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TrustedReviews: Yesterday Flash memory giant SanDisk has announced ‘slotMusic’: a new physical music format where 320kbps encoded, DRM-free music will be sold on 1GB microSD cards. The seemingly antiquated plan also has the backing of all four major record labels (EMI, Sony BMG, Warner Music and Universal) so widespread support is expected but will anyone be convinced?

The theory is simple: most mobile phones are united in their adoption of the microSD format so users will simply be able to pop down to their local store, buy a slotMusic album and insert it into their handsets.

SanDisk’s Sansa Fuze and View MP3 players also carry microSD expansion slots.

Of course the problem with all this is we have seen something virtually identical try and fail before. TrustedFlash was announced back in September 2005 and proposed DRM-protected albums and video content sold on microSD cards.

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Electronista: Major music label EMI will slash as many as 2,000 jobs in a bid to sustain itself, company chief Guy Hands revealed today. Although the firm’s music contains only about 4,500 workers, at least one third (1,500) and as many as 2,000 will be let go to reduce the beleaguered label’s costs by as much as €266 million per year. This will also come with a consolidation that brings normally separate distribution, marketing, and sales into a more efficient single group. It should also allow sub-labels such as Capitol or Parlophone more freedom to find and sign new musicians, according to EMI.

The seemingly drastic move has largely been credited to the struggle to adapt to downloadable music,”We have spent a long time looking intensely at EMI and the problems faced by its recorded music division which, like the rest of the music industry, has been struggling to respond to the challenges posed by a digital environment,” Hands says.

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Reuters: Warner Music Group (WMG) and Sony BMG Music Entertainment are feeling increased pressure to follow EMI and Universal Music Group’s lead in distributing music in the MP3 format, which forgoes restrictive digital rights management technology.A yearlong download promotion planned between Pepsi and Amazon is among several developments forcing WMG and Sony to consider the format, Billboard has learned,

News of the Pepsi promotion, which is expected to be announced February 3 during the Super Bowl, coincides with Wal-Mart’s ultimatum that major labels supply walmart.com with their music in MP3, sources said.

Labels said they have been watching the success of an MP3 test that Universal Music Group (UMG) began in August. The major label continues to allow the sale of 85 percent of its current catalog as MP3s. Sources said UMG is on the verge of permanently embracing that digital format. But a source close to the testing insisted that the decision is still up in the air while the company awaits conclusive results from the trial, which are due in mid-January.

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Gizmodo: Microsoft, seeing all the good press Apple got for starting to sell DRM-free music in their store courtesy of EMI, has decided to do the same thing.

In the near future, Zune owners will be able to buy songs from the Zune Marketplace in what we can only assume will be DRM-free WMA files.

There’s no date or pricing set for when the big M is going to start doing this, but it will be interesting to see if they do the same higher bitrate/premium price scheme that Apple did or just replace the DRM’d versions with DRM-free versions and charge the same amount.

In any case, it’s pretty hot that the no-DRM movement actually has a bandwagon and major companies are actually jumping on it.

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Reuters: Apple and EMI’s landmark deal to sell EMI songs at higher audio qualities and stripped of copy protection on iTunes raises as many questions as it answers.

The agreement marks the first for one of the world’s most popular digital media retailer. It is also part of Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ call to dismantle restrictions on digital music to boost sales and allow media to be played on devices other than its iPod devices.

EMI will be making copy protection free music available at other online outlets in the coming weeks. 

A couple of key points from the companies’ statements:

• Songs without digital rights management will cost 30 cents more.
• EMI’s wholesale pricing for premium single tracks will rise.
• EMI’s wholesale pricing for entire albums will remain the same.
• EMI music videos will be available on iTunes DRM-free at no price hike.
• iTunes consumers who have purchased copy protected songs can upgrade for 30 cents.

Here are a couple questions that come to mind:

• Do consumers care to pay a 30 percent premium for better quality and the ability to play their digital music on any player of choice?
• Will this stem piracy?
• Will other labels follow? Who’s next?
• What happened to Steve Jobs’ hard stance against variable pricing (excluding the Japanese iTunes store)?

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Engadget: It’s official: EMI music is now DRM-free. True to his word, Steve Jobs has “embraced it in a heartbeat” making it available for download from Apple’s iTunes store, first, starting in May.

It’s taken so long but now, even (one of) the Big Four realizes that DRM fails to prevent piracy yet succeeds at being an unnecessary nuisance for the vast majority of law abiding consumers.

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MarketWatch: EMI Music Chairman Alain Levy recently told an audience at the London Business School that the CD is dead, saying music companies will no longer be able to sell CDs without offering “value-added” material.