When I first heard that record companies were thinking of implementing "copy protection", it sounded like a sick joke. Then it prevented me from buying the new Radiohead album and it didn't seem so funny. And then I inadvertently bought a "copy-protected" disc because I didn't notice the special logo that was supposed to warn me. I've since bought another such disc and my opinion of "copy protection" has now changed a little. It's simply a joke.
First, there's no consistency in the releases. The new Annie Lennox album comes in two different editions: a single disc and a dual disc version with a DVD. The double disc has a "copy-controlled" sticker on the front but the single disc version doesn't. Are they both copy-protected? I don't know, I only bought the one with the logo.
The new Jewel album has the same "copy-controlled" logo on the front of her album but curiously, the back cover bears the familiar "Compact Disc digital audio" logo when the disc isn't technically a compact disc. The logo then appears again inside on the corners of the tray. Warner Music appear to be doing their best to confuse their customers and could well be in breach of someone's trademark.
The key reason why it's a joke is pretty simple: I can't get the copy protection to work. I placed the Annie Lennox album in my Sony CD burner drive, fired up my favourite Linux CD ripping software 'cdrdao' and waited to see what happens. It proceeded to rip the entire disc. Puzzled, I tried burning it back to a blank disc and playing the result. That worked too. I then took my copy and the original disc to work and tried it on my machine there. That worked as well. Tonight I bought the new Jewel album and decided I'd try copying that one (maybe they've fixed the technology now?). Again, my computer quite happily ripped the CD and the resulting disc played fine. I feel like I've been ripped off. The disc claims it's "copy controlled" but it doesn't appear to be at all. Is that misleading conduct on the part of Warner Music? Or is it simply stupid?
