes too much pain for legitmate buyers” while trying to distinguish between legal and illegal uses. He says no one has done it right, yet. There are “huge problems” with DRM, he says, and “we need more flexible models, such as the ability to “buy an artist out for life” (not sure what he means). He also criticized DRM schemes that try to install intelligence in each copy so that it is device specific.

 

In 2007, Apple openly supports death of drm , Steve Jobs has stepped up to the plate and written an open letter to the music industry in the fight against DRM. Despite Apple’s near monopoly on legal digital music sales, he discusses how they got to where they are now with DRM and options moving forward. The record labels then and today demanded protection of their songs — and thus Apple created their internal DRM called FairPlay. Jobs discusses how 90% of record label sales revenue comes from the billions of CDs sold — CDs that are not DRM-protected (consumers can go home and rip their CDs). The most songs were sold unprotected (as audio CDs). He makes a good point — and he likely feels Apple could sell more digital music than the mere 3% that occupy iPods, by selling unprotected songs.

 

Now is 2011, there are still many video , audio files with drm labels , users can’t easily copy songs to give to friends, they can’t read ebooks easily , they will need drm converter, drm remover software, ebook drm removal to remove drm protection, remove drm from ebook , delete drm from music, etc. Users hate DRM because they are locked in to one device or service. Given the plethora of illegal services for obtaining DRM-free music for free, DRM-laden online digital music sales haven’t grown fast enough to offset plummeting CD sales, which down much in the last year. A billion songs a month are downloaded, mostly illegally, from P2P networks. Drm is still a painful things, more and more users hate songs with drm labels. There are a large number of people listen to Bill Gates’ advice to buy the CD, rip and and do what you like with the music , but don’t buy DRM’d music . According to the case , the future of drm is inevitable death.