iTunes goes unlimited?

Article: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080319-apple-may-bundle-unlimited-itunes-with-ipods.html

iTunes, the popular Apple program used for buying, playing, and managing music on your iPod, may be going through a major change. At the moment, users must pay 99¢ per song, and most albums are priced around $9.99. But Apple wants to offer a subscription service that will allow consumers to purchase an unlimited amount of songs at one price, as long as they still own the iPod the plan is registered under. If the consumer buys a new iPod, they have to pay the fee again to renew the subscription. Apple wants to charge $20, but record labels would rather see somewhere around $80.

The article is unclear as to whether the fee would be a one-time payout, or if you would have to pay it every year. If it is a one-time payout, $20 and even $80 are great deals, considering that buying CDs at the mall will cost you between $10 and $20 each. But if you have to renew your subscription every year by paying the fee again, $80 seems way too high. Paying $20/year is much more reasonable.

There are a few other questions that need to be answered. I love my iPod, and unless something comes out that blows it out of the water, I will never switch brands of mp3 players. What I DON'T like is digital rights management (DRM). When you buy a song from the iTunes store, it is DRM-encrypted, which means you cannot play the song on any device but the iPod (or your computer, of course). Not only that, there's a limit to how many times you can burn the song to a CD. There is a way around that by burning a CD, then ripping the song back off it, which removes the DRM. But that's besides the point. If I pay for my songs, I should be able to use them freely. I should be able to put them on my cell phone, or make ringtones out of them. I should not have to burn them all to audio CDs and rip them back to the computer just to use them freely. So my questions is, if iTunes is going to ask consumers to pay a yearly/monthly/one-time fee in order to download music from their store, are they going to get away from their ridiculous DRM ways? Probably not, since it locks consumers into repeat Apple purchases in order to play their purchased music.

Another question I want answered is, will the entire iTunes database be open to everyone for download? iTunes has separate stores for separate countries -- US, UK, France, Italy, Japan, etc. I love contemporary music from other countries, and sometimes its hard to come by. Imported CDs can cost a fortune, and finding it on the internet isn't always easy. Many times I find music I like on iTunes, but I cannot buy it because you can only buy from the store in the country you're registered in. If this new service allows you to download from any iTunes store, that alone would be a selling point for me. While I still hate DRM, I'd put up with it if it was the only affordable way for me to get my international taste buds satisfied.

iTunes is probably the largest (or one of the largest) music databases out there when you consider how many countries it serves (which means different music for different stores). I think many consumers would be all over this subscription service if launched. As for me, I will wait and see what the answers to my questions are before I decide whether I like it or not.