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After a long, dormant Christmas break, it took an optimistic music industry related news story to get me blogging again. As I was wasting my time on digg this morning, I found an entry on the future of DRM (Digital Rights Management) in 2007.

The article mentions five bright spots that show the paradigm shift from DRM to DRM free music.

1. Amazon may make a DRM free music download store to compete with Apple’s iTunes.
2. Yahoo Music will experiment with [a little] DRM free music from EMI and Sony BMG artists.
3. eMusic’s success as the 2nd leading online music marketplace shows that DRM-free music is demand, and that major labels and other retailers will follow suit.
4. Limewire may charge $1 per download for its DRM-free music if the labels give in and okay it.
5. Myspace wants to let its musicians sell only DRM-free music to other myspace members.

So it’s news stories like these that keep my head up and allow me to still have hope for a DRM free music world. Are most of these scenerios likely? Ahh..doubtful. I think 2-3 are somewhat likely, which would still be a victory for music fans. Once the DRM-free ball gets rolling, I don’t see it turning back.