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Info on Intel's Viiv DRM
An anonymous reader writes "CNET went to Intel's Viiv launch in Australia and scored some interesting info about Viiv's DRM scheme. From the article: '[Don] MacDonald also told CNET.com.au that Viiv won't be testing to see if the content being played is pirated from networks such as BitTorrent. He believes that it's not Intel's job to be policing downloads and that it's wrong to assume that all consumers are criminals. As such, Viiv won't test for watermarks or other red flags that reveal pirated content, allowing any type of media to be played.' Another choice quote from the article: 'MacDonald is confident that piracy won't be a significant issue for Viiv, as Intel promises to make content easier to buy than it is to pirate.'"
Then that's unfortunate, but doesn't give you the right to do anything dodgy to obtain it.
Can intel be that smart promoting VIIV's DRM capabilities at a time when they are losing market share to AMD?
On Wall Street, AMD is currently gaining market share from Intel. (slowly, but surely)
As a consumer, I see AMD with a better price-to-performance ratio then Intel. Also AMD's chips require less electricity for that performance.
Now throw DRM into the mix and what am I going to buy? A DRM enabled chip that costs more, or a chip that is DRM-Free, costs less, and performs better?
It sounds like Intel is shooting themselves in the foot...
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I was at the Intel Viiv launch yesterday. It was a reasonably interesting launch although I will forever have the jargon "the new normal" burned in to me brain.
Whilst the talk of making "content easier to buy than it is to pirate" is nice, you have to remember that Intel is only providing the platform to access the content and not the content itself. This is clearly different from Apple's iTunes/iPod/Frontrow strategy of controlling the software and hardware platform(s) for viewing content *and* being the distributor/supplier of content. Hence Intel itself doesn't have much to say on the crucial issue of the cost of content (in fact, to the best of my knowledge, cost -- in comparison to existing distribution points/media types -- was not mentioned once during the presentation). Its all very well to make content easy to access, but it also has to be priced correctly. Intel is obviously hoping the market and competition (between content suppliers) will take care of pricing. I guess time will tell, but its a far cry from the simple easy-to-remember 99c-a-song (in the US, $1.29 here) model of the iTMS.
Whilst its nice that Viiv won't apply DRM restrictions to content that enters into the system without DRM, that doesn't mean that the content provided through the Viiv platform won't be ladden with DRM. Again, as Intel doesn't control the supply of content supply the best they can 'promise'(as per the Cnet article) is to "[encourage] Viiv content providers to allow users to pass their media to other devices". Personally I would prefer a stated policy rather than some airy-fairy promise about encouraging fair(er) use for consumers.
On a related issue, Dan Warne of APC raised an interesting point during the panel discussion regarding billing. Unlike Apple's system (where, obviously, they are the only supply point through iTunes), because there will be multiple content providers and there is no centralised billing system its likely you will have to provide your credit card details to each content provider seperately (at least for the time being, although MacDonald made some soothing noises about investigating a more centralised model... grain of salt, etc). Ironically, despite making much of the fact that you won't need a keyboard with Viiv for complex tasks (such as networking, etc), some on the panel noted it would be cumbersome to have to enter your credit card details through the Viiv interface with the remote and suggest hooking up a keyboard or visiting the content providers website on another computer.
In case you hadn't guessed, whilst I think Viiv has some interesting uses, I remain very sceptical that this is anything more than a flash in the pan despite Intel's claims of this being the (wait for it) "new normal" and hoping in 50 years time it will be remembered like the introduction of television. It may have more impact in other markets, but given the lack of interest in such basic technologies as Standard Definition Digital TV, trying to get consumers to spend thousands on a PC for the living room (without the buzz of the iPod/iTunes duo) seems like a hard sell to me.