"We Need To Protect The Music"

I don't have the mental capacity to unravel the levels of irony currently unfolding in the music business.  Explaining the strategy behind Universal using DRM-free music to create a new market that will challenge the omnipotent iPod is like Sudoku for marketeers.  However, the trigger is clear.  This year, 22 percent of all music sold in the US will move through iTunes.  Having spent gazillions on lawyers fees trying - and failing - to prevent such a DRM-free market being created, it's a remarkable twist in this story.  But in this fascinating Wired article we can understand that myopia created by quarterly reporting and reliance on the huge profit margins of previous distribution systems (ie CDs) were equally culpable in the industry's current desperate situation.  "We need to protect the music. I know that," says Universal Music Group CEO, Doug Morris.  Don't worry Doug, 'the music' is going to be fine.  When you gave it all to Steve Jobs he put it in his safe.  Now he only lets people use it if they pay him.