By Rachel Chalmers
The Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) claims it has persuaded 100 consumer electronics and IT companies to adopt its specification for portable devices for digital music. The spec is under final technical review and should be ratified at the SDMI Plenary meeting on July 7-8, after which it will be made public. It provides for a two-phase system. Phase I commences with adoption of the spec. It ends when Phase II adds a screening technology to filter out pirated music. During Phase I, compliant devices will accept music in any format, copyright-protected or not. But when Phase II begins, consumers will be expected to upgrade. The upgraded software will then refuse to play back pirated copies of new musical releases.
That spells an end to the thriving black market in ripped MP3s, illegal copies of copyright works made and distributed using what has become the people’s internet audio format. The SDMI hastens to add that in both phases, consumers will be able to rip songs from their CDs and download unprotected MP3s, as they do now. The real target is piracy. The technology is based on the premise that devices should respect the usage rules embedded in music by its creators – or in this case, its publishers, since SDMI is largely an initiative of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
MP3’s supporters are, predictably, unconvinced. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has established the Consortium for Audiovisual Free Expression (CAFE) largely to oppose the work of the SDMI. CAFE’s web site lays out its fundamental principles, including this one: No one should assume by default that we’re criminals, and the technology that we use shouldn’t do so either. CAFE objects to the perceived secrecy and lack of consultation SDMI has shown in arriving at its portable device specification. What about civil liberties? Where’s the public? CAFE asks, before warning: Stay tuned. You haven’t heard the last of MP3.
