What is DRM-free music?

DRM stands for Digital Rights Management or sometimes Digital Restrictions Management. It is basically a way for retailers or music publishers to keep some control over the music they sell, and to dissuade people from copying and sharing music to others who do not purchase it. It has recently become an interesting topic as Apple has announced to change all of its music available through the iTunes Store to be completely DRM-free. Previously, most music downloaded from the iTunes Store was under Apple's Fairplay DRM technology. This limited the music to be only playable on ipods, iphones, and within iTunes. With the removal of such restrictions, music purchased from the iTunes store is now unrestricted to be copied, shared, and used in or on other devices.

So simply put, DRM-free music is music that is free of restrictions. It can be used just as an MP3 that is ripped from a CD. Now, the legality of using the music however you like may be questionable...but the ability is there.