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A Brief History of Failed Digital Rights Management Schemes
antdude points out this article at opensource.com on the "graveyard" of digital rights management schemes — the death of each of which has left customers out in the cold. An excerpt: "There are more than a few reasons digital rights management (DRM) has been largely unsuccessful. But the easiest way to explain to a consumer why DRM doesn't work is to put it in terms he understands: 'What happens to the music you paid for if that company changes its mind?' It was one thing when it was a theoretical question. Now it's a historical one ..."
'What happens to the music you paid for if that company changes its mind?
Answer: It PlaysForSure (TM).
What happens to the music you paid for if that company changes its mind?
Well in the Apple iTunes case the audio quality was improved and the DRM was also removed.
What do you mean it didn't work? DRM schemes such as Microsoft's "Play Anywhere" are abandoned and then the customer who paid good money for the music has to buy it again if they still want it,. DRM works exactly as planned and intended/
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Several years ago when I first learned of HDLC, I posted here into a thread about the "new" high-definition technology warning that there was a new connector coming (it became HDMI) and a new nasty form of DRM going along with it (HDLC) and that people should hold off because the early adopters were going to get screwed. The response was a lot of angry posts telling me that I didn't know what I was talking about, early adopters told me that their expensive TV sets could play HD just fine, and I was modded down, apparently so people considering buying an early set without HDMI and HDLC would not see my warning.
Now people who bought those amazingly expensive early "monitors" can't watch HD content from a Blu-Ray player or on-line streaming service on them (although they can enjoy grainy 480 line service). Why? Apparently we can get angry enough when a bank tries to charge $60 a year to spend our own money via a debit card, but we are not able to get angry enough with the content providers when they screw us and make it clear their intent is to buy congressmen to subvert the intention of Copyright as stated in the U.S. Constitution. So the content providers are going to keep screwing their customers. I'm sure that they would like to screw more people, but so far they have only figured ut how to screw the artists and the customers, aside for some random lawsuits that assume if you are not signing up for the screwing then you mist be a criminal.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
It's insane to call Apple's FairPlay DRM a failed system, as the item for this says. The system did exactly what it was supposed to do. It allowed Apple to start legally selling something that the record labels wouldn't allow without it and then it was taken away when the labels agreed to go without it. The system worked as advertised. It achieved the goals of building a market for legal music. And then it went away. It was very successful and then it was retired when it was no longer needed.