The big record labels have refrained from releasing much music on the Net until they feel confident they can protect their copyrights. As a result, the landscape continues to be littered with trial projects and start-ups failing for lack of access to the most popular music. If those signs aren't forthcoming at this week's Los Angeles meeting, some say, the cracks developing in the foundation are likely to widen. But we can't go forever working in a vacuum. A few companies, including MP3 chipmaker Micronas Semiconductors, have pulled out of the development effort.
Analysts expect more to follow suit.
Increasingly, people across the online music world are asking if SDMI is relevant. I think it's a serious question whether SDMI needs to exist anymore. The SDMI project kicked off in early 1999, and was created for the record, computer and consumer electronics companies to find a way to block unauthorized copying and widespread distribution of digital music files. The group was intended to set generic standards for this protection, so different technologies used by the various participants would work together as easily as CD players from different manufacturers work together today. Under this model, an inaudible bit of data would be included inside songs, which would tell a music software device whether it could be copied or played.