AppleInsider reports that movie industry executives refuse to license their films to the iTunes Music Store unless Apple locks down the content in a way that makes them happy:

"The studios want to avoid the experience of the music industry, which has yet to recover from years of illegal digital piracy," the report states. It quotes one studio executive involved in the talks as saying Apple must introduce a "new model" for feature film content delivery.

It is debatable and, by all independent analyses, extremely unlikely, that piracy is responsible for a decrease in music industry revenue. Never mind that (1) companies similar in size to the aggregate size of the RIAA's member companies experienced a similar downturn in revenue; (2) the music companies have actually been releasing fewer units than before their downturn; and (3) it may just be possible that consumers are buying less corporate music because they don't like it.

The RIAA and MPAA have always argued that DRM is essential to their online business models. Without DRM, they argue, we wouldn't be able to provide the content to you; therefore, in order to provide content to you, we must DRM it. This flawed logic implies that DRM is necessary for online content distribution, when, in fact, these industries only require DRM so that they can be sure that no one will ever -- ever -- use their content in a way that they don't want.

But this isn't news. Music companies have been pressing Apple to fall into their way of doing things for years. Music companies want Apple to adopt a variable pricing scheme that makes popular tracks more expensive than unpopular ones. Ever since the inception of the iTunes Music Store, Steve Jobs has sold all music for the same price, regardless of popularity. The only things that makes albums more expensive at the iTunes Music Store is the amount of stuff included (i.e. a multi-disc collection is more expensive than a single-disc album).

Fortunately, Apple is more responsive to its consumers than Microsoft, and Steve Jobs is stubborn enough not to be bullied by music industry executives. When the music companies came to Microsoft and said that they wanted a device that would barely function, and when it did, it would function the way music companies wanted it to, Microsoft said, "Where do we sign?" Apple designed the iPod and the iTunes Music Store by asking, "What features do consumers want?" DRM is probably not at the top of the list.