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Business News Digital
Nokia considering DRM-free version of Comes With Music
By CMU Editorial | Published on Tuesday 3 March 2009
Nokia has halted sales of the US version of its XpressMusic phone, which only went on sale last week, after various glitches were discovered, including problems connecting to AT&T’s 3G network, and with the phone’s ear pieces. The phone firm has reportedly shipped in the European version of the phone to sell to American consumers while they fix the problems with the US version of the device.
Talking of Nokia and music based products, word has it the phone maker is looking into launching a DRM-free version of its high profile though not especially well received Comes With Music service. As previously reported, Comes With Music is Nokia’s much hyped download service through which owners of special handsets can download an unlimited number of permanent audio tracks from a big catalogue of music for free (well, the cost is bundled into the cost of the phone).
The only problem (other than the fact Nokia never sent us the sample phone they always promised, their PR team being a bit rubbish and all) is that, while in theory providing ‘permanent downloads’, the tracks come with digital rights management encoding which locks them to the phone or PC to which they are downloaded – meaning they become redundant once a user buys a new mobile or computer.
Unfortunately for Nokia, their new service was launched just as DRM was finally cut from a-la-carte download stores, and the DRM-free MP3 became the format of choice for most consumers.
Although official figures are not known, some say that the uptake of Comes With Music has not met Nokia’s expectations, and bosses there recognise that the widespread criticism of the service’s use of DRM is probably to blame (even though that’s necessarily a fair criticism, given the low cost of the service, there’s no reason why Nokia customers can’t use Comes With Music for short-term enjoyment and new music discovery, while still being able to afford to pay to download truly permanent copies of the few tracks they want to keep long term from other services like iTunes).
Either way, Nokia’s Director Of Global Digital Music Retail, former Sony Music man Adam Mirabella, is being quoted in the Asian media as saying a DRM-free version of the Comes With Music services is “on the roadmap”.
How that would work isn’t clear, though the service Ericsson plans to launch to compete with Comes With Music doesn’t make any claim that the DRMed downloads are permanent, but instead allows users to access MP3 copies of their most listened to tracks at the end of their subscription, which is arguably a good middle ground between the restricted unlimited play and a-la-carte download models.
