More Lawmakers Saying The FCC Should Stop Using Bogus Methods To Track Broadband Penetration

Basing Your Business Model On Copy Protection Perhaps Not Such A Good Idea

from the making-things-worse-for-consumers-isn't-a-recommended-strategy dept

Fri, Oct 12th 2007 6:18pm — Mike Masnick

I have to admit that I never understood the purpose behind Snocap, Shawn Fanning's "second act" after Napster. The idea was that it would help artists sell music... by wrapping it up in DRM. As we pointed out when it launched, any business model based on DRM is doomed from the start. So, just as many bands start rushing to free their music from shackles, it should come as no surprise that Snocap is laying off 60% of its workforce and trying to sell itself. It may find someone out there willing to buy the company, but it's a sucker's bet. The very core of the company's business model is based on limiting what customers can do -- just as bands are figuring out how to provide more value to customers by not limiting them.

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Filed Under: copy protection, drm, music
Companies: snocap

8 Comments

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Woo First, 12 Oct 2007 @ 8:12pm

How many times must we tell them before they listen?
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Evil Mike, 12 Oct 2007 @ 8:47pm

Telling will do no good. It must be proven beyond a doubt.

(Preferably by kicking their collective buttocks in the game of "who can make more profit?")
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Plaxico, 12 Oct 2007 @ 9:51pm

!DRM
You guys are wrong. SNOCAP != DRM. I don't know where you got that. SNOCAP principally sold MP3 files through their MyStores. Only when rights holders (and only major labels)insisted on using DRM would SNOCAP sell in DRM'd format. It's really up to the rightsholder.
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Douglas, 13 Oct 2007 @ 12:03pm

Karma Karma Karma...
Good to see them fail, karma's a bitch!!
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adam, 13 Oct 2007 @ 4:39pm

Plaxico is right
Whoever owns the rights to the song dictates the Format and/or DRM rules... not the service providers. I purchased a few open mp3s through snocap stores.
I thought the basic idea behind snocap was decent... just poorly executed.
The interface, usability and features of their 'mini-stores' sucked. And most artists that I've talked to who used their service said their customer service sucked. Sounds like they were a pain in the ass to deal with as well.
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fritzbrown, 14 Oct 2007 @ 8:01am

Re: Karma Karma Karma...
The guy developed napster so I think he has non-DRM karma in spades.
Besides, as others have commented, the article is a bit misleading.
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joedirt, 14 Oct 2007 @ 1:41pm

Writing an Article without doing Research Perhaps
As Plaxico and others have said, they allowed the rightsholder the option to choose how to package the music and what business model(s) to allow. They even mentioned in previous interviews that their hope was that rightsholders would see DRM-free music selling better than protected music and eventually switch.
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nacht engel, 15 Oct 2007 @ 11:12pm

Why does everyone cry about DRM, when they are happy to use Flash in pretty much everything web related.

If Flash and their technologies are not the biggest pervayers of DRM (albeit faux-DRM), I don't know who is.

Now no on calls it DRM, becuase it used to be just crap timeline animations.

But with them pushing into the video world, with their new player, and in particular in the cableTV video world, 99% of all web video, purchased or otherwise, will be in their proprietary "shell" which is the exact same thing as DRM.
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