iTunes going DRM-free
— ♣The biggest news at this morning’s Apple keynote presentation at MacWorld Expo 2009 was easily surrounding iTunes, and is also the news that will be of the most interest to our visually impaired readers.
Starting today, a staggering eight million songs in the iTunes Music Store will be made available DRM-Free, with the remainder of the catalog to follow before the end of March.
DRM, (Digital Rights Management), is a mechanism by which digital content purchased online is protected against unauthorized distribution or piracy. The scheme never worked well, and resulted in penalizing honest users while doing nothing to stop true content pirates.
You can upgrade your existing iTunes purchases o DRM-free versions at 256BPS, (twice the quality of standard iTunes content), for $.30 per track, or 30% the price of an album.
Additionally, Apple announced that variable pricing will also be introduced into the iTunes Music Store beginning in April. Songs will be priced at either $.69, $.99, or $1.29 per track at that time.