DRM in the U.K.

With recently low paid-download reports, frustrated British music retailers are pushing for a DRM-free holiday season. According to Kim Bayley, Director of the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA), protection formats such as DRM are “stifling growth and working against the consumer interest,” and “add to the slow take-up of legal digital services.”With recently low paid-download reports, frustrated British music retailers are pushing for a DRM-free holiday season. According to Kim Bayley, Director of the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA), protection formats such as DRM are “stifling growth and working against the consumer interest,” and “add to the slow take-up of legal digital services.”

Now more than ever labels are being encouraged to drop their DRM formats with the oncoming, potentially very lucrative holiday season. Recent polls have shown a mere 150 million paid down loads in the region. According to Bayley “that amounts to an average of less than one 79 pence download per head of population per year.”

Discouragingly, annual music sales show an 11 percent decline from the previous year’s numbers according to BPI and the Official UK Charts Company. A change in formatting at this time could provide a much needed last minute boost in year in sales.