Arguments For
- The music industry, including the artists themselves, are firm believers in DRM which serves to protect their investment in time and money.
- If there was no protection system in place, anyone could copy and distribute music many times over; the loss of revenue would have a detrimental impact on the music industry and would not only stifle the industry but music innovation too.
- Having a copyright protection system such as DRM ensures that publishers and their artists get a return and are able to reinvest for future projects.
- File sharing networks, such as decentralized P2P, enables millions of users worldwide to share music that has been ripped from CD and transferred from other sources; having DRM limits this impact.
Arguments Against
For consumers, DRM can be a real bone of contention. It can limit their enjoyment of music that they have legally purchased by placing too many restrictions on them.
- Apple iTunes ‘fairplay’ DRM system for example restricts the number of computers a song can be played on; this restriction can be argued to be unfair due to it not infringing copyright but merely being an end-user activity.
- Fair usage is interfered with because DRM stops the end-user from being creative - remixing etc.
- Sometimes there is a need to convert from one digital music format to another in order that the music can be usable on a particular electronic device - DRM prevents choice.
- DRM technology is not sophisticated enough at the moment to provide a fair end-user experience while preventing copyright infringement.
