The Infamous DRM Letter

"On the whole, I think DRM feels good." -Steve Evil

In February 2007, Steve Jobs published a letter stating a position against DRM in the music industry. That position has since been analyzed to no end. Though it has been criticized by some and lauded by others, the analysis leaves one question unanswered: Is Steve Jobs really against DRM?

And the answer is... of course not. Then why write the letter? Because the music industry is one area where DRM is not necessarily on Apple's side. In the letter, Jobs lists three possible futures for Digital Rights Management and the first two, continuing on the current path or licensing FairPlay out to other companies, are bad for business.

The third possibility is to do away with DRM entirely. While arguing in favor of this alternative, Jobs throws out the red herring: "Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats... This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat."

Notice that this is the only scenario in which Apple risks no obvious loss. It provides for interoperability within the market, meaning any music purchased from Microsoft could still be played on an iPod, and establishes conditions within which none of Apple's "secrets" are "leaked." In fact, these two points are stated openly and plainly throughout the letter. Also, since Apple doesn't own the music, the company has less vested interest in digitally managing the rights to it.

Here, Jobs begins to sound sucpiciously like the average consumer who feels the pinch of DRM and wishes it would go away. In other words, a hypocrite. The classic case of dishing it out but not wanting to take it. So in order to back up these claims, perhaps we ought to examine some other areas in which Apple has involved itself with DRM.

First of all, notice that Jobs' letter refers only to the music industry and, as I mentioned, does not address products that are actually made by Apple. On the other hand, Apple dvd players may only change regions five times, Apple is currently working with Nike to restrict what you can do with your shoes, and perhaps less obvious, try watching an online NetFlix video with a Macintosh (<- that's just a picture, by the way). The Netflix example is my favorite. It's difficult to believe that Apple would actually keep me from receiving a service I currently purchase from an entirely unrelated company. Sad as it is, because of Apple's quest to maximize profits by managing media, even Netflix has become a no-no.