Digital Restrictions Management for P2P Systems

Anonymous Coward writes "Digital restrictions management for an open-source peer-to-peer network. Researchers at the Georgia Tech Information Security Center have created a content protection system that is a plug-in for LimeWire/Gnutella. The paper argues that DRM is beneficial to everyone including independent musicians and end-users."

Comments

finally

[tps12]

I'm always getting my digital rights all messed up. Especially when stealing movies on LimeWire, my time shifting tends to get tangled in my fair use, and since information wants to be free I end up with data all over the floor. This plugin will help me manage my digital rights, so I can finally focus on what matters: ripping off starving artists.

Censorship is never beneficial

[kenp2002]

Censorship is never beneficial. I warned that the DMCA could be used to prohibit access to free material (i.e. Adobe published Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven" in a DRM format. Project Gutenberg is now violating the circumvention clause regardless of who came first. See the Analog section of the DMCA for details.) This is the second step in the progression to a new dark age... My suggestion is fight fire with fire. Use an encryption format on the next P2P application then, in the EULA state that you cannot use the software unless you are a Non-Corporate, Non-Government agency. If a company uses the app to spy the contents, they are in voliation of the EULA and you sue. If the hack the client they violate the DMCA by circumventing the encryption.

My 2 cents

(I spell crappy... I know... Shashdot needs a spell checker... ispell plugin anyone?)

Every Time I read "Content" in this article

[dfenstrate]

I want to vomit a little more.

Maybe I'm young and naive, but it seems to me that the entire notion of "content" is offensive. Like the music or pr0n videos or what have you was simply items in a box, with no regard for what's inside.
Though I suppose you could fairly call Britney Spheres, Backdoor Boys, and We'Stync to be nothing more than worthless coporate content, I cannot equally call the 405 short, Mudhens, Indigo Girls, or a great number of other independant, thoughtful works "content."
It's their blood & sweat, not a packaged good.

The notion of content is what allows them to call copyright infringement "piracy", what makes them want to license every listening. The music/videos/whatever are cheap, taiwan-made products to be whored around as much as possible for the greatest profit.

What they're really exchanging is ideas, peoples feelings, and as Jefferson once said (paraphrasing) 'When I give an idea to you, I am not deprived of it's possesion, but we are both richer for it'

I'm not saying anything about the entire legality of it, or what I think of this paper (Gee, I didn't know academics were whoring themselves to the entertainment industry lately) but this talk of 'content' is cheapening to the work serious musicians, directors, and artists perform.

Just venting. thank you for yer time.

Re:WTF ?

[SirSlud]

>DRM in itself isn't bad, because if the artist wishes to release their song in that format, that is their right.

Sorry, can you explain to me what exactly the rights of artists are? And why those rights are relevant to the artist given that 98% of the copyright in the western world is owned by corperations?

The artist is obligated to ensure that, upon claiming protection via copyright, his work is freely accessible 20 years after his death. Should he DRM-ize all his songs to expire after 6 months, and never publish them again, it is the artist that is breaking copyright law (by not making his work available to the commons after his copyright protection has expired.)

Show Me The Money

[limekiller4]

First, let me say that what I'm about to show might be entirely common among colleges, not just the Georgia Institute of Technology. But whenever I see some academic group pushing something that is inexorably linked to commercial interests, I start looking for a money trail.

EPICS, Georgia Tech Receives Software Grant to Improve Retention For Minority Students (2000)
This year, they'll have even more to celebrate, as Microsoft Research's University Relations Group announces a grant that will put "bundles" of its latest software and publications in the hands of 1,000 underrepresented students over the next two years.

EPICS, Microsoft Partnership Donates Software to Hands On Atlanta (date unknown)
"Thanks to the partnership of the nationally based Engineering Projects In Community Service (EPICS) and Microsoft Corporation, a generous software gift was recently donated to HOA. This software, Microsoft Project 2000, will allow the organization to implement a system to improve its special events planning. "

Microsoft Exec to Address Georgia Tech Grads (1999)
Deborah Willingham, vice president of Microsoft Corporation's Business and Enterprise Division Marketing, will address Georgia Institute of Technology's 205th Commencement ceremony on Saturday, December 18.

Microsoft grant gives OMED another reason to celebrate at Tower Awards(date unknown)
This year, adding to the excitement, Microsoft Research's University Relations Group announced a grant that will put "bundles" of its latest software and publications in the hands of 1,000 underrepresented [Georgia Tech] students over the next two years.

This was just a quick check on Google.

Again, there might not be a cookie jar that Microsoft doesn't have their fist in, but it might be nice to know.

Re:I wonder . . .

[medcalf]

Theft is theft. It deprives you of your natural right to use your property, by depriving you of possession of your property.

Copyright violation is not theft. It arguably deprives you of your ability to collect revenues from your property (or reduces your potential revenues), but it does not deprive you of the actual property, which you can still use since you still possess it.

The rhetoric of "copyright violation *is* theft" is simply wrong, and ignores the fact that the score-keeper here is not revenues generated from a given property, but the property itself.