I do agree that Apple should aggressively work toward this, and they should absolutely drop the "all-or-nothing" mentality with DRM on the iTunes store, because dropping all DRM at once won't work. They definitely need to start somewhere, even if it's with relatively unknown artists and/or labels

Bang on. There's a lot of obscure catalogue sitting around that should be on emusic, but it isn't because the major labels think that if they sell a non-DRM file the world will end.

Last year, Warner Music took ownership (from Rupert Murdoch) of the great New Zealand (formerly) indie label Flying Nun Records, home of the Clean, Chris Knox and others - 430 releases. The 25th anniversary of the label passed last year. The good thing to do would have been putting the catalogue on emusic, where someone might actually discover it. But no, Warners would rather not sell music at all than sell it without DRM ...