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The Perils of DRM — When Content Providers Die

Posted by Soulskill on from the involuntary-renting dept.

An anonymous reader writes "If you purchase music or movies online, what happens if the vendor goes out of business? Will you have trouble accessing your content? The question came up recently after HDGiants — provider of high-quality audio and video downloads — filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. A consumer says his content became locked inside his PC. Walmart customers suffered a similar fate last year when the retailer shut down its DRM servers (a decision they reversed after many complaints). And if Vudu dies? Your content may be locked in a proprietary box forever. Time to start buying discs again?"

7 of 275 comments (clear)

  1. Start buying disk again? by pecosdave · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I never stopped! With a DVD I have "Digital Copy" on EVERY DVD without having to use the stupid number system and ask for permission, and it's legal. I don't have to rely on a content provider to stay in business, and I don't have some company somewhere with self interest telling me what devices I can and can't play back the content on. Well, I do, but I don't have to listen to them.

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    1. Re:Start buying disk again? by sakdoctor · · Score: 5, Insightful

      DVD has copy and region protection. The only reason I have a large DVD collection today, is because the copy protection was utterly destroyed early on, ensuring my fair use indefinitely, of the discs I own.
      More modern protection schemes haven't been shredded to my satisfaction, so I won't be buying into them any time soon.

      Legally grey means nothing to me. If there is decoder library that works in linux, and region hacks for the physical drives, I'm in.

  2. Maybe... by SilverHatHacker · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Maybe if the content providers would have used a sound business model that actually ATTRACTS customers instead of alienating them, they wouldn't have died in the first place?

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  3. XKCD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    http://xkcd.com/488/

  4. Analog hole by davidwr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The analog hole will always be there for audio and video. Yes, it's a pain to buy a DRM'd song then hook up ye olde tape recorder to your speaker output before the vendor files for chapter 11, but it does work.

    I'm more worried about games and other content that are different each time you use them.

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    Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
  5. Re:On the other hand... by BrokenHalo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Six months? May be it's just me but that is a lot of interest in an album... ATM, my music "library" has 13 artists for a grand total of 7 GB (half of it is King Crimson).

    Make up your mind! King Crimson has been active for something like 40 years, and Robert Fripp has been prolific outside the context of that band for years. If you are discerning enough to download their work, why throw it away? And if you like it, why not let them have some royalties for their work?

    I can just about understand not wanting to buy a CD if you only like one track, and I can even understand not wanting to pay for a single track if you're only half-enthusiastic about it.

    But if you like a band enough to download 7GB of their work, why begrudge them a modest return for their work?

  6. Whose? by arth1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...if what you "bought" was shallow crap that you will have lost interest in in six months, who cares if the DRM servers shut down after a year? And that describes 99% of the market.

    Because that shallow crap is yours. It's the right that's at stake here, not the economical value or arts value.
    Is it OK if I go through your home and throw away the things I think are crap?

    One man's crap, another man's treasure. I don't know whether my daughter in the future would like to have a copy of Lipps Inc. "Funkytown" or Video Kids' "Woodpeckers from Space". But if she does, they're there. And playable -- not subject to whether a company has gone belly up or not.