Steve Jobs Calls on Music Labels to Let Apple Sell DRM-Free Music

Wow.

Steve Jobs has published a 2,000-word essay on Apple.com titled “Thoughts on Music”. A more apt title would have been “Thoughts on DRM”. The nut of it:

The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.

★ Tuesday, 6 February 2007