Another thing that these people seem to always forget is that the files have ALWAYS been available without DRM, you just had to “pirate” (arr me maties!) them via Limewire/Kazaa/BitTorrent/Napster/etc. They really aren’t enabling people to trade “pirated” content, because everyone has already been doing it. Even if all of the music sold was in a DRM’d format (i.e. CDs didn’t exist) there will always be a way (analog loop?) for at least one person to create a DRM-free version of the songs and put them up for file sharing. It only takes one person to start the fire. Sure, it may sound slightly worse, but it isn’t like fidelity is really that big of a concern, these are MP3s after-all.

I’m still waiting for the online store that sells music in a lossless compression, or at 24-bit 96khz sample-rate in a more advanced format than MP3. I still buy my CDs and rip to Vorbis. Besides the better sound quality, a nice side effect of Vorbis is that it makes it so nobody wants to copy my music from me.

“Now consumers are getting their wish, and the music industry will continue to crumble.

Giving up control of content and giving it away free are not rational ideas in a market economy, yet everyone’s cheering. Has the world gone mad?”

Um, it’s not free. Since when does no DRM equal free? The irony is that since Amazon came around with DRM-free MP3s, I’ve actually purchased MORE music than before.