Fidelity Restriction Talks Delay Sale of Samsung MP3 Phones in Korea

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on March 31, 2004 - 3:47am.

Seoul -- The Korea Herald reported on Wednesday that the Korean recording industry is demanding that cell phones that can download and play MP3 music files support only radio-quality sound, to deter potential piracy. Bowing to pressure from groups including the Korea Association of Phonogram Producers and Korea Music Copyright Association, Samsung decided to delay release of its MP3 Anycall handset this week while it negotiates with the Korean record industry over degrading the sound quality of recordings to below 96 kbps. "Our industry has been in a nose-dive since the release of MP3 players in 2000. At that time, we felt hopeless because Korean people were insensitive to copyright issues and we did not have any unified organization that could cope with the situation," Yoon Seong-woo, a director of the Korea Association of Phonogram Producers, told The Korea Herald. "Because the MP3 phone market is big enough to destroy the music industry, we're struggling to defend it."
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