The Giant Sucking Sound of DRM

MP3.com just published an interesting article on optimizing the battery life of digital audio players. The article concluded that copy-protected Windows Media Audio tracks knocked several hours off the playback time on each tested player.

Savvy readers then pointed out that because WMA is more highly compressed, it naturally requires more processor power to play back. A more conclusive experiment would have been to compare encrypted and non-encrypted WMA files, not WMAs and MP3s.

Still, given the dramatic difference in battery life with different playback formats, I think manufacturers and reviewers should test and publish a range of playback specs.

Contemplating dying batteries made me wonder how much of my life I’ve lost typing in software serial numbers and filling out nosy registration sites. Digital Rights Management (DRM) is a drain in more ways than one.

On the other hand, it makes possible some exciting scenarios like one I witnessed at NAMM, when I introduced Steve Turnidge of Weed to David Zicarelli of Cycling ’74. It turned out they were both fans of Roger Manning, Jr., so Turnidge whipped out his high-speed thumb drive and transferred several hundred megabytes of rare Manning tracks to Zicarelli’s computer. Because the tracks were “Weedified” WMA files, Zicarelli will be able to play them three times each before deciding if he wants to purchase them. If he does, Manning, Turnidge, and Weed will all get a cut.

Although Weed demands some form-filling itself, it essentially rewards people for sharing music, which strikes me as a better approach than punishing them.