When Would You Accept DRM?

twigles asks: "Following on the heels of Apple closing DVD Jon's end run around its DRM and a British TV station offering DRM'd downloads it seems fair to ask, what DRM would you accept as a consumer? Personally, I take the view that if a song, movie, book, etc. is DRM'd then it isn't truly mine. On the other hand, if a particular piece of digital media is priced correctly (a la' rental fee) would that be satisfactory, or do you feel that DRM in any form is ridiculous?"

Comments

Never

[Anonymous Coward]

Not as long as I have any alternative.

Re:Never

[mankey wanker]

Agreed.

The pretense is that every media container you own - CD, DVD, book, magazine, etc - is a licensed copy of that type of media alone. You do not have the right of use for the exact same content in another form.

This is all nonsense, of course. And we have let them build a business on the nonsense for far too long.

I have long since drawn my own line in the sand.

Re:Never

[mirko]

Yes, which is the reason why it has to be reflected upon before it reaches the commercial level.
BEcause of the Internet, we don't need a comemrcial circuit, we need communication aver what is being made.
That's why I created GNUArt: To give creators a possibility to get their stuff circulating with no restrictions other than ensuring their contribution would remain known as theirs.
Now, if the gallery gained popularity it would help benevolents distributing their creations.

Re:Never

[Technician]

Not as long as I have any alternative.

Actualy only as rights of first sale are not messed up. The price on DVD's and the fact I can pass them on and they will play in the next guy's machine is the only reason I buy DVD's. The broken right of first sale is what killed Circuit City's implimentation even though the price was lower.
Nobody wants to buy a movie with an expiration date.

Re:Never

[kernelfoobar]

Talk about coincidence: slashdot's QOTD:
"Never give in. Never give in. Never. Never. Never." -- Winston Churchill

Re:Never

[Hogwash McFly]

From my cold, dead hands!...er...you will find the note saying 'I accept DRM'.

Re:Never

[ndtechnologies]

Agreed. There are alternatives out there. It does suck that we have to search for them, but they are there. Not to spam the forum here, but that was the whole reason for creating my Music Store. I wanted an Alternative, and couldn't find one, so we made it happen. We are trying to help bands, and consumers alike by doing things differently (or trying to anyway). See my sig for more info...

Re:Never

[ratell]

You don't have any alternative.

There's a deli here in Portland where the owner has a big stack of cd's with a sign taped to them saying that he's no longer allowed to play them without paying royalties.

Even with a cd there are limits on what you can do with it. It's not a question of whether or not your rights are being managed. It's just a question of where the line is drawn.

Re:Never

[Lord Kano]

The broken right of first sale is what killed Circuit City's implimentation even though the price was lower.

I went round after round with the managers at CC when I worked there on this. When DIVX was failing corporate put pressure on store managers to push it more. They in turn put pressure on us to push DIVX. I told my manager that I'd obey any directive that he gave me, but I wouldn't lie. So if any customer asked me if I was going to buy one, I'd have to tell them no. If they then asked WHY, I'd have to be honest about it.

My manager wisely didn't try to force me to sell them. We reached the comprimise of me asking "Have you seen our DIVX demonstration?"

LK

Re:Never

[mkw87]

never say never!

Personally I hate DRM but I think I will find it hard to not accept when I graduate Harvard Law and get hired by the RIAA to try 2 cases per year against people that I rat out b/c they were jerks in college.

I believe I'll start with a few of the professors fond of classical music......

Re:Never

[ePhil_One]

From the summary:
Personally, I take the view that if a song, movie, book, etc. is DRM'd then it isn't truly mine

Exactly. You didn't write the song, make the move, etc. If you want to own the content, create it or pay someone to create. It cost more than $.99 a song, or $19.99 a movie. From the parent:
The pretense is that every media container you own - CD, DVD, book, magazine, etc - is a licensed copy of that type of media alone. You do not have the right of use for the exact same content in another form.

Technically you generally do have the right to use that content in another form, unless the terms of the license agreement say you don't. DRM protected content usually includes such provisions, such as iTunes allowing you to burn CD's of the material. The Fair Use concept generally allows you to use it for your own enjoyment so long as you don't make a profit. The wholesale redistribution of that content via Peer to Peer networks should not be considered "Fair Use".

This is all nonsense, of course. And we have let them build a business on the nonsense for far too long

So your proposal is to stop allowing people to profit from their creations? Which might work for simple works, like songs, where a an artists might be driven by the need to create enough to invest his time writing new songs, but who would invest more than a few thousand to create a movie that movie theaters could just copy and display for free? Well, the Government and other advertisers I guess.

I have long since drawn my own line in the sand.

Great! Where can I check out the content you created and licensed under the Creative Commons license? So long as your line is "I won't purchase DRM media", thats fine. Just don't extend that to "I don't like the terms you offer this non-neccessity product under, but choose to consume it anyway without compensating you".

Re:Never

[dnoyeb]

I will accept your DRMed media if you except my DRMed cash. At such time when your DRM media no longer functions I will remotely disable and reclaim my DRMed cash.

That seems fair to me.

P.S. I dont think the parent you are replying to mentioned anything about the theft you keep bandying around.

Re:Never

[hairyfeet]

You know why there is piracy?Because the big labels screw their customers out of $20+ for a piece of plastic while they screw the artist and through them less than a dollar of it,if anything. I've been their.I watched as a buddies band got screwed and the band members bankrupted because after the label got done with "creative bookkeeping" they handed them a bill for $5000!They paid for the album themselves,Got NO promotion from the label,stayed in fleabag hotels,And sold out every club they played.I watched the local record shops have to restock THREE times because they couldn't keep their albums on the shelves and i know they were doing just as good elsewhere because i toured with the with my former band. The bill had things like "misc promo fees" and "creative artist devlopment" WTF?They fought for three years and never saw a dime!I will care about the poor theiving record and movie companies when it's a cold day in hell!How can you care about a business that whole goal in life is to screw everyone they come in contact with?You sir,Are a dumb@ss.

Re:Never

[Zork the Almighty]

This is a great point. Unfortunately few media companies are interested in giving the consumer something, they are mostly focused on taking away.

Re:Never

[Znork]

"You didn't write the song, make the move, etc. If you want to own the content, create it or pay someone to create."

Nobody owns the actual song. Someone may own the copyright to the song, but that is just ownership of temporary government sponsored monopolistic rights, not ownership of the song itself. Further, there is plenty of precedence stating that when you buy a copy of a song or other work protected by copyright you own that copy of the work in question. That is the first sale doctrine, and generally it's been upheld that if someone claims they're selling something to you they _are_ in fact selling something to you, no matter how they wish to later claim licensing or rental. Your rights to do what you wish with your property may however be curtailed by someones copyright, but you are still the owner of that property.

"So your proposal is to stop allowing people to profit from their creations?"

There's a difference between allowing people to profit from their creations and allowing derived monopolies to expand indefinitely, thus severely damaging the free market. Copyright is meant to compensate the creator of a work, not huge inefficient corporations with whatever expenses they can generate. And it's becoming woefully obvious that the intellectual monopolies are our economies version of the Soviet factories. Only when you have a monopoly can you let your expenses grow to hundreds or thousands of times what the actual production cost is.

Patents and copyright need to be drastically revised to compensate _only_ the actual creative work.

Re:Never

[Lussarn]

The underlying problem you talk about is of course that you can't buy DRM:ed media, Every form of DRM today, iTunes or otherwise is a rent. Lifetime maybe but when you die you take you music into the grave.

If I buy something it should be mine, I should be able to dictate the terms I use it on, I should be able to resell. I should be able to trade media with another store or a friend.

I can't stand renting everything digitally for the rest of my life. Now is the time for the consumer to stand up or we will lose all our rights in the digital world.

Re:Never

[Maxo-Texas]

You buy a lifetime license to the content when you buy it. They retain a record that you bought it and you only pay media costs (which are zero for downloading). A portion of your purchase price is invested to cover the costs of bandwidth and remembering that you are licensed to this material. --- But that is isn't going to happen so the answer is never.

Re:Never

[TedCheshireAcad]

A legal method to protect intangible goods is anti capitalism? Yeah...whatever.

Re:Never

[Dhaos]

And why should we want to buy such an extremely limited license, when our parents, and even our grandparents, got a better deal by purchasing the physical medium?

If I want to let you borrow a CD, you can. If I want to let you borrow something I've downloaded off Napster Express, well, we're both screwed.

DRM now? Sure. I won't buy it- that's me voting with my wallet. However, when the content providers decide to provide everything in DRMed format, and electronics manufacturers only provide DRM-ready equipment, its game over. Your parents and grandparents had a better deal.

Re:Never

[JebusIsLord]

or you reformat your PC or buy a new one, or you buy a new portable which doesn't play MP4, or you decide to transcode to a different format later on.

I have no problem with copyrights on music like most of the people here... but I personally purchase CDs and then promptly rip them to lossless format (FLAC), then transcode to the current portable format de jour (MP3 still right now).

These MP3s i stream to work through my website, burn to CDs for play in my car, upload to my nomad jukebox, and play on my Linux and Windows machines.

Now contrast that with what I could do using a DRM'd format such as itunes MP4, WMA, or DVD-audio.

Exactly.

Re:Never

[CalexAtNoon]

DRM is big pain in the butt for the consumer.

How did you feel if a book that you bought dissapeared in smoke 3 years after. You probably wouldn't buy the book in the fist place!

There are no standards, you can't play you DRMed avi files on your new DVD player or any other device except a Windows/PC (and that's when the files aren't locked to run only on your system).

If you bought something DRMed or download it in a subscription based service you better hope you don't REALLY need those files. In the case the content provider goes under, ceases to distribute, or simply disallows the use of a file, you can complain all you want because the file is not yours.

DRM is being pushed because content publishers and copyright holders fear digital copying. Altough there are more books, CDs and DVDs sold now than in any other time, more music is sold and more contents are on the market.

Like CSS, region coding and so on, DRM is a way to protect business models, to trap markets in price rigging schemes that milk every penny that a regional market can offer. Or do you think that prices are the same all over the world?

To this day DRM has been used has a tight fist strategy, intended to reduce consumer choice and to makes the consumer buy the same things all over again.

Re:Never

[squiggleslash]

Anti-Free Market perhaps, but not anti-Capitalism. Can you invest in an enterprise and make a profit from doing so with copyrights in place?

Most certainly. Indeed, the more arbitrary monopolies you allow people to make for themselves, the easier it is to create opportunities for that investment.

An example, methinks, of how the Free Market isn't always the same thing as Capitalism.

Re:Never

[__aanebg9627]

An idea is not "intangible goods". Everyone can have an idea at the same time, sing the same song at the same time, perform the same Shakespearean play at the same time. There is no rational reason to prevent this. Ideas and songs do not behave like chairs or clothing -- many people can use them at the same time. We do want to encourage people to craft songs, think up new ideas, and so on. But we do not need to create a new form of property out of ideas and songs to do so.

Allowing our government to grant a monopoly on these things is, IMO, incredibly counterproductive. It reminds me most of the way some European monarchs treated manufacturing when it began to grow -- individuals were given exclusive rights to manufacture this or that product. The countries which did not follow this practice developed vibrant economies, and those that did eventually abandoned the practice in order to catch up.

In other words, copyrights and so forth are the opposite of free market capitalism, just as the monopolies granted by the old monarchies were. To refresh you memory, recall the Boston Tea Party? It was the American colonists' rebellion against the King George's imposition of one of those monarchical monopolies.

Free markets are much better for manufacturing and trading societies, and free use of ideas, songs and stories will be much more productive for our society.

Re:Never

[cayenne8]

"Technically you generally do have the right to use that content in another form, unless the terms of the license agreement say you don't."

That exactly is the problem!! The record companies are changing the paradigm. In the past...when buying cassettes, albums and CDs....you were buying the media and a copy of the music contained...to use as you wanted within fair use rights. You were NEVER considered buying a license to use it...but, you owned your copy to do with as you pleased...within copyright law (as you alluded to in your comment about doing this with no profit involved.)/

Now, just because the music is digital...they're trying to say, no, you don't buy your copy...you buy a license to USE it...which can be revoked at any time.

This is what's wrong...and I believe, the center of much of the controversy. They're changing what you purchase. And if we don't fight this...it will become the norm.

I've said it before..."What one generation accepts...the next generation embraces"

Re:Never

[cayenne8]

" Yes, but that's the point. You aren't buying the music (or other media). You are buying a limited license to use the music (or other media) in some way. If you don't want to buy such a license, don't."

And just when did it change to this?? In the past, when I bought cassettes, albums...and as I knew...CD's...I was NOT buying a license to use it. I was buying a piece of media and buying my copy of the material contain upon it, to do with it as I pleased within fair use usage, and copyright restraints. Now, that you can digitially store it...they're changing it to a license? Where and when did this happen?

I don't know about you...but, I've never agreed to any license...hell, ever seen a EULA on an album or CD?

Re:Never

[Chazman]

You didn't write the song, make the move, etc. If you want to own the content, create it or pay someone to create.

NOBODY *owns* content. Content is thought, experience, knowledge, understanding, appreciation. These are intangible, and cannot be contained, quantified, or taken from someone after the fact. We enacted copyright to give creators an incentive to create, that our society should be rich in content. But even in its current screwed up, completely out of proportion incarnation, copyright terms end. Copyright does not last forever. Content eventually becomes free of all restrictions, and all can use it however they please. But DRM doesn't end. This is why DRM is bad for society. It de-facto extends copyright indefinitely, and does so with more onerous restrictions than copyright itself allows a creator to impose. Here's an answer to the original story submitter's question: I will accept DRM when it automatically becomes completely and permanently disabled the instant the copyright on the work it's protecting expires.

So your proposal is to stop allowing people to profit from their creations?

I would remind you that copyright does not exist to guarantee creators the ability to profit from their creations. It exists merely provide an environment in which creators have incentive to create. Incentive need not include any guarantees. (e.g.: Look at Vegas. Plenty of people find adequate incentive to gamble at casinos.) Once copyright has gone far enough that creators find enough incentive to create, and our society has rich, continuous streams of new content, its job is done, and anything additional is too much. IMHO, we're already quite far into the realm of "too much".

Re:Never

[redheaded_stepchild]

Technically, the license of use on the older style of media was exactly the same as what they're trying to do with DRM. They simply didn't have any useful way of stopping you from doing what you wanted. Don't get me wrong, I'm against DRM, but don't try to kid yourself that you ever truly 'owned' the content on your older stuff, either. You were buying licensed content, with all the crap TOU we're dealing with now. If they wanted to, they could have gone after you for every cassette or VHS tape you ever copied. What stopped them was cost/benefit. The only ones who ever got busted were people doing it as large operations. So, it really comes down to more of a misunderstanding about what you had then and what you're getting now. Again, I hate DRM, but you're not helping anyone with this rhetoric.

Re:Never

[defile]

Don't be so sure of that.

From DNA Lounge blog:

In case you were looking for more reasons to hate ASCAP, there's this article about Skip's Tavern here in San Francisco. It's a bar that has live music, with bands who play only original songs. ASCAP came to them and said, "you have bands, and so they must be playing songs on which ASCAP controls the copyright! Pay us $800/year." The bar owner asked for evidence that there was any copyright infringement; in response, ASCAP sued him. They were unwilling to negotiate, so in response, he's no longer doing live music at all.

Re:Never

[Lussarn]

The big difference is that with "analog distributions" (CD, DVD, Cassets etc), You didn't have to sign a contract to buy because there are laws which says what you can and can't do with the media you buy. You can't show a movie you buy in a cinema for example, but you can redistribute (or sell) the media.

Now with digital media the laws says that companies can grant whatever rights they want to the media in the form of licences. The first thing they took away was the ability to redistribute, you can no longer sell what you have once bought (this is why I like to call online media distributing as renting). With DRM they have also taken away the ability to use what you have payed for in ways not authorized by the licence.

New laws are needed and they should give more rights to the consumer.

Re:Never

[motherball]

No, you've completely missed my point. Are you even responding to the post above you? Its not "wheww, 128kbps is great, OMG" at all... I've
never use iTMS, and I never buy hype. Heck, you've bought the hype that you need a RAID. For what? your music?

My point really coalesces at the bottom. DRM and controlling "content" is just a last scramble for table scraps using an old business model. A business model that was built around analog media that travelled household to household packaged in cardboard and plastic.

all that's irrelevant now. This is the business model used by untalented people to make money off of the talented. That's why I'm againt intellectual property. Instead we could switch to a whuffie based economy. where the talented would again prosper.

Yes

[henrypijames]

I do feel "DRM in any form is ridiculous". It's that simple.

Re:Yes

[BoomerSooner]

I accept no DRM. If it is locked, I don't buy it. I guess I'm going to have to brush up on my disassembly debugging for strategically placed jump routines.

Re:Yes

[dopelogik]

Everyone just loves to hate DRM cause it's so controlling and limiting and 1984 and blah blah. What about the fact that DRM allows Napster to offer an excellent service like Napster-to-Go? Or how about DRM allows video producers to have a video be playable only from their web site and for a certain amount of time before it expires? Does anyone care about the valid and useful DRM applications before screaming human rights violations?

Re:Yes

[Scrameustache]

I do feel "DRM in any form is ridiculous". It's that simple.

But the owners love it!
So unless you're planning a glorious uprising of the working classes, then we'd better get used to it.

The DRM I'm willing to accept os the DRM that I won't even notice. Like the one on the iTMS seem to be. I never bought any of their wares, but from the list, I could burn any of my music, and move is to another computer without problems.

DRM that doesn't get in the way of fair use is acceptable.

Re:Yes

[ZorinLynx]

>What about the fact that DRM allows Napster to offer an excellent service like Napster-to-Go?

I'm sure the same service can be offered with open MP3 or OGG files.

>Or how about DRM allows video producers to have a video be playable only from their web site and for a certain amount of time before it expires?

But I don't want that! I want to be able to download and save video I view on the net. Web sites don't stick around forever, and if you see something cool, there's no guarantee it'll be there tomorrow. Therefore, I want to be able to save it.

I have archives of several pages that I wouldn't be able to see anymore if I hadn't been able to save. We must not let DRM-proponents get their way, because if they do, media archives will be a thing of the past. Look at archive.org and the prelinger archives -- if all those movies had been DRMed and expired, we wouldn't have them today, right?

DRM is evil. Sorry, no ifs, ands, or buts here.

-Z

Re:Yes

[badasscat]

But the owners love it!
So unless you're planning a glorious uprising of the working classes, then we'd better get used to it.

Great attitude. I suppose we all may as well have gotten used to Hitler too - after all, there was nothing anybody could do about him!

Before anyone gets all bent out of shape, I'm not in any way saying DRM is as bad as Hitler. I'm just pointing out the fallacy in these "better get used to it" arguments. There is a line that can be crossed whereby something is no longer worth "getting used to", where a person's rights and liberties simply take precedent over any restrictions somebody wants to place on them, and that line is somewhat different for everybody. This topic exists for the sole purpose of finding out where that line is for each of us respondents. (Obviously for you, DRM does not cross your personal line in the sand, but it does cross mine and a lot of others'.)

The DRM I'm willing to accept os the DRM that I won't even notice. Like the one on the iTMS seem to be.

Yeah, just try upgrading your OS and then tell me how you don't even notice the iTMS DRM.

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't use Napster and have no intention to buy crippled music. If someone wants to limit playback of a video they are publishing on a website, the easy way is to not bother publishing it at all. Likewise for time limited documents etc, we (as a company) will NEVER accept anything written in vanishing ink.

So what are these great uses of DRM?

Re:Yes

[noiseusse]

I second that.

It's supposition of guilt. These companies assume that you will "infringe" their copyrights and take measures to prevent any copying which then infringes on your fair-use rights which, imho are much more important with opt-out copyright laws like we have in the states. It's a double-edged sword. They also want to lock you into their proprietary system which is onerous but not really unexpected. It's amazing to me that anyone would accept this. It's their job to be as sneaky and diabolical as possible and it's out job to say "Hey, wait a minute. That's BS".

btw, forgive me if I'm wrong but I don't remember any of this hubbub over mixtapes. What happened?

Re:Yes

[MartinG]

But the owners love it!

The copyright holders love it, not the owners.

The copyright holders love it because it gives them control over the owners of the media.

I think you are talking about "intellectual property owners." This is why the phrase "intellectual property" is a misleading one because it tricks folks into thinking that intangible things are the same as tangible things when they are not.

If I buy a cd or a dvd, I am its owner, nobody else. If I download from an online music store, I am paying for a service. In either case, nobody else "owns" anything I have paid for.

Re:Yes

[iainl]

You can have iTMS tunes registered on up to 5 machines at once. If like me (and most people here) your "upgrading OS" involves a full uninstall/reinstall, just remember to deregister the old installation before you start, so you don't waste one of those 5 times.

Re:Yes

[letxa2000]

Sorry to break it to you, but DRM is the only way to sell media on computers without mass piracy.

So we're supposed to accept DRM because they somehow feel entitled to our money? Oxygen is freely available too. If it were't, someone would be charging for it. That doesn't mean that some chemical company is entitled to a subsidy, tax, or other business structure to prop up their failing business because no-one is willing to pay for their freely-available Oxygen product.

My prediction: Artists will make money off of concerts, merchandise, and endorsements but their music will be available free. More music will be available from more artists since the only difference between a garage band and Madonna will be the quality of their music, not whether or not they got a record contract. And I predict the recording industry will shrivel up and die because it no longer serves a useful purpose. And I mean the recording industry, not music. RIAA != music. If RIAA dies that doesn't mean music dies. It just means some useless media executive will go have to find a real job instead of pimping for the real talent which is the musicians.

Yes, things will get worse before they get better. The recording industry will not die quietly. But it will die. And music will be free. Technology and the free market guarantees that, and even rich industry and corrupt government are incapable of stopping technology and market forces over the long term. It's like a 5-foot seawall trying to stop a 50-foot tsunami.

Re:Yes

[nojomofo]

Apple has placed DRM on iTunes songs. This is not a subsidy. Not a tax. It is a business model. If you don't like it, then don't support it. It's that simple. Nobody is forcing you to listen to music that you have to pay for. You can go and listen to free music. If you don't think it's as good, then maybe there's also something wrong with the business model of "giving stuff away for free".

I'm not saying that I don't want to live in a world where I can download my music for free (legally). But the way to get there isn't to bitch about capitalists trying to earn a living. The way to get there is to do something about it.

Re:Yes

[mpe]

They'd be up on bittorrent within under an hour. Sorry to break it to you, but DRM is the only way to sell media on computers without mass piracy.

The problem with "DRM" is that it will never work. The way to sell content is to make it easily available for anyone to buy at a fair price. Such that buying becomes the "easy option".

Re:Yes

[Skye16]

They're already up on bittorent within under an hour. They always will be. There will always be one person smart enough to break the DRM and put it up free and clear. What then? Where's your fucking argument now? It does nothing but piss the rest of us off and make a few geeks happy because now they can figure out how to beat the system AGAIN.

Get a brain.

Re:Yes

[soupdevil]

As an artist who has wrestled with many corporate members of the *AA, I can assure you that the companies exist to make sure that the artists do NOT get paid, or if they do, at least they get paid poorly, and late. That is their business model.

Re:Yes

[optimus2861]

If you're claiming you own the intangible music encoded on that CD or DVD, you're a hypocrite. You just claimed that it can't be owned.

He's not a hyprocrite; he's exactly right. You can't own music. You can't own the words in a book. You can't own a movie. You can own copies of all those things, and/or you can own the copyright on all those things. When I buy a DVD, I own the DVD, and I own the copy of the content on that DVD. What I do not own is the copyright on that content. The ownership of the two is distinct, and an interest in one does not in any way affect an interest in the other. Just read section 202 of US copyright law:

202. Ownership of copyright as distinct from ownership of material object

Ownership of a copyright, or of any of the exclusive rights under a copyright, is distinct from ownership of any material object in which the work is embodied. Transfer of ownership of any material object, including the copy or phonorecord in which the work is first fixed, does not of itself convey any rights in the copyrighted work embodied in the object; nor, in the absence of an agreement, does transfer of ownership of a copyright or of any exclusive rights under a copyright convey property rights in any material object.

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

Sir, what you have said is logical and reasonable. Prepare to be modded a troll.

Re:Yes

[SavoWood]

As an artist who is a BMI member, I can assure you they do work to make sure I get paid for my work. After a broadcast, it usually takes about 9 months for the money to get to me, but given the number of songs being played on all the media outlets out there, it actually seems kind of fast. I don't produce/write/perform my music so much for the love of it, as I do for the fact I can earn a living doing it. I have music all over television, films, and on record store shelves. My hard labor went into the production of that music. DRM helps to protect my hard work and ensure I get paid for it.

Yes, I love what I do. Being paid for it is a bonus. I don't need to go work in an office pushing papers around and running spreadsheets of numbers. Personally, I would find that sort of things boring. The current business model allows me to earn a living doing what I like instead of what I have to do to make ends meet. If I weren't a little talented, it wouldn't work out, and I'd be forced to give away my music in hopes of being noticed by a few people who might fork over whatever few pennies they could spare. I don't do busking any more as that was one of the worst weeks of my life.

When your product is such a pile of crap, you have to give it away, the only income you'll get from it is pity money. I can now understand why it's called a pittance.

Re:Yes

[NothingToSeeHere]

The DRM I'm willing to accept os the DRM that I won't even notice. Like the one on the iTMS seem to be.

Not even iTMS is unnoticable. I found that out yesterday, after I sent my Mac to be repaired. I copied my entire system to another (nearly identical) Powerbook, so I thought I wouldn't run into problems while my machine is gone...

Not only can I no longer play my purchased songs (of course I could authorize my replacement machine), but I just realized that since the motherboard is being replaced on my machine, I've probably permanently wasted one of my 5 allowed "authorized" machines, cause when I get it back, it won't be the "same" machine to iTunes!

Good thing I only made a small test-run with iTMS and purchased 4 songs. That doesn't hurt too much. But others will run into larger problems, that's for sure.

To me, DRM will only be acceptable as a passive measure. Indestructible watermarks are ok, if they don't impede my use of the purchased material. If files appear on the net and the company holding the rights immediately knows who leaked them and comes after that person, that's only fair. Also, that way, it will be far easier to measure the amount of damage inflicted by an individual file sharer.

Re:Yes

[tomjen]

Yes just like the horse carrige industries have died out because selfish bastards wanted to ride an automobil.

Just like typewriters are a thing of the past, replaced with computers.

Put ofcause if you prefer to write you letter with homemade ink on homemade paper go a head.

Re:Yes

[MartinG]

you actually never own their son

True, but I do own my copy of that song.

* you don't OWN all rights on the content on that disc, only those rights copyright holder grants to you.

I don't own all the rights on the content, true.

I own more that just what they grant me though. They can grant me any rights that copyright takes away by default, but any other rights I have already.

Think of it as a venn diagram with sets A, B, C
A is the set of all rights.
B is the set of rights copyright law removes. (and is a not empty subset of A)
C is the set of rights granted by a copyright owner. (and is a subset of B)

The rights I have on a work is the union of A and C.

The copyright owner can try to add any restriction they want. (eg, you do not have the right to fly a helocopter if you buy this CD) but they are unenforcable. They cannot take away rights using copyright, only give back rights that copyright law took away in the first place.

The only exception to that is if you have entered into a contract with them.

Re:Yes

[zeeeej]

Wrong. It doesn't work both ways. Modern corporate capitalism insulates those at the very top by passing along every increased cost along with every demand from investors for predictably increasing profits. The bigger the corporations get, the less risk at the top.

Because the investment market demands it, there will never be a limit to how far companies will go, tacking on additional costs. Company A does it, Companies B and C see that A didn't collapse, then they do it too. People bitch for a while, but seeing no easy alternative, eventually move on and accept it. No collusion needed - the big investors spread the word as to what is needed. Don't do it, and your market value takes a dive.

Here are a (very) few recent examples:

ATMs - when was the last time you went "off-network" and DIDN'T pay an ATM fee? ATMs, even free ones, save money for banks, who no longer have to pay tellers. But they continue to practice this blatant theft because they can get away with it. Why? Profits must rise!

Ring Tones - Want an annoying song on your phone? Pay $2 and we'll give it to you for three months. How do they get away with this? There are no alternatives. Should one arise and gain any traction, expect it to be sued/legislated out of existence.

Credit cards - Everyone knows it's evil to raise someone's interest rate quietly from 10% to 30% because that person was late on a phone bill. And that's just the tip of the iceberg for that slimy sector. And yet it continues to happen, and for some reason the "free market" hasn't stepped in to stop it. Profits must rise!

It's time we face the facts. Corporations are consumers' enemies, no matter how much they try to soothe us into believing they're not. And in that war, they have all the big guns. DRM is another cannon in the arsenal. It's hardly surprising that some choose to use guerilla tactics like P2P to fight back.

Re:Yes

[Ender_Stonebender]

I was gonna stay out this one, but my head will explode if I don't comment on this.

* you don't OWN all rights on the content on that disc, only those rights copyright holder grants to you.

WRONG!!! I have all rights that the copyright system of my country allows me, as well as any additional rights that the copyright holder may grant me. That's what "fair use" is, and, here in the U.S.A. at least, it specifically states that I can make copies for personal use or my personal "archive" of music (which happens to sitting on the floor beside me at the moment, I bring it with me on long trips so as not to risk losing/breaking the originals).

--Ender

Re:Yes

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

I'm sure someday we'll get to the point where there will have to be shrinkwrap licenses on our music and video, but for the moment take a look at software. I would contend that in practice, you have the same rights to music and video that you buy that you have to software that you buy. Just read the license, some time.

In other words, you may use the media in the approved fashion on an approved device, and very little else.

Well you're right about the part that you have "the same rights to music and video that you buy that you have to software that you buy". The rights you have in either case are all the rights that copyright law grants you. When buying most software, the license is presented after the copy of the copyrighted work becomes yours. You don't need a license to use something you already own.

The license, even if/when you hit "I accept" may not even be valid under contract law since the software company did not concede anything in exchange for your rights at that time. They didn't conceed a copy of the software - you already had that.

I'll answer for slashdot

[daveschroeder]

- No DRM of any form is ever okay: I should be able to do anything with items I obtain, including sharing them with others;

- It's not right for content creators/originators/owners/licensors to expect to be able to protect their content; if their content needs protection, their business model is dying;

- All "information" and "ideas", which includes music, software, text, and other unique works, should be allowed to freely flow between people in an unlimited fashion without any encumbrances of ownership;

- DRM is fundamentally flawed and is only used as a tool of the rich and powerful to forcefeed commercial tripe to the masses;

- In the digital realm, ideas of "ownership" and "theft" are meaningless. The world has changed, and unlimited digital copies of all manner of content can be distributed nearly free and without any harm to or detraction from the original. Therefore, any old model based on physical manifestations (books, CDs, DVDs, etc.) is dead.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[DaHat]

- All "information" and "ideas", which includes music, software, text, and other unique works, should be allowed to freely flow between people in an unlimited fashion without any encumbrances of ownership;

I take it you aren't a fan of the GPL then. Take what you said to it's logical conclusion and the GPL becomes too restrictive even for you.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[Coocha]

dave, you seem a little bitter about last night's thread, but I won't hold it against you ;) You made some good points last night.

I could live with DRM'ed content if, as the article mentions, it is priced comparatively to a rental fee. However, if physical media were to go the way of the dodo and consumers were expected to accept DRM'ed downloads in lieu of owning physical media they could (by right) copy and manipulate for personal use, I don't think that would be an acceptable outcome. Several people mentioned last night that purchasing media give the purchaser rights to resell, copy, etc. Now if an EULA explicitly restricts you from doing these things and you still accept it, that's your problem. But if the day comes that consumers are given no choice (i.e. their rights to copy for personal use are negated by the fact that the only available format for purchase removes these rights), that's when DRM will start to smell funny to me.

Just my 2cents, and FWIW it seems like I fall somewhere in between daveschroeder's opinion, and the opinion of many other slashdotters who commented on the 'DVD Jon' story last night. But like you suggested dave, I do not patronize iTMS for the specific reason that DRM is not worth circumventing if the same media can be purchased on formats that don't restrict my personal choices.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[jdreed1024]

No DRM of any form is ever okay: I should be able to do anything with items I obtain, including sharing them with others;

I agree. I shelled out $5 for Debian on CD. I should be able to do whatever I want with it, including redistribute only the binaries to people, without any source code. Or modify the source code, build binaries, and ship only those binaries to people. Why not? I paid for it. Who the hell is this Stallman guy who thinks he can tell me what I get to do with something I bought? Sounds like another Jack Valenti to me.

Seriously, the "It's mine I paid for it, fuck you" attitude doesn't work in civilized society. There is a concept of "fair use" - sure, it's gone out the window in recent years, but it was called "fair use" for a reason. It wasn't called "fuck you, mr. artist".

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[Speare]

There are some who definitely feel the GPL is too restrictive. Look at the BSD license. If you write it, and you *want* to share it, then do so. If you modify it, and you *want* to share it, then do so.

Just as the protecting freedom of speech means protecting speech you hate, protecting an open sharing society means sharing with people who don't want to share it forward. Once you share something, you should not have any control over what the recipient does with it. Sure, somebody might try to sell your code, but that doesn't diminish your ideas, nor does it diminish the ability of others to build and share.

I'm not pushing this concept, I'm just saying that some people definitely feel this way. Any opinion is a valid opinion, even when you don't agree with it.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

Correct. The GPL is a means to an end, not the goal itself. As long as copyright and even more ridiculous restrictions on the free flow of information exist, the GPL is a way of limiting the support for propietarism. When all information is unrestricted, the GPL will have done its job. It will be obsolete then.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[mmkkbb]

(though they may dream of it, in the end, most of them only end up doing it for the passion)

You think it's easy to do music full time while keeping a day job? There IS a life outside Slashbot-land. I think you need a change of perspective.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[govtcheez]

Well hey, you feel free to live life on some hippy commune where you barter for everything, but I've got bills to pay, and if my company started charging ludicrously small amounts for consulting, I wouldn't be able to pay them. Your "free everything" idea is nice, but totally unrealistic.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[Bender0x7D1]

To answer your points:

First, you need to be careful defining what you "own". If I rent/lease a car I can't do anything I want with it. Even if I own the car, I can't use it in a reckless manner or give it to someone to use in a crime. If I rent a DVD from a store I can't do anything I want with it. For example, I am not allowed to melt the DVD itself or scratch it so it is unusable.

As to your second point, there is a lot of software that is hideously complex and expensive to create and cannot just be made "free". How many companies can create controller software for a cellular base station (I used to work at Motorola) and then give it away free? It doesn't work well as an open source project since there is no way to test the software without purchasing specific hardware that costs US$100k or more. So how does a cellular provider get this software? Develop it themselves? Oh wait, then their competitors get it for free (according to your premise) and they can undercut your price because you had the cost to develop it in the first place.

Third point - so if I have a world changing idea then I should just give it away? Unfortunately, I have to eat and prefer to live in a house instead of a tent (winter can be harsh in my part of the world) so I need some money for those things. Sorry, but that is just the way it is. If you will guarantee to give me food and shelter then I might give it my ideas for free. Communism tried this and it didn't work out (at least in the USSR).

DRM is flawed, but since people prefer free to costing something it is required if you want any compensation for what you do. Imagine making music and only being able to sell 1 copy of your music and everyone on Earth then gets a copy. Who is going to pay US$10k for a song to cover the cost of the recording equipment when everyone else gets it for free? If I wait for a few days I can be the one who gets it for free.

Final point - spoken like someone who never had their roommate "borrow" some of their software/movies/pictures/etc. My wedding pictures are my property and I don't want someone else to have/look at/post them without my approval.

Personally I think DRM is hideously broken in our current state of law/society. However, I think it is required since most people prefer to get something free instead of paying for it.

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[brianiac]

Why is it *necessary* to make money from ideas?

I work hard every day, and when I find a solution to a problem, or an insight worth sharing (this one may not count), I share it.

What puzzles me is the sense of entitlement people and companies get when they come up with something they want to share, and feel they should get paid over and over for having done something once.

I much prefer a patronage model (where content creation is underwritten) to the "double-billing" model of "intellectual 'property'" (got to get a few quotes in there before they become patented).

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[rudy_wayne]

"Still, the wide-open Stallmanesque idea of non-ownership for all IP eliminates any chance of someone with an appreciable level of talent in, say, music, to be able to quit their day job and be able to provide for themselves and/or families by making music."

True, but that has nothing to do with DRM. The record companies sold non-DRM vinyl LPs for over 60 years and non-DRm CDs for over 20 years. Not only did the record companies make billions in profits but a lot of musicians got very rich as well.

DRM *IS NOT* about "fight piracy". It *IS NOT* about "protecting intellectual property". The sole purpose of DRM is to fundamentally change the ownership of property that you have legitimately purchased -- "you don't own it, you've merely purchased a license to use it -- but you can only use it in the way that we dictate".

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[cpt kangarooski]

Meh. Is it that important? I mean, special effects can hardly compare to finding a convenient planet, terraforming it to correspond to Middle Earth, genetically engineering actual orcs, elfs, ents, and so forth, building the various structures, providing sufficient technology to replicate the magic in the series, etc.

That would be pretty neat, but it would cost an unimaginable amount.

Frankly, I can be pretty happy watching good, but low budget movies, as I can be watching good, big budget movies. Crappy movies remain crappy no matter how much money you throw at them.

Plus the cost of special effects continues to drop all the time. The LoTR movies, for a given level of quality, could certainly be made less expensively now than they were at the time. And would've cost far more a few years before they were made.

In a few decades, it'll probably be something that a home computer can do in realtime. (Anyone ever see that movie "Tron," and then play the more recent "Tron 2.0" video game?)

Re:I'll answer for slashdot

[TheSpoom]

The idea, though, is that you CAN do this without having to break any encryption or remove DRM from any files; the files are yours to do with as you please. You shouldn't do what you are saying and it is against the law, but your computer isn't preventing you from doing so. This is what the grandparent is saying: we should be ABLE to do what we please with the media we have, not necessarily that they come with no restrictions at all.

Do you trust your customer based?

[jarich]

That's the bottom line... do you think your customers are trying to steal from you or do you trust them?

The Pragmatic Progammers sell the PDFs of their books with no DRM and they seem to be doing okay. That is to say, the books aren't all over Google.

http://www.pragmaticprogrammer.com/starter_kit/faq s/pdf_faq.html

I'll accept it when...

[Enigma_Man]

I have no other choice, because the lemming-like "masses" have already been duped into buying all DRMed stuff, and buying/selling non-DRMed hardware is illegal, and comes with a 30 year jail sentence, and I've become nothing but a hollow shell of an old man/corporate consumer.

-Jesse

My rights

[fuct_onion]

I'm fine with any 'Digital Rights Management' that doesn't, in the course of said management, infringe on _my_ management of _my_ digital rights.

Re:My rights

[pla]

I'm fine with any 'Digital Rights Management' that doesn't, in the course of said management, infringe on _my_ management of _my_ digital rights.

Okay, so one more point for "never"?


For myself... You can put DRM on my coffin. The rest, I'll avoid if at all possible and break it if I can't avoid it.

Basically, never...

[tquinlan]

...if a company wants to sell me something, yet wants to put restrictions on that thing, then I am not likely to buy. If you want to sell me a subscription, then do that, but don't make it so that I can't move the content from place to place in my domain (ie, living room, portable devices, computer, etc.).

As it is, most content is unbuyable now, anyway, so I don't even buy that much. (I haven't bought a CD in years, and a DVD in months.) Media companies need to start making intelligent music and shows, and then let me do what I want with it. If they want income streams, fine - sell me a subscription. But if you're going to do that, and I'm willing to buy, then don't restrict how I use it.

Re:Basically, never...

[kurtis_mayfield]

Exactly. The problem right now is that the content companies want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to have DRM and restrict how you use the content, which is esentially selling you a license for the content. But they treat CD's, DVD's, software as if they are physically selling you the product. If you want to just sell me a license, then you have to have a system in place where you can replace the content during the terms of the license. Right now if you buy a CD and ask the content companies to replace that CD when it gets damaged, they will not replace it.

Duh

[puke76]

I'd accept DRM when it wouldn't restrict my fair use. That will never happen, so long as manufacturers and content providers are using DRM to lock people into their proprietary platforms and distribution networks (whilst claiming to use it to combat piracy).

Purchase or rent

[hoggoth]

If I am purchasing music, paying per song or album, then it is MY music. I don't accept that at some date in the future my music will no longer be playable because some company went out of business or no longer supports my hardware/operating system, or because I moved all my files over to a new computer and can't get the DRM to work.

If I am renting music, for example paying $20/month for all I can listen to, then I can accept pretty much any DRM because I don't expect the music to be "mine". If something goes wrong with my DRM I would just switch to a different service and for $20/month have unlimited listening rights again.

Note that, for me, it's not worth $20/month to listen to music on my computer. I already have plenty of music I own on my computer, and there are free alternatives for radio-style listening.
But I get that it's a worthwhile proposition for some people.

Re:Purchase or rent

[Sentry21]

I'm inclined to weigh in in support of the parent. DRM is for when the media is not yours - for when you are distributing confidential PDFs, renting out digital downloads, providing subscription-based services, providing an 'embedded' system with trade secrets, and so on. If DRM will help these situations come about (I'll pay SciFi $1/show to watch Stargate in HDTV downloads), then I will champion them.

DRM should not be used in situations where the media itself is replacing physical media - buying music online instead of buying a CD, etc. I think FairPlay is a fantastic exception to this rule, as it is very liberal and has only a modicum of restrictions (I think three computers is fair, and no extra fees to play on iPod).

People who want to sell you something and be able to take it back, however, should be revolted against.

When properly priced...

[scsirob]

When the content is properly priced, what's the need for DRM anyway? If the download offers value for money then anyone should be willing to pay for that. If it's overpriced then DRM is a way to force the high price down the customer's throat.

wtf?!

[Xepherys2]

Alright, this is ridiculous. DRM is no different, in principle, than copyright. Does everyone here feel that copyrights are unacceptable? Most people (myself included) that have problems with DRM aren't or shouldn't be with DRM itself, but how it's implemented. If DRM exists, to show a digital copyright, so to speak, but it does not infringe on my fair use, the ability to copy a song or video to media for my personal use, or use it in ANY of my personal audio/video devices, than I think DRM is wonderful.

Re:wtf?!

[xiando]

"DRM is no different, in principle, than copyright. " WRONG. Copyright does not prevent me from FAIR USE. Copyright does not prevent me from actually USING the product on my Linux system. DRM does. See the difference now?

Want what I pay for

[GeckoX]

If I buy something, it is not acceptable for it to be encumbered by DRM.

However, if it's used to enforce a rental or temporary use of something, and that's what I'm agreeing to pay for, no problem.

But again, if you are trying to sell me something that is broken, I won't be buying. FYI: If everybody made their purchases this way, there would be no such thing as DRM. In my opinion, iTMS users have done serious damage by undermining expected fair use by accepting these purchases.

None.

[hanssprudel]

The problem is not that when you buy some DRMed media that you do not really own the song, the movie, or whatever. The problem is that when you take part in a DRM system, you do not really own you computer any longer. I will not buy into a system that has my computer acting against me on behalf of others - not at any price, nor for any benefit.

Computers are not like cable boxes or satellite receivers, or even DVD players. They are our most fundamental and important devices of communication. To surrender control over those devices to others is a mistake we should pay for dearly...

Re:None.

[DavidpFitz]

Computers are not like cable boxes or satellite receivers, or even DVD players. They are our most fundamental and important devices of communication. To surrender control over those devices to others is a mistake we should pay for dearly...

I don't know about you, but I have a life and I consider my mouth to be my most fundemental device of communication. My computer is waaaaay down the list!

Re:None.

[hanssprudel]

I don't mind software that comes with a EULA. I just don't respect them. Likewise I don't mind media that has DRM, as long as I can circumvent it.

Quick answer: no

[LegendOfLink]

I don't like to buy anything that would somehow cripple my functionality. Pirating aside, there are a lot of legitimate purposes for making a CD into an MP3. I do it at work all the time, I bring it in, rip it to MP3, and then take the CD home with me.

But I don't think we'll really have a choice in the future. If there's one thing companies hate, it's lawsuits, and they'll do anything to avoid them, including implementing DRM.

You probably already do...

[tommertron]

Do you own any DVDs? They're DRM'd, in that you can't copy them (unless you use widely available cracking software.) Same with console games. Digital rights management is everywhere, and most of us accept it out of necessity. But there will always be ways of getting around it for those people (like us) willing to put in the extra work.

Personally, I don't really care that much about DRM, as long as it's designed well, like the iTMS. I don't know if I "own" the songs or not, but I don't really care - it's never really restricted what I've wanted to do with my music. And if they do make it hard, I'll just find a crack to get around it.

DRMs MUST be banned.

[Quebec]

The first DRM I was aware of was Macrovision.

I remember a call from a friend of mine who remembered that I was knowledgeable in video editing and she contacted me to help her with a problem they had with a student project. (that was back in 1994)

They were student who selected very short extracts of scenes for their project for the last 20 sleepless hours and they wondered why they couldn't make copies of many of their extracts. When I finally arrived all I could do is explaining what was happenning and tell them to find some other scenes (Macrovision had a cyclic effect in which a few seconds would be copied all right) I didn't have any video filter at that time to go around it and it was too late to go and find/build one.

CONCLUSION:
It's simple, DRM prevented those kids to express themselves correctly, it was damaging their possibility to create.

Now, with DRMs much more insinous than Macrovision nowadays just try to imagine the artists who have been prevented to express themselves, imagine also the art forms that have been crushed before their own existences by these DRMs.

DRM is bad, it is evil, it MUST be banned for the sake of the human spirit.

( it's the second time I put this story in /. comments but i figure most didn't see it the first time)

Never.

[Catiline]

I will never accept Digital Rights Manglement.

The problem isn't really the restrictions now -- I will gladly grand the copyright holder the right to control the (re-)distrobution of their product. Copyright doesn't, and shouldn't, control or limit use, which a lot of DRM/copy protection does, and that I do object to. But having iTMS want to limit P2P reproduction -- to me, that's fair.

To me, the issue is instead what happens 150 years from now -- they copyright has expired, but Rights Manglement never dies....

Let me tell you why I am okay with it

[Performaman]

I have no problem with DRM because there will always be people like DVD Jon who will crack it. That way, everybody wins: the companies get money from people that legimately download songs, and the people who don't like DRM will be able to get rid of it. I've run several songs that I've downloaded from iTunes through JHymn and produced MP3 files without DRM. So, let companies feel secure and buy DRM music. Then, remove the DRM portion of it.

Re:Let me tell you why I am okay with it

[Digitech]

I think that is just it. I think if they make DRM that can't be broken, people won't buy it and it will die out on its own. My guess is that most people who buy from iTunes know that they can always burn a DRM-free copy. Even if they never rip it to their hard drive, they know they can if they want to. Now, if I knew that I couldn't ever get a copy free from DRM, I wouldn't buy from that service. I think that is on the mind of probably 90% of the people who buy from iTunes.

RMS short story

[Anonymous Coward]

Richard M. Stallman has written a fiction story called "The Right to Read", which is very relevant to the current subject.

Not mine?

[XxtraLarGe]

I download music from iTunes all the time and burn it to audio CD's. How isn't it mine?

Re:Not mine?

[Electroly]

It's up to five computers now, not three.

The problem is philosophical to a point

[jav1231]

The real issue is that the media giants aren't willing to work within the new marketplace. It's like going to another planet where humans have already discovered they can breath without a space suit, and they come along and want you to wear one anyway. I think if they would release a lot of their old libraries, cut those prices, they'd have a market willing to buy new songs at decent prices. So much DRM today restricts moving songs from one place to another to prevent piracy at the expense of convenience. People have grown accustomed to taking a CD from car to home to friend's homes etc. now you want to lock them down. I understand the need for DRM I just think they need to rethink their methodology. I don't know the answer, but I am uneasy with a technology that is basically attempting to make an outdated business model fit into this new marketplace. This shows an amazingly naive understanding of the digital landscape. They need to change with the times and they just can't see it. That doesn't mean give away their music, but it does mean understanding your market.

Unacceptable in any form

[Mr Pippin]

DRM is unacceptable to me in any form. It's basic premise is that consumers are untrustworthy and/or criminals.
In effect, it states I don't have control of my property, and logically means to me I don't own it.
I DO have products that are DRM'd, today (Apple iTunes). The only saving grace of which is that I can burn them to CD and be rid of the DRM.

I purchased almost 2000 CD's in my youth.

[Richard Steiner]

For the past 4-5 years, however, I've been limiting my CD purchases to used CD's on HALF.COM and elsewhere, and I've been totally avoiding the online digital music scene (preferring instead to concentrate on slowly ripping my collection and burning it in MP3 form to data CD's).

Why should I continue to support an industry which (a) treats me like a crook and (b) won't give me what I want?

What do I want? Digital music files that I can play, store, and convert however the hell I want to. I paid for the right to use the music -- GIVE ME THAT RIGHT.

DRM by any other name

[thewiz]

is still just as stupid. When I purchase an item I expect that it is mine to do with as I please, not to still be at the whim of whatever company made it. I certainly don't expect http://www.ragold.com/ to come by and tell me what to do with the Dilbert (tm) mints I purchased from them. I also don't expect Honda to dictate to me what to do with my Accord. Why should I let the RIAA/MPAA/Apple/etc tell me under what terms and conditions I can enjoy the music/movies I purchase?

As for Jon's end run around Apple's DRM (twice), I applaud his efforts. It certainly shows that DRM can't stand up to people who want to control the things they buy. I no more want my music to be limited to a single computer or iPod in my house than I want to be limited to what TV I can watch movies on or which DVD player I can play a DVD on.

Don't answer for me, Argentina

[Theaetetus]

- It's not right for content creators/originators/owners/licensors to expect to be able to protect their content; if their content needs protection, their business model is dying;

- All "information" and "ideas", which includes music, software, text, and other unique works, should be allowed to freely flow between people in an unlimited fashion without any encumbrances of ownership;

A question... with these two statements, are you offering government or societal subsidy for content creators? Authors, artists, musicians, innovators, programmers, designers, etc., who deal in information and ideas would get paid for their labors by society in general?
Or are you not proposing that?

In which case, what incentive would any content provider have to provide content? I mean, personal enjoyment comes into it - I like to write, I like to create and play music - but I still have to pay bills. And for any form of content creation that requires capital investment (say, Pixar's render farm), with no return on their investment, do you think any of that would survive?

-T

Grew up with CD's and LaserDiscs, can't accept DRM

[michaelmalak]

Prior to 1980, it was expected that when you went to a movie you might not be able to ever see it again. And it was expected that your records would get more and more scratchy and skippy with age, and maybe even break.

Not me. My teenage years were in the 1980's, where I was able to purchase -- legally -- "perfect" quality CDs and high quality (for NTSC, anyway) LaserDiscs, both free of copy protection. Both CDs and LaserDiscs were touted to last a lifetime, and even though that's not true, the lack of copy protection enabled lifetime chain copying to preserve the recording for personal use.

I grew up accustomed to, after hearing or seeing something I liked, purchasing it, and playing it back at any time for one of two purposes: a) reflecting upon its content, b) recalling the time and place where I originally heard or saw the recording, for the purposes of sentimentality.

I've said it many times, and almost always get modded down, but I'll say it again. I consider it a form of mind control for a publisher to present something for my consumption, and then be able to at a later date forbid me from reviewing that material in the time, place, and manner of my choosing.

As I said, I believe this attitude of mine is due in part to my Gen X demographic. Baby boomers and older -- those presumably running XXAA -- grew up not expecting reviewing capability. Baby boomlets grew up expecting stuff for free via P2P. Gen X'ers are in the position of expecting lifetime reviewing capability, and expecting to pay a reasonable one-time fee for it.

But demographically, there aren't as many Gen X'ers as baby boomers and baby boomlets. And no one seems to care that books after 1924 are rotting away. So DRM and short memories it will be from now on.

Pricing and product decide..

[B5_geek]

If it's an audio CD - No way in hell regardless of price. I bought my last CD about 2-3 years ago, when I discovered it had DRM on it I vowed never again. (I only kept it because I am a big fan of the artist.)

Physical products should not contain any DRM, but allow for a sales paradigm that a small'ish fee and a download allows for limited DRM or other revenue genterating ideas for the content provider.

$1.00 movie downloads, free TV show downloads with ads built-in.

Or have a quality/price ratio.

piss-poor = free
56k stream = $0.99 / video
128k stream = $1.50
T1 = $2.00

DVD = $20 + ability to rip/store and view *for personal useage only*

Movie companies want you to goto the theater & buy a ticket and then buy the DVD. How many people here can attest to d'loading a crappy cam version of a film and then wanting the "extra-value" that the theater experience offers?

I know I do all the time. I use cam downloads as my person movie critic Roger & Fatbert.

It has also saved me from wasting my money.
With the exception of bandwidth costs (And there are alternative methods that could be looked into) they have nothing to loose.

Too many times companies are stuck in the same mindset of: It has worked well for the last 100 years, why should we change now?

Hmm, dinosaurs. Fossil-Fuel.
rise-lather-repeat

To paraphrase

[Marcus Erroneous]

When they pry my music from my cold, dead, fingers.

Question of the object's value

[mike3411]

I wouldn't out of hand reject DRM, but it must be priced into my purchasing decision. Currently, $15 for a DVD that I know I can watch forever, play on any DVD player, backup if needed, loan to a friend, etc., is a good deal. Because of this I have purchased quite a few DVDs, and I think the DVD market has been very strong for that reason. Various forms of DRM, for example newer copy protection methods (might not play in some DVD drives), prevention of copying, possible other incursions to my anticipated fair use, all detract from the value of the disc. If the movie was a good buy at $15 with no DRM, I'll be damned if I would pay the same for something that essentially has had positive features removed. Things like convenience, freedom of use and fair use are all going to get priced into the total cost. If the only thing I can buy is a DRM'd $15 DVD, then I won't buy it. I think most consumers make also make this value decision. I think the problem will be when some of the new DRM systems are implemented, and consumers are not adequately aware or informed. Hopefully publishers will manage to keep DRM out of the user's way enough for us to keep shopping.

DRM is OK if...

[erik_norgaard]

The discussion seems to be blurred by the fact that DRM is invented to prevent unfair use and not to impose unreasonable restrictions on the honest consumers.

I don't think that the content providers are happy with having to do this.

I would accept DRM if:

* I find price is reasonable

* Does not impose restrictions on my personal use

* DRM Expires after a reasonable time

70 years after the death of the artist does not seem reasonable to me - I happen to like stuff created by people who died 69 years ago :-)

There is no reason that music, text books etc. should be free, just as there is no reason that software should be free. The creator may choose either, and the consumer must then choose whether to support non-free content.

If I create something, then I can choose the conditions under which I will make it available, and you can choose whether you find it valuable enough to accept those conditions.

If ends don't meet then the product disappears - It's that simple.

Quit all that b*** about the companies charging unreasonable high fees - you are free not to use their product.

Just my 5 euro-cents

Erik

Interesting, yes. Insightful, no.

[PrvtBurrito]

While I agree that in the digital realm many of the rules that apply to physical manifestations do not transfer over. I also agree that DRM is flawed.

I do not agree, however, that, "In the digital realm, ideas of "ownership" and "theft" are meaningless." and I'm willing to bet that a lot of /.'ers don't agree as well. Even the hallowed GPL depends on foundations of digital ownership, for without these common rules it simply would not be enforceable. Copyright law has been around longer than digital media, and it also gives rights to creators of 'virtual' content such as a book, movie or song.

/. enforces its ownership rules as well. Recently, CmdrTaco, in his blog, suggested he would send the equivalent a C+D to enforce /.'s trademark.. Just because something can be transfered 'nearly free' does not make their creators free of rights.

Anyways, your perception is not based on reality, because the reality of the world is that digital rights are here to stay, and they've been here a lot longer than you imply. As for DRM, I believe it signals a bad days ahead for computer users. And I hope that the trend of incorporating things that are controlled by a company and not the hardware owner are a failure.

BUY v.s. RENT

[xiando]

The issue, for me, is not DRM or not DRM. It is renting vs buying.

And DRM imposes restrictions as if you were renting or leasing the product. That would be alright if the price on the product was close to zero, but I get offended when someone claims they are selling me something when the product is not sold, but rented.

That being said, I use Linux. There is no way to buy/rent DRM products for Linux users, and I am fairly sure that if it was possible it would not be Open Source. And if you are not willing to show me the source, then I am not going to install it on my system. I require the source, the source ensures FAIR USE. The sum of this is that DRM in any shape or form will never work for me.

As long as it's mine, as in... well... mine.

[Arminator]

As long as this DRM allows me to:

• continue to use my medium (music, movie etc.) even after the DRM authenticating facility ceased to exist.
• continue using my medium on a new pc, after my old one ceased to exist.
• lend the medium to a friend. Maybe even timebombed (eg after a week, the friend cannot use it anymore, I mean, he has to give back my CD's/DVD's too, after some time).
• transfer my medium to another type of storage in case CDs or DVDs are as common as 8-tracks or something.

Furthermore not having the feeling, that the DRM mechanism can be used to remotely cut me off from using my medium is a big plus, too (like for example that Napster monthly-fee thingie, where your music stops playing, as soon as you stop paying). Basically: If the DRMed medium has the same usability as a CD I bought about 6 years ago, then it's a DRM I'd accept. Apples iTunes DRM is almost fine by me, since my friends in the LAN can listen to my music. I can burn them a CD, and so on. However I don't know what happens, if iTMS closes its doors, and my PC crashes. When I'm still able to authenticate my protected music, all is well. And if not, well there is always (J)Hymn...

Amen

[jimbro2k]

"That will never happen"

Truer words were never spoken. The original purpose of patents was to encourage innovation. The modern purpose is to build monopoly and to discourage innovation because it threatens existing monopolies.

A "good" use of DRM is to identify the true source of a file, payment being only one of the reasons to so. But the "modern" purpose is to deliberately infringe on fair-use rights, ultimately denying them.

DRM Control

[Deathlizard]

The Only DRM that I will support is Personal DRM. If I make a file and I want to be the only person to be able to open it, Great. If a Bank wants to use DRM as a way to protect it's customers from ID Theft, Great. The way I look at personal DRM is that it's another security layer to protect myself (or my company's) personal data.

Commercial DRM I don't support at all. If I buy a CD I expect that CD to play in anything I have for as long as I own that CD. Commercial DRM limits that. The Best Example is Windows XP. Yes I have to register it to use it and it works. Now what happens when MS decides to not support WinXP anymore? Can they guarantee that I can install WinXP and use it 20 years from now?

Both Personal and commercial DRM have issues when it comes to system recovery. I see this problem in WMP now. If you buy music on WMP and WinXP crashes, I hope you backed up your Encryption key, otherwise all your music is now worthless. The same goes with the Encrypting File system in WinXP, although that can be handled and minimized by a Domain server in a business environment.

so in summary:
DRM in my control = Good
DRM in Someone Else's Control = Bad

Fundamentally untenable concept

[Shaper_pmp]

I can't foresee any occasion where I'd accept DRM, ever. Allow me to explain:

DRM only works if it's supported right down to the hardware, and I fundamentally object to my computer having a different agenda to mine. I will not buy hardware that I'm not in control of, and I view it as irresponsible and invasive to even try to control or artificially limit something I've paid (my) good money for.

If you don't understand this attitude, ask yourself why the government fines people for speeding but doesn't install mandatory speed-limiters in cars, or makes murder illegal but doesn't ban guns outright. Precedents both.

DRM without end-to-end hardware support is essentially impotent unless you are prohibited from cracking it by law. Legislating against technology like this is like legislating against bad weather, or against the tide - it's coming eventually whether you like it or not, and you only look stupid and/or put yourself in harm's way by trying to get between it and where it's going.

(As an aside, can anyone think of an example where a popular technology has been legislated against, and it's died there and then? I honestly can't think of one. In contrast, I can think of several cases where legal proceedings (and the attendant publicity) have launched a new piece of techology into mainstream usage, but I can't think of one counterexample. If anyone else can, please let me know...)

Short version - end-to-end DRM is fundamentally invasive and tramples on your rights as a consumer (First Sale, Fair Use, etc). Vulnerable DRM propped up by dubious lawmaking both cheapens the law and retards technology as a whole (e.g. banning P2P networks unless they pro-actively filter for copyrighted software effectively bands P2P as a useful technology).

DRM represents an attempt to graft concepts and precedent from physical property law onto digital "property". They are not alike, and this sets a false precedent which will (and is) harming both our technological and cultural development.

Slashdot Devil's Advocate

[Theaetetus]

... apparently, since I'm one of the few people who see a point for DRM here.

To respond in a general sense to multiple posts:
I'll only allow DRM on rentals, not on purchases

Reasonable - if you purchase, you have first sale right, format shifting rights, reverse engineering, etc. However, you have no right to distribute. People do distribute, however, and DRM is a reasonable way of stopping or limiting that. Another would be remove the DRM, but watermark all files with a generic tag, and have all ISPs monitor your uploads, looking for that tag - and when you do, they immediately notify the feds and shut off your stream. Would that be reasonable?

DRM is never acceptable. All ideas should be free

Which is a great idea, if ideas never cost money to implement. But, because they do (Pixar's multi-million dollar renderfarm, an author's bills as they take a year to write a novel, a programmer's Fritos and Coke as they program a new game), idea creators need to be subsidized for their ideas. Either that can be society or government subsidizing them (would you accept that? Or would that be too much like "communism" for most people?) or by charging consumers, which is our current system. DRM allows them to retain control such that consumers have to pay for use - which subsidizes the artist and pays their expenses.
Removing DRM removes their source of income which removes the incentive to create.

I know most Slashdotters will say "I don't pirate movies, software, or music. I don't distribute it" - in which case, they'll be solidly behind the first idea, right? Or, they will say "I don't want to pay for it, I just want it". In which case, they'll be solidly behind the second idea, right?

TANSTAAFL. Can't get the content if you can't pay the creator.

-T

Limited life of DRM schemes

[metoc]

My biggest issue is with the lifespan of the DRM schemes and authentication backends.

I am okay for short lifespans. If I rent a video from the local BlockBusters I am perfectly okay with a DRM scheme that blocks access after a fixed period of time.

Over the long run I have see many problems:

1. Lifespan of companies like the new Napster. The music is only playable as long as Napster is around to authenticate the DRM scheme. Napster goes out of business and its dead.

2. Lifespan of the DRM scheme. If I buy (not rent) a title, the DRM scheme better allow me to use it as long as I have it. I don't want to find out its not compatible with Windows 2020 or Linux 10.4, and told I have to buy a new version.

3. Valid expiry dates. If a title has a copyright expiry date of say March 1, 2054, then the DRM should reflect this, not 2038 (UNIX time_t value) which I expect to be around for, or infinite (which means the title will be copyrighted well after the Sun goes nova).

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

"I understand the need..."

[MacDork]

I understand the need for DRM I just think they need to rethink their methodology.

I think that expecting the record companies to stop their price fixing is unrealistic. They've already settled one case out of court for peanuts, so of course they're going to do it again.

I think the original poster touched on it

[goldcd]

when he mentioned the retail fee. We're all used to buying/renting physical items and don't get upset by it. We understand the rules.
When I pop into Blockbuster to rent a DVD for £3, I understand that I've got his film to watch for a couple of nights and then I have to return it.
People don't protest against this, I've never heard of anybody refusing to rent films as they have to return them.
We're also used to the model of buying CDs and DVDs. I go into a shop, I give them some money and they give me a piece of entertainment to take home and put on my shelf. It's mine. I can make a thousand copies of the CD and rip it to any format I want, whenever I want. In reality I can't remember the last time I copied a CD and I just rip it once to m4a - but I know I have the option to if a friend wants it, or I upgrade to a non-iPod.
The problem with DRM is that it's being offered with similar terms to physical media with additional restrictions imposed and no real advantage. I can buy an album from iTunes or a physical CD - the CD usually works out cheaper, so why on earth would I want a DRMed digital copy?
The two models I can see working for DRM are rental and subscription (or a combination of the two). Firstly we have the Real Rhapsody system up and working - I pay a fixed price and get all the music I want. This is offering me something that wouldn't have been possible with physical media. Secondly we could have a film rental system. For those days I feel lazy and can't even be bothered to leave the house, it'd be nice to be able to download and watch a film for a couple of pounds.
I think my point is that most people have nothing against DRM, it's jus that currently it's not offering us anything better or cheaper than what we currently have.

Rotting Music and Games

[gosand]

And no one seems to care that books after 1924 are rotting away. So DRM and short memories it will be from now on.

And a majority of the recorded music is rotting away because it isn't available. I too grew up in the 80s. What if I want to listen to a group that I liked, but my tapes are worn out? Can I go out and buy their CD? Maybe, if any store will carry it. There is a lot of good (and bad) music that will be lost because the record companies don't think they can make money on it anymore. They own the right to it, and choose to let it die.

The same goes for lots of things I guess. We are definitely a nostalgia generation. If it weren't for the enthusiast community, a lot of the video games from the 80s would be extinct. I was into arcade video game collecting for a while, and one of my friends (who was into it WAY more than me) cobbled together pieces from several different video game boards to resurrect a game that nobody had anymore in working condition. (Zektor) Now you can play it on MAME. Now you can play LOTS of games on MAME, and big companies had nothing to do with it. Music and movies are the same to some extent, I am afraid. I don't want to hear crap that is on the radio, I would like to hear the old stuff I used to listen to when I was growing up. It is getting harder and harder to find.

It is part of OUR culture, it is still up to us to preserve it.

Am I renting or buying?

[Shivetya]

That is the key to the DRM argument.

If I am renting then I do not have a problem with DRM. If I am buying then I do. The only way to protect the consumer who buys in a DRM world is to have a disinterested third party holding the keys should the seller vanish. Even then this is not a great solution as it still means a delay.

The reason DRM exists is because too many people cannot be trusted to not give away COPIES of stuff they do not have the right to distribute copies of. Its the bad apples that make it easy for companies to justify DRM.

I would accept watermarking provided they was an absolute method to track it back to my purchase. A personal watermark that all media I buy online being tagged with would be a better solution. That key would have to be transportable between different types of hardware, have to be unique, and have to have a way I could prove its mine beyond doubt.

Re:Grew up with CD's and LaserDiscs, can't accept

[Assmasher]

No offense but the reason there wasn't copy protection on CDs when you "grew up" wasn't because it was some ridiculous golden age of fair play but because it was extraordinarily difficult for you to do so.

Guess when copy protection in the music industry started to become an issue...? Right when CD Burners became affordable.

if DRM existed, it would be acceptable.

[lfourrier]

DRM : Digital Rights Management
Management : acte of managing.

Whose rights exists ?
- Author rights.
- Producer rights.
- Public rights.

Show me a system that manage (not restrict) public rights.
Show me a system that remove all protections once a work fall in the public domain.
Show me a system that help me to parody, or quote, or permit me all fair right uses, no matter where I'm in the world.
No SCDRMS (So called Digital rights management system) manage rights.
Presently, DRM is inexistant. What exist is public perception manipulation and brainwashing. And this, too, is unacceptable.

Only if I own a permanent "license" for the conten

[dethndrek]

I can only truly accept digital rights management if I can own a license for the copyrighted work I have purchased until the end of my days.

For example, if I purchase a CD, I want to pay for the rights once, and thereafter only pay for the medium the work is contained on.
If I am truly buying a license to listen, read, or view the material, then I should be able to retain that license if I run over the medium with my car.

Using this framework I could buy a CD, MP3, Tape, etc. and whatever future medium is released for the price of the medium without having to pay for the license over and over and over.

Digital watermarks

[Nosher]

It doesn't work very well at the moment, but why on earth is it not possible to devote more resources into creating some sort of undetectable (quantum?) watermarking instead of the pointless pursuit of locking by encryption?? Watermarks, or signatures, do nothing to restrict fair-use, copying, format-shifting or whatever. However, if watermarked media is illegally released on P2P or the 'net, it's easy to determine where it came from and apply the full extent of existing legislation to the perp.

The problem currently is that re-sampling or otherwise altering a watermarked resource breaks the mark, but I would certainly go as far as to agree to allowing transcoding software (e.g. rippers and so on) to maintain the watermark whatever I do to the media (obviously, one would still be free to compile a bespoke version of OSS without such a function, which is a bit of a loophole). The reason? It doesn't restrict my use or re-use of the stuff I've bought in any way. All it means is that if I'm naughty and put it on P2P, The Man (tm) can come and get me.

Why DRM can't work in it's current form

[NetMagi]

DRM isn't a bad thing if it did what they said it does as opposed to doing what their investors want.

The ONLY thing DRM is good at right now is keeping us locked into a device or proprietary service.

I have over 8000 mp3's. Three-quarters of them are ripped from cd's I legally purchased and the last quarter was ripped from friends, downloaded from napster (way back), winmx, or some torrent.

I've been adding to this collection since 1997. Over the years I've listened to it:

-on my home computer
-in my car burned as a standard audio cd
-in my car on a hacked virgin webplayer I mounted to the glove box
-in my car on an mp3-cd player
-at friend's houses streamed with andromeda
-on my archos jukebox
-on my PDA
-on my home stereo through a computer I had hooked up there
-on my home stereo through a D-link networked media player
-on my work computer
-on my laptop while travelling

As far as I'm concerned, that's ALL fair use. I WILL NOT buy music if I don't have the flexibility I had with MP3's. I really love my music, and the ability to play it anywhere with little or no effort. Initial cost aside, if I threw it all away, and bought all my music DRM-protected, how much OF MY TIME do you think I would have to spend TRYING to listen to it in all those places. I'd lose my damn mind fighting with it, and probably STOP listening to music altogether for some time.

From the other side of the fence, I can understand the record companies position. I'm sure those money-grubbing bastards can't sleep at night knowing ppl are listening to music they own for free. I can sympathize with this as I like to protect my own business interests as well, but I think they're going about it the wrong way.

Music is easily traded because there's essentially no difference between the cd I buy in the store, and well encoded mp3's of the album I can download freely. Give us added-value. Start bundling cool stuff in with the cd's we want. Some labels do this to some extent, but not enough. The last 5 cd's I bought retail were purchased because they came with bonus dvd's, booklets, or were some special edition release. I opened up my wallet and gladly dished out the 20 bucks every time.

Why does everything have to be absolute?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Or how about DRM allows video producers to have a video be playable only from their web site and for a certain amount of time before it expires?

But I don't want that! I want to be able to download and save video I view on the net.

I hesitate to post a counter-opinion, since doing so on these threads seems to be worth about (-2, I Disagree So You're A Troll), but what the hell. ;-)

What if the alternative is not being able to download legally at all? I don't know whether it's officially acknowledged or not, but it's a good bet that legit services like Napster's or Apple's are only allowed to distribute the content by the recording industry after agreeing to apply DRM technology to it. If they gave up, or the DRM proved to be ineffective, there probably wouldn't be any legal download services at all. At that stage, some people reading this may be quite happy to break the law and risk becoming a statistic/example case so they could still download music, but a lot of people would lose out through being unwilling to commit a crime.

Not everything in this world comes down to absolute ownership. The rental model has been working well for videotapes for years: if you just want to watch a film once, but don't want to keep the tape, you can pay a smaller amount but you have to give it back a couple of days later. Most of the arguments in posts like the parent would basically rule out such a model, despite the fact that it is welcomed by many and of benefit to them.

I have archives of several pages that I wouldn't be able to see anymore if I hadn't been able to save.

And I know two people, completely independently, who had trouble securing book publishing deals after draft content that they put on their web site temporarily for the benefit of those who were interested wound up republished (without their consent, or even notifying them) on so-called archive sites that have decided they are above copyright law (which I suspect may become an expensive mistake the first time they try this with a megacorp).

Neither of these people publishes anything whatsoever on the web any more, because the resulting tedious negotiations with their publisher's lawyers over distribution rights just aren't worth it. Ultimately, it's not the authors who have lost out here, it's the people who were benefitting from having their content at a much cheaper rate. That was the very distribution of work that copyright and similar concepts are intended to promote, and when copyright wasn't respected, it stopped. Go figure...

Re:Why does everything have to be absolute?

[jalefkowit]

The rental model has been working well for videotapes for years: if you just want to watch a film once, but don't want to keep the tape, you can pay a smaller amount but you have to give it back a couple of days later.

The only reason that model worked is because the content producers had a cartel that allowed them to charge an unrealistically high price for new movies on videocassette: $100+ per copy. No home user was gonna pay that much per movie, so rental (from a middleman who swallowed the high initial cost and recouped it was the only feasible market model.

When DVD came along, Warner Bros. Home Video president Warren Lieberfarb had the vision to see that they could make a lot more money with a sales model and realistic pricing than they were through the rental model. So he led Warner to break with the cartel and push DVD as a sell-through format at the $10-20 price point. He took a lot of flak from the rest of the industry for that, but when the money started to roll in for Warner it wasn't long before the rest of the cartel followed suit.

Today, the studios make more money off Lieberfarb's model than they do at the box office on many movies, and rental behemoths like Blockbuster Inc. are seeing their value plummet. So it's pretty clear that in this example, when given a choice between rentals and reasonably priced sale copies, people prefer to buy over renting.

Where are the Apple zealots?

[Spankophile]

C'mon now!

Where are all the Apple zealots now? Just two articles ago were I was reading the spouting of how much they don't mind DRM. How iTMS is so great that they don't mind a little slice of freedom being taken away. How Apple is just sooooo consumer-friendly, and they're trying to convince the record labels to be more digital on our behalf.

It's a lot harder to chime in when the question posed is tantamount to "When is it acceptable to give up your freedom to a company"

Just because Apple says that it's DRM is the best it could do for the consumer and still appease the labels, doesn't mean it's something the consumer should accept.

THIS is NOT insightful its bullshit.

[haplo21112]

Everyone just loves to hate DRM cause it's so controlling and limiting and 1984 and blah blah. What about the fact that DRM allows Napster to offer an excellent service like Napster-to-Go?

Unacceptable they can offer the same service without DRM...DRM is NOT a requirement for doing business. If the companies like Napster refused to give in to the record companies we would not be in this situation. It comes down to this...you can either sell the music through this service without DRM and trust the consumers. Or you can not sell it, make no money and the consumers will still obtain the music, but you will not get a dime for it.

Or how about DRM allows video producers to have a video be playable only from their web site and for a certain amount of time before it expires?
Again I call shenanigans...you offer it up I should be able to save it to my machine to then play it back in whatever way I deem comfortable. If I want to play it back in a format like the video out to my TV because I want a larger picture I shouldn't be restricted to the medai player window in a web page. Or perhaps even to watching it using only a particular OS.

Does anyone care about the valid and useful DRM applications before screaming human rights violations?
There are no valid and useful applications DRM just gets in the way...there is no reason for it...
END OF STORY...if you believe in DRM your a dumb "cow", who doesn't understand just how your being screwed...

DRM that implements Copyright Law

[cfulmer]

So, what DRM would I accept? I'd accept something that (1) was guaranteed to work into the future and (2) allowed me to do whatever copyright law allows me to do.

Both these have problems -- under (1), when the MS Monopoly eventually collapses under its own weight, what will I do with my iTunes music?

And (2) is exceptionally hard to encode as DRM. Gross infringement is fairly easy to deal with -- the case where I take a new music CD under copyright, make a copy of it and sell the copy. But, there are a lot of cases where infringement is not as obvious. Let's say, for example, that the CD contained a mix of public domain stuff and new stuff and I just wanted to extract and copy the public domain items. Or, it was a phonebook and I wanted to copy it. (Under a SCOTUS case, Feist v. Rural, Copyright does not extend to raw collections of facts. A bunch of European countries do have a pseudo-copyright in such works.) Or, I want to make a parody. These things are legal but extremely difficult for DRM software to deal with because it would require the software to look at the intent of what I'm doing.

Rights holders are trying to replace the rules of copyright with the rules of contract -- "I'll let you listen to this music if you agree to only listen to it 10 times." And, the main enabler for this is contracts of adhesion -- those shrink-wrap/click-through agreements that nobody reads but that courts generally enforce. Getting rid of these contracts will break DRM's legal foundation.

When libraries make the next revolutionary step

[Psychic Burrito]

Libraries are online for a long time now, but one cannot read the text online. When libraries could lend whole books digitally, we could all have an incredibly big chunk of knowledge available instantly, and mostly for free or a very small price.

Libraries don't do this because they are reluctant, but - in general law terms - because they are allowed to lend exactly 1 bought book to 1 person at a time, and when they would lend you a digital copy of a book, they could lend a book to 100 people at a time while only having bought 1 piece.

Now with DRM, one could devise a system where you had to "bring back your copy" before anybody else could check it out, therefore combining the digital advantage (speed, ease of use) with the library advantage (big selection, near-zero-price).

So, at least in this case, DRM can actually bring value to the people.

Re:When libraries make the next revolutionary step

[Greego]

Now with DRM, one could devise a system where you had to "bring back your copy" before anybody else could check it out, therefore combining the digital advantage (speed, ease of use) with the library advantage (big selection, near-zero-price).

So, at least in this case, DRM can actually bring value to the people.

For fuck's sake, the only solution is to make it available to everyone, or don't publish the fucking thing online in the first place. I realise that your idea is perhaps the only one that copyright holders would consider, but it's still fucked. Digital information must be free (as in speech), especially library texts. Anything else is not only sub-optimal (why wait for someone to check back a digital book when you should be able to get it now?) but more importantly, unethical (why should people be deprived of sharing books that cost the copyright holder nothing to have propagated?) I really wish people could realise the potential of completely freeing digital information - DRM's sole purpose is to extend the control over distribution that megacorps currently have over tangible media (which is becoming less and less desired due to the flexibility and durability offered by digital content) to intangible media.
/rant

Only good DRM is broken DRM

[Aaden42]

There's only one DRM'd item I've ever purchased that I didn't know in advance I had the tools to decrypt. That's my metric for what DRM I accept as a consumer.

I didn't buy a single iTunes track until PlayFair came out. After that, I've bought lots of music, so Apple's directly benefitted from PlayFair/Hymn's existance in my case. I know that I have my music as nice decrypted AAC streams. Even in the worst case of Apple watermarking the actual digital stream, I know I can always play my music in any number of open source players. That's good enough for me.

The only other DRM I've ever found acceptable is the one used by Palm Digital (aka PeanutPress) for their eBooks. The books are encrypted, but you can read them on an unlimited number of Palm, PocketPC, Symbian, Windows, or Mac devices. They use your full name and credit card number to encrypt a session key for the book. Once you enter your name/number, the decrypted session key is kept on your device (so your credit card number ISN'T store on your Palm!). There's no limit to the number of devices you can unlock the book on, and there's no call-home function to authorize the unlock process -- it's just straight crypto. The hook of course, is that if you want to distribute the book (without breaking the actual DRM), you need to include your name and card number. Probably not something you want to do on the Internet, and of course the leak can be tracked back to you with appropriate consequences. On the other hand, if you want to let a friend "borrow" your book, just beam it to his Palm, email it to him, etc. and enter your name and card number on his machine. He can't transfer the book to anyone else without re-keying the name/number, yet he can read the book for as long as he wants without having to worry about "losing" one of your precious authorizations. PeanutPress will even re-encrypt all your books using a new credit card number (once you use it to make a purchase), so you don't need to remember which card you used for which book -- you can always redownload all your books with your current card number.

If iTunes and others decided to go the route of PeanutPress, I probably wouldn't even bother to break the encryption. As long as the seller maintains control over me after the sale, then there's no way I'm going to buy something I can't break.

As far as a "rental" instead of a purchase, if I can't rent/burn/return, it's pretty unlikely I'd go for it. We'd have to be talking REAL cheap for me to consider it.

The people have spoken

[briancnorton]

Asking slashdotters a drm question is about as likely to get you a representative response as asking about Artic drilling on a greenpeace board. The market has spoken, loudly. It has said in no uncertain terms that

1)DRM is OK as long as they're not Nazi's about your use (like burning CDs from iTMS)
2)If you don't do MP3, you have nothing. (sony)
3)Nobody gives a crap about OGG.

I know these things are painful to hear, but that's what HAS happened. I know some people think of creative work as the common property of all mankind, but [sarcasm] "high quality" [/sarcasm] media production costs big bucks, and they need to recoup that investment. The options to do so are

1)DRM (sorta works)
2)Prevent all digital distribution (didn't work)
3)rethink your business model. (record companies know they are obsolete, this wont happen)

Libraries

[SquadBoy]

Would be the only real non-evil use that I can think of. The ability to do "inter-library" loans over the net would be pretty cool.

Basically a given library could buy a electronic copy of a given book and through whatever DRM scheme they can dream up allow you to borrow/return it over the net. And thinking of it it would be pretty cool to be able to "lend" somebody a copy of a book off of my Safari account. Of course there are ways to kind of do that now. But to be able to really do it would be cool. That's really about the only use that I can think of. Include in that maybe being able to rent CDs/DVDs the same way.

You filesharers brought it on yourselves

[al404]

There's a lot of strange people here who seem to think they "own" what's on a CD and have every right to do what ever they want with it. Well sorry, but you have the right to listen to it, whenever you want, as often as you want. And that's it. What's on it is not yours. Picture this. One copy of a CD or DVD is sold. It is shared on a filesharing network. No other copies are sold. How much would you have to charge for that CD or DVD? It would be quite expensive. This scenario is what frightened record and film companies into backing DRM. If everyone stopped filesharing tomorrow there's be no more DRM within a year. You may think filesharing is OK, but I don't see any difference at all between it and stealing CDs from Tower Records. What is the difference?

License Agreement?

[phriedom]

"Technically you generally do have the right to use that content in another form, unless the terms of the license agreement say you don't."

But I didn't agree to any license. I went to the store, they offered a CD or DVD for sale for a price, I accepted the offer and paid the price and took the disc home. That is the entire agreement. Why should I need a license to listen to or watch the disc I bought? Why should I need a license to rip it to .MP3 or .AVI so I can take it with me more conveniently?

Yes I do think that distributing it over a p2p system would be a violation of copyright, and illegal, and wrong, but what does "license" have to do with anything?

Re:You forgot one...

[supersmike]

Currently, when I slap a Disney DVD into my set-top player, I have to leave the room for twenty minutes while the mandatory previews play (well, okay, until I hacked my player I did...).

How'd you hack your player? I would love to skip the ads and play the movie. Hell - I payed for it, didn't I? If I wanted to watch ads, I would watch TV. So, how do you hack your DVD player to skip the ads?

Re:I just got your content!

[Theaetetus]

"Can't get the content if you can't pay the creator."

Ha ha! I just got your post for free! Without paying you! ha ha! Sucker!

It was a donation.

The only DRM that matters is the Artist's DRM

[WillAffleckUW]

all others are merely bacteria trying to degrade the environment.

So, just as I buy my music and videos from local stores that give the artists a higher cut, the only DRMs I'm buying into are artist-derived, not the intermediaries.

You Believe in a Lie

[eno2001]

So your proposal is to stop allowing people to profit from their creations?

Copyright law today rarely protects the financial interests of the people who created the work. It mostly protects the financial interests of the distributor who do not fairly compensate the artists. The artists themselves do not have the right to copy their own works. This is why all media publishing industries are so screwed right now. I remember when I was back in audio production school, I was told that most employers in the music business consider all work that you do (even at home on your own equipment) to be their property. This is written into the employment contract. Doesn't sound like a way to protect the interests of the people who are actually creating the works. If the creators of a work want to profit from their creation, they are far better going it alone and utilizing the power of today's technology for distribution. At worst, they could gain some notoriety if their work is any good. But as soon as they sign up with a label, they are going to get screwed. The statement you made hat I am nit-picking should be phrased:

So your proposal is to stop allowing the major labels/motion picture distributors to profit from their acquisitions?

If you were an artist, you'd "get it". Sound to me like you're a "suit" or a wannabe business person.

I am not a crook

[cjames53]

I am not a crook. DRM is based on the fundamental assumption that we are all dishonest, that *I* am dishonest, and that the author of a work won't give it to me until s/he has a way of controlling me. I have music that I got thirty years ago. It is still playable. During the cassette era, I made cassette tapes of my collection; during the CD era I made CDs. Now I have MP3s. I've made a few anthologies of favorites to share with a few friends and family. All of this is perfectly legal under "fair use." If DRM had been available for vinyl, my entire collection would be useless today, even though I bought and paid for it. The chances that DRM would survive across 30 years is virtually zero, given the pace of new operating systems, DRM owners going out of business, disk crashes, new compression formats, and so on. When I buy a song, I'm buying the right to use it... forever. Period. I won't accept anyone's assertion that I'm fundamentally dishonest and can't be trusted.

90% Discount for DRM

[mikeplokta]

Anything you acquire that is encumbered with DRM is only rented, not purchased. I'd accept it for a similar discount level to rental vs purchased DVDs -- 10% of the purchase price. If a DVD costs $20, but that includes the media, packaging, shipping and retail costs that don't apply to electronic delivery, then a reasonable price for an unDRMed download might be $10. And a resonable price for a DRMed version of the same movie would be $1. For music, $1 for a track without DRM and 10 cents with DRM. Apple and Napster are trying to charge purchase prices for rental product.

Rental vs. sale

[Todd Knarr]

If they're openly renting it to me, the way the local video store makes no bones about the fact that they're renting me a DVD for a limited time, then I'll accept DRM (provided that the DRM system works on my computers and doesn't impose itself on parts of the system not being used to view that particular content). If they want to have the transaction look and feel like a sale, then they're selling me a copy just like a bookstore sells me a copy of a book and, once the sale's completed, the seller and/or copyright owner should have no more control over that copy than they do the copy of the book I bought.

DRM: Depreciated Reposessable Media

[aphor]

How much would you pay for a car that could be deactivated at will by the dealer?

Wouldn't it be great if you could make something that everyone wanted, but you can sell it to everyone without spending a dime to distribute it? And then wouldn't it be great if you could make it evaporate so that the same people would have to pay you again and again?

They want to have their cake and eat it too. Who can blame the greedy shits? Greedy greedy greedy greedy greedy. You can copy information infinitely without depleting the source, and each copy can be the source for more. So distribution is free on a massive scale, and then if you could also tap into scarcity value like when you sell something that is a depleting resource the more you sell it... so you get the courts to make that legal fiction work in the markets and KA-CHING!

All of the arguments that people have against welfare and lazy people with their entitlements all apply to corporations and institutions exactly the same way. If you create a system of entitlements, watch the life get sucked out of the business. DMCA is a system of entitlements for corporations who sell DRM. It's just too bad they have to compete against non-DRM. If things that were sold as DRM start behaving unlike non-DRM, watch the Divx history repeat itself.

DRM fundamentally impossible

[Edward Faulkner]

DRM is stupid simply because it's impossible to make it work.

Even if you have DRM-enabled hardware, there's always the "analog hole". And all it takes is one person with some decent analog equipment to recapture the data, and begin distributing digital copies.

If bandwidth keeps getting cheaper, things like Freenet will probably get fast enough to spread digital media. At which point there's no stopping it, short of a full-blown 1984 scenario.

skewing the point..

[TheJOsh!(tm)]

US copyright law forbids the distribution of content without the copyright holder's consent. the GPL is an implicit consent to allow redistribution IF, and only if, one distributes the source code for any modifications as well. basically, it says that if you're willing to share your mods, we'll wave the explicit reproduction rights granted us under copyright laws. if you're not willing to share, than copyright laws apply and you can't distribute.

DRM not only limits your ability to distribute (which is against the law anyway), it "forbids" you from doing what you want with the product you paid for.

there is no correlation between the GPL and DRM BECAUSE you can do whatever you want with GPL'd software, no holds barred, EXCEPT DISTRIBUTE. That's why Google et. al. can make modifications without giving up the source, because they DON'T DISTRIBUTE THE CHANGES. DRM is an entirely different beast, it restricts what you can do with your purchase aside from distribution.

making arguments of this fashion is not only side stepping the issue, it's blatantly ignoring the issue in the first place, it's misleading...

If it were reasonable & similar to current use

[dascandy]

That means: - I can lend it to a friend, not listen to it in the meantime and when I get it back listen to it again - I can copy it onto all sorts of music carriers that don't need adjusting for it, such as mp3, cd, cassette tape and so on, so I can enjoy it in any form and at any place I like to - I can modify the song to my own request - I can reacquire it without payment since I already paid for it - I can choose which songs (not albums, songs) I get - It wouldn't be overly expensive (say, 0.60 per song or something around that) Since this is all pretty impossible to do, I go for the company that sells them without copyright protection software. If they make it possible for me to do these, I will not go around these things. If they make it impossible to do any of these, I'm not going to care much about their copyright (since they don't care about my use right).

DRMed cash

[MerlinTheWizard]

Interesting concept. Kinda funny sounding at face value, of course, but it raises an interesting idea: the fairness of any commercial deal and the equal power of both the vendor and the consumer. Clearly, what "disturbs" a lot of people concerning DRM is that the vendor keeps the upper hand. The deal is not fair, not necessarily in terms of value-for-money (after all, it could be seen as a form of long-term rental thing, as someone pointed out), but in terms of power. It is very clear that whoever has the right to "lock" something you buy has more power than you do. Your only power is not to buy it. True, it is a significant power in your hands, but if people choose not to buy stuff, especially cultural stuff, it's the end of not only an industry but of a big part of our cultural life. Until then, and hopefully that won't happen, DRM is a form of commercial dictatorship.

Re:DRMed cash

[BobSutan]

Yet how many people went out and bought WindowsXP knowing full well that it included product activation?

This is why I have little hope in people actually "getting it". Its also why I fear that this will eventually lead to the downfall of American cultural and economic supremacy. In a nutshell, greed will kill innovation by locking everything up for perpetual profit, and countries that aren't bound by our lock-happy laws will take our initiative and run away with it in the form of ubercheap competing products.

It sounds silly, but that's pretty close to how the PC business got started in the first place (research the creation of the term "IBM-PC compatible").

Re:The RIAA brought it on themselves

[al404]

there's a big difference between shoplifting and copyright infringement, I'm sure there is but not in the sense of - I pay for a CD and I can hear it any time, or I don't pay for a CD and I can hear it anytime. In the sense of not paying then filesharing and shoplifting are the same. The piece of plastic means nothing anymore. And yes you can do all those things, such as copying and making mp3s, and you're still just using your right to listen to it when you want. I'm not going to attempt to defend the RIAA. But it's obvious that the whole original Napster thing really scared them all - it could really make a dent and even put them out of business. Now there are cases of record companies not playing fair etc. but think what we would lose without them. And at the end of the day they really are music fans like us, especially the small labels. It's just their job to maximise revenue from an Artist (and they need someone to do this). It's irrelevent how much the CD costs, the whole ship is funded by lots of people paying a certain amount. I used to work in a recording studio. The equipment and acoustics are expensive, and you have to keep replacing it. These are peoples jobs, mortgages etc we are talking about, and it's all funded from CD sales. Yes you can set it up in a bedroom, but there will be no hardware to actually buy without CD sales. And at the end of the day - why should some people pay and not others. It's not fair, not sustainable and it's ethically wrong. And also - believe me, the record companies want to make it as easy as possible for you to buy their stuff - no filesharing and DRM would definitely be out of the window - an easy, playable on anything solution is far better for them. But you are right, with the possibility of mass sharing, they'd never do it.

Rental yes, purchase no

[davidwr]

If I'm renting for a limited time, I'll accept limitations, but not if I'm buying a "perpetual use" copy. When I rent a DVD at Blockbuster I don't transfer it to VHS just so I can play the tape, but if I buy the DVD I may do just that.

Of course, this assumes I have a choice in the matter. If it's something I *need* then I am behind the proverbial 8-ball and will take the information in whatever way I can get it :(.

DRM schemes destroy fair use.

[Lodragandraoidh]

There is already plenty of law that can be used to bring pirates to justice and regain lost compensation.

DRM is the 'easy' way out for the media business - if they can lock up everything, then they don't have to pay lawyers to enforce their rights.

However the side effect of the DRM approach is that it tramples on the rights of people to gain fair use of copyrighted material for teaching, for personal archiving and any other non-infringing right accorded by legal precidence.

Of course, businesses would love to control all of the media on your devices - even the media you yourself have created. That way you have to pay them for their hardware and software to view anything and everything - another 'Microsoft Tax' in the making.

Just say NO to DRM of any kind. It doesn't work, and it ends up making criminals out of hobbyists - when the lawyers should be spending their time doing real investigations of the real criminals instead.

FUD vs FSD

[BobSutan]

From a Boston College Intellectual Property article in 1998.

Quote: The first sale doctrine states that once a copyright owner sells a copy of his work to another, the copyright owner relinquishes all further rights to sell or otherwise dispose of that copy. The Supreme Court first adopted the first sale doctrine in the case of Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus, 210 U.S. 339 (1908). In that case, the Supreme Court held that the exclusive right to sell copyrighted works only applied to the first sale of a copyrighted work. 210 U.S. 339, 349-350. While the copyright owner retained the underlying copyright to the expression fixed in the work, the copyright owner gave up his ability to control the fate of the work once it had been sold.

This extends the thought that a copyrighted work/intellectual property is in fact not licensed, but sold as property. Once sold, the copyright owner no longer has a say in the future use or sale of said copy. Its just a fact of copyright law. Now apply that precedent to software, et al, and you can see why DRM/licensing is a farce.
Additionally, what constitues unauthorized reproduction (in reference to those ominous FBI warnings everyone is so fond of) is defined in legal code and is not the purview of a company's policy, or more applicably, the psuedo-legalmumbojumbo often seen present on retail media, or in marketing media. All that stuff is just various types of FUD, plain and simple. The biggest farce to hit the IP scene was in the form of licensing a la Microsoft. All it really is is a gentleman's agreement that they won't sue you for not buying multiple copies of their software so long as you pay up for what they deem said software to be worth (think VAR licenses). Don't get me wrong, they're useful as hell. But given the past 20 years of legal precedents, federally speaking, licensing is pure bunk. Now at the State level that's different. Some States have in fact held licenses as legally binding contracts, so YMMV in that sense.
(Devil's Advocate)In most circumstances a minor cannot enter into a legally binding contract with an adult without parental consent, so what happens in the event a minor should buy a copy of a game, software, or other Intellectual Property?(/Devil's Advocate)

Do It Yourself (and make everyone happy)

[x404x]

I actually started a _small_ record label (6 active bands) for this exact reason - I was tired of seeing bands get screwed over. The general public knows nothing of what really goes on behind the scenes in production of an LP/CD or exactly how bad bands get screwed.

Perfect example: With recording, mastering, CD production, and printing - I can put out 1000 CDs @ $1.74USD each. We are as small as it gets - only 6 bands, two active people working on projects, and only 829 results on google. With only two releases under our belt we are a little nobody punkrock label that very few people outside the Tampa Bay area has ever heard of. If I can do it at $1.74USD per CD I know for a fact any "major" label can do it much cheaper. (Yes, I have factored in costs of distribution. I have world-wide distribution at my disposal, it's cheaper then you might think.)

One of the most active bands on my label decided that they wanted to sell every new CD they make for $5 each, then when they release something new they put the old CD on the net in mp3 format for free. Their fans have the option of downloading every track on the CD for free (DRM is never an option for our digital releases) and burning it OR they can pay $5 for a CD with the printed lyrics, pictures, and other info you would typically see in a CD insert.

The majority of fans choose to do both - have the music on their computer AND purchase a CD. They know the price is fair as it's easy to see we are not out to make money off the band by charging $15 to $20 for $1.74 worth of "work".

Fans generally want to support the band they like but at the same time they don't want to get ripped off. I guarantee that if you ask any member of a band on my label how they feel about working with us they will have nothing negative to say about how we do things. Music is the most important part to us, not making money - when the bands see that and the fans see that everyone is happy.

If the major record labels were to drop the CD/LP prices by 50% piracy would drop significantly. While the public might not know about the record labels and what happens to the bands, they DO know when they are getting ripped off.Any major label could do the same as I do if they were more worried about music then money, we all know that will never happen.

Re:Mod parent up!

[node 3]

That is exactly why I favor the BSD license: It's the freer of the two (GPL vs. BSD).

It's like saying a society with laws against slavery is freer than one that has no such limits. In both cases, one "freedom" is taken away so that the entire system is more free.

There are two dynamics at play:

1. The system that the license creates.
2. The individual instances within that system.

The system the GPL creates is more free, but the BSD allows for one more freedom in the individual cases.

The BSD promoters (who use 'freedom' as a reason) seem to be missing the forest, and only seeing the trees. It's one thing if you want your code to be usable in proprietary products, but that's not promoting freedom in the system.

People won't preserve freedoms they don't value.

[jbn-o]

I doubt people rejected Divx (or whatever the Circuit City proprietary DVD was called) because they insisted on preserving their right of first sale. Most people have no idea what right of first sale is, even if they leverage it when they buy used media at stores and garage sales. Without evidence supporting the assertion, arguing that consumers are working to preserve isn't convincing.

I would be much more likely to buy an explanation that jibes with what I hear from consumers (and jibes with what I'm seeing multinational corporations teach consumers). For example, incompatibilities with their everyday lives, sort of like the lame reasons why people reject e-books: computers aren't portable and cheap like paper, they can't be read as easily in all the conditions in which one reads a paperback book, and so on. I call these reasons "lame" because they are so easily addressed (and thus resistence is so easily undermined) by sufficiently advanced technology. The more interesting and important issues have to do with the law (right of first sale, as you brought up, for instance) and ethics (how should we treat one another?).

I should add that I'm not saying any of this to stifle any attempt to educate the public about more important reasons to critically examine DRM or related efforts in "trusted computing" attestation ability. We need more people talking about what to look for when old ideas are transferred to new technology (reading books on computers instead of bound paper volumes, listening to music on portable digital audio players instead of carting around playable media, etc.).

Re:Ethical Gymnastics.

[Rutulian]

A justification open to abuse. People are creating rootkits, and stealing personal information. I'd be a fool to not capitalize on those actions.

That response makes absolutely no sense, so let me reiterate my point. People download music. That is, there is a demand for downloadable music. Now, are you going to sell them their downloadable music, or are you going to leave them to using other means? If the music industry decides to not sell downloadable music when DRM proves to be ineffective (and it will), they will only be shooting themselves in the foot.

From the standpoint of "benefits", there's effectively no diference between illegally downloading, and purchasing the product.

How do you come to this conclusion? When you buy something there are benefits of convenience, quality, support, dealing with a reputable vendor, etc.... The product may be the same, but there is the opportunity for added value, such as indexing services, concert ticket discounts, information about the artists, and bonus material that is not released elsewhere. Why do people buy Red Hat Linux when they can download it for free? Because Red Hat adds value to their product that people are willing to pay for and can't get anywhere else.

Why should I "convince you" that my product is desirable, when your actions send the clear message to me that it is indeed desirable?

That is exactly my point. Unhindered downloadable music is desired. So quit f**ing around and sell it. DRMed music is not desirable. Right now the only way that people can get unhindered music is from a P2P network where quality sucks and download times are abysmal. With the iTMS hack, people can *buy* quality music from a convenient store without the DRM. If you want me to buy the DRMed music, you are going to have to convince me in some way that the total of what you are offering (i.e: $0.99 price + DRM + AAC format + good bitrate + fast download) is better than getting it from a P2P network. Some people will think your offer is better, others will not. You can get more people to take your offer if you remove the DRM.

Under agreed upon social rules. Piracy is the absence of one party not playing by the rules.

No, piracy is a market reality. Companies have been dealing with the reality of piracy for a long time and still turning a profit. Rampant piracy is obviously bad, which is why federal enforcement agencies go after major infringers. But eliminating piracy altogether is impossible, and it is a waste of time to try. You are better off adding value to your product.

A civil crime. Plus you'll not going to advance anything by copying a design (patent), and marking up the cost.

Not sure what your point is here.

What the law protects isn't ideas themselves (nor is it what the founding fathers ment).

The founding fathers didn't have anything to say about intellectual property law. As for the rest, do you have any evidence of said scarcity? Or did you just copy that from a high school text book?

New stupid record

[BagMan2]

This topic seems to have produced the highest level of stupid replies I have ever seen on Slashdot (and that's saying something).

Stupid ideas like the corporations are getting all the money, not the artists, therefore it is ok to steal stuff, since the corporations don't deserve copyright protections anyways.

Stupid ideas like I won't buy anything that has DRM, when the reality is that virtually everybody has at least one of the major gaming consoles.

Stupid ideas like once I buy it I can do anything I want with it, including giving it out to everybody I want.

The stupid-meter is off the chart on this topic. The fact is that a lot more people than the artist have a vested and legitimate interest in making money in this business. Whether you like it or not, the technology is going to catch up and we are going to have a strong (and fair) DRM scheme eventually.

It may take decades, but eventually stealing copyrighted materials will be as difficult as stealing a book is today. And that's the way it should be. If you don't like it, you don't have to buy the product.

If the copyright owner could come up with some scheme that only allowed you to access their content from inside your car during daylight hours, then more power to them. You may not like it, but that's a decision you are free to make before you buy the product.

Personally, I pay $4 to be able to watch a movie for 5 days only (blockbuster rental), or I pay $15 to be able to watch it as long as I want. If they can come up with a scheme whereby I can pay $8 and watch it all I want, but only from my home TV, that's fine with me too.

Do whatever the hell they want. I am the consumer and can decide for myself whether I am willing to put up with their restrictions for the price I am paying.

It's ALL on the pricing

[mordejai]

Let's think about this for a minute...
- The average price for a CD in my country (Argentina) is U$S 8
- The average CD contains about 13 songs. That would make the song price 0.62

Now, there are several problems with current DRM'd digital downloads:
- Worse quality (lossy compression)
- I can play the songs in about 1% of the places where I can play a CD
- I can't sell the songs when I get tired of them
- I don't get a CD box (they DO add value for me)

This, combined with the fact that distribution costs are A LOT lower, should make the downloaded songs AT LEAST 4 times cheaper. That is, 0.15 a song.

Conclusion: I'll buy DRM'd songs when they price them correctly.
15 cents a song, 2 bucks for an album, and perhaps some discount for buying several albums from the same artist.

But that's not what DRM is about...

[Omega]

I agree. I shelled out $5 for Debian on CD. I should be able to do whatever I want with it, including redistribute only the binaries to people, without any source code. Or modify the source code, build binaries, and ship only those binaries to people. Why not? I paid for it. Who the hell is this Stallman guy who thinks he can tell me what I get to do with something I bought? Sounds like another Jack Valenti to me.

That's a specious argument. People aren't pissed off at Digital Restrictions Management because they want to pirate music or movies or whatever.

• They're pissed off because they can't make a backup copy and there's no warranty on the original
• They're pissed because they can't resell their used copy if they don't want it any more
• They're pissed off because they used to be able to do these things and now it's being taken away from them

Don't get me wrong, I'm pro-copyright (although 90 years + the life of the artist is a little much). I agree that trading copyrighted anything online is illegal (movies, music, books, software, whatever). But that's not what DRM is about. DRM is about taking away the rights of the end-user -- by destroying the principle of first sale. DRM tells the end user, we think you're a thief, so we're going to protect you from yourself.

I'm all for the RIAA lawsuits -- because that's how you protect copyright. I'm all for FSF lawsuits against GPL violators because that's how you protect copyright. If Red Hat DRM'd my Enterprise Linux CDs, I'd still look for a way to break the DRM and make a backup copy because I bought a usable copy of software.

Of course this is all academic, anyway. I've always said, "as long as something can be seen, heard or otherwise processed by humans, it can always be duplicated." New DRM schemes will be broken. The "Trusted Computing" machines will be cracked -- because necessity is the mother of invention.