EMI Launches Advertising-Supported P2P Service 260
SirClicksalot writes to tell us that EMI is launching the first ad-supported peer-to-peer music downloading service called Qtrax. With Qtrax users will have two tiers of membership available to them, which EMI hopes will draw in a large segment of users to try it out and graduate many of them to stay on with a monthly fee or purchase music permanently. From the article "In the ad-supported, free tier, users will be able to search the network for specific tracks, and those tracks registered with Qtrax will be made available for download in Qtrax's proprietary ".mpq" file format. Users will then be able to play the downloaded .mpq file in full-fidelity sound quality for a pre-defined number of times. Each time a consumer plays a track, the Qtrax player will also offer fans click-to-buy purchase options, as well as the opportunity to upgrade to a premium subscription service for a flat monthly fee."
iTunes FairPlay Vs Qtrax DRM (Score:4, Interesting)
Why is this better than iTunes? Because with iTunes, the money comes directly out of your pocket but you're still forced to decrypt those files you're buying. The primary difference is that iTunes gives you the sense that you'll always be able to play that song after you've paid for it, but does anyone have this in writing?
I'm not sure but I would wager that the "Premium" tier service for Qtrax operates in much the same way as iTunes
Having been in bands that only play the local scene, this new "P2P2A" just looks like another level of penetration preventing bands from "making it big." For a second there, it looked like the internet & P2P networks would allow starting bands to release their stuff for anyone if they so chose (something that used to require signing a label). Now, you have to be signed on a label and it has to be the right label with deals worked with iTunes or Qtrax to make your music available. If consumers are moved to use primarily one of these two programs for their music, how will they ever be exposed to bands on indie labels or bands not on labels at all?
What I'm trying to say is
Wait, so why should we get this? (Score:5, Interesting)
Permanently? (Score:5, Interesting)
So, that means that I'll be buying
Oh, and on an unrelated note ThePirateBay [thepiratebay.org] is back up again.
It's *NEW*! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:iTunes FairPlay Vs Qtrax DRM (Score:3, Interesting)
The smart move here is to go back to downloading your music in free, unencumbered, formats without the artist's permission. If you have an overpowering urge to pay for the music you listen to, then by all means do so, but don't pay middlemen and marketroids to make your life difficult with DRM and any other fascist digital evil they throw at you - making DRM profitable is probably less ethical than freeloading music. Go to the gig and buy a T-shirt or some other merchandise, or just paypal them directly. The musicians get a *much* higher proportion of the proceeds that way (since they're basically getting the huge chunk allocated to the middlemen as well as the crumbs that were earmarked to them in the first place.
Re:Wait, so why should we get this? (Score:4, Interesting)
- Make their sofware be able to go around your personal firewall to "phone home"
- Make their sofware, outside the control of your personal firewall, be available as a server so that it can be updated/controlled remotelly
- Wrapping, at the TCP stack level, all traffic to and from their software in an encryption layer so that you can't figure out what information is being send over the wire by snooping.
- Increase the (thread/process level) priority of TCP/UDP traffic to and from their software so that your machine is a beter P2P drone.
- Make your machine a drone in their P2P network all the time as long as Windows is running, even if you kill all user space processes and threads.
- Making it harder to read any key material from memory when their software checks with the server to see if you're still allowed to listen to your music.
Re:Eminently Defeatable (Score:3, Interesting)
Basically it sets up a sound card drvier on your computer that all the programs that emit sound use to play back through, and you can record that sound into different formats like mp3 and ogg as it is played through your speakers...
Patrick
EMI takes one step forward, two steps back... (Score:5, Interesting)
The premium subscription service tier uses Microsoft's Janus DRM technology...for unlimited access to music in the Qtrax network. Subscribers will also have the ability to transfer content to Windows Media enabled portable devices for as long as the subscription stays active.
1) You don't ever own the music. It's being licensed, and as soon as you cancel your subscription, the DRM will stop the music from playing.
2) You can't burn the music to a CD, still the most common method for playing music.
3) You can't play the music on any portable device that doesn't support Windows Media, meaning iPod owners can't transfer the music to their iPods.
EMI doesn't seem to understand that consumers want to take their music with them, not leave it on the computer. The #1 portable music player right now is the CD player, and iPod is #2. You can't have a viable competitor in the market if you cut off the top two music players, parading your DRM agenda. This service won't fly.
Re:Yeah, Cool. (Score:1, Interesting)
Speaking of which, they say "Users will then be able to play the downloaded
How good is the fidelity of these files? What is the frequency response? CD's frequency response is horrible compared to earlier technologies, and compressed files like MP3 have even lower response. Likewise with the dynamic range, which is better in CDs than older tech, but its superior dynamic range has never AFAIK been used. A Compressed file also loses dynamics (but with the original having little or none it doesn't matter much).
I know you kids don't give a rat's ass how bad your shitty 398k (let alone 56k) MP3s sound, but in th e'70s I had vinyl playing through four way speakers with six drivers each, including a fifteen inch woofer in each speaker. If you turned it up and went outside you'd swear there was a live band in the living room, so I'm kind of spoiled. I care about fidelity. I'm a nerd, give me some numbers!
Re:iTunes FairPlay Vs Qtrax DRM (Score:3, Interesting)
If I like a track, but it's in a format I cannot play (DRM wmv, copy-protected CD etc.) I may not buy it. I don't like to support that kind of crap. But if I really like it, I will download it illegally, then buy it. I may not download the file from the online store, or open the case I buy in a physical store, but I've paid for my right to listen to the music.
I don't know if it's legal (after I've paid), but I don't care. There's nothing wrong with what I do.
Tiscali has shut down it's online JukeBox (Score:3, Interesting)
"Why have you decided to shut down the service today? Because after going online in total accordance with the music industry and having it launched officially, thus letting our users access it with the characteristics we tested and fine-tuned, today the music industry forwards unexpected demands."
and
"Clearly, major labels do not understand the business potential that is behind a service like Tiscali Juke Box which, by acknowledging and paying the rights for all songs being listened to in streaming mode, allows the safeguard of the rights of the industry and the artists."
Re:iTunes FairPlay Vs Qtrax DRM (Score:3, Interesting)
What Joe Doesn't know (Score:3, Interesting)
Put on something you'd expect to see a broadcast journalist to wear on TV
Grab a friend to operate the camera.
Go out on the street.
Interview random people about "The Sony Root Kit Debacle."
Watch the clueless looks you get, even if you try this stunt on the MIT Campus.
Joe Six Pack and most the nation most the nation know nothing about the Sony Root Kit.
Re:iTunes FairPlay Vs Qtrax DRM (Score:3, Interesting)
Previewing Music (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Permanently? (Score:2, Interesting)
Go jamendo [jamendo.com].
Jamendo is hunderds of Creative Commons licensed music albums available on BitTorrent and eMule/kad/ed2k networks, OGG and MP3 no DRM. The system is free for artists, free for music fans and ad supported. Very popular in french speaking countries.
Download, listen, share legally, pay if you wish.
Que veux-tu de plus ?