Open-Source DRM Ready To Take On Big Guns

Barence writes "An open-source digital rights management (DRM) scheme says it's ready to supplant Apple and Microsoft as the world's leading copy protection solution. Marlin, which is backed by companies such as Sony and Samsung, has just announced a new partner program that aims to drive the DRM system into more consumer devices. 'It works in a way that doesn't hold consumers hostage,' Talal Shamoon told PC Pro. 'It allows you to protect and share content in the home, in a way that people own the content, not the devices.' When asked about the biggest problem of DRM — that customers hate it — he argued that 'the biggest problem with DRM is people have implemented it badly. Make DRM invisible and people will use it.'"

Comments

How can it be both effective and invisible?

[Tetsujin]

I don't get it... If DRM works, it restricts what you do. If it restricts what you do, it's not inivisible. How is this implementation different from any other DRM?

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[ShieldW0lf]

How is this implementation different from any other DRM?

It's the shiniest turd of all!

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[theaveng]

I visited their website. It appears to be based on the tried-and-true "license" model where you must buy a license in order to use a program... or in this case, play a song. The obvious flaw is that is the server goes down, no more license.

And of course licensing is typically an annual payment plan. I don't want to "rent" my purchased songs year-after-year-after-year.

http://www.marlin-community.com/technology/how_marlin_works

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[Aeolien]

The most invisible form of DRM I've seen is Steam. That's because it isn't just DRM, it's a fairly significant service. I can't sell my game, but I can play it on any number of computers, even if I don't have the original disc. I can chat with friends during my game, and every so often, I can play a game for free for a weekend, or give out a guest pass to my friends for a month or two. Given these benefits, and because the only thing it restricts is reselling, I hardly ever think of it as DRM.

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[Gizzmonic]

Unfortunately, I think this is the future of gaming. The next game consoles might not even have optical drives. You won't be able to loan a game to a friend, or rent a game from Blockbuster. And good luck reselling games that you bought over the Internet! Gamestop and others might go out of business. When your hard drive fails, you'll spend days re-downloading content (if you're lucky). If not, you'll be branded as a thief and have to spend hours arguing on the phone with Indian tech support for the right to re-download stuff you already paid for.

The Internet has done a lot of great things for gaming, but I am really scared of what will happen if console manufacturers get rid of removable media for games.

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[NotBornYesterday]

Any DRM makes comsumers' use of lawfully acquired media subject to external control, which means that sooner or later the consumer is going to get ripped off. Notoriously frangible EULAs, market conditions, corporate acquisitions and mergers, etc., mean that someday the external entity that supports the continued use of the media will likely go away. This also ensures that the lifespan of media is temporary, rather than enduring. In a weird way, artists seeking to use DRM cash in on their work today are ensuring their relative anonymity tomorrow, when no one can find a playable copy of that old song they used to love so much as a kid back in '08.

Re:How can it be both effective and invisible?

[genner]

I guess it makes them feel safer, like a child hiding under the covers to be protected from the monsters.

Hey don't mock it. It works!

My bedroom has been monster free for thirty years.

There's only one way to make DRM really invisible

[DreamerFi]

And that's by not having it at all.

I don't buy products with DRM, no matter how much they've tried to make it non-intrusive for me.

And backed by Sony? That puts it on my personal blacklist right away.

Sense, it makes none!

[ijustam]

...allowing users to share content between any Marlin-enabled device in the home rather than on specific machines. "It works in a way that doesn't hold consumers hostage,"

So long as Marlin stays in business, and every device you want your music on is a Marlin device. So, if Marlin goes under and your computer crashes, you're out of luck?

Re:Impossible

[gstoddart]

You can never make DRM invisible, since people are illegally sharing video and music files all the time today.

I think they'll be happy if it's invisible to the people who have bought the content and are playing by their rules.

The ones who are sharing files on the internet .. they'd like to stop and have the DRM be anything but invisible.

Cheers

How it's theoretically different

[MikeRT]

Based on their description, they seem to have built it from a better understanding of the human psychology WRT ownership of property. Most people instinctively believe that they own their music and movies and that their personal use shouldn't be restricted. This DRM seems to operate on the basis of restricting the ability to playback the content to the devices controlled by a customer, not to a set number of devices.

If this article turns out to be mostly right, it's a positive step. It recognizes the fact that most people will never get why it's infringement to share a CD or DVD across a family. So, the solution, is to focus more on how one user might give the data to a user that shouldn't receive it, than to focus on locking up the user's practical enjoyment of the product.

The key to making DRM work is to back off the user's day-to-day playback, and focus on making it so that devices won't receive content from users that don't have permission to give it to them. That's what copyright was created for: to prevent unauthorized reproductions, not tell the user exactly how they will use the IP once they buy it.

Re:How it's theoretically different

[Evanisincontrol]

You're saying then that I can't loan a copy of a book I own to a friend or family member because it's copyright infringement. That's utter and complete bullshit.

No, he's saying that can't make a complete copy of a book you own and give it to a friend or family member because it's copyright infringement. And he's right. The difference between loaning a book and "loaning" an MP3 is that once you'd "loaned" your buddy a song, he has complete access to it whenever he wants. More importantly, he has complete parallel access to it with you. Only one instance of the song was paid for, yet two people are able to enjoy its use at any time, perhaps simultaneously.

If I have physical media that I legally purchased, I should be able to loan that media out to whoever the hell I want to, and it's nobody's damned business.

Agreed. If you have an iPod with songs on it that you purchased, you should absolutely be allowed to lend someone that physical media -- that is, the iPod -- and let them use it as long as they want. And you can. You cannot, however, just send them the songs off your iPod, for reasons stated above.

Re:How it's theoretically different

[BorgDrone]

The difference between loaning a book and "loaning" an MP3 is that once you'd "loaned" your buddy a song, he has complete access to it whenever he wants. More importantly, he has complete parallel access to it with you.

Indeed, and this is completely different from a physical object like a book. The problem is trying to apply an economic model to a situation where it doesn't apply. Prices of physical objects are more or less determined by supply and demand. For this to work the object in question has to be scarce. Digital data isn't. Once it's created, there is an endless supply of it. Supply and demand doesn't work here. Trying to create artificial scarcity through DRM is solving the wrong problem. Don't try to make a product fit your business model, adapt your business model to the actual product.

Even worse, in trying to make the 'new' work exactly like the old they are actually trying to destroy some of the properties that make the 'new' more exiting and desirable.

Re:Invisibility (re)defined

[jeffasselin]

Not "people who aren't breaking the law", but people "who aren't doing what we don't want them to do". Not the same thing at all.

Most DRM schemes are trying to put themselves above law and morality then imply that they are simply enforcing that. But law and morality are more complex than any computer is currently able to understand and enforce.

Re:Invisible!

[squiggleslash]

I've taken a look at the specs and it's pretty impressive actually. They're using ROT-26 encryption, and you manage copies using commands called "cp", "mv", and "rm". These commands look at a set of user rights before they operate - read, write, and execute permissions are set separately and the content owner can also assign permissions to groups or even the whole world.

The only major fly in the ointment is that apparently DVD Jon has already released a beta of a tool called "chmod" that can change all of those permissions.

Even easier...

[gravyface]

Set your recording device to be "wav" or "what I hear" or something similar in your soundcard's mixer's "recording" view. Grab Audacity, hit record, then hit play on *insert_audio_source_here* No signal loss from using the physical outputs.