Not sure about bands not getting rich selling albums. I've heard this thrown around a lot. You'd have to show me the breakdown of a famous band's income statement. Royalties for advertising, movies, radio playback etc. certainly contributes, but there's still CD's on the shelf for a reason. Money from concerts? Maybe... but I don't see mass-market margins happening there.
There are very few drm free choices for non-britney fans in SA. Our CD selection is pretty mainstream. grooveshark is probably the best pre-listening service, not sure why it hasn't been shut down yet...
The battle is really between technology companies, who own the customer base (apple / amazon) and record labels, who own the media rights. Record labels hold on to DRM in order to hold resellers to ransom and maintain their monopoly of the market. In the case of iTunes, Apple took a really bold step. And others followed suit. Resellers need to get as many clients as they can and then use that as leverage against the record labels. You and I need to make them aware of their power against labels and responsibilities to consumers. Of course users will chose piracy vs DRM if they don't have a non-drm choice. It's a no-brainer.
Please can somebody show me the figures of the iTunes store post-drm removal. My suspicion is that it's still as popular as ever and customers are happy to keep paying. I couldn't find any google results on the matter.
The whole music paradigm is going to have to change radically in the next few years. Hopefully consumers will kill off traditional record labels or technology houses will buy them out and kill them off.
It think this is the last anti-DRM post I write. I'm getting sick of the whole issue now.
