Culver City (CA) - EMI, one of the world's top music labels, has walked out of licensing talks with the world's largest online music retailers. EMI faced off against the likes of Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo and RealNetworks and couldn't agree on the size of an upfront payment in exchange for offering DRM-free music. According to Bloomberg news, EMI wanted substantially more money which would have been in addition to the individual song fees that it would have received from sales.

EMI hasn't publicly talked about the meeting, but the company appeared to be close to a deal just a few weeks ago. One possible complication could have been Warner Music's bid to buy EMI. Warner opposes DRM-free music sales.

Earlier in the month, Apple's Steve Jobs started the anti-DRM craze by publishing an open letter to the music industry. In the letter, Jobs said that eliminating DRM would make things less complicated for the consumer and could eventually bring higher revenues to the music industry.

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