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Regulator Blocks BBC DRM Plans
TheRaven64 writes "The BBC's plans to introduce DRM for over-the-air digital broadcasts were today dealt a setback when the regulator, Ofcom, asked them the same question that has been asked of many DRM systems: 'How does this benefit the consumer?' The letter to the BBC is quoted in the article as saying that 'Ofcom received a large number of responses to this consultation, in particular from consumers and consumer groups, who raised a number of potentially significant consumer "fair use" and competition issues that were not addressed in our original consultation.' This does not end the chance of the BBC being allowed to introduce DRM in the future, but it at least delays their opportunity to do so."
DRM was never about the consumer. The only people who benefit from DRM are content providers. They use DRM as a way of unfairly controlling what you can do with the content you paid good money for.
Sorry, but my karma just ran over your dogma.
One particular fellow doesn't even seem to put two and two together (or spell correctly) and realize that his exact situation is just what they intend to block:
While I appreciate the BBC is keen to retain third party content providers for their HD channels I think compromising the rights of their viewers is not an acceptable solution to achieve this. I believe that it is in contravention of the BBC's responsibilty to provide unencumbered content to TV licence payers.
Personally third party content is of little importance to me, certainly not worth the risk of losing my ability to watch television on my computer via my DVB capture card; I use an open source operating system which will be highly unlikely to obtain a licence for the BBC's proprietary compression tables.
It amazes me that none of these responses addresses the basic needs or the fact that the BBC may be faced with losing some premium content providers if this doesn't go into effect. It's bad alright but what's your suggested solution to this (perceived) problem? That's why it will be eventually put into place if you don't proffer an alternative. Attack the problem at the root of its source and work to show that piracy really isn't a big deal, that's your only choice. Fundamentally, DRM is the only other alternative the market has to offer right now.
My work here is dung.
Be interesting to see if this then get's applied to DVDs.
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
"I have read a few of the responses and have found virtually no alternative suggestions to combating piracy than DRM."
Piracy is the only response of the market to a fiat monopoly.
With commodities you can "vote with your dollars". But with copyright, it's hobson's choice.
So why must piracy be solved here?
Sell cheap enough to maximise ROI. And they are the only ones who can do this.
All in all, a good example of how an independent, publicly funded news organisation can work. The BBC should focus on this kind of thing and not on idiocies like DRM. I wrote to Ofcom to oppose this and was very pleased that they have responded in this way. I was slightly less pleased that the form that they sent me asking for permission to publish my letter was a MS Word document...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
allowing BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Five, etc. to obtain the rights to show series and films that the rights holders will not allow them to show without content protection in the receiver.
This would things like the HD versions of Hollywood films which the MPAA doesn't want people getting good digital copies of for free.
I find it strange that the BBC has been picked on for this, it is a condition imposed by the content rights holders and the BBC is only one of several companies involved in defining the broadcast platform specifications.
I have read a few of the responses and have found virtually no alternative suggestions to combating piracy than DRM.
One alternative: Creative Commons Share Alike - No Commercial - No Derivates.
The BBC argues that content providers expect that DRM be provided. Ignore, for a moment, all other strong arguments against the use of DRM (and against it doing any good anyhow).
The BBC is funded by public money, so they get the opportunity to do stuff without being pushed about by commercial interests - for this reason they are already expected to include programming that is for the benefit of society and the public. I'd say that this is another excellent reason that they should be pressured to take a stand against the erosion of fair use rights. Similarly to certain types of programming, this is too important to leave up to commercial stations - in fact, commercial stations seem likely to push their own DRM agenda based on connections to vested interests.
Fundamentally, the BBC is funded by the public and it ought to limit the extent to which it makes itself and its viewers beholden to commercial interests. If content providers won't play ball, the BBC has the clout (currently one of the only UK broadcasters who are actually doing well) to make them see sense, or do without them and take stuff in-house. If the BBC are going to allow themselves to be directed by private content producers then we might as well just leave it to the commercial broadcasters and save ourselves the money.
well, that's obviously the problem... regulation of any kind is BAD, free markets RULE. God, what have the LIEberals done to you guys?\
An old quote from where I come from goes like this... "If you see abundance of money and wastefulness of resources, then understand that someone's legitimate right to those resources is being compromised".
Yes, art... like any other field should provide a given artist a stable income.
Yes, the artist worked hard, nonetheless, piracy is a consequence of someone who is finding it hard to pay the bills wanting something beyond his budget. On the other hand, a given (successful) artist who will probably feed generations with the wealth accumulated wants even more money.
On purely human grounds, I find something is wrong with this picture, very wrong.
Once the songs has been composed, the value-added component for every CD or MP3 they sell just doesn't add up to the price they charge consumers. Even if you take into account the effort and labor of composing the song, it still does not add up. This is something fundamental to a working capitalist society. Things should cost a fair price, media does not.
What exactly are the media giants selling, is it art... then why have I bought the same song in LP, Cassette, CD and now mp3s.
I can't put my finger on exactly what is wrong with this model.
IMO, this needs to be revisited to figure out how everyone gets their fair share, consumers and artists.
The issue with DRM is not whether its good or bad, its how its how it is applied.
A proper digital rights management would allow users to purchase only the content they want to see.
Lets say I want to purchase a season of and view it via HD streaming online or anywhere else I can get access to the content. Then a DRM could allow persons to view the content. However the customer's "rightful use" must be guaranteed, allowing multiple and unequivocal access to the media.
WTF? The content providers suffer more from DRM than all other parties combined. DRM makes it so that only people with patience and special tools (i.e. pirates) are able to play the content, and then everyone else has to get the DRM-stripped it-just-works content from the pirates.
The only people who benefit from DRM are the big manufacturers, DRM-licensing bodies, etc. The idea is to try to keep the player market small.
To me, the real problem is greed. If the content providers were content to simply make a profit and live like normal human beings, then prices would be reasonable and pirating would be even more uncommon than it is already. But no, everybody has to try and become a millionaire (ah, so old-fashioned, I mean billionaire of course!). The current thinking is that it is a corporation's job to maximize profit. That makes corporations necessarily hostile to society and civilization as a whole. This type of thinking dictates that they must gouge, hype, stifle competition, and use monopolistic practices to victimize the consumer for maximum gain. In the United States, we can't even pass health care reform because corporations don't want it. These corporations bribe, intimidate, and use the media they control to turn public opinion against the public good. For as long as we continue to believe that greed is good, and that the goal of business is to maximize profits, our societies will continue to decline, and our jobs will go elsewhere, and our governments will work against us.
I'd rather watch both sides of an argument (FOX and MSNBC) rather than assume I can trust a single source.
Ahem. On most topics, FOX and MSNBC are on the same side of the argument, or close enough not to matter much. The American political spectrum has become so narrow, and so far skewed to the right, that differentiating between the American "left" and American "right" seems to be more about trying to decide who is further to the right, Gengis Khan or Benito Mousselini, than discussing any real differences.
Then along comes Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, who would be considered to the right in any other part of the developed world, proposing sweeping (and belated) healthcare reform, and from the myopic and illiterate perspective of most Americans, they are seen as radically left.
It's amazing. To anyone else in the developed world, MSNBC and FOX are equally far out in right field, both bordering on unabashed extremism. As is most of America, for that matter. The fact that America is still struggling to sort out its medical system, 60-90 years after everyone else did, is telling in and of itself. For a bunch of creationists, the American right sure does seem to believe in Social Darwinism.
The sad thing is, most Americans don't even know enough to be ashamed of the rhetoric that is accepted as normal in politics over there, whether it's on defense, healthcare, women's rights, racial equality, or the so-called war on terror.
It has gotten to the point where "left wing" in America is not packing a pistol to an event where the president is expected to appear. Pathetic...and I don't see MSNBC, or CNN, as reporting these events all that differently than FOX these days. The do seem to be less tasteless in the talk shows they broadcast, but that's a far cry from broadcasting content that contains any real substance or concrete information, much less reporting balanced news a la the BBC.
But then, I'm an American lucky enough to be living elsewhere for the time being, and able to get relatively unbiased information without having to jump through a million hoops, or listen to Hannity screaming on my televison set.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
The BBC board are not stupid, they know applying to have tax payer funded content restricted isnt going to fly. They are maneuvering to cover their backs. Despite what they say the BBC are very ratings focused. They are going head to head with ITV (the biggest independent TV station in the UK) over the Saturday night prime slot with their own reality TV/talent show for example.
They want to broadcast popular shows but dont want content restriction to be used as leverage by the content providers. Rather than saying "we wont do that b/c its not in the public interest" the BBC are aiming to say "We cant use DRM b/c its against the law."
I can't think of anything witty right now
Here's the answer: Don't take content from someone who doesn't want it available without DRM.
There's no need to. BBC Freeplay won't have content without DRM because it cannot: have TV must pay. Even if DRM means you can't play. Ergo, can't have DRM.
It's not like there's not plenty of content out there. Heck, the BBC has STACKS of stuff that could do a rerun and there's all that niche stuff that isn't commercial but is wanted by a section of the license fee payers but unavailable because everybody is chasing the lowest common denominator.
Short of it is: DRM can't be implemented by the BBC licensed under the TVLA terms.
I'm fairly sure if it was a choice between fronting all the money themselves and foregoing DRM, partners of BBC productions would relent on DRM. If the market to the BBC disappears and a product has to face tougher competition in the rest of the market, some will find that DRM isn't worth losing money over and go with the BBC.
Here's what happened in America.
The original deal (which seemed stable to me): The cable TV company (Comcast) provided content that I could watch. I paid them money.
The cable TV company, in switching from analog cable to digital cable, required cablecard or other things that prevented it working with normal digital tuners, and even got the regulators' blessings. So they now offer this deal: The cable TV company will provide content that I cannot watch, and I will pay them money.
If the new deal isn't as good as the old one (e.g. suppose it costs more), you better have a good reason and be ready to explain it. I expect technological progress, though I also know sometimes things don't work out that way. But however the changing offer degrades, there has to be at least something in it for me.
I rejected the offer. They are no longer receiving monthly payments.
Is that your plan, BBC? To copy what happened to my cable TV company in America? (How inappropriate that I say it "happened to" them, since they are the ones who initiated the change. With the tech switch to digital and highdef, from a business perspective, the easiest thing for them to have done, would be to continue the old deal, which worked to both parties' benefit.) Are you really sure you want to do that? I know you're a quasi-government entity, so profits aren't your only motive, but I don't see how your plan might possibly benefit you in any ways, even in non-profit "socialist" terms.
The question of DRM never should have gotten as far as a regulator. BBC should be protecting its own interests, and that obviously means no DRM. Regulators are things that industries should begrudgingly tolerate and be seen as generally hostile. When your regulator, posing as someone who protects the interests of others (your customers), ends up being your own savior, it probably means you've got a bad attitude and a fundamental misunderstanding of your own business.
Whoever at BBC took this matter up with the regulator, needs to be replaced. Not because he lost, but because he won while trying to lose.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
That's essentially what it boils down to. If I paint a wall in a neighbours house, I charge for the time it takes to paint it. I don't expect to "earn" money every time the poor sods look at the bloody wall, now do I?
It's about time we sat down & looked at this copyright/DRM lark seriously. In no other profession can you expect to earn money, 70 sodding years after you are dead, for 3 hours work.
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
That's essentially what it boils down to. If I paint a wall in a neighbours house, I charge for the time it takes to paint it. I don't expect to "earn" money every time the poor sods look at the bloody wall, now do I?
Are you even listening to yourself?
1) You're comparing a service (like wall painting), which is arranged for in advance and with terms understood to both parties, to - for example - a novel. Which the author risks his time to write, with no known buyers necessarily lined up (unless a publisher really wants to front some money, against future sales, just to keep in the author's good graces).
2) An author doesn't make money every time you read his book, he makes money when you buy it. If he makes the mistake of only selling it in a way that some readers will find very inconvenient, then he's lost a customer, and has to live with the consequences. But you don't pay a musician every time you pop that same CD in the car's player, or pay a cookbook maker or gourmet magazine publisher every time you make a dish while looing at a printed recipe you bought.
3) The author doesn't make a penny unless he can find himself some customers that will agree to the terms under which he's selling the book. He may not find such a customer for days, or even years after he has invested the time to do the work. He may not find his second (or second millionth) customer until years more have gone by. But he risked the time it took to create the work in anticipation of finding those customers, later. Are you implying that there's a moral difference between selling a novel week after you finish it, and selling it three weeks after you finish it? How bout 30 weeks? Has the author's investment in his own work suddenly become unimportant to you based on which day it is on the calendar?
4) "for 3 hours work." Really. That's what you think is involved in producing, say, a documentary, or a symphony, or a graphic novel, and so on? I suppose you think that because a concert pianist only performs for 45 minutes during a concert, that she's only done 45 minutes worth of work in order to deliver that performance? Are you really that obtuse?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Not that I like DRM, but how is the consumer better off with no imported shows than with DRM-laden imported shows?
Nope, however I have neither the time, nor the inclination to respond to your diatribe, unless of course I get paid a penny everytime someone reads my reply, for the rest of my life + whatever number of years your government legislates after I'm dead. Fuck, I spent a number of years in education, learning how to walk, snog, write, type, ride a bicycle, blow my nose - I should be recompensed, shouldn't I?
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
It's about time we sat down & looked at this copyright/DRM lark seriously. In no other profession can you expect to earn money, 70 sodding years after you are dead, for 3 hours work.
Or indeed any amount of work your ancestors may have done for decades after they died.
1) You're comparing a service (like wall painting), which is arranged for in advance and with terms understood to both parties, to - for example - a novel. Which the author risks his time to write, with no known buyers necessarily lined up (unless a publisher really wants to front some money, against future sales, just to keep in the author's good graces).
Yet people keep writing novels without any kind of publishing arrangement in place. Indeed some authors, e.g. J K Rowling, have great difficulty getting published.
There are also authors (including published ones) who "give away" their novels. Including as readings, even audio plays (with a large cast).
Apologies, how's this then? In no other profession can one expect to earn money.
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
You're still thinking of business in terms that only really fit the physical distribution of a limited commodity. Rentals? Why rent? The media is beyond cheap and the distribution nearly instantaneous with the ability to cheaply create unlimited copies. It's more akin to selling air, which is convenient to purchase at the pump to fill your tires; most of the value comes from that convenience because air is ubiquitous. I'm not saying the media comes without cost but that cost has been grossly exaggerated in part by the lack of a pre-existing delivery system.
But before I completely bore you with my tangent: renting is now totally unnecessary. Tivo proved this. Emusic proved this. Cable proved this. By struggling to recreate this limited availability these companies are essentially creating the Pirate Bays and Rapidshares out there and that's their new profit stream. You needn't care how long a 'rental' is yours because you're not denying anyone else access to it.
As for try before you buy, streaming lower quality bitrates works great for this. Some people might be happy to rip these, but not much if higher quality media is trivially cheap.
DRM achieves nothing but emulating the distribution of boxed plastic disks and sooner or later no one will really remember such out dated content delivery systems, well, but us old timers.
Yet people keep writing novels without any kind of publishing arrangement in place
Exactly. They are investing their time, and taking a risk. Just like all entrepenuers. And like most ventures, it doesn't work out for most people, because very few are particularly good at what they attempt, or have a clue about the market they're trying to approach.
There are also authors (including published ones) who "give away" their novels. Including as readings, even audio plays (with a large cast).
When, where, and how they choose to. Which is a lot different than having the work ripped of just because someone else who doesn't feel like paying for their entertainment knows a technical way to pirate the work.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Combat piracy by getting rid of the concept. The idea of pegged legged men with ships ceasing limited goods and wealth should be relegated to it's place in our history. As for the delivery of digital and streaming media the idea relies on too many false pretenses. The cost of controlling access to content is astronomical. The very act is hostile towards the consumer, and eventually futile in an endless game of cat and mouse. Ubiquitous, cheap content is the most likely answer. Combat piracy by making it available, convenient and cheap. This is the era of economics of scale. The golden age of paid content is ahead of us and it won't rely on tricking consumers with scarcity induced by DRM but by using digital delivery to provide convenience and ease of access at a lower cost. Trading files only really makes sense with restrictive or cost prohibitive access.
Nope, however I have neither the time, nor the inclination to respond to your diatribe
Of course you don't. Because you know you trotted out an absurdly wrong-headed analogy, and realize it makes no sense to compare home improvement services with creative works made in advance of, in and in speculation of sales.
unless of course I get paid a penny everytime
By different people? Perhaps. That would be a better fit, conceptually, with the actual topic at hand, as opposed to your earlier bit of nonsense.
I spent a number of years in education, learning how to walk, snog, write, type, ride a bicycle, blow my nose - I should be recompensed, shouldn't I
No, not unless you can find some people interested in what you actually do for them, with all of that fine experience under your belt. But since, given your examples, you don't sound like the kind of person who ever does invest and risk months of your life at a time in the creation of something that you hope you can market to readers/listeners/viewers, I can see how you don't really understand the topic at all. Too many hours of house paint fumes, perhaps.
Comments like yours are always conspicuously missing a proposal for how a market of media buyers will sort out the merit of one artist's work relative to another, and find a way to buy what they like, and ignore what they don't, and still avoid having the truly creative, in-demand artist not simply have their work ripped off by millions the moment it's in the hands of the first person who buys it. Let me guess: you propose some sort of government-based artists' fund and bureaucracy? A tax on everyone, perhaps, so that anyone who says they're an artist can collect money, all so that people who like to pirate entertainment they're too cheap to pay for can finally feel off the hook for stealing from the very artists they claim to admire?
Nah. Artists producing something people actually want, physicists, house painters, people who have no aspiration or drive to do more than pluck chickens - it's all the same. Perhaps there should simply be a national wage for all people. Well, except for the Pay Czars, of course. They need a little something extra, what with the stress and all. It's hard to find just the right amount of currency to make sure that the house painter is just as happy as the person who creates something loved by millions of people, isn't it? Whew! Hard work, comrade.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The sticker price is merely a starting point for the negotiations.
The buyer and seller come to a mutually beneficial agreement they both like.
So why should "art" be different from all other commercial transactions?
PS are you really called "Ohrion"? Shows what you think of your position...
Oooh, snag a finger nail did we?
I spent a goodly time in the book publishing industry, so am well aware of the creative pain. I was also associated, thankfully briefly, with the music industry, and am well aware of the bleeding opposite.
My younger brother spent the best part of 1975 writing a book on Advanced Stats & got it published. For the first two years he sold
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
At the risk of being burned at the stake, [...]
Don't sweat it. Your post doesn't contain enough evidence for the mods to conclusively prove that you weigh the same as a duck.
If it's $3 to rent and $9 to buy, then they'd have to rent *over* three times as much as they'd sell, since there's also three times the bandwidth to be paid for now, as well as the costs of the DRM.
Have you done the market research which shows that the demand for $3 rentals does indeed not exceed the demand for $9 purchases by a factor of three?
If there is this higher demand for rentals, it makes (in an objective sense) perfect sense to offer it. If people making the offer think the higher demand exists, it makes subjective, i.e. from their POV, sense to offer it.
You claim this isn't the case. Got data?
It is all well and good that your heart is bleeding for these uncomprehended artists, until you realise that a few weeks of work guarantees many of them decades of earnings without them ever moving a single finger any more.
The tragic thing is that actually artists are not the ones deriving much from the abusive copyright terms, but rather music labels, film mega corporations, mammoth editorial houses, and the nascent influential big game makers.
Before copyright became a matter of mummification, you could expect that an artists would enjoy the labours of their work for a reasonable, short period of time, before the public at large could use those works, never created in a vacuum, in order to create new works that enriched us all.
It is monumentally ignorant to have a dig at patronage as a means to promote the arts that could bypass copyright altogether, for the simple reason that it is proven to work.
Most of the classical music prior to the invention of the phonograph was made under patronage of the rich and powerful. Prior to that, religious intent provided enough incentive to create some of the most impressive works of art ever envisaged.
In our time money talks, so there is nothing stopping people organizing syndicates to pay creative people that have probed themselves to be worth paying attention to by means of free content.
The natural state of affairs for human progress has always been cooperation, sharing of ideas and improvement of the ideas of others.
It is only recently in human history that we have been compelled to stop progress by slowing down, in purpose, how ideas are used. This is just sheer madness.
Sooner or later the abusive copyright (and patent) terms that big corporations are lobbied for will be repelled, in their place we will have reaonslbe terms that provide incentive for creative people for a short term, releasing human knowledge to be used by all.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Writing is a service, and there is no reason whatsoever why it can't be paid in advance for. Oh wait, as a matter of fact it is , which is why the payments writers get for writing are just called that: advances. Silly me, what do I know.
There are many risky ways to earn a living, and many people before copyright wrote great works of art without worrying much about copyright, but rather for other reasons. Or do you think that Homer cared much about such a concept?
Good enlightening literature will always be written, copyright or not, because there will always be people wanting to communicate with their fellow human beings without necessarily looking at the state of their wallet first (as a matter of fact this is how most writers approach their work, a select very few actually make a living from writing, all the others just write in the hope of being published but are under no illusions that they will be economically independent thanks to their writing).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Please tell me something. When you buy something do you buy from somebody that imposes asinine terms on you or from somebody that accommodates your needs?
In the case of the BBC one of the overwhelming needs should be that any content produced should be very accessible, with no restrictions at all, and that people should be free to do whatever they want with the content. In other words, it is time the BBC thinks more about their pay masters rather than its providers. What a novel concept!
They could do that, some Production companies would politely decline (because they want to continue living from the copyright gravy train) but some others would come forward and produce work in those terms, finding ways to make a profit.
Perhaps the productions would become more expensive (I doubt it, filming equipment is coming down in price dramatically, so again, unless the precious "creative" people just want to enrich themselves, I fail to see why producing work that would be freely released later should affect them), but again, most of the BBC output is crap (Jonathan Ross, anything with Russell Brand, and the innumerable quiz shows), so maybe it would not be a bad idea to concentrate the minds of production companies by stopping them living of perpetual copyrights.
But I will tell you why this will not happen. The relationship between the bosses in the BBC (hundreds of them!) and the production companies is incestuous in nature. People that work in the BBC jump to work into Production companies and vice versa, and then the ones are the friends of the others.
What hope there is that the BBC will look after the interests of its paymasters when in reality the interests of all the parties involved are elsewhere?
It is only by means of strict regulation and legal enforcement, that the BBC will do what it ought to do, and if they don't do it soon, they will be forced to anyway when the generation of people that understand copyright by the sham it is, achieve positions of political power.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Film and video equipment is spiralling down in price (it is all electronics after all). And ideas are a dime a dozen (really, everybody and his dog are creative. People: creativity is a human trait, not a skill reserved to the relations of BBC and Production Companies' moguls).
If you pay £20 000 000 to somebody like Jonathan Ross, for a frankly mediocre variety show (which amounts to little more than a PR exercies for the latest singer, starlet or celebrity de jour) you can easily pay £1 000 000 to somebody else to make the same crappy show (really, is that guy really that good?) and use the other £19 mill to produce 19 1 hour programmes at 1 million a pop.
1 million is certainly little, but is not peanuts. And like that you could skim through the BBC's budget and find out that the savings are there for the taking.
The BBC would be perfectly fine, it just lacks the people with the courage to make it much better than it currently is.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.