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CRF Reveals Draft of New DRM Technology
scubacuda writes "PC Advisor and others report that the CRF (Content Reference Forum), a new, cross-industry standards organisation that boasts Universal Music Group, Microsoft, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) and VeriSign among its members, has unveiled a new specification for a DRM technology.
A draft of CRF Baseline Profile 1.0 is available for public review and comment." According to a report on CNET News, the "the [CRF-created] file would set up a process that automatically delivers files in the right format and potentially triggers an automatic payment system that could be changed moment to moment by the content distributor."
Wow, people are going to download executable code from kazaa and execute it. It ain't hard to guess what the follow-up news stories are going to be like. (Dammit, why haven't I bought stock in the anti-virus companies yet?!)
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
Blah. you mean more like 'automatic theft system'( once your machine is cracked ), or 'automatic consumer screw system', or 'automatic removal system' ( for those documents of 'restricted information' )...
If we ever get to that point, i for one wont be using a PC device of any kind...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
...file would set up a process that automatically ... triggers an automatic payment system that could be changed moment to moment by the content distributor.
Hey, I'll sell you a music file for only 1 cent.
On second thought, make that $100
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Last time I checked, a file that tries to automatically charge you for opening it was a...
virus?
Ok, let me also say this. The whole thought process around the word automatically is really starting to scare the hell out me. We live in a society where folk have a hard time keeping track of written checks. How the hell do we expect them to keep track of all the automatic deductions being taken from them?
Oh wait, we don't. Just another way to enslave the masses I guess.
No thanks. I will stick files that might sound like crap, but I don't get charged for until I buy the cd (let the flames begin).
is it just me or does this "potentially triggers an automatic payment system that could be changed moment to moment by the content distributor" sound a bit dangerous and easily abusable by the 'content distributor'?
Is it just me, or does this require the participation of ALL digital content providers to work? For example, how will the downloaded file get a working file from iTunes if Apple doesn't want any part of it?
If I'm right, this seems dead before it starts, since the only real shot it has (IMHO) is being able to provide all songs, where some online sales places can't.
Am I wrong?
Its really scary reading all this online. Large monopolies growing larger set to put the law back 200 hundred and more years.
A lot of people who don't read places like slashdot would be equally concerned if they knew what was going on. They need to be educated, its why democracy works, and why it fails when it doesn't occur.
"potentially triggers an automatic payment system that could be changed moment to moment by the content distributor" So basically, a file could cost 10 cents one minute, and 20 the next? What if you happened to download the file as it was being repriced, and you end up paying more than you expected?
Suddenly I am less happy. #1. M$ is part and parcel of it. #2. I don't like DRM Glancing at a document on the site, it would appear that it is a lawyer tool. Observe from their document: The primary goal for developing CEL is to meet requirements for building operational systems for content reference as given in [15], and to provide an extensible architectural framework for specifying contracts in other potential applications (outside of those for content reference) The primary function of a contract in CEL is to serve the following purposes: Evidence: communicate information conveyed within a contract that can be easily and unambiguously understood. Execution: facilitate permissive, obligatory or prohibitory performance within a contract in appropriate context, integrated with the contracting parties' business processes. This includes determination of whether or not one is allowed to exercise some right, or is required to fulfill some obligation or obey some prohibition. Evaluation: check permissive, obligatory or prohibitory performance by contracting parties. This appears to be another tool to control what I do. So I dislike it.
/b
|f(x)dx = F(b) - F(a)
I know it's 2003, but why does it feel like 1984?
Can the money they make and/or "save" on this stuff ever possibly justify the expenses that must be going into research/development and other costs (including pissed off consumers) for this stuff?
Folks I hate to break it to ya but this type of stuff is the beginning of the end for privacy in the U.S. and abroad. Any lingering "wall" of privacy afforded to citizens trying to maintain personal discretion and private matters..well private is being torn down bit by bit. First it's the Patriot Act with it's slick naming scheme police state features and now it's the computer industry complying with it's handlers to figure out a way to make your data their data (remember that possession of 'property' is 9/10th's of the law...if any of us actually "owned" anything anymore anyway) What is this mess leading too? World Police Government....Sorry to spills the beans.
Fun for the whole family, have little billy click it twice for twice the fun!
Seriously, I was eating in "Dennies" (rellay, my fault, I know) and the eight of us each had the all-you-can-eat breakfast bar. When the bill arrived we had been charged for ten. When we said, "hey, there are eight of us, but you charged us for ten" the servers response was, "oh, so do you want to go back and eat some more?"
If you don't understand what is so wrong with the server in this example, then "automatically" and "changed at any time" are happy fun words for you and yours.
Someone please save us all from the popular culture that would make people think anything like this CRF could be given a "popular and positive" spin...
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
As far as I can imagine, "automatic payment" won't survive in a court. Unless you authorize payment, it's theft - setting up the account isn't authorization enough. The second they charge you, you can bring up a suit saying that you didn't download that song, your 7-year-old did, who isn't old enough to participate in the contract, etc.. I don't see how they expect to prove you payed if the transfer is completely automatic (no digital signiture, no entry of credit card info at time of purchase, no "Click Here to Order," etc.).
Imagine a virus that downloads tens of thousands of songs to your computer. Then imagine the automatic money transfer. Then imagine the lawsuit you'll have if they won't give back the money.
G
So we repeal copyright. What is left to 'promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries'?
"She's a West Texas girl, just like me" - G.W Bush Iraqis
"the [CRF-created] file would set up a process that automatically delivers files in the right format and potentially triggers an automatic payment system that could be changed moment to moment by the content distributor."
Oh yeah, that sounds like a great idea.
Remember, these are the people you keep reading about that leave their servers open and have lists of credit cards stolen from them. Regularly.
Just imagine DRM and auto billing mixed into that. This will be a nightmare of epic proportions. You heard it here first.
Weaselmancer
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Still smells the same....it stinks...
Copyright eventually expires, DRM doesn't.
Shakespeare didn't have copyright protection, neither did Bach, Mozart, Beethoven.
Interesting that no one since has been deemed better in those particular categories.
Infuriate left and right
I agree with all the previous posts saying how this is just another control mechanism. How in the hell can any human being accept a standard that automatically charges your bank account or credit card? I can see it now...you accidentally click on something and you end up buying it even thought you never agreed to or wanted said product.
So what is your response to this Mega-Corporation virtual theft? You call up their 1-800 number based in some 3rd world country and sit on hold for a day or so. When you finally get someone online they know nothing plus you can't understand a word they say.
God this sounds fucking great!
I can't wait! Where do I sign up?
Seriously these mega-corps can institute this standard or whatever they want to call it and sell it to the masses but we DO have a say so. I hope it goes the way of the 1st incarnation of DivX from Circuit City and burns out oh so quickly.
We as consumers can reject this outright and not buy into it. Money talks and bullshit walks. Money is the only thing these companies understand and that's the genesis of the entire drm/dmca argument although they would like to convince us it's just the ability to innovate.
With groups wanting to tie a drm to hardware and now this I really think the day is coming where we will actually want to stick with yesterday's hardware (today's) and forgo the next gen with all of the mega-media money protections built in.
I will stick with the hardware that I can control and not let it control me.
You aren't free to do anything, until you've lost everything.
What kind of fantasy world are they living in. The problem is that almost everything is encoded in well known formats that can be handled by most machines. The powers that be wish that content on P2P networks were in proprietary protected formats, but except for a bit of windows media crap, it isn't.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
And they plan to correct that by providing files to download that are specifically designed not to be readable by people who lack the appropriate software or hardware
These people don't actually use the English language. Or at best its a version of English that has been taken out the back, given a good thrashing and been convinced to do what its told or there'll be more of the same.
Both the RIAA, Microsoft and Verisign have a dominant role in their respective markets. This forum is about providing a infrastructure for digital content.
There is inherently nothing wrong with that. That is, as long as they define infrastructure that will be universally applicable. So if it only runs on an Microsoft platform it has failed. If it only protects data by companies associated with the RIAA it has failed. If the only security it allows for is the security as provided by Verisign it has failed.
When content, of a type protected by the mechanisms to be worked out by this committee, become available, the content is the copyright of the issuer of the data and as such it is entitled to the protection offered by the infrastructure. This means that music is secured at the time of publication within the infrastructure. This allows for people to create their own content and do with it as they like and, if at all it is secured, it is secured within the same infrastructure as is the commercial content as published by the organisations associated with the RIAA.
* Linus Torvalds has said before that the inclusion of DRM is not a problem as far as he is concerned.
* Music Midi and computers have a long history. It cannot be that the use of computers connencted with music or photo's or video will cease.
* There is nothing inherently wrong with DRM but it has to be open and it must secure my data as much as the data from a commercial entity.
* Given the pedegree of the people in this committee THEY have to prove their bona fides. Microsoft is a convicted monopolist and the RIAA wants the law to grant them the right to be a monopolist. They have one good thing going for them; Microsoft is one of the greatest marketing companies ever.
Thanks,
Gerard