A number of people have been covering the statement by Bill Gates on DRM. He said a number of things about DRM being too complicated, not interoperable, and confusing to consumers.
Although it’s nice to hear an influential technologist like Bill Gates acknowledge the consumer un-friendlyness of DRM, those statements aren’t particularly surprising or revolutionary. Particularly when you consider the market position of Microsoft’s player vs the iPod.
The iPod has the majority of the market share. Apple uses the DRM on it’s iTunes Store tracks to prevent playback on any device other than an iPod. This means that, for someone to decide to switch to Microsoft’s Zune, they’d need to re-purchase any tracks bought from the iTunes Store to play on the Zune.
Obviously, people are unlikely to want to pay for the same music twice, so of course Mr. Gates is going to argues for greater interoperability. However, he also said a truly amazing thing. According to the reports, he said: “People should just buy a cd and rip it.”
Now, that’s an amazing thing for someone who’s just set up an online music store to say. That’s like opening a McDonald’s franchise and then telling people they really should be eating home cooked meals made from organic meat and veg.
Here Here Mr. Gates. I fully agree with you. If you buy a track from iTunes or the Zune music store, you’re buying a bit of convenience in return for a lot of pain later on. However, if you buy the CD and rip it, you can rip it again when the next music player comes along, rather than having to buy it all over.