Simon Haynes on DRM

[unixronin]

(via a pointer from james_nicoll er ... excuse my brainfart, I meant davefreer)

DRM stands for Digital Rights Management, and it's a fancy term for copyright protection.

Electronic gadgets are released at a staggering pace, and there have been situations where encrypted files purchased a few years ago are no longer supported by new and improved devices.  I have hundreds of paperbacks which were published thirty and forty years ago, and somehow they don't seem to suffer from the same flaw.

Ebooks should be like paperbacks.  Once you've bought them they should be readable on whichever computer program or ebook device you own now, or in the future.  They shouldn't be locked to EbookReaderWidget 2000 when you really want to read them on EbookWidgetPlus 2008.  (You may have no intention of upgrading, but what if your ancient but workable ERW 2000 falls in the bath?)

Comments

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

I predict that as more and more consumers are bit by the DRM discontinuance problems, it will go away. Most companies already acknowledge that it does nothing to combat piracy. Right now, it's only use it an attempt to erode fair use rights under copyright law, in conjunction with the DCMA.

As for me, I refuse to use any product or service that presumptively calls me a thief! I don't care if it costs more. If I can't afford it, I won't use it. They can all wash my bum and drink the water.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

They can all wash my bum and drink the water.

Oh, what a lovely turn of phrase. :)

[unix-jedi.livejournal.com]

I predict that as more and more consumers are bit by the DRM discontinuance problems, it will go away.

...

For about a year. Maybe 2. Then somebody will say "Hey! You know what!"
And it'll be back. It's a cycle, and it'll be back, soon enough.

For every customer who's been bit, and who swears bitterly is a person who sees their hard work "being stolen", and insists on preventing that. For every 2 people unable to use their purchased product, there's 4 who say "I'm not a pirate, I don't see the problem."

DRM (or as we used to call it, Copy Protection) is an idea that seems so wonderful that there will always be people pursuing it.
[quick googling]

OK, somebody I know used to work at a company famous for their DRM. When they reporting about $200M in profit, they were spending $40M on attempting to outwit hackers and changing the codes, so to speak. They could have increased profitability by 20%, but that wasn't as important as blocking those dammed hackers!

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Two words: "Target fixation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Target_fixation)."

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

The cost is the other side of the equation. Only those players in it for the long haul, or with a failing business model, can afford to pursue the escalation of copy protection vs breaker. I heard that copy protection sophistication increases linearly, while cracking schemes are squared. There is this business downturn going on right now. Some Harvard MBA is going to look at the ongoing costs of adding copy protection vs ... What? What is that money buying the company? Quantify it, if you can. And it produces ill will over time. It may keep trying to come back, but most reputable companies will move away from it.

It is still an attempt to revoke my rights as a consumer. They want my money, they respect my rights.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I just blindly bumped into another layer of DRM about a week ago. My wife and I decided that buying a PS3 was the best way to get a Blu-ray player and still allow me a chance to play a game I'd been wanting (that is ONLY available on PS3 or X360).

Imagine my surprise (and lack of humor) when I decided to load my music collection (all legally bought CD's) onto the PS3 hard drive (to use it as a juke-box) - and discovered that it wouldn't even save the music unless I enabled "network" access, visited a specific target site, and allowed some 3rd party to "validate" music I've owned for 10-20 YEARS!

[argonel.livejournal.com]

That is odd. I don't recall any problems adding music to my PS3. I even have a mix of music that I ripped on the PS3 and music that I ripped on my computer and transferred to the PS3. It is even pretty happpy playing music off my home network, as long as I am sharing it via Windows media player or Azureus.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

Most people, it would seem, hook up the PS3 to some form of internet access by default, and so would not even notice the access use of the equipment to "validate" their music.

On the other hand, I had no intention of ever using this as an internet device. I was only going to use it for 2 things: play blu-ray DVD's; and play 1-person RPG's. The juke-box idea was an after-thought. Because I did not have internet access established when I tried to play the first CD, it prompted me to set-up the "network" access, which tipped me off to the whole scam.

[lizzibabe.livejournal.com]

I entirely agree. It's why I've decided against the Kindle. Everything I've read indicates that I'd have to convert all my existing legal ebooks over to a Kindle-proprietary format. Everything that I've read indicates that the Sony E-Reader will accept all my e-books just fine: txt, rtf, pdf, etc.