At a wedding I attended recently I met a gentleman who for some time had been someone quite important at the BPI who, in a discussion about copyright law, file-sharing and “fair use” threw into conversation the little gem: “Well of course the BPI are just as corrupt as the file-sharers…”
I was reminded of him today when Phil sent me a link to this article about the BPI’s latest announcement in which they state for the first time, unequivocally that if you are format shifting your own purchased music (that is copying from CD to MP3 or CD to any other format) the BPI will not pursue you.
The headline bullet point in the press release itself is:
BPI reassures consumers: “We will not sue you for filling your iPod with music you have bought yourself”
This is, of course, a Good Thing (capital G, capital T). Although it is just making clear a right we all knew we should have had!
They also urge Apple to work towards interoperability with other formats, and for iTunes to support non-Apple players. I’m not a Windows or an Apple zealot: I hate both their DRM with the same passion. There are very very few DRM-laden tracks on my iPod, and those are mostly the free ones from iTunes. Everything is beautiful clean unrestricted MP3!
Less good is the information further down the release where they talk about suing AllofMP3.com - the controversial Russian MP3 site. They’ll seek a judgement against the site itself - not the users of the site. Phew! 
This also raises a rather interesting issue about DRM. Basically if I am allowed to format shift then DRM in WMA or any other approach is not legally binding so long as I can circumvent it as long as I do this without reverse engineering the DRM (but what if I use something that is the product of reverse engineering). So why invest vast amounts of money in locking me into file formats that aren’t difficult to circumvent - e.g. burn to CD and then use an MP3 ripper? All the DRM has achieved is annoy me.