Well maybe we have seen the first sign of the fall of DRM on the Zune player. No, I’m not talking about the plethora of Zune hacks out there. I’m talking about the man who started Microsoft making comments about how useless DRM can be. He admits that not even Microsoft has been able to do DRM right and it may signal a shift in their thinking when it comes to DRM.

The idea that DRM is here to stay seems a sure bet but the consumer ultimately has the choice in what they buy and if Microsoft feels that DRM hurts sales they have the power to make changes. The wireless sharing features of the Zune make it more difficult to enforce DRM and in order to really open up the wireless they will need to relax the DRM restrictions.

Maybe future Zune players won’t have so many restrictions on the Zune to Zune sharing and it will help the players gain acceptance to a wider market share. I think the content sharing is the key to Zune success and DRM seems to be getting in the way of things.

iTWire - DRM is “too complicated” - just rip CDs, says Bill Gates

Gates confessed to a round table of prominent bloggers that “no one has done it right” when it comes to Digital Rights Management. This is despite Microsoft recently creating yet another DRM format for it’s new Zune MP3 player.

Gates went on to say Digital Rights Management “causes too much pain for legitimate buyers” trying to distinguish between legal and illegal uses. He declined to elaborate on how Microsoft would address this.

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