Boy band out of step with fans' mood

All singing, all dancing boy band Nsync is the latest pop killjoy to jump on the copy protected CD bandwagon. Just a week after Michael Jackson's latest single came out in un-copyable CD format, Nsync's record label has likewise earned the wrath of digital activists.

The band's new single, Celebrity, released on the Zomba label, will be available in three versions in a bid to test the waters of copy protected CDs.

Like Jackson's latest CD, the German releases of Celebrity will feature strong protection which will even prevent it being played on a PC. The US release will feature slightly weaker protection and fans in the UK will be able to rip MP3s to their hearts' content as the UK release has no protection at all.

It is believed that record companies are slipping un-copyable CDs to the public in small amounts to see if anyone notices. Of course, the copy protection system will have to be deployed on a global scale before the crackdown on unsolicited copying is successful.

The Zomba discs are thought to use the same Key2audio protection that Sony uses. This means that CDs cannot be played on CDRom drives, cannot be copied using a CD writer, cannot be ripped into MP3 or Wav formats and cannot be digitally copied on devices such as MP3 players and Minidisc recorders.

But there are reports that some standard CD players have choked on the dodgy discs.

Activist organisation the UK Campaign for Digital Rights has voiced concern about the use of such technologies and is staging a protest on 6 October in an attempt to "turn the tide against these extremely unpleasant plans from the media giants".

By leafleting major record stores nationwide the organisation hopes to raise public awareness of the copy protected CDs.