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UCB Researchers Critique DRM, Compulsory Licensing
An anonymous reader writes "
In this
paper, Berkeley researchers critique a host of cockamamie DRM schemes, and
they also question the compulsory
licensing approach recently being promoted by the EFF. They get into some
of the practical details about compulsory licensing that no one else seems to
be talking about like technical feasibility, incentives to cheat, monitoring for compliance, efficiency of collection and distribution of funds,
privacy, fair use, feasibility of legal enforcement... Anyway, it's worth
a read and is a useful contribution to the debate, whatever side you're on.
"
Unfortunately, that is becoming more and more the case.
It's time to stop implementing these schemes! Block Microsoft netblocks at the border routers, Same goes for Intuit, RealPlayer, and anyone else that compromises users rights for profit.
You think that I'm crazy, you should see this guy!
WTF? PDF is a format that renders the same regardless of the program used to view it, and can be generated by open-source linux software. HTML is a format that is viewed differently depending on the program and settings used, especially since the majority of people use IE (not exactly standards compliant). Moreover, PDF files can be easily saved and viewed later without worrying about saving every single image in the same path - which is often useful for research papers with charts and graphs all over the place (ejournals often have PDF files which, when printed out, are identical to the articles in the paper-based journal...try doing that with HTML.