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Explaining DRM to a Less-Experienced PC User?
An anonymous reader asks: "I have a question for Slashdot users eager for a challenge. How would one explain – at a casual level – the concept of, and problems with, DRM to someone who is competent using a computer, but with little technical knowledge?"
This topic has been kicked around by
To date, I have not seen anything approaching a casual description of DRM. In fact, I've seen mostly confusion about and around it. If I were trying to explain to the uninitiated, I would take the tack of describing anything DRM'ed as potentially unusable on one or more devices you own. The fact there is so much turbulence swirling around DRM is an indicator how it hasn't gelled.
Actually I've tried to explain to casual users. For example, I tell Tivo users (who can be extremely passionate) programs on their "Now Showing" list would not be guaranteed to stay around for as long as necessary to be viewed; or may not be viewable more than once; or may be "eaten" as they're viewed, leaving the ability to backtrack and rewatch segments no longer allowed. That usually gets them going.
For CD listeners, I describe CDs that may or may not play on their computer, but are extremely likely to fail on any older CD player, in their car, or in their home entertainment system.
The more I can drive home with examples what DRM looks and feels like, the more I find a spark in the unitiateds' eyes. They don't like it even when only getting a sense of DRM. They don't like it at all.
I think that DRM can't be described casually, and is so amazingly complex, confusing, and potentially onerous lends even more amazement it could ever be allowed to be implemented.
That is all.
DRM will feast on the bones of your children! It will send your soul to the firey depths of hellfire, as its deadly claws of DEATH drink your brains through your eyeballs! The D in DRM is for DEVIL!! (not sure what the R and the M stand for...) It is the Dread Pirate Roberts, here for your SOOOUUUUULLLS....
Before you die, you see DoubleRing...
"Copy protection"
:-)
Seriously. I've tried explaining the matter to my friends and girlfriend. Those two words saved my life.
Start up your computer and open iTunes. Play an AAC file. Open several other media players and try to play the file. Copy the file to another computer and play it with iTunes. Now try a file that has been licensed on 5 computers. Download the file onto a standard MP3 player (perhaps the user's cell phone) and also an iPod and attempt to play it.
Repeat with an MP3. Explain to the user that the lack of functionality of the AAC is due to a feature called DRM.
"No, you can't. Let me transcode it first."
Imagine a vendor who has absolutely no respect for you as a human being. That's someone who uses DRM.
Next!
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
It is like hiring (paying) a private eye to spy on yourself, or like having one of those "angel" that pops behind your shoulder when you're going to do something "not so" good. (I don't know if it is really an angel, it might be a devil in disguise)
DRM is somebody saying "You can have this lawnmower, but only if you always take this ball and chain with it. Just so I'm sure you don't run off with it. So that you can still use it, it also comes with a butler who will unlock it for you. He unlocks it by flipping a switch from "locked" to "unlocked". You may not flip the switch yourself. The butler only works on tuesdays."
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
It's EEEEEEEEEVIIIIIIIIL!!!
I usually relate it to something people are familiar with since grade school, creating a montage, which most digital restrictions schemes make impossible.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Try this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1H7omJW4TI
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Just tell them it saves the children -- that's all they need to know.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
"You can't copy it." Jesus how complicated is that? What a leading question.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
"You don't get to choose when and how to use what you've paid for."
"Someone else gets to decide when and how you can play music you bought, watch the movies you're bought, play the games that you've paid for."
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
Infected, encryption, and copy protection are the words that I usually use. I then tell them that the point of this is to restrict what you can do with the stuff you've bought. Example:
Mom: "So what's the deal with itunes songs?"
Me: "Well, basically the songs are infected. They've been encrypted in a way that can only be read by itunes and ipod, and they do this to restrict how you can use your songs."
Pop in a random DVD in their player and let them (try to) skip the ads, the "you don't steal a dvd"-ad, the FBI warnings, the previews and then when you stop the movie for any reason, the fact that you have to watch that crap all over again.
if($subject == devotechristian) {
include "american pie" . $previews
}
Then tell them it will only get worse and that DVD was just a begin. Or tell $random_audiophile he won't be able to make back up copies of his "high quality master"...
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
Right to Read explains the problem with the associated moral dillemas and pulls at the heartstrings. But it is serving as a sort of Animal Farm for DRM advocates, who seem to point out how much they can gain in the short term by enforcing these schemes to make people more money.
Basically, you have to ask the guy about whether he'd be allowed to own anything. DRM is taking America (and a few other countries) into a dark age where there is really nothing you can buy - you can only rent it or lease it,with the owner living downstairs and always prying into your life. Somewhat like Three's Company Too, but except Mr Roper isn't really one person, but a composite of the company director board.
But let me put my example up - I never bought new textbooks. In my college, it is customary to buy the books off your seniors, with the associated writings on the margin, underlined points and the odd love letter hidden in it. But as Right to Read illustrates, information when it loses its physical form becomes a commodity which can be sold over and over again to the same induvidual - for different uses. Meaning that, if I had an ebook DRM based textbook, all of them would have expired by now - while I still retain some of the CS books which have changed the way I think about computers. OR playing quake1 on my new Radeon box, I don't know if I'll ever be able to play Doom3 legally once the Steam servers go offline.
DRM exploits the transience of information in the digital world to squeeze water from a stone, without adding any extra value to the customer (other than the carrots required for them to bite).
Oblig. UF quote (where's pitr these days ?)Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
Digital Rights Manglers
Digital Replay Minimizers
Didyaget Rapedbythe Media?
Don't Replay Me
Dumbass Ripoff Manager
Don't sRatch Me
Definitely Repurchase Multiples
Difficult Relating Mechanism
Dildo for RIAA and MPAA
if I claimed I was emperor just because some watery tart lobbed a scimitar at me they'd put me away!
I have attempted in the past to explain DRM to my parents by using an analogy based on a house. I know house/lock/weaponry analogies tend to fail rather quickly, however, it strantely worked with my non-tech parents.
I have included a rough transcript of the analogy below.
==
For our purposes, we have a digital file, which is represented by a house.
We have digital rights management (DRM), which is represented by an elaborite door and lock system which is operated by a rather burly doorman.
Now for the cases...
Case 1: You own the house and the doorman is under your control.
(This is similar to you creating a document and applying your own DRM to it.)
You are the owner of the house. You can tell the doorman to keep people out completely, to let certian people in so that they can see your model train collection in the basement, to let certian people open your refrigerator and take a beer... what ever you want, when you want.
Case 2: You rent the house, but the doorman lets you do what you want
(You get a document and the terms of usage are unlimited.)
You may rent the house, but the doorman lets you do anything you want.
Case 3: You rent the house, but the doorman has strict orders on what you can do
(You get a document with moderate DRM)
You are a tennant, but you can't repaint the walls. The doorman, unknown to you, has been forbidden to let your friends drink your beer.
Case 4: You rent the house, but you have no control.
(You get a document with extreme DRM)
You live at the house, but the doorman can do anything he wants to you. Whenever you put beer in the frige, the doorman is the only person allowed to drink it. You are allowed a dog, but the doorman only allows it to poop in your bedroom. Occasionally, you wakeup and the entire place is redecorated by the landlord. You want to move, but the contract you signed prevents it until a replacement house is built.
Navicula hydraulica plena anguilarum est. Omnes castelli tuus nostri sunt. Ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta.
You know you can still find some at swap meets these days... but eventually your music won't play anymore. Same with ACME Brand DRM...
someday it will stop working. Then you get to buy it again. Remember records? Tapes? DRM is disposable.
Don't buy
Disposable Restricted Music.
Doomed Regrettable Muck
Digitally Reduced Mush
Doubly Repurchased Music
Damned Retarded Munchkins
I gotta make a script for this!
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
Buy two cheap hardcovers at a used-book store. Show them one of the books. Offer to let them read it. Tear all the pages out or deface them in some way. Hand it over.
If they don't understand yet, hit them with the second book.
DRM is like a condom for the content creators. It keeps them from being infected with pirates.
This is your media: ()
/=======
\ ~~~~~~
This is your media on DRM: \______/
Any questions?
"DRM is a complicated bunch of technical crap that might be tacked on to music, videos, etc., which is designed to keep you from doing what you feel like you should be able to do."
Feel free to submit proposed revisions.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
It's actually not that hard. Imagine if you bought a car and the car had a key that only you could use. So if you wanted to loan the car to a friend, he couldn't use it. When you wanted to sell the car, you wouldn't be able to sell the car either because it wouldn't work for anybody else. It would work fine for you, but the moment your wife needed to drive it, too bad.
That's DRM in a nutshell. It's actually worse than that but the metaphor degrades somewhat beyond that.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
sorry - couldn't resist
"Suppose there was a new movie coming out, but they would only let you into the theatre to see it if you had a chip implanted in your brain that stopped you from spoiling any part of the movie to people who hadn't seen it. Maybe it stops you from saying things about the content, or maybe it makes it come out as gibberish that other people who've seen the movie understand. Who knows? For all you know, the chip could stop you from not liking the movie, or force you to pay to see it multiple times, or compel you to see other movies by the same studio. Maybe the chip has a receiver in it and they can make you do anything they want. Maybe someone else can send a signal to that receiver and make you do things a lot more malicious than not spoiling a movie. And of course, they won't let you see what the chip does do because then maybe you could figure out a way to make it not do it. So, would you put a chip in your brain to see a movie? No? Then don't let the music industry install software on your computer to let you listen to music.
What sound do people on rollercoasters make? Hint: it's not Xbox 360.
Everyone likes car analogies. Think of an engine in a car.
The big corporations who control the media, they're the piston. The cylinder is your ass.
See this CD you bought? You own it. You can make backups of it. You can lend it to a friend. You can make mix CDs for your car. You can make copies for any MP3 player you buy. If your car/mp3 player/etc./and/or CD gets stolen, you can make another MP3 and you can listen to your backup. If you get sick of it you can sell it to someone else who will appreciate it.
See this Napster/Sony/Microsoft/FooDRM media file you "bought?" You do not own it. You cannot make backups. If your PC/Phone/MP3 player dies, so does your music. You cannot lend it to a friend. You cannot make mix CDs for your car. If you upgrade your MP3 player, you may have to "buy" it again. If your MP3 player/PC/etc. is stolen or dies, you also lose your music. If you get sick of the DRM'd music you "bought" you cannot resell it to someone else who will appreciate it. You "bought" nothing.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
"Imagine a [customer] who has absolutely no respect for you as a human being. That's someone who pirates."
There's two sides to every issue, and slashdot will only present one of them. Yours is (+2). Mine's (0).
the less experience pc user generally doesn't care about DRM. they care only that they can listen to their music (or watch movies or whatever) in the way it was meant to be, which to them is many times on the ipod (which is the reason i don't consider apple to be any better than microsoft). they can listen to their itunes downloaded songs on their ipod and they don't really care about using it in any other way.
i work in a college. i have student employees. they just don't care. but here's where they do care. we have ruckus, which is drm'd wma files. they don't like that they can't play them on their ipod and consider it to be a fault of ruckus (granted, they have to buy a subscription to play it on a supported playsforsure player, of which the ipod is not one of them, but that's apple's fault, not ruckus's). they think it's stupid. they also don't like that they technically (although we found this to be untrue) cannot even listen to the music without a valid subscription (which is free during hte school year and costs money during the summer). but they don't care about their apple itunes drm... go figure.
so there's almost no point in trying to explain it to them because they just don't care.
please me, have no regrets.
DVDs are exactly the kind of thing to use to explain DRM to the general public. Start with skipping commercials, and then move on to region coding, CSS, Macrovision (I couldn't transfer my old VHS tapes to DVD using a $200 VCR/DVDRW machine because it mistakes a bad-quality tape for the Macrovision signal distortion), etc.
http://outcampaign.org/
DRM is a system that lets everybody but you control when, where and on what you can watch video or listen to music, and how much you'll be paying for the privledge. This includes artists, distributers, copyright owners, manufacturers, and the government.
Simple.
We do not inherit the Earth from our parents. We borrow it from our children.
DRM baaaad....Freedom Goooood
I've explained this to a few people over time, and everyone seems to get the picture. What it usually boils down to is me telling the other people, "DRM gives companies control over your computer so that they can arbitrarily decide what you are and aren't allowed to do with it." People hate to hear this.
paid for-just one example
rolling stones-vinyl album-60s
rolling stones-8 track-70s
rolling stones-cassette-80s
rolling stones-cd-90s
21st century-AIN'T buying no mo rolling stones on super high def DRM smellovision locked down time release only plays on alternate tuesdays on approved players diskcubes! Enough! Want to know how much new music I have bought since DRM hit? ZERO. ZEE and RO. You took a customer with decades of purchases and made him just go FU! It is now possible to digitally download a full album for pennies of bandwith,or stamp out discs for ridiculous cheap-so where is the cost savings? Where? Computers dropped in price due to high tech advances, why not music, uses all the same tech. A regular desktop used to cost three thousand bucks, now you can get a better one for $300, yet MUSIC COSTS THE SAME AS IT DID BACK THEN. WHY???? The tech *is there* so don't deny it. They want to keep selling, make it a dollar an album download-still plenty of profit, or two dollars a disc, top price, on the rack at the store. 20 bucks for 10 cents worth of plastic is a ripoff! 99 cents for one tune downloaded is STILL a ripoff price! Either pass on tech advances to your customers or be declared a corporate thief and get treated accordingly! Subverting the legislative process through BRIBES, then trying to get a MONOPOLY on technological advances is WRONG! Cartel music pricing is the original ripoff!
Now do you know why people don't care about your old century business practices? It's because they suck! YOU GUYS CHANGE FIRST, you are the ones started ripping people off, you greedy jerks.
.. BadAnalogyGuy!
Since this was on boingboing, I'd be surprised if someone didn't mention this already. There's a children's book that explains DRM.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
If a person buys a song off of iTMS, then their expectation is that they'll be able to play it on their iPod and in iTunes. For this reason, it would be pointless to "educate" the user about the DRM - because they don't care that they can't use it with non-iPod, non-iTunes modes of playback. It's about as likely to get them to care about DRM as it is to get them to care that they can't play VHS tapes in a DVD player.
In general, people aren't stupid - even if they don't understand computers, they can still understand basic consumer skills. If a vendor of DRM'd software explains what the terms of the DRM are, and the user pays for it anyway, then it means that the user has no problem with buying a limited product. A DRM'd file is not a broken file, however much the Slashdot crowd may disagree. The file does exactly what it says it would do. The user doesn't care about being able to convert it to a different format, doesn't care about being able to send it to a different computer, doesn't care about what happens to the file when it goes into the public domain. The user has no problem accepting files that you can't do these things to, because the user never wanted to do any of those things anyway, and the user was never led to believe that any of these things would be possible. The user is not being cheated, any more than you'd be cheated if you had bought a copy of a single-player game, and was shocked to discover that it does not feature a multiplayer mode.
So, we can clearly see that the point of this exercise is not to convince average users that DRM is Evil and that the vendors of DRM'd software are trying to cheat them. This raises the next question: what is the purpose of "educating" non-tech users about DRM? Is it just for the purpose of creating market forces that will enable us to buy non-DRM'd music (even if it costs more)? Is it an attempt to create a grass-roots resistance against the encroachment on technology rights by whatever government-controlling conspiracy it's popular to believe in this week, who no doubt want to make unlicensed software of any variety illegal? I'm not seeing it, here.
...but is it art?
Imagine a bookstore that has all the books you could ever want. Now imagine that when you buy a book, it remains forever chained to a desk in that bookstore. You can come back and visit it, but you can never take it out of the bookstore. If the bookstore closes or moves, your books go away with it.
The ______ Agenda
What's Wrong With Copy Protection by John Gilmore. He explains how copy prevention technology prevents him from making proper copies of an original work that he created and owns to copyright to.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
DRM is like buying a Ford Expedition SUV that you think you own, but lo and behold, the hood is welded shut to prevent non Ford technicians from servicing, and to keep you from buying after market parts for it. It's like having a black box in your Expedition that shuts you down or calls the cops on you if you drive 66mph or cross state lines without paying a Ford interstate crossing fee. DRM is also like Chevron slapping in a gasoline meter that dings you an extra $1 per gallon for choosing Valero gasoline, or just shuts your car down and voids your warranty.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
DRM means a lot of things, but if you want to explain what it means to music enthusiast Joe Ipod, try using a real-world example:
-----
DRM is a way of limiting what a person is allowed to do with a given computer file. The limits are imposed by the people who create the file.
For example, when you buy music from iTunes, you send them money, and they send you a file. That file contains music. However, the music is wrapped inside of technology called DRM, that limits the access to that music. In order to listen to the music in that file, you have to appease the DRM by getting approval from iTunes. Of course, you just bought it from iTunes, so of course they give you permission to listen to it. However, if you sent that file off to your good friend Alice, and she tried to play it, the DRM is still there, and it asks iTunes if Alice can listen to the music, and iTunes would say, no, Alice does not have the right to listen to it, because she hasn't paid for that right.
The full extent of what this means is contrary to how people are used to dealing with purchased music. With CD's, for example, there is a single original copy, and you can sell that copy to someone else if you no longer want it. A music file limited by DRM, on the other hand, cannot be sold or given away. You are stuck with it. At least as long as iTunes remains up and running. If iTunes ceased to exist, then when you go to play the file, and the DRM asks iTunes if you can listen to the music, without the proper response, the DRM will not let you at the music, and thus you can no longer listen to it.
If you then extend this to files containing other types of information, like books and movies, the same set of rules apply: if you cannot prove that you are allowed to access a file you have, then you cannot access it. Guilty until proven innocent.
-----
In general, if you are speaking to the non-geek, I find it's good to use common place terminology, even if it is technically not accurate (like calling all digital audio "mp3" for example). Also, try to give an unbiased overview before launching into the reasons why it is the devil incarnate. Trying to remain neutral helps me to keep my thoughts organized, and also keeps the n00b from being turned off by a hateful geek rant.
"They want to stop your computer from doing what you want it to do, and I won't be able to fix it for you."
DRM isn't about copy protection any more. Now it's more about renting, instead of buying.
"Sooner or later, you're going to have to buy all your music and videos again".
The challenge of this question is coming up with a description of the "problems" of DRM that actually sound like problems to "less-experienced users".
If you tell someone "When you buy from music from iTunes, you'll only be able to play it on all of your computers, all of your iPods, and all of your CD players.", chances are they aren't going to understand just how "obviously" oppressive and stifling that is.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
DRM is a way of punishing paying consumers because the people who don't pay anyway get a superior unencumbered version online, for free. You see, companies want to give you incentive to NOT pay, er, um...... wait.
You have a brain. Inside are memories. As things are right now, there are no legal restrictions on you thinking about or even recalling these memories. What DRM does is place restrictions on these memories. Everyone involved in these memories now must give you permission before you can access them. If someone says something stupid in front of you, you now need their permission to remember it. If someone has sex with you, you now need their permission to recall it. If you see a murder, you now need the murderer's permission to remember it.
DRM is about giving control of information *permanently* to the creator. This is not where it belongs. It belongs (eventually at least) in the public domain for everyone to do with as they please.
Digital media is too easy to copy without degradation. DRM is an attempt to cut down on piracy by locking a piece of digital media to some entity that has the rights to use it.
This is what I told one of my friends when he asked about DRM.
I create a doc and give it to you, also I control how you use it say, whether u can print it, make a copy of it, etc..
DRM is ripping movies you bought so you can skip the FBI warning.
DRM is ripping music you bought so it works on the player they don't want it to.
DRM is downloading a crack for software you bought, so you don't have register it.
DRM is changing a CMOS bit so your wireless card works in a system it isn't type accepted for.
Anything you have to break to make it work is DRM.
I would use the following definition, or a variant thereof: "DRM is the name given to technology used by the people who sell you digital content to control how, when and where you view/listen, store or copy that content. It includes laws to make it illegal for you to get around those controls." Beyond that, don't bother explaining, show them what it is and how it works, read on:
In years of trying to make my girlfriend, who is a strategy consultant and all-around pretty competent 'business' PC user (i.e. knows her way around Windows reasonably well, knows end-user apps, etc.) and a very bright person, I couldn't get her to care ("I buy all my music/films".)
What'd it take for her to understand why this is important and to listen to me on how it works? Well, we're spending a year on another continent and all of a sudden, her DVDs don't work in the player in our furnished apartment. Oops. Boy, was she pissed. Boy, did she want to know how it worked, why it sucked and how to get around it all of a sudden.
Same with why Windows is broken ("but it just works for what I want to do.") Until it didn't "just work." Same with data privacy ("I don't have anything to hide") until someone stole her credit card number.
The phrase you need to remember is "show me the money" or, in consulting terminology, "where's the 'so what'?" Most people won't care or give a rat's ass until it affects them directly.
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
That means that if you buy a CD with MS' DRM, you won't be able to listen on it on: - many CD players, including those built into stereos (car and home) - most DVD players with CD playing capabilities - your iPod, or any or a wide range of other MP3 players, again including those built into expensive stereos (both car and home) - your Mac or Linux PC - your PS/PS2/PS3/PSP / GameCube/Wii / any other non-Xbox game system - regardless of whether or not it has multimedia capabilities.
Note that all of these devices you paid good money for. You also paid good money for the music; however, the music requires you to buy new devices. Why? Simply because the maker of the device didn't pay for the music company's DRM. Maybe they couldn't afford it, maybe it only supported certain media codecs, but most likely because that form of DRM wasn't invented yet - meaning that any device made before the DRM is 100% incompatible with any media that uses that form of DRM.
But perhaps the biggest problem with DRM is that it solves nothing. Pirates can still hack the DRM and sell cheap copies, or make them available online -- and any true pirate not only knows how, but is completely comfortable with doing this. It's no sweat off the pirate's back - they can simply download a tool off the Internet (or program their own) to get rid of the DRM. It doesn't matter how tough the DRM is, the pirates will find a way around it - it's their job.
So in short, DRM is a way for media companies to force you to pay more and buy only from them and their partners.
www.linuxpenguin.net
Who forbids it? Why the company that sold you the sugar cubes offcourse. Why do you have to obey them? Because DRM tells you too and if you do not you go to jail for longer then for rape or murder.
That is DRM. It is like trusted computing, wich really means, we don't trust you computing. DRM and Trusted computing are about the seller telling the buyer what he can do with the product. This is a totally new idea.
As said, nobody on the world would think of it to suggest that a sugar cube wich is clearly designed to be put into hot drinks cannot be used in any other way as the buyer sees fit. I can literally do anything with the sugar cubes I buy that I want with the only hindrance that the act may not be against the normal law. The seller has NOTHING whatsoever to say about it.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
please don't make generalizations like that. This less expereinced PC user is interested, self-taught, and realizes there is a hell of a lot more to know than I currently do. (And I am actually finding this to be a damn helpful thread!)
I've spent some days/months/years explaining the nature of DRM. It's not so much that people don't understand it. The problem is that they don't believe it!
I mean, I can see that it's unbelievable. That the claims of people opposing DRM sound outlandish. And they do sound completely insane. The most insane thing about it is that they're true.
Generally, I've met 3 reactions:
1. Claims of impossibility
These people usually go "They can't do that". They don't understand that it can be done. They stopped taking a close look at technology with compact cassettes and think that everything works like they did. I.e. that there is just a 'cable' coming out of their player and that this cable can be jacked into a recording device, and that this has to work all the time because, well, it has always worked this way.
2. There will be a recorder
Actually a subgroup of group one, those people usually counter with the motion that for every kind of protection so far, someone has made a program or device that "took care of the problem". What they fail to see is that it's illegal to create such a program or device. Another thing they can't believe, that it can be illegal to program something. Honestly, it is hard to believe...
3. There will be a crack
Finally the group that tells you "so what, someone's gonna crack it". While they are most likely right, I don't really see why I should go into illegality to execute a right I have.
That's more the problem with DRM. It's not that people wouldn't listen. They just don't believe.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"3. There will be a crack
Finally the group that tells you "so what, someone's gonna crack it". While they are most likely right, I don't really see why I should go into illegality to execute a right I have."
I'd buy that argument if I knew that the anti-DRM crowd actually knew what their rights were.* But I've read so much bullshit and misinformation from this forum that I can't. And until they demonstrate that they do, and actually start making factual arguments. Theyre "I hate DRM" crusade will be fall apart.
*Hell, they can't even demonstrate proper knowledge of patents, copyright, or trademark.
For abstract examples of middle ground uses which are wrongly denied by DRM and are made illegal by the ill-conceived DMCA please read the 30-days of DRM rss feed.
I tend to explain it in ways like, imagine you buy a car that comes with the restriction that it cannot be driven on asphalt.. that you are limited to keeping it in your garage and driving it on dirt roads.. and that in order to get it too and from the dirt roads you will need to hire a truck to transport it to and from those dirt roads and that the only way around driving it "on" asphalt was to sit in the car with the engine running whilst on the back of the truck that you hired thats driving on asphalt.... now imagine having that limit on your music that you buy on internet.. being able to only run it on your pc, having to spend time and money and energy to move that pc around with you, possibly installing the PC in your car and buy a lot of batteries to power it or spend more money on a laptop or portable musicplayer that has to be chosen according to THEIR choices and not your wishes about the music player and ofcourse having to pay extra to find power for it everywhere you go...
another thing I've discussed a lot with people is the "piracy equals theft" bit that certain organisations tries to make people believe, its not.. it never will be.. if a COPY is the same as theft then taking a photo of a car is stealing that cars design.. which probably is copyrighted somewhere.. and it wouldnt just be cars.. it would be ANYTHING thats made by anyone.. and if someone owns a forest and you take a picture of that.. well I'm sure they'd manage to sue you over that too......imagine outlawing the use of your senses because you hear a song thats owned by someone else without having paid to hear that song and your "brain" copies it and omg.. you just comitted a crime.. smelling someones recipie without paying for a license.. reading a book would fall within the same stupid definition......... no..... piracy may be illegal but it is NOT the same as theft.
"It's like DVD region coding on everything. You know what a pain in the ass that is? Whoops, your computer's a different region to your iPod's a different region to your PVR! Nothing works together, and the only reason is so they can get you to pay three times. DRM is a way to rip people off."
http://rocknerd.co.uk
DRM in a nutshell: The pursuit of total corporate control of consumer data, at the expense of ease of use and flexibility, for the single purpose of generating as much revenue from sources currently deemed untapped.
You're on Slashdot. You don't have a girlfriend. It's ok. We don't really care either. :p
eTrade SUCKS
"You forgot to mention that when DRM'ed material falls out of copyright there's no way of putting it into the public domain wiping our childrens history books clean."
You do realize that that assertion has never been demonstrated. A boogeyman as it were.
Also most piracy falls not only well within all copyright limits (past, present), but it has happenned to material that hasn't even been released to the general public. e.g HL2.
"You don't get to choose when and how to use what you've paid for."
That's very close to what I would have come up with.
I think one of the confusing things about these kinds of debates is that the pro and anti side focus on the intended or feared consequences. Thus, both sides tend to talke past each other. You've made a succinct statement of the anti-side's view. The pro side would put it this way:
"People won't be able to steal movies and music and resell them."
The problem with planning for the future is unintended consequences, both of action and inaction. Particularly with technology, where details of design and implementation may have dire consequences. I am not necessarily against DRM on moral principle, so much as I know the one sided and therefore half-baked schemes will be a large scale disaster for society at large.
Every decision that is taken should have a sheet divided in half, one half for intended consequences, the other for unintended consequenes.
Intended Consequences:
(a) Companies purchasing copyrights can recoup the value of those rights, and in turn artists can be paid more.
(b) Keep existing business models viable.
(c) Create new business models around electronic distribution.
Unintended Consequences (examples):
(a) When DVDs become obsolete, all the DVD movies you've bought are useless.
(b) You may not be able to move your purchased works to new media when your original media is getting damaged. This is major for libraries.
(c) People will no longer be able to quote passages from books and other works for critical, educational or satirical purposes.
(d) Schemes that try to give you more flexibilty may fail if the company you bought the material from goes out of business. This means you won't be able to use the stuff you bought.
(e) If a DRM scheme becomes obsolete, very quickly all the works protected by that scheme will become unreadable, possibly causing them to be lost forever.
(f) You won't be able to copy a work when its copyright expires and you are legally entitled to do so. Some DRM schemes amount to a perpetual copyright, which is against the intent of the Constitution and all copyright precedent.
(g) To make some visions of DRM work, your player might phone home to the company, which compromises your privacy. Companies have a voracious appetite for information about consumer behavior, so it's only a matter of time before this is put back on the table. What you do with a work after you buy it is none of their business, unless it's something infringing on their rights.
(h) You may not be able to buy movies and music at all; companies could force you to enter into a relationship with them, and they will broker all your use of DRM protected works. You can add the record company, the movie company and the book company to the list of companies you are forced to have a relationship with if you don't want to live like a cave man: the telephone company, the cable company, the power company etc.
Naturally, I think the potential downsides of DRM greatly outweigh its benefits. But it's important to remember that all these dystopic scenarios are potential results. They are not logically inevitable results of any DRM, they're just probable results of likely DRM schemes.
If we add a stipulation to DRM that preserves the status quo, I think it DRM becomes a lot less obnoxious:
Definition: A "Fair" DRM is a system which enforces a copyright holder's traditional legal rights, does not extend them in time or any other way, does not restrict the legally recognized rights of consumers purchasing copyrighted materials, and does not force consumers to accept an ongoing contractual relationship with the copyright holder or its agents.
You could still enter into a relationship with, say, the music utility to send them a monthly check in return for access to their library. But the DRM scheme should not force you to accept this business model, it sh
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
You're promoting nebulous concepts of sale, ownership and so forth. The non-academic audience needs past experience of tangible examples for concepts to sink in properly.
SONY's recent CD scandal (the one that makes your drive from working properly) is a convenient one. The problem proposed here is to explain the issue to computer-competent but non-technical people - many of these same people have suffered from that exact scandal.
Two sentences to offer the audience:
1. Do you want a CD player, or a broken CD player?
2. Well, the Big Media companies want you to have a broken one.
It can't be simpler.
DRM is saying that the whims of companies get to determine what you can do with the things you own, not the law or common sense. And furthermore, thanks to some clever lobbying a few years back, the company's whims have the full force of the law behind them.
DRM is saying that if you have the legal right to do something, but Sony or Disney or AOL decided that you shouldn't, you can be arrested for doing it.
The ______ Agenda
Don't know if this has been mentioned here before.
There is a very nice book written for kids with great illustrations available at "The pig and the box".
from the page: The Pig and the Box is about a pig who finds a magic box that can replicate anything you put into it. The pig becomes so protective of it, and so suspicious of anyone that wants to use it, that he makes people take their copied items home in special buckets that act as... well, they're basically DRM. It's like a fable, except the moral of the story is very modern in tone.
a funny readComputer Users: DRM turns your computer against you I know sometimes it seems like your computer has it's own agenda, when it refuses to print or copy or find your documents. DRM does this on purpose. It is designed to stop you copying and pasting, printing and sharing things. I don't think you want this. Computer Scientists: DRM will fail through emulation One of the basic precepts of Computer Science is the Church-Turing thesis, which shows that any computer can emulate any other one. This is not theory, but something we all use every day, whether it is Java virtual machines, or CPU's emulating older ones for software compatibility. The corollary of this is that code can never really know where it is running. For a rock solid example, look at MAME, the Multi-Arcade Machine Emulator, that runs almost any video game from the last 30 years. The games think you have paid a quarter when you press the '5' key. Corporations: DRM has to be undone to be used Microsoft has been touting DRM features in the next version of Office that will only allow approved people to copy or forward or print documents that they can read. But if they can read them, they can describe, paraphrase, retype or photograph them. If you can't trust your employees, but think you can trust your computers more, you have deeper problems than document leakage. Lawyers: DRM makes machines judge, jury and executioner Law is complex and subtle, with elaborate and oft-satirised processes and procedures for making, enforcing, fight and settling contentious issues. Due process is there for good reasons which I don't need to rehearse to you. DRM undoes all this with the simplistic, hard-edged certainty of a machine. It will refuse to let you copy video you have shot yourself, or prevent citation by copying and pasting. It will make presumptions of guilt rather than innocence. Some tasks we can delegate to machines; law and jurisprudence should not be one. Media Companies: DRM destroys value By adding DRM to your products, you make them less attractive to your potential customers. This will reduce the amount they are willing to pay for them, significantly. Companies that bet on DRM die off. Apple's iTunes store (often cited as a DRM success) will burn Audio CDs, so it preserves the customer value.
DRM is like having to prove that you own your car and have a valid license to drive every time you want to go somewhere. DRM is like having to prove you own your house before you can unlock the front door.
-- Ed Carp, N7EKG erc@pobox.com PGP KeyID: 0x0BD32C9B What I'm up to: http://intuitives.mine.nu
If you want to explain DRM, use a simple real-world example everyone is familiar (and frustrated) with -the DVD.
You put a DVD in your player to watch a movie and what happens? You can't just watch the movie, you get FBI warnings, studio splash screens, movie trailers, etc. before you even get to the main menu. Can you fast-forward through them, skip them, go straight to the menu? Sometimes -that's up to the studio to decide, not you while your sitting in your living room. If you try to do something the studio doesn't approve (sometimes just hitting the Stop button duing a movie trailer), you get an error message.
That's DRM -it allows the content provider to control what the user can do, to the point that it can prevent the user from doing what is perfectly legal to do. That's what DRM (as opposed to copy protection) is all about -enforcing the will of the copyright holder after the sale.
Hey, you typed a dash at the beginning of a line! It looks like you're creating a bulleted list: and I know that what you really want is for me to reformat the line into a bulleted list with completely new and different formatting from what it had when you started typing
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
It's really quite simple: If you buy a computer (or any other electronic device), who do you think should have the power to control what it does? You, the OWNER of the device or someone else?
If you think the owner should control his own devices and not be deprived of his OWN (real, physical) property, then you must oppose DRM.
Buying a DRMed device is like buying the house for which you are denied the key, instead you have to ask some guy at the door everytime you want to get in.
If you're trying to explain it to a sports fan, use this:
You've seen that disclaimer at the end of televised sporting events, "This game and any information about it may not be retransmitted, rebroadcast, or shared in any way without the express written consent of the teams and the NBA/NFL/MLB/NCAA/etc."? DRM would allow those groups to actually enforce that restriction -- newer VCRs, TiVos, etc. would refuse to record those events unless you bought a license to record that specific event from the appropriate agency and/or teams, and those agencies or teams would have basically complete control over what you do with the copy.
"Brazil 1984"
Perhaps you could ask your girlfriend what could have been done to make her to care about the issue before it hit her? Is a physical demonstration the only method of convincing?
It seems this is the biggest hurdle to educating citizens about things that manage their rights (not just DRM). They seem to have the idea that it won't happen to them (I buy all my media, I don't have anything to hide, it works for me, etc). If you are fortunate to intimately know someone intelligent who had this attitude and then was "slapped" in the face with it; it seems that it is of massive value to ask them how they could have been shown the (very real) danger and consequenes of their actions without actually experiencing those consequences.
Reading my post back, it seems this is a fundamental problem of humanity...
Just because you are not paranoid does not mean they are not out to get you.
okay, we all now that the slashdrones are anti-DRM, but the original poster did not ask how to explain the horrors of DRM, but what it is and why its bad.
What it is?
DRM is a way of altering plain files so that some entity, usually the RIAA or MPAA through the reseller you bought it from, can control what you do with it and can make sure you use it only in an approved manner. It means that they can make sure it works only at certain times, and only on certain machines. I means that they can prevent you from copying it (sometimes even from making backups) converting to other forms (making a cd of music for example) or moving it from one place to another (must play it only on the machine where it was downloaded)
Why its bad?
DRM means that someone else controls how you use things, not you. In the case of things you rent (subscritpion services), it means that they can enforce the terms f the agreement to the letter with no leeway, including what you would assume is natural (fair use). In the case of purchases, it means that you really do not own the thing you purchased. You own only the right to play it in accordance with the contract you made when purchasing it, not an unconditional right to play it any way you want.
It really all comes down to the individual. If you do not like the terms under which something is distributed, do not accept the terms and do not use the media. If the only media of the type you are looking for is restricted by DRM, then pay for your enjoyment or make your own media and release it without DRM so that others who are like minded may enjoy it. Its really quite simple. DRM is not evil. DRM simply means that you use things in accordance with the letter of the agreements you enter into, or you do not use those things. If you simply must use them, they live with it, otherwise, invent your own
DRM is the reason you can morally engage in acts of piracy.
Experience is best. Create a virus which delays the opening of music CDs and files by a couple of minutes (with a countdown timer) by bringing up a message box "You are prevented from opening this file by DRM. WE control when and where music you own can be played. This philosphy is being supported by your senator. Speak to your senator here http://list.of.senators.gov/"
Let it become widely publicised as "The DRM virus about to hit" and it becomes embedded in the layman's collective psyche that DRM it is "bad"
A more legal way would be for widely used applications like WinAmp to display a similar message when they encounter DRM content.
It would work fine for you, but the moment your wife needed to drive it, too bad.
;)
To a lot of guys, that really doesn't sound too bad.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
When these people talk about 'secure content' and such, what they are talking about is securing your computer from you, not securing it for you.
What DRM means is that other people controls what your computer will, or will not, do and you will have essentially no say in that.
That's part of why I don't intend to buy Microsoft's next OS... It has that sort of remote control garbage built in as an integral part of it.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
like crippeling a abacus so we can't calculate
how much money the industry is REALLY making
(and not losing).
Ask them the following: "Would you buy a book to read if it had a lock on it, like a diary?" - "What if it came with the key?" - "What if the key only worked for that book, and no other book?" - "What if you lost the key?" - "What if the publisher of the book wouldn't sell you another key?" - "What if the key stopped working after a period of time - 1 day - 1 month - 1 year - 10 years - 100 years - would you still buy the book?" - "Would you hand the book down to your kids? Grandkids? Etc?" - "What if the publisher came out with the same book, but with pictures, and it used a different key - would you buy it again?" - "What if that were the only copy of the book left, and the key was lost to time - what then?"
Then ask them to imagine a future where all knowledge and all information - from stories, to works of art, paintings, even our laws - were all written in these books. Then ask them "What if the keys were lost to some of them - would that be OK?" - "Would that be fair to the future?" - "Would it be fair to the citizens?" - "Would it be fair to your children?"
Then, ask them if they have bought any DVDs - then tell them that DVDs are such "books" - today and forever...
Tell them we better hope to not lose any of the keys...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I agree with your comment for the most part. However, I firmly believe you will be able to play Doom 3 with no issues whatsoever once the Steam servers go offline. In fact, I can play Doom 3 legally without being connected to the internet, or even having Steam installed. =P
"So after all this, you make my case for me. To end this stalemate, you must die..."
Many comments say something like: "DRM prevents you from doing what you want to do with your stuff..."
When you buy a CD, you DO NOT buy the album. It is NOT yours to duplicate and sell, or broadcast. So, what DID you buy? You bought a licence to do specific things like "listen to the album in a private setting". The problem here is that this licence has never really been written down anywhere. Courts have decided on issues like "fair use", so consumers should now have a reasonable idea about what they can and cannot do with a CD.
DRM is the actual owner of the copyrighted work trying to prevent you from doing illegal things with their work using technical measures. This is completely reasonable.
The problem with DRM is that it usually also prevents things that we've grown to consider "fair use".
Simple.
Explain that DRM stands for Digital RESTRICTIONS Management.
Then when they ask for clarification you can tell them, plus it gets the acronym of DRM to be more accurate to the point where it becomes Digital RESTRICTIONS Management, NOT Digital Rights Management.
Visceral Psyche Films