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."

Comments

Consumer? Pah.

[wiggys]

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.

Re:Consumer? Pah.

[ScentCone]

The only people who benefit from DRM are content providers.

Well, then, maybe all of the people who want content, and who are always complaining about the quality of content, should look for a way to get what they want without there being any content creators/providers who do what they do with any prospect of earning a living. If we can just dispense with this whole notion of creative professionals, and just settle for entertainment created by junior high school vampire romance fangurlz, Bon Jovi tribute bar bands, street mimes, and hippes who want everyone to have their vegan curry recipes (for free!) then everything would just settle down nicely. There's absolutely no need for people who work for years on recording or film projects. It's pointless to expect people to work off and on for a decade on a novel. Those people should never be able to sell their works, they should instead focus on t-shirt sales and readings in coffee houses, where they are compensated with a share of the barista's tip jar. After all, it's absurd for anyone to make a single penny the week after they've spent a year doing the actual work of creating something. All entertainment should be paid for in advance by fans. Selling your work, on your own terms, after you invest the time to create it: that's, like, totally fascism.

Here's an idea: just don't do business with DRM-centric content creators or the distribution networks/agents with whom they've chosen to do business. Give your business to people who want to give away their work for free. If that really is the way to earn a living as a creative person, then truth of that notion will be plain for all to see. Put your money (or the lack of spending it) where your mouth is. If having a say in how your creative work is reproduced strikes you as eeeevil, then you surely wouldn't want to enjoy entertainment or information produced by someone who embraces the idea anyway, right? Right? Because, you know, that would be intellectually dishonest.

Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

"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.

BBC Bias

[TheRaven64]

Somewhat off topic, which is why I didn't mention this in the summary, but this is a good example of the BBC covering a BBC-related story in a balanced manner. The subject of the story is the BBC's attempt to do something being blocked, and you will note several things:

1. The story exists at all.
2. It contains more quotes from people opposed to the plans than in favour of it.
3. The people opposing it do not have cherry-picked quotes making them look crazy.

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...

Re:Need Better Input Than This

[alecto]

Then let the "content providers" take their ball and go home. If they think they're not leaving money on the table, their call. But keep your digital restrictions out of my living room.

Re:Need Better Input Than This

[TheRaven64]

The BBC is publicly funded. Their mandate to work in the public interest should trump all other concerns. If a studio wishes to make DRM a condition of licensing their content, then the BBC should walk away. It will harm the studio a lot more than it will harm the BBC. They should put the money that they save by not licensing the content into producing original content.

Re:Need Better Input Than This

[Anonymous Coward]

The premium HD content providers to the BBC are interested in this so you'll need a different strategy than just saying, "wrong wrong wrong."

The BBC should not be buying in premium content. The reason why all UK TV owners have to buy a license is to provide financing for the BBC, to enable them to provide quality programming other channels consider money losers. The UK already has 100s of channels showing crap from all over the world, including so-called premium TV shows.

DRM has nothing to do with piracy, that's just BS. The sole reason for DRM is to take the industry and consumer over to pay per view/listen models.

BBC should answer to society, not companies

[Lemming Mark]

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.

MSNBC and FOX are both to the right

[FreeUser]

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.