Tom Coates comments on the review, commissioned by Gordon Brown to look at intellectual property rights in the UK:

if I'm reading it correctly, it contains recommendations that individuals should have the right to make private copies of their music, that copyright terms should not be extended and that there should be a general provision that any subsequent term extensions should not be retroactive - ie. that people with copyright get what they were entitled to when the work was created. It looks like he's also recommended no changes to the EU's patent law with regards to software patents or genes or business practices, and that there should be provisions which require media that contains DRM to be clearly labelled.

Naturally there's a wikipedia article with more info :

The British Phonographic Industry and prominent musicians, such as Cliff Richard and Ian Anderson, had lobbied for an extension to 95 years, matching the protection provided in the USA; other musicians, such as Dave Rowntree of Blur provided counteropinions. The Gowers Review found that the UK, compared with the USA, suffers no apparent impediment to creativity due to this disparity.

<lefty alert> I find it heartening that this is being approached from the standpoint of society rather than the individual (in contrast to much American debate on IP issues). Copyright and patent laws are primarily mechanisms designed to maximise the amount of invention/creativity in order to benefit society. Monopoly of the idea or work for the commercial gain of the inventor (or owner of the patent) is a secondary side effect included to amplify that primary benefit, and IMO an unfortunate one at that. </lefty alert>

The full review can be found here(pdf)

Nick Carr's thesis is:

• IPod music sales plateaued in Q1 this year
• so apple starts losing it's leverage with music companies
• but music companies will want to sell music that plays on IPods
• so unprotected mp3s seems the way to go

But won't this lead to rampant piracy?

No. Because there's already rampant illegal copying. Most unauthorized copying is done either through online file-sharing networks or by burning CDs for friends. DRM schemes have little effect on either of those. All new songs are immediately available on file-sharing networks, DRM or not.

EMI is experimenting with selling un-encumbered songs - is this the start of a new trend?