DRM

A few of my favorite blogs have touched on this topic today (Idolator did twice) and at this point it honestly seems like pretty low-hanging fruit to me to even comment on it, but as long as record companies continue their blind assault on the city walls of common sense, I figure every voice counts.

Forget the moral highground. Nobody is buying it. Everyone knows that the RIAA is comprised of some of the slimiest swindlers in the history of commerce and when Mitch Bainwol (or his latest mouthpiece Ric Keller (R-FL)) open their mouths to reveal several rows of razor-sharp teeth and play the morality card, it's laughable. But I'd rather not waste the keystrokes on moral theory.

The current reality is that Pandora's Box has been opened and nobody, not even if Voltron and Optimus Prime worked together, is ever going to be able to shut it, morality be damned. And here are the record companies, clinging to DRM like that kid in kindergarten whose parents hated him enough to let him bring his "blankie" to school. I know it's a scary new world out there, guys, but DRM is not going to protect you. It just makes you look fucking stupid.

Here's the bottom line: Someone, somewhere, is going to beat your DRM no matter what. They're going to have fun doing it, they're going to brag about it to their friends, and the day after they've posted it on their torrent site of choice, it'll be on every torrent site. The Idolators have an interesting argument today that this might not even be such a bad thing. Your energy and funds would be better spent on something, ANYTHING, other than a battle that you will definitely, without a doubt, not win.

How about artist development? Just a thought.