Microsoft-Sony Plan: A Media-Rights Ploy?

sk8rboi writes "Missing in Wed.'s (CNet) reports about the Digital Home Working Group (DHWG) effort from âoeMicrosoft and Sony to make sure DVD players and cell phones can communicate with each other over a home wireless networkâ is the real reason for the work--it's a DRM (digital rights management) play in disguise. Look at it logically. Why would an industry alliance need to define a standard to share an MP3 file between a smart phone and a PC? According to EmbeddedWatch, the answer is, it wouldnâ(TM)t. The file can already be shared via wireless email or WiFi. And both can read the file, since both support MP3. Consumer-electronics systems and computers can already interchange all sorts of files. But what they canâ(TM)t do--and what companies like Microsoft and Sony wish they could--is regulate the transfer of such files (aka block them if theyâ(TM)ve been downloaded for free from KaZaa). (DHWG, by the way, is actually led by Intel.)"

Comments

wrong

[cristofer8]

I disagree. It's not just for smartphones, but a way for you dvd player to talk to you pc, which, currently, it can't. Granted, it's more than likely that whatever scheme they come up with will have DRM (sony is an riaa member after all), but I don't necessarily think that the driving point is to add drm to already existing standards.

You can leave junk like Kazaa out of this

[sdo1]

aka block them if theyâ(TM)ve been downloaded for free from KaZaa

You know, even bring up Kazaa and the like only hurts the cause because (and I don't think anyone will dispute this) the vast majority of the files available on Kazaa and the like are copyrighted.

The better tact would be to say "even if they've been downloaded from any of the hundreds of free (or pay) and legal sources of .mp3's all over net" or "if they've been ripped from CDs that you bought."

This isn't about being able to share content downloaded from Kazaa. Oh boo-hoo, you can't play the copyrighted song that you didn't buy. The much bigger problem is the content that I paid for, was actually free, or that I have fair use rights to play. If DRM gets in the way of that, then's when I get angry.

-S

The most interesting part of the article...

[ihatesco]

is this image

If I am not mistaken, barring the device discovery and control part, everything is already known, has a widely known standard, and is already interoperable. With the exception of DRM which is marked as "Proprietary/Vertical". Will that mean that Sony DRM stuff (which will work on a Montavista Linux Based platform will not be displayed on my Longhorn PC? That's crazy.

And what if this become a "standard" like Motif or CDE? (Yeah, a bloated, cumbersome standard, that Micrsoft will replace with something suited for her whims instead)

And free content will be able to circulate between one system and the other? Oh, yeah...

I can envision the chaos that will occur when I will be able to rip the movies from one of the n competing DRM technologies.

Everyone will be posting torrents on /, (slashcomma) with downloads to the "easy-do-it-all-crack-o-rama" program, and then will be out renting DRM "X" standard technology in order to spread the content between pcs, cellphones, and their taiwanese blueray players.

+ + + +
HTTP enabled phone. Why I suddenly foresee http://4g.goatse.cx (don't follow that link even if it doesn't work) for the future cellphones?

Fair Use Rights

[chmilar]

For me, it comes down to one thing:

If I feel that some media or player has the potential to "rip me off" by restricting my fair use rights, I will avoid it. I don't want to pay for a song or movie, and then be restricted from using it in a reasonable fashion.

Since all current Digital Restrictions Management schemes do not guarantee my fair use rights, I will not subscribe to any of them. I would rather "go without" the media than put up with this crap.