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Kindle, Zune DRM Restrictions Coming Into Focus
It's not news that the media you buy for both Kindle and Zune are protected by DRM. Readers are sending in stories of some of the ramifications of that fact. First, Absentminded-Artist notes an account at Gear Diary recounting what an Amazon rep told one user about download limits on Kindle books. "One facet of the Kindle's DRM has reared an ugly head: download limitations. Upgraded your iPhone recently? Bought a new Kindle? You may not be able to reload your entire library. There's an unadvertised flag: 'You mean when you go to buy the book it doesn't say "this book can be downloaded this number of times" even though that limitation is there?' To which [the rep] replied, 'No, I'm very sorry it doesn't.'" Next, reader Rjak writes "DRM is a bad idea, poorly implemented. One of the many many valid reasons to drop Zune and its marketplace is the DRM validation error you see below. The vast majority of the music I had purchased last year is completely gone. There's no refund, the music doesn't exist on the service anymore, the files are just garbage now. Here's the error (screen capture): 'This item is no longer available at Zune Marketplace. Because of this, you can no longer play it or sync it with your Zune. There might be another iteration of it available in Zune Marketplace.'" Update: 06/23 00:28 GMT by KD : The Gear Diary blog has been updated with what may be more definitive information from Amazon on how the Kindle DRM behaves.
It's times like this I wish I had mod-points.
Sadly though, I doubt the record companies will see things quite the same way when they bust you for using the evil bittorrent.
According to P.T.Barnum, there's a 'sucker born every minute'. He goes on to say that one should 'never give a sucker an even break'.
To those who actually pay out money for DRM-encumbered media... "Come in, Sir! Welcome, Madam! There's this bridge spanning Sydney Harbour, priced way beneath its value, that you may be interested in buying shares in!"
Personally, I try to acquire my media files - ebooks, music and video - for free. If I can't get them for free, I'm sometimes willing to pay for them. But the only way I'll even think about paying is if I'll be ending up with cleartext files. Hell will freeze over before I'll put down hard money in return for some encrypted copy of a media file. WTF are consumers thinking?!?
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
Fair use is a copyright clause, but according to Copyright I have no right, except for that part about fair use. Got it ...
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun