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Microsoft to Become Mobile DRM Standard?
An anonymous reader writes "It seems most of the media has missed the significance of Microsoft's recent partnership with DoCoMo to put Windows Media DRM on i-mode handsets. If all the i-mode players adopt Windows DRM, that gives Microsoft access to a significant chunk of the mobile market. Couple this with the more recent MTV Urge announcement and you've got Microsoft set to own the DRM space - at least on mobile devices - by stealth. Telecoms.com has a take on the situation, but also reveals that the GSM Association may be on the verge of recommending Windows mobile DRM to all its members. Puts the French copyright and DRM legislation in a whole new perspective - interoperability issues can be solved by removing the competition."
Microsoft, DRM and Standard in the same sentence!
Dude, be careful with your words, I almost had a heart attack...
Heh, looks kinda funny to see "standard DRM". While standard is all about being open, fair and compatible with others, DRM makes me think more about hiding in the dark, afraid of the light, keeping ones dirty secrets and trying to suppress the breathing of others. Doesn't come together.
Swedish plasma phys. PhD student; MSc EE; knows maths, programming, electronics; finance interest; seeks opportunities
MTV doesn't even play music. I don't expect them to sell music. MTV is a pointless marketing creation designed to push an image onto a line of mediocre products purchased willingly by an unsuspecting public with way too much money and zero common sense.
That's why I'm sticking with Apple.
DRM is dead. Unfettered formats exist and are in widespread use. Try as they might, they can't unring the bell.
but I think it'll be a good thing. Mostly because I'd like to see some kind of set standard, so I can listen to my music from any service on any player. Thats not too much to ask, right?
Microsoft will gain control over the market of 5 people that like DRM!
Quick, someone sue them for monopolisic practices!
Does Microsoft NOT know they should be attempting to distance themselves from DRM?
so this is how Microsoft flirts with open source :)
If all the i-mode players adopt Windows DRM, that gives Microsoft access to a significant chunk of the mobile market.
Won't the government have a problem with this? Again they're squeezing out the competition due to it's monopoly status? Of course all companies can compete with each other, but when you get into the power that MS has and you start essentially killing off competition, well that's just wrong.
That which does not kill me only postpones the inevitable.
""It seems most of the media has missed the significance of Microsoft's recent partnership with DoCoMo to put Windows Media DRM on i-mode handsets. If all the i-mode players adopt Windows DRM, that gives Microsoft access to a significant chunk of the mobile market. "
They get "it" just fine. Question is; do you get "it"?
Hardy har har har!
Of all the DRM tools I've encountered, the one that struck me as being most effective has got to be Apple's "Please don't steal music" sticker.
Boy, they know how to pick a loser. Assuming the carriers go along with this, all Microsoft will have is domination over a standard that nobody will want to use. DRM is annoying enough when it comes to file transfers on computers. Can you imagine how annoying it will be with phones? Will your files survive your phone dropping into the toilet? Or will they be easily transferable to a new phone with the same mobile number assigned to it? You know the answer - and of course, you won't be able to redownload files you've paid for.
It's interesting to see what they waste brainspan and dollars on.
Let the media giants DRM what they want. They'll only succeed in pushing people to other alternatives.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
come on Finland !!
q uarters.htm
o soft-get-friendly-over-windows-media/
... revealed their plans to add support for Windows Media Audio files, Windows Media DRM 10 and Media Transfer Protocol to their handsets.
http://explorer.altopix.com/map/lqoqnr/Nokia_Head
damn, wait
http://www.engadget.com/2005/02/14/nokia-and-micr
Nokia
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
OK, hear me out before you string me up...
1) MS is a monopoly. Legally defined as such in the US, and I believe EU now as well.
2) MS gets DRM monopoly through wheeling and dealing.
3) Competitors cry anti-competative behavior.
4) A non-corporate-stooge-necon is elected US President. (Let's hope for this anyway, regardless of MS, but I digress...)
5) DoJ sues MS yet again, forces them to open Windows DRM. With a non-stooge in office, they bother to enforce it this time.
6) Open DRM is by definition ineffective. Thus the monopoly DRM system is now effectively useless, as forced by the DoJ.
7) Profit.
OK, so it's a stretch, but a guy can wish, can't he? There's got to be some good news for people who give a damn about freedom.
--GrouchoMarx
Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?
Use all the Microsoft DRM you'd like, I'm not buying that device.
Brilliant. By partnering with bloated, overprotected, "Hey, our shares cost 3 million yen each so the hoi polloi can't buy them" merchants DoCoMo, inventors of the phone-that-is-mostly-only-big-in-Japan, MS have gained a foothold in the crucial 'things that people actively want to not have' market.
Next up, a partnership with Freddy Krueger to gain a foothold in the 'things that shoot razor blades into your hand when you pick them up market'. Followed by a partnership with the earth's ferrous core (a major player in minerals circles) to get into the 'things that are thousands of miles below the earth's surface and vaporize human flesh on contact' market.
And of course, a strong position in the market for technologies that customers actually pay to avoid could also lead to other key advantages, such as losing money (investors are always suspicios of cash-heavy companies) and being widely ridiculed (a new, positive, clown-like image).
'DRM market space', yeesh. Make some forking products already. Where's my sub $100 tablet PC?
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
A Japanese mobile telecomm provider will use Microsoft's DRM on its phones.
Therefore all other DRM systems, portable music players, and Apple, will cease to exist?
Hell, I still can't find anyone who listens to music on their phone.
When people aren't listening to music, they'll need a good charge in case they have to make a long phone call. I think that is reason enough to not worry about "one device to rule them all."
But he still won't give you the loving you so crave. Sucks, don't it?
I recently rented a DVD for my family and I to watch. We have our DVD player attached to one of those combined VHS/TV televisions. Apparently the Macrovision copy protection on the DVD prevented it from playing very well. The picture would brighten and darked repeatedly. We weren't even recording onto a VHS tape, so we aren't sure why we had problems.
Regardless, we promptly returned the DVD to the video shoppe, and went to the library. My son and daughters each selected a number of books, as did my wife and I. For the past few weeks, we have been reading instead of watching TV or movies. To be frank, we are far happier. It costs us far less, and the quality of the content is often far higher. We often learn, rather than mindlessly digest.
I wish to thank those who advocate the use of DRM. It has successfully turned us away from using such products, back towards books. We are far better off for that.
I think N91 was delayed because they wanted to make it work with WMP11 and the DRM thingy. Anyways I'm very happy with my phone :D
Microsoft has been fucking the RIAA *and* the MPAA behind our back!
What happened to the idea of all the big boys sitting down and drawing up somethings? What about governments sitting down and saying we need something?
Surely the model of the internet working as it does sets some level that we can aspire to in other markets?
Sorry about the formatting there..
Funny thing is that the article seem to miss one small point. They talk about how Microsoft *may* become a standard on DoCoMos FOMA networks. The thing is that the OMA DRM specification already exist and run on millions of phones in Europe. (And anywhere else which has GSM/UMTS phones.)
I fail to see how this new architecture can hope to jump in and replace something which has already been in use for a couple of years.
Of course a lot of people probably don't realise that they have DRM on their phones.
I've been using Microsoft DRM with the Napster subscription service for over a year now on an iRiver H10 hard-drive device. You can't beat the convenience and the price -- the cost of a single CD per month for lots of great music.
It's such a good model I even bought four more iRiver devices for others.
To clarify some points in the original comment:
The pricing and model beats iTunes. Many, many services will end up using Microsoft DRM. When people wake up and look beyond the fatuous Apple image to practical realities, Microsoft DRM will come out the winner.
Microsoft owns the mobile DRM space? Great! Now they will fuck it up like they fuck up everything else, it won't even be marginally functional until release 3.1, and that will take them years. Everybody will hate it and its bugs and misfeatures, it won't work, content factories will come to realize DRM doesn't restrict anything except their ability to attract new customers, and DRM will get the bloody black eye it deserves.
That's alright then.
Infuriate left and right
This really isn't a surprise. Just business as usual. Microsoft has vast monopoly power that will allow it to gain monopolies in any emerging computing connected/related device.
PDA's previously owned by Palm, will soon be a microsoft monopoly.
Gaming. Sony faces the biggest threat ever and yet managed to make incredibly stupid moves that will make the move to microsoft gaming domination even faster. Microsoft is using it's clout with gaming house/publishers and outright buying them if all else fails. The end is microsoft will dominate console gaming. Only when is the question, not if.
Media. Microsoft is agressively pusing it's DRM/codecs everywhere. It managed to get it's codecs into both HD-DVD and Blu Ray standards. It has just about every online media shop except Itunes. Itunes is an anomoly and it will be interesting to see how weathers the microsoft onslaught. I predict in 10 years. More than half the music sold will be using microsoft DRM.
A non-corporate-stooge-necon is elected US President. might as well wish for a magical unicorn from happy land. Oh wait. Did I parse that wrong? Okay, is it (non-corporate-stooge)-necon or non-(corporate-stooge-necon)? Because the first doesn't exist. If you meant the second, I agree, but it really wasn't clear.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I've been extremely disappointed with 90% of the albums I've purchased over the past decade. One half-way decent song and 7 to 9 other Contractual Obligatory Offerings for $13.95 is just way too out of line with market realities. I guess I'm the last person on the planet who doesn't own an iPod (actually, I've been told there's another person in Mauritania who also doesn't own one), so I'm not buying my music alacarte. I'm not sure that even if I could purchase by the song I would find enough good stuff to be satisified with the Standard Product coming out of the music industry these days.
On the plus side: playing music makes you smarter (pretty sure I've read that research has indicated this; back in the 70's, IBM used to use programming aptitude tests that looked closely at musical skills as an indicator of possible programming aptitude in non-programmers), it's a great stress-reliever and no matter how bad you are as a musician, you'll never be as bad as The White Stripes.
Seriously, though, several friends have told me that an hour of me for free is a better deal than 42:30 of Beck at any price. I tell them to bring the beer and everybody's happy.
No DRM at all seems like a better set standard than one particular flavor of DRM, don't you think?
However, even if there were no DRM, there would still be competition between music providers. MP3 would be the standard format, but AAC, Ogg Vorbis, et al would be offered by different music stores. Basically, I don't know that it's possible to have one Holy Grail Music Format. The days of the phonograph and cassette tape are dead, because computer technology has opened up format competition.
Now that the cat is out of the bag, I don't see how it can be put back in, except by settling on some sort of anti-competitive monopoly standard, which as we've seen with Windows, isn't such a good thing for competition or for consumers.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
The most likely technical enhancements Micorosft will make to DRM is embellishment with GPS tracking technology to ensure the MS name (Maximum Surveillance) is earned by every device with the MS label.
If we have to have DRM, then I for one would feel much more comfortable if it was an indepdent company, where DRM was their only line of business. This way you could feel safe that you don't have companies like Microsoft and Apple with what would appear to be a conflict of interest.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Making the trains run on time!
I drank what? -- Socrates
This is a very astute observation. How can anyone involved in antitrust not come to the conslusion that Microsoft is 8,000 times more a monololy today than it was when the trial was determining whether MS Office and Windows constituted a monopoly? Then, the issue of servers and devices were not even factors. Now that MS represents a quasi-governmental agency with total disregard for business ethics and consumer privacy, there is little chance that the antitrust laws that all other businesses have to abide by will be applied to MS.
Excellent work, sir! That was some wickedly subdued sarcasm! I look forward to the flamewar the misunderstanding of that statement spawns downthread.
You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.
Doesn't matter any more. Psychopathic Corporate entities will use the money and power they have attained through the liberalisation and centralisation of national resources to coerce government into becoming a commerce enabling gateway stripping individuals of their apparently inconsequential right to all the above freedoms.
Freedoms are a commercially incompatible route to free choice.
If you ask One Million Customers what they think of DRM, assuming they know the full story, not one will tell you it is a positive or worthwhile or wanted product.
The customer is dead, the commercial human entity has now been born. A machine made to consume. Long live the robots.
Consider CSS. It was lousy encryption, sure, but it was standardized across an entire medium. DVD's are rippable (and viewable on non-sanctioned players and operating systems) as a result.
Now, consider what would happen if this Microsoft DRM becomes industry standard. If it's the standard, it's everywhere. If it gets cracked, it's cracked for everything that uses MS' DRM.
Given the legendary quality and security we've come to expect from Microsoft's software offerings, well, you can figure out the rest.
-- This void intentionally left null.
That said, Sony is just Palm all over again. Sony had a gargantuan lead with the PS2 -- 75% market share or some such. Then they basically rolled over. The PS3 wanders onstage a full year after Xbox 360 (assuming no further delays), costing $600?? Who's going to buy that? By next Christmas, the 360 will cost $300 and have hundreds of games.
Why should Microsoft take heat for Sony being a bunch of idiots?
Yeah, that's what businesses do. Go figure.I'll put it plainly: Movie studios won't accept Fairplay for movies, period. They've gotten burned too many times by software-only solutions. They are looking for a tamper-resistant, hardware-based alternative. So far Intel and Microsoft are the only companies stepping up to the plate.
Microsoft isn't winning the DRM fight because of its "monopoly powers" (the only monopoly in digital media right now is iTunes). It's winning because no one else is in the game. It's easy to win a race when you're the only one running.
No shilling here. I like the iRiver device and the Napster service, and Microsoft happens to make it possible.
And I like Linux too. I worked three years developing a Linux-based software product at SenSage and appreciated Linux for what it provided. In like vein I appreciate Microsoft's DRM.
My phone bluescreening at random intervals.
Some days it's just not worth
chewing through my restraints.
When has a microsoft product not been released with a day 0 exploit? MS just made my decade.
money for a song for their cellphone is dumb enough not to care about drm.
The constitution gives *Congress* the power "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries". It does not encumber in any way, shape, or form, the way Authors and Inventors make their Writings and Discoveries available to the public.
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
"that said, Sony is just Palm all over again. Sony had a gargantuan lead with the PS2 -- 75% market share or some such. Then they basically rolled over."
The only thing laughable is your very thin analysis. Sony's flubbed launch will speed up the process, but it does not change the inevitable outcome. Sony was mortally wounded the day the first Xbox was launched. It is only a quesiton of how much time it takes to die. Microsoft is leveraging a combination of PC API's, Market clout and it's mountain of monopoly cash to buy out developers when all else fails. Look at the number of PC/Xbox only releases even when the ps/2 was the market leader. Microsoft is simply extending one monopoly into another.
This is no slashdot party line. It is simple observations. How do you compete against someone who owns the main gaming API's for PC, and has massive marketing clout and a mountain of cash to buy up the developers that are the oxygen of gaming. Thinking ahead (generation 3 or 4 Xbox) in gaming time. There were will be Microsoft and bit players.
The same thing will happen in any computing related market Microsoft wants to dominate.
On a side note...
It will be interesting to see how this whole thing plays out with MS's recent E3 announcements about their new Live Anywhere feature in developement for the Xbox 360 and Windows Vista. Download music on your computer, listen to it in your video games, then take it with you on your cell phone. Only a company like MS could pull something like that off, and it appears they're giving it their best shot.
There IS a law that IS thoroughly Unconstitutional in light of the GP's comments.
The DMCA does not make provisions for whether or not the work protected is no longer under Copyright- it's still very illegal to provide or traffic in a circumvention method or disclose how to accomplish the same, even if you're talking about it in the context of a work in the Public Domain that's "protected" by the DRM.
This effectively makes it Copyrighted forever . Mandated DRM combined with DMCA makes for an eternal Copyright for all intents and purposes- at the least the DMCA needs to go the way of the Dodo because it's in violation of the Constitutional grant of authority in this matter given to Congress.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Section 1201 makes it illegal to:
While it doesn't impact any defenses to prosecution on infringement (Which is what we normally call "Fair Use"...), the above pretty much means if you're breaking a work out of a DRMed transport that has lapsed into the Public Domain, you're still breaking the law as you're violating items 1 or 2 as the law doesn't have exemptions for works effectively in the Public Domain- it doesn't care or even talk to that. It only makes illegal anything that could be used to circumvent a protection measure used to protect a given Work of Art.
Basically, you've got two things going on here. You've got traditional Copyright law with all the protections, etc. that entails with that. Then you've got this poorly crafted (and willfully done so...) overlay called the DMCA that makes it a requirement to pull anything on a moment's notice from a website or similar (With no proof of ownership being required...) and makes it illegal to discuss or implement any means for unlocking the content, even if it's in the Public Domain at the time it was encapsulated in the DRMed format.
Again, I'm not a lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that an IP lawyer will tell you the same thing or something very similar here.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
They can have it. I usually don't allow my "radical" thoughts to be posted like this, but I think I speak for most informed users when I say they can take their digital restrictions management and shove it straight up their nether regions.
Just to pick a nit Sony's biggest enemy is Sony. Not Microsoft.
The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer. - Edward R. Murrow
Currently, you can't use them on a passenger aircraft, as they are all mobile phones and have to be turned off throughout the flight, in many cases by law!
Looks like one place where an MP3 player could come in very useful to pass away the time....
Ok, I know some people that have the ROKR and other phones that play MP3s. Most of them NEVER use the functionality because they're talking on the phone more than they are using it to play music. Plus, these folks also have iPods that they use in their cars and when they're working out. They rarely take their phone to the gym with them, and if they do they leave it in the car and take their iPod in. I don't see this flying. As for ring tones, I think most of the people I know get one or two a year, if they get any at all because they are ridiculously expensive. I think Microsoft is gonna fall flat on their face with this move and not even put a dent in the digital music market (let alone in the DRM world) currently owned by Apple. IMHO
With Java and Linux seeing a lot of use on mobile phones, will we see these being pushed out by Windows because surely to use Windows DRM you need to be using Windows platform on the phone?
This is a case of using the desktop monopoly, and desire to be compatible with all those Windows desktops, to enter other markets.
Pity really. Compare Java/Linux with Dot-Net/Windows and Java/Linux wins hands down. I imagine that's why they've done so well so far despite the compatibility advantages pushed by Microsoft for their platform. I've found Dot-Net performance terribly slow, and some of the stupid errors it throws up at runtime incredibly annoying. Switching back to working on Java in Eclipse is like a breath of fresh air.
It's easy to win a race when you're the only one running.
Too bad the race is so crap to watch that everybody leave before the second half.
very nice link
mod parent up.
I recently had to buy a new cellphone because my old one literally broke down. it was 6.5 inches x 2 inches x 1.5 inches (big), had a black and white screen, and had something which is sorely lacking in todays overbloated cellphones.. FUNCTIONALITY.
It served as a phone and only a phone, and as such it was simpler to use than even an ipod, and could easily run for 2 weeks between charges.
the phone i got to replace it has useless crap such as color screens and fancy lights/ringtones, but these are at the expense of such things as battery life and the simplicity necessary for use on the go.
I would be more than happy to build my own cellphone to avoid these problems.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
Media files on phones aren't supposed to last longer than a couple of monthes.
The target audience is teenagers who absolutely do not want to be caught with anything that is no longer in top 10 charts.
Will I be able to sue micr.. *cough cough* a DRM product company if their application crashes and I am locked out of their media?
quick, before they put it in the EULA