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Content Control in Mobile Devices

BigJim.fr writes: "Mobile operators envision the handset as the ultimate closed platform providing an opportunity to regain end to end control over content distribution. Right to replay from Total Telecom provides insight into how they imagine user-hostile digital right management systems in the near future." Excellent article.

12 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. Be an informed customer by RC514 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Don't buy what you don't want. It is that simple.

    --

    1. Re:Be an informed customer by cpt+kangarooski · · Score: 4, Interesting

      That's not good enough. This is so actively hostile to users, why should it even be allowed to exist? It needn't. An aggressive response would be far superior, I think, to a passive one.

      --
      -- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
  2. Do they have no clue? by gagravarr · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "By definition a standard drm is less secure than a proprietary one," says Gregg Makuch, senior product manager for mobile product and services at Seattle-based Realnetworks.

    Yes, security by obscurity, that well known way to make your product more secure... anyone else scared by people with this sort of mindset potentially having so much control over what we will and won't be able to do?

    --
    This post will enter the public domain 70 years after my death, unless Disney buys another extension.
  3. about the end... by mirko · · Score: 4, Interesting
    While the audience hears the song on the radio they are invited to order the track through their gsm phone, just by sending an sms to a short
    number (5380).


    They may have to improve SMS maniability as it is far too uncomfortable.

    The sms is answered immediately to validate the email address given in the sms and after a confirmation, the content is sent to the listener's mailbox.

    Immediately ?

    Are they sure ?

    And why would somebody buy the right to play an MP3-like on a shitty phone loudspeaker when they actually hear it on a good radio at the same time? If they really like the song, then they may wait until its has ended to buy it, wouldn't they?

    A micropayment of EUR2 is deducted from the phone bill, and the licence is sent separately
    to the same mailbox, or as a present to a friend, all within seconds.

    So:
    1. It is quite expensive
    2. This means that the phone companies will be the new banks which'll not only know how much we own but also with whom we communicate. This is dangerous for privacy
    3. mail on a phone ? I knew I was getting old but please, why not on something comfortable with a maniable device which name begins with "key" and end with "board" ?


    When the listener opens his email he finds the track and licence in his mailbox and may play the
    music.


    So it'll take some time to actually hear what we wanted to hear when we were too busy purchasing it?

    The content owner - in this case Radio 538 - has the choice to allow cd burning or not;
    to listen for a week, a month, or forever - whatever they agree to with the artist can be set in the business model.


    Content owner ?

    What about public domain songs ? (see my .sig)

    They will be thrown out of the media?

    And why do the song "belong" to the radio (content owner)?

    don't they mean the "distributor"?
    --
    Trolling using another account since 2005.
  4. Standards-based v proprietary security by Polaris · · Score: 3, Insightful

    '"By definition a standard drm is less secure than a proprietary one," says Gregg Makuch, senior product manager for mobile product and services at Seattle-based Realnetworks.' I find this hard to accept. Certainly a standards-based drm is verifiably more secure than a proprietary one, and all too often proprietary standards rely on obscurity or a smug belief in the superiority of the technology, without it having stood up to peer review by experts (remember GSM encryption?).

  5. scary... by Em+Emalb · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "When the listener opens his email he finds the track and licence in his mailbox and may play the music. The content owner - in this case Radio 538 - has the choice to allow cd burning or not; to listen for a week, a month, or forever - whatever they agree to with the artist can be set in the business model."

    Ok, so I pay for this track, probably can't burn it, move it to another device, I don't know how long I have it for, and they can take it from me at anytime? This is a good thing?

    It's a good thing we are all sheep to be led blindly through the world. Technology like this scares the hell out of me. I pray people will wake up and say gosh damnit, we are tired of this shit and we ARE NOT going to take it anymore.

    --
    Sent from your iPad.
  6. Who's going to do this? by Dr.+Spork · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I am quite unafraid of these developments. I never expect to download media to a handheld device. If I want control over the songs I listen to while I jog or sit on the train, I'll bring an iPaq or something similar. If I want someone else to pick the music for me, I'll tune to the radio. If I want the internet... well, that part will stay free.

    Who the hell do they think will pay for media streamed to handhelds? I can only vaguely imagine such people (the types that leave their cell phones on in the opera house). I won't shed a tear if it turns out that MS milks them.

    Besides, if portable devices are connected to the internet with decent bandwidth, I'm sure that computer-only services that provide media without DRM will make a mobile device frontend, and you'll be able to get the same media on the handheld. Still, I don't quite see the point, but maybe that's a sign I'm getting old.

  7. Common Sense Gone South? by TicTacTux · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Okay, for two bucks I give you the right to look at me for one hour. (Staring costs extra). After that period you're forced to look somewhere else, please. Note that I am not only the content owner, I am the content myself...

    Just because it is technologically possible it does not mean it makes *sense*. The end effect of this behaviour is utter egoism, nothing else. I understand a musician needs a beer or a pizza from time to time. I also understand he/she does her stuff primarily for their own satisfaction. Making money off it is a welcome side effect. If we start to pervert this into its contrary, we better get prepared to have transponders implanted, and after an afternoon's walk through the park we're getting charged for 'services' we did not even dream of using.

    Maybe those technocrats and lawyers should have their EQ checked. Good night when making a buck is the only or primary motivation for anything...

    --
    Use The Source, Luke!
  8. House of cards by pointym5 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's interesting that no mention at all is made in the article of the fact that the success of any DRM scheme is utterly dependent upon the legal foundation of DMCA-like laws. The details of the various schemes are unimportant, and their currently escalating sophistication is simply a passing phase. Eventually it will become clear that all that matters is the threat of criminal punishment at the hands of compliant governments. All these fancy cryptosystems will devolve to the ROT-13 level of complexity.

    This is not meant as a joke or a troll. Why, in the long run, should anybody invest in expensive complex technologies when simple cheap ones satisfying the letter of the law will suffice? As successive DRM implementations fall before the incessant pressure of educated people bent on their defeat, corporate interests whose profit stream rests on control of their "intellectual property" will throw up their hands and cry "terrorist!" to a Senate committee. Mark my words.

  9. Unbeatable Method of Defeating Content Control by Greyfox · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The big media companies keep talking about content control. The ultimate goals of content control are to charge every single person who partakes of the content every time they partake of the content and also to install such a formidable barrier of entry to the content generation business that the only way to publish your work on a large scale would be to enter into contracts unfavorable to you with some giant mega-corporation.

    What I am about to tell you is 100% legal under the DMCA (Not that that will prevent these companies from attempting to file lawsuits.) It is an absolutely effective method of defeating any content control, and it is your only hope of retaining any rights against the giant mega-corporations. It is so dangerous to them that I am really surprised that they have not yet attempted to pass a law to stop it forever.

    What's this big secret (I hear you cry?) It is simply this: Don't consume their content. Do some research. Find that club that's playing that local band. Go see a live play. Find other ways to amuse yourself. Dropping those multiple billions of dollars a year that we collectively spend into the local economy rather than into the pockets of some mega-corporation would take its toll fairly quickly.

    Someone's bound to reply "You could write your congressman" but come on -- Your congressman gets a letter from you and from Sony. The Sony letter has a nice fat check in it. Guess which letter he's going to open first. Guess which one he pays the most attention to. The Enron collapse demonstrates just how much power the corporations actually have in this country, and Congress may make mouth-flappy-noises about campaign finance reform but it is not going to happen. They'd never put any teeth into any laws they make even if they do pass some. Americans just didn't get pissed off enough about it.

    --

    I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

  10. Be an active opponent by Dan+Crash · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Don't buy what you don't want. It is that simple.

    I see this attitude a lot on Slashdot, and every time I do I think, "Could you bury your head a little further in the sand?"

    Statements like "Don't buy it if you don't want it" really do nothing to address the fact that digital rights management *is* being rolled out, that many if not most people *will* buy into it, and that this will change the legitimate options left for others.

    Think automobiles.

    Once upon a time, if you didn't like the new-fangled horseless carriages, you could simply "not buy what you didn't want" and ride your trusty steed or horse-drawn carriage instead. How many horses do you see on the roads now?

    * * *
    When something become ubiquitous, it changes people's mindsets. Ideas that once seemed unconscionable begin to seem not only bearable but familiar and preferable.

    Just not buying DRM yourself isn't enough. We all have to organize and work together to defeat strong DMR if we want to continue to enjoy free (as-in-liberty) information ourselves.

    --
    He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
  11. Repeat after me ... by Aceticon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A mobile phone is a device for social iteraction.

    That's right boys and girls - the biggest use of mobile is to comunicate with other people.

    Now comes 3G - brand new, lotsa bandwidth.

    What's the first thing the so-called industry experts think about?
    - Let's use mobile phones as a way to deliver content to people - basically a glorified pay-per-use portable televison and radio in one.

    Immediatly followed by:
    - Let's protect the content from being redistributed by the users - no sending of copyrighted music to your friends buddy.

    Wake up!!!

    If instead of all this bulls*it mobile phone companies would create an open architecture that allows costumers to send anything to other costumers ( the mother of all P2P services ) there could be loads of money to be made ( just charge by the KByte ).

    Cheeesh ....