I chose an interesting time to be out of town. The last 3-4 weeks have brought many changes, announcements and opinions to the DRM battle.

On Monday Apple and EMI announced that EMI’s entire catalog will be made available DRM-Free at 256 kbps AAC and users who previously downloaded lower quality formats can upgrade for 30 cents a song. While charging users to “upgrade” to DRM-Free versions is pretty lame it’s a step in the right direction to offer DRM-Free downloads.
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The bandwagon continues to ramble on with Microsoft stating that DRM-Free downloads will be available in the Zune Marketplace sometime in the near future.
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Then on Friday 13th it was announced that EMI and Soundbuzz were in talks to release DRM-Free music in Asia.
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In a completely different direction the Warner label sent a termination notice to newly formed AnywhereCD for an apparent breach of contract. This breach of contract was due to AnywhereCD selling DRM-Free music which according to Warner was not part of the agreement. AnywhereCD was formed by Michael Robertson who is the founder of MP3.com.
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