EFF Releases Music DRM Guide

Chris Chiasson writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) recently created a plain English guide to several fair use restrictions that major online music services, such as Apple's iTunes, force on their customers via Digital Rights Management (DRM) laden music files and End User License Agreements (EULAs). An excerpt from the guide follows: 'Forget about breaking the DRM to make traditional uses like CD burning and so forth. Breaking the DRM or distributing the tools to break DRM may expose you to liability under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) even if you're not making any illegal uses.' The EFF also lists four alternative music services which sell unrestricted files."

Comments

DRM

[eneville]

Any form of DRM sucks, and I'll do whatever I can to avoid entering into any DRM agreement.

Re:DRM

[Coniptor]

You are an idiot!
People on the greater average do NOT know the limitations ahead of time nor what DRM is. Walk down a street or hall in your local mall and randomly ask people if they know what DRM is.

People who research and are aware what they are buying are the minority.

People who go buy the next new toy because it's the latest fad tech/music toy because so and so has it and now they must have it to keep up with the Jonses don't research and educate them selves. That's too much trouble, they just want it to fill like equals to everyone else who's gone out and bought it. It's more of a indirect peer presure sort of thing.

So please shutup and do trip down a flight of stairs so I and others don't have to read your ignorant words and so there is more oxygen for the rest of us. Your taking up space!

Re:DRM

[Blondie-Wan]

Sure, they ought to know what they're getting into, but aside from the question of how realistic it is to expect Joe Average to actually read the EULA (and then decide not to go along with it, and reject it at that point after going to the trouble to download the software or whatever to get there), it'll still affect those of us who do reject DRM in one form or another, since mass acceptance will make them commercially viable, and may make the alternatives you seek commercially unviable. It's therefore in your interests to not only read the agreements for yourself, but also to educate others on them, and to generally oppose ones you think are particularly intolerable.

That said, I do permit myself to buy from the iTMS, since I gave it some consideration and decided the DRM implementation isn't too intrusive (for my own needs, anyway). I do support alternative, DRM-free services, though, and encourage others to do the same.

preaching to the choir, blah blah

[Anonymous Coward]

the EFF need to get their guides printed onto paper and distributed to the public, buses, trains, in the street , through doors, offices, trams, subways, parking lots, schools , youth clubs, community centers ,even TV (get those cheques written) basically anywhere the public might see it and read it and understand it

otherwise nothing will change, we (technologists/gurus/nerds etc) all know the ramifications of DRM and the threat it poses to society, but society doesnt know or even care about what they dont understand sick profiteers are trying to do

educate people, lots of them, quickly, using traditional methods, because this inteweb is not the answer to this problem

Re:Forget about breaking the DRM

[TheSpoom]

But see, I don't want to burn CDs. I want music that will play anywhere. And I don't want to have to go through some complicated process like burning to CDs first then ripping the CDs, or using some obscure program to strip the DRM.

This is not a flame; this is simply why I won't buy something from a service encumbered by DRM restrictions.

Re:Bad reporting

[Lord Byron II]

All they were doing was giving an example of how Apple could change your rights. The argument was not "Apple is bad because they lowered the burn rights from 10 to 7", but "Apple is bad because they *can* lower the burn rights from 10 to 7".

If they were attempting to provide complete details on how iTunes works, then yes, things like the number of authorizable computers would have been important to have. But since they were only trying to show how the consumer can have a purchased product taken away from them, the example they provided was sufficient.

It's a choice... but for how long?

[sound vision]

Sure, you can go out and buy a CD today, but what about in 10 years? 5? CDs will eventually be replaced by SACD or DVD-A, both of which have DRM schemes. If we don't stop DRM now, there will be no alternative.

Sure, DRM can and will be cracked, but that's not what it's about. The iTunes DRM can be cracked, too. It provides a major inconvenience, many hurdles for us to jump over just to use something we already bought & payed for.

About DVD-A's encryption being cracked, it wasn't What happened was a patch was released for WinDVD to redirect the output to a file instead of a sound card. You can bet the RIAA is working on a way to neutralize this.

Fair and unbiased

[shmlco]

"... fair use restrictions that major online music services, such as Apple's iTunes, force on their customers via Digital Rights Management (DRM) laden music files..."

Wow. Sounds like a balanced, fair, and unbiased review of the issues to me.

Good.

[Captain Scurvy]

As others have pointed out, we presently have a choice as to whether or not we do business with people who sell DRM media. If the laws do not change to require DRM (and that is a really big if), then you just don't have to give your money to people who sell DRM. It is good that the EFF has pointed out some alternative choices. If people don't want DRM, then the marketplace will decide whether or not it'll stick around.

However, I'm pretty cynical, so I instead expect laws to change to make restricted media the norm.

Re:Forget about breaking the DRM

[Mr2cents]

While I'd never like to see DRM'd files as the sole distribution method as this is to open to proprietry player lock-in, I have zero objection to it as an alternative method of purchasing music.

The record companies have always been trying to force copy protection upon any medium. Any time a copying device gets on the market, they go wild! BTW, they force us to pay taxes on blank CDs because 'they are only used to copy music', but at the same time it remains illegal to copy them (totally ignoring the fact that I paid taxes to do so).

This DRM thing will not remain limited to those online songs, it will (try to) become a general 'feature', locking you down and threatening your electronic freedom.

THIS JUST IN:

[Twid]

Many public foundations employ "copyright" and "licenses" -- also known as "legal restrictions" -- that prevent you from doing things like reproducing or distributing their works. Forget about breaking the license with a copy machine. Breaking the license is a violation of the law and could expose you to prosecution.

The EFF says:
"EFF is a nonprofit group of passionate people -- lawyers, technologists, volunteers, and visionaries -- working to protect your digital rights."

But buried in the source to this very article is the following secret code:
License rdf:about="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by- nc/1.0/"
requires rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Attributi on"
permits rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Reproduct ion"
permits rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Distribut ion"
permits rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Derivativ eWorks"
prohibits rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Commercia lUse"
requires rdf:resource="http://web.resource.org/cc/Notice"

This "code" restricts your rights to use the article. Even worse, each article might have a different license! Future articles might change their license at any time!

The facts: you read it, they still own it. Sounds like 1984? Read on.

Additional EFF article restrictions:
- Prohibits commercial re-use or re-mixing into a new article.
- Requires that the license and copyright be reproduced with the article.
- Requires that you credit the copyright holder and/or author.

Other articles using this same "licensing" could be even more restrictive!

Looking for alternatives? Here are some sites that don't use restrictive "copyright" and "licensing".
- Project Gutenberg http://promo.net/pg/
- Public Domain Music http://www.pdinfo.com/

You're not buying, you're renting.

[CustomDesigned]

That is what I tell non-techie family and friends. I don't talk about how "evil" such media companies are, I just explain that calling their purchase a "sale" is a "stretcher" - something average folk are very familiar with in advertising.

When you "buy" a DVD, you do not actual own the copy, you have merely purchased a long term rental. The rental agreement lets you play it at home for an indefinite period (basically as long as the current type of player is still produced and/or yours still works) - subject to certain restrictions on some titles (e.g. being forced to watch the previews).

Instead of breaking the law wherever feasible, I think our crowd would be much more successful helping to enforce it. If the EFF could bring suit simply to force media companies to stop calling what they do "selling copies", and call them "long term rentals" instead, then the market would take care of the rest. There would still be a market for long term rentals - but you would also be able to actually buy a copy for more money than a long term rental (probably something around what video rental stores pay for their copy).

The best way to get rid of a bad law is to enforce it vigorously.