04/23/2008, 10:45am, EDT
Wednesday, April 23rdMS locks ex-MSN Music users out of purchases
Microsoft late yesterday stirred controversy by telling former customers of its shuttered MSN Music service that it will shut down its license activation system for the service by the end of August. Although it allows customers to play any purchased songs on existing operating systems and computers, any music transfered to a new PC or OS install after the cutoff date will no longer be authorized to play.
The company doesn't provide a reason for the shutdown but is believed to be both a question of cost-cutting measures as well as a means of steering customers towards newer and more active stores, including Microsoft's own Zune Marketplace. The store launched along with the Zune player in late 2006 and is seen as the company's preferred music service. Both MSN Music and the MTV-supported URGE store have since been shut down in the wake of the Zune Marketplace's appearance.
Critics of digital rights management (DRM) schemes have warned that such problems are likely to occur as long as music and video is copy protected, as they typically depend on the host company remaining both in business and actively interested in maintaining the rights system for legacy users. Stores such as Amazon MP3 have insisted on DRM-free tracks in part to guarantee the survival of tracks regardless of the company's own actions.
Filed under: industry
Other story tags: Microsoft, Amazon, Zune, MSN Music, URGE
, 
, 32
, 
, 
, 
, 
, 
Top
subscribe to comments
for this article
As for iTunes, one can't really blame them for that because it has tried to get DRM free songs and really the Music production labels are the ones resisting.
Then again, it could just be an MS thing. You know, only caring about the money and not about the customer. ???? LOL :-)
en
...for the 3 guys that bought music from them in the first place...
Apple, not so much.
Other than that, your knee-jerk reactionary Apple-bashing was spot-on.
If MS wasn't being run by a bunch of clueless idiots, they would offer to convert the content to their new DRM'd format at the very least, and eat any licensing charges that might incur, or they would simply reimburse them. The lawsuit damages will probably exceed them.