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In yet another example of the music industry trying to say that they understand what’s going on with distributing music through the web, the record labels are trying to push a new format that will attempt to replace the album.  The format, called CMX, will be a single download that will contain the songs of the album, artwork, videos and “mobile products.”  It will come with a unique splash page that will provide access to all those features.

Interestingly enough, the major labels (EMI, Warner, Universal, and Sony) all approached Apple with this idea 18 months ago as the way to drum up interest in albums rather than simply singles.  Apple refused, and seems to be working on a competitive format code-named Cocktail that’s rumored to be launching with the rumored Apple tablet.  That alone means the labels might be onto something, or at least Apple thinks so and the details we don’t yet know might possibly make the format work.

What’s missing here, however, is why anyone would purchase the new format. Digital music sales have long been single downloads, though there are those few who do buy whole albums from Apple, Amazon or any other digital music site.  Those music sales tend to be transferred from computers to MP3 players, phones, or just about any other device that’s come out in the past few years. 

Knowing the music industry, there would likely be DRM on CMX files which may limit those capabilities.  Even if there isn’t DRM, we want to be able to do what we want with our music.  Those who download music tend to make playlists with their music and there’s no word on how that would work if all is contained in the CMX files.  If we’re able to extract music from the CMX files for playlists at decent bitrates, and if the launch bands include something better than U2, there’s no reason not to check it out, if only to try it out.

Read [Times Online]