DRM Doesn't Scale

In the world of technology, geeks, and hackers, saying something doesn't scale is one of the worst things you can say.

But in the case of DRM, it's true and it's time to admit it and move on.

We (the wilson family) are moving very quickly to a peer to peer archicture in our home music setup.

About five years ago, I decided to create an all digital system for playing music at home.

It was based on a central server architecture and we selected the music servers from Request Media (formerly Audio Request).

We connected these servers to a multi-room audio system and we control them with a combination of crestron panels, java clients, and web browsers throughout our home.

After having that system for a couple years, we decided we wanted it at our second home at the beach.  So we took one of the servers out to long island and connected it to our house in the city via our cable modem internet connection so it could synch with the main server.  It was simple to do.

We control that server with our TV set, java clients, and web browsers.

We have been buying CDs, ripping them onto our servers, and then putting the CDs away for posterity for the past five years and its worked great in both homes.

But in the past year, the music has been migrating off of the servers onto the growing array of computers we have in our homes.  There are a ton of reasons for it, but I think the main one is the emergence of the iPod as the way everyone wants to listen to music outside of the home.

So each of us, including our kids, have iTunes on our computers, and an iPod that we synch to.  We pull the music off the servers and onto our computers.

And now, at an ever increasing rate, we buy music directly from iTunes onto our computers, bypassing the Request servers completely.  That is a big problem that I have not come up with a good soultion for since Request can't deal with the DRM that iTunes uses.  We often end up buying music two or three times, a couple times via iTunes (multiple people) and then we buy the CD to get the music onto our servers.

iTunes has a music sharing service built into it so we've started connecting to each other's computers and sharing music with each other, again bypassing the Request servers.  That tends to limit the number of times we buy a song on iTunes, but since there's no single directory for all of our shared music, it doesn't solve the issue completely.

And then last spring, I connected a low end Dell PC which runs two applications, iTunes and Rhapsody, to the music systems in both homes.  And using the music sharing services, we can play music anywhere in either home that resides on any computer.

Although we still use the Request servers to play music, we are using them less and less and I see a time coming when we won't use them at all.

So how is this related to DRM and the scaling issues?

I recently got the Gotham Gal a new Mac mini for her office.  I signed her up for iTunes and configured it to use the same account everyone uses.  She bought some music and when she went to play it, she got the message that the account can only serve 5 users.  So she bought the music, paid for it, and she can't even play it on her own computer.  That's the DRM wreaking havoc on our home music system.

In the central server architecture, we bought the music once on a CD, put it on the central server, and then were able to play it in any room in our two homes.  That makes sense.

In the peer to peer world, with DRM working behind the scenes, we end up buying the music several times, and then can't play it on every computer we own.  That doesn't make sense.

So maybe they should up the DRM limit to 10 users?  That might work, but we've got close to 10 computers in our two homes when you include the two dedicated machines we use to play music, the five computers (one for each person), a kitchen computer, and shared machine in our beach house because not everyone has a laptop to bring with them. 

What if we get a couple more laptops? 

When is enough enough? 

What if we get a few more dedicated music computers so we can play different music in different rooms in the house?

After thinking about this problem for the past couple months, I think its pretty clear that DRM doesn't scale.

What we need is music dial tone.

Then DRM can scale.  Either you have the dial tone or you don't.  It will be that simple.

Until then, we are going to be fighting an every increasing battle with complexity that is going to hamper the migration from the analog music business to the digital music business.  And that sucks for everyone who loves music.

Comments

[Giordano]

It all makes sense, Fred, but reading it I couldn´t referain from thinking ¨ah... the problems of the very rich.Good that I´m broke, so I don´t have to worry about this kind of things :)¨
Cheers,
Giordano

[Jason Chervokas]

Limiting the amount of devices on which you can have a file or through which you can listen to a file is ridiculous. If you buy the music you should get a universal license for any personal use. Sharing among a family over multiple devices is absolutely fair use.

In the meantime may I suggest JHymn, an excellent program for stripping the DRM from iTunes files.

[Raj Bala]

Have you checked out emusic.com as an alternative to iTunes? VBR MP3s with no DRM. No major labels though --- all the indie you can handle.

[Michael Parekh]

Totally agree, Fred...the inability to share the purchased iTunes music on as many of my computers as I'd like is the primary reason I've not bought any music from iTunes for months now.

I believe when Steve Jobs first announced iTunes and the revolutionary pricing of $0.99/track, he made it clear that Apple fought for the ability to play purchased music on unlimited computers.

But the music industry apparently pushed back and the limit of 5 or 7 was agreed upon as a compromise.

So there may be more political and business model conflict issues than technical issues that are the problem here.

As a result, I've stopped buying music from iTunes altogether for this reason, relying instead on Rhapsody and the central server system for the dozen plus windows pc, macs, laptops etc. around the house.

It's not a perfect great solution, because it totally takes away the joy of impulse purchase off of iTunes.

[Eric Schneider]

Well, there is a (lame) solution to the
iTunes problem. iTunes *does* let you burn
Audio CD formatted CDs (which I do, for
listening in the car.) There's nothing to
prevent you from backing up your iTunes
purchases to Audio CD format then ripping
them back in as MP3s.

It's lame, yes, but I've found it an
adequate solution to similar problems.

-es

[Raj Bala]

Transcoded MP3s are fine for some, but I won't allow it.

[Jason Preston]

The other problem I have with using iTunes as a jukebox for several locations throughout the house is that I'm a playlist oriented person. I'm not sure if you've figured a way around this but even if you have a number of computers with access to all of the music files available, I can't access playlists in the living room that were created in the kitchen...

I really do think that iTunes needs to offer better networking options -- maybe apple should create an "iTunes server app" that would take all your music, playlists, and podcasts, store them in a central location, and then allow you to access that music (via password) from any number of other iTunes client apps.

(Also posting and linking from my blog, because I have no shame).

[Todd Pines]

And so you indirectly hit on the high end audio problem. How do you keep your investment in proprietary gear relevant as your pc becomes the preferred primary storage of choice followed by ipods, etc. - something I've enjoyed reading about for awhile.

One thing that I'm looking into is an itunes app for the crestron that was recently launched http://www.techliving.com/news/2541.html

It doesn't solve the DRM problem (which I 100% agree with your post), but it gives you back control at your gear in accessing your pc-based music.

[Raj Bala]

Slim Devices makes a really simple, neat appliance for MP3 streaming. It's not as significant, IMO, to the open source software that they also have available for you to manage your MP3s from any broswer. I think you can import iTunes playlists, but not positive.

http://www.slimdevices.com/

[jackson]

I'm sure you'll work it out. Gee, this new media makes everything so easy, it's right at your fingertips huh? :) Excuse me, I've got to go flip the record over.....

[Steve Rimland]

The Elan Via DJ is your ANSWER Fred!! It supports the AAC File Format (DRM). I found this device last year while researching for our home system, and went with the ViaDJ for this very reason. The ViaDJ is made for Elan by a company called I-Merge out of England. There is also going to be a Linux software update.

There is a third party software distributed with the device called 'Xiva Producer' that gets installed on your networked pc's and gives you incredible flexability- Drag and drop songs form any computer into the viaDj, drag songs/entire albums from the viaDJ to your computer, drag and drop songs from your computer into the viaDJ and create playlists of up to 99 songs in each list from your touch screens or computers.

The unit can be controlled from any networked pc, as well as your touchpads throughout your house. The ViaDj also gives you the ability to simultaneously hear different music in up to 3 zones. The only problem down the road is what do we do if everything goes Windows Media DRM?

[Manu Sharma]

Could Yahoo Music Engine be the solution to your problem?

"It's like this. I have a Yahoo-issued laptop that I use at work and quite a bit at home. But I also have a really nice Dell PC as my home desktop. Both have YME installed. If I add five Meat Loaf tracks to my collection on the laptop, they're automatically downloaded to my desktop PC next time I start YME on it. Of course, it works in both directions."

(YME doesn't work with iPod, of course)