But enough of the technical information, let's get on to the important issue. Whose fault is the whole SonyBMG dodgy copy protection debacle? This links in to the other long running SonyBMG story - moves by former BMG execs to have SonyBMG boss Andy Lack kicked out of the top job. Gossipers in the US are now wondering if the growing PR disaster surrounding the use of rootkit protection software will be used as an excuse to kick Lack out - based on the assumption the SonyBMG chief must have signed off his company's partnership with First4Internet, the company who developed the dodgy anti-piracy tool. That said, some insiders say that if anyone at the top level of SonyBMG was actively involved in the decision to use the anti-piracy technology, it would have been Chief Operating Officer Michael Smellie, the former BMG exec whose decision to quit at the end of the year was a catalyst in the growing tensions between the Sony and BMG camps. Therefore, if someone high up has to take the fall for the PR disaster, it would be the already departing Smellie and not Lack.
While we're on the SonyBMG executive tensions story - an interesting twist was reported on in the New York Post this week. As previously reported, recent rumours have suggested that former BMG boss Rolf Schmidt-Holtz might be brought in alongside, above or instead of Lack to overcome the current problems at the top of the major label. Well, presumably on the basis that attack is the best form of defence, there are now rumours that Sony Corp chief Howard Stringer might try to push Schmidt-Holtz, currently chairman of the board, out of his job, on the assumption that he is responsible "for the nasty leaks about Lack and his rumored early departure from the company".
Whether there is any truth to any of those rumours remains to be seen, but the New York Post concludes that Stringer and his counterpart at Bertlesmann, Gunther Thielen, need to do something sooner rather than later to ease the stresses at the top of their joint venture record company. It says: "[they have] to do something-either fire one or the other [Lack or Schmidt-Holtz], or move them around out of each other's way-because it is tearing the company apart."