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Kiss DRM goodbye on Ovi Music

August 17, 2010
By Donovan Jackson

Sitting, as one does, at a restaurant on Women’s Day, I was discussing with a friend the severe limitations of music downloaded on some mobile phones. While you can certainly play the song on your phone, you cannot use it as a ringtone, nor can you transfer it to another device. The upshot of the discussion was that the music accessed like that was nothing much more, really, than a gimmick.

That goes straight to the heart of the significance of Nokia’s announcement that as of 9^th September, Ovi Music downloads are now DRM-free. It’s simple, really: when you purchase and download music from Ovi Music, it is yours to do with as you please.

Ovi Music is still known as the Nokia Music Store…but the latter name is soon to change.

In the wake of the announcement last week, there was a good deal of confusion from consumers as to exactly what DRM is. That much was clear from discussion boards (including Twitter) and also David O’Sullivan’s show on 702 Talk Radio. For those of us who work in the technology and related industries, that came as something of a surprise – but, then, what we take for granted is (evidently!) not common knowledge.

Chances are that as a reader of the Nokia Ringaz blog, you will already know what DRM is – Digital Rights Management. As mentioned already, that just means limitations on how you can access and use any digital content – music, video, etc. It’s a contentious issue which revolves around how rights to intellectual properly are managed and granted by the content owners – in this case the music labels.

By removing restrictions completely on the tunes you buy from Ovi Music, Nokia in effect takes a massive leap forward. You do, after all, pay for the music you download from the store, and should therefore have the right to use it as you please.

That goes to the heart of the controversy around DRM: if you pay for it, do not some rights transfer to you? Such as to use the intellectual property you have purchased as you please? Nokia certainly thinks so, and hence has made the necessary arrangements to confer those rights on you when you buy from Ovi Music.

Of course, given the campaigns around it – and the sheer value of it – Nokia Comes With Music is no doubt a recognized brand. That also gets a revamp, changing to Ovi Music Unlimited. But, because you don’t pay for the music from this platform, it will not be DRM-free. Given our discussion above, the ‘fairness’ of the approach should be readily understood: if you want music that you intend to share, make the small payment and it is yours to enjoy as you please.

Tags: DRM, music, Nokia, Ovi, Store

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16 Responses to “Kiss DRM goodbye on Ovi Music”

Pierre says:

September 6, 2010 at 10:53 am

Hi,

I hope you can help or just point me in the right direction!: I have downloaded several tracks through Nokia Ovi Player over the last year, but then upgraded my phone software. The licences were then obviously lost, so I had to obtain these again. I tried several methods: The phone would either connect and try to obtain direct, but – after logging on – could not find the licences, or tells me that I do not have playback rights!

I also used Ovi Player to go to the “My Music”-tab, then to “download history”, and re-downloaded the entire files to my PC. When I then try to transfer to my mobile, it tells me I do not have playback rights, although I just chose “re-download” again from previously downloaded tracks! – Go figure!!

How could it have “lost” my licences, and how do I get it back?? – I’ve tried everything now…

Also, will the supposed “new” Nokia Music application allow me to download mp3-versions of previously downloaded (bought) tracks, so that I can get rid of this mess? – Personally, I’d prefer not to wait until Thursday!

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Cellphone mythbusters: Myth #5, you have to be signed to publish on Nokia’s Ovi Music Store | Nokia Ringaz Blog says:

September 7, 2010 at 9:49 am

[...] One of the world’s biggest providers of digital music is now the Nokia Music Store (which will become Ovi Music on Thursday). With daily downloads on Ovi Store approaching 2 million per day worldwide, this is a massive [...]

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Nokia N8 raises the social networking and media imaging bar | Nokia Ringaz Blog says:

September 16, 2010 at 11:03 am

[...] its imaging capabilities and the Nokia N8 also comes loaded with six months free access to the Ovi Music Store which has over 6 million downloadable music tracks. The track selection scroll bar format means [...]

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NokiaRSA says:

September 28, 2010 at 10:59 pm

@Pierre – apology for the late response to your comment. We have asked our Customer Care guys to do a follow-up with you to make sure that your issues are resolved with your ‘lost’ music. Hopefully all is up and running again and you have managed to recover your tracks. All you need to do to get Mp3 version of the music you purchased before the 9th of September is to re-download them from your History / Vault on the store. Enjoy the music!

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Monte says:

October 5, 2010 at 4:50 pm

Hi,

I’m in the same boat as Pierre, lost the licences for all my music when I swicthed from Vista to Windows 7. I did 3 or 4 different searches, none of the Nokia FAQs or music store help pages had the answer to what must be a simple question. The trick is, the music download history shows I have no history with the store, so I can’t simply redownload the DRM free versions of the tracks. The files are on my C drive, but won’t play. Please help, by getting one of the support folks to email me.

Many thanks,
Casey

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NokiaRSA says:

October 6, 2010 at 9:37 am

@Monte – We’ve passed your info onto our Customer Care Team – someone will be in touch soon to help you sort out the track issue on your account. Just a quick check did you not perhaps receive comms from the Ovi Music team advising that your username has changed? If you had multiple accounts using the same email address, it could be the solution to the ‘missing’ tracks, but none the less our Customer Care guys will chat to you soon

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