In a story over on HypeBot it appears EMI could be looking to sell off it’s recorded music division in an effort to pull themselves out of the profit black hole they seem to have fallen into. So in an effort to cut costs and boost their share price the board is said to be “seriously considering it”.

Sources are reporting that since EMI’s original proposal of offering DRM free MP3s didn’t go over too well with record labels (imagine that) they — EMI — came back with an offer where the labels would give EMI an advance on future royalties. Yeah….. that’s what I said. Read that full L.A. Times story here.

So could EMI’s decision and subsequent announcement that they were looking to move to DRM free MP3 downloads really have been a smart tactical move in preparation for their music division sell off bomb? I mean let’s face it, the sale of their music division will not only leave them in a position where they could care less about the effects of DRM free MP3 sales on the music industry, but it will also leave them a very profitable music publishing company with their catalog of licenses for over 1 million songs.

Now we all know the whole DRM idea wasn’t what we wanted but in an effort to legitimize the media downloads industry we had to get in bed with the record companies. And from that hot steamy union was born DRM. The thought that assigning digital policemen to our music that we paid 99 cents for might not be embraced by the public never seems to have crossed anyone’s mind. Seems like there were so many handshakes and money transfers happening that no one stopped to think about where the money was coming from — the consumers. So it should be no surprise that one of the 4 pillars of the recording industry has seen the light early and is taking full advantage of the first mover advantage.

So it seems the other major players in the recording industry are either going to have to follow suit or get left in the dust. Either way something has got to give. Love em or hate em, we need the RIAA. The artists couldn’t produce and distribute their music on the scale that they do without them. But who knows, when it comes down to the end game it just could be that all the digital distributors will be standing there with open doors ready to be the new distributors for the new millenia. Leaving consumers waving bye bye to CDs or any other form of tangible media units. Has EMI forseen the future of music distribution? Only time will tell but until then we’ll just continue supporting the artists and downloading music, DRM or not. Right everyone?