DRM Has Always Been a Horrible Idea

An anonymous reader writes "For years, the reaction of the big entertainment companies to digital disruption has been to try and restrict and control, a wrong-headed approach that was bound to backfire. But the entertainment companies were never known for being forward thinking whether it was radio in the 20s or cassette tapes in the 70s or VCRs in the 80s or Napster in the 90s. The reaction was the always the same. Take a defensive position and try to battle the disruptive force. And it never worked. And DRM was perhaps the worst reaction of all, place restrictions on your content that punish the very people who were willing to pay for it, while others were free to use it without restriction. It was an approach that never made much sense, and it's good to know that mounting evidence proves that's the case."

Comments

No Shit

[thatkid_2002]

Sherlock.

Re:No Shit

[dgatwood]

In other news, the sky is blue.

Re:No Shit

[houstonbofh]

The news is not that DRM is bad. The news is that people outside of IT are realizing it.

Re:No Shit

[FunkDup]

DRM is bad.

I was watching this recently posted video of Ray Kurzweil interviewing Robert Freitas, a "nanobot theoretician", about the current state of nanotech. Freitas suggested the use of DRM techniques as a way of preventing the malicious use of nanotechnology. Seems like a "good" application to me. There's another video of RK interviewing Eric Drexler whichh is also interesting.

Re:No Shit

[wbr1]

Did you buy or pirate that Sherlock. If the DRM were intact you couldn't even use the title, therefore we are issuing a cease and desist letter as well as requesting that formal charges be filed.

Re:No Shit

[Hatta]

Freitas suggested the use of DRM techniques as a way of preventing the malicious use of nanotechnology. Seems like a "good" application to me.

Me too. That sounds like a well intentioned application that would be wonderful to realize. The problem is that in the real world, DRM of any sort only restricts legitimate users. This has been true with every instance of DRM anywhere in the world, ever. Would you trust DRM to protect us against nanobots with that track record?

Of course not. So his point stands, DRM is bad.

Re:No Shit

[phantomfive]

He's not a very good nanobot theoretician (seriously, where do these guys even come from?). If he were, he'd realize that the simple solution would be to teach one nanobot to break the DRM of another nanobot (through soldering, reprogramming, whatever). Then you'd have two nanobots that are free, and they can do the same to two other nanobots. Then you have four nanobots that are free, and it doesn't take long for the whole swarm to unleash itself.

Part of the reason DRM never works is because, well, it doesn't work. There's always away around it.

Re:No Shit

[Smauler]

_THIS_. I hate DRM in all its forms. I want it to go away.

However, Steam with DRM have managed to produce a platform that is not intrusive, not problematic, and just works, and they give decent value for money. They have done DRM right, and it is showing in their sales figures.

DRM right is antithetical to loads of people... but they've given loads of advantages to me... Installing and playing my games where I like, just with a login. Installing games after 3 separate hard drive failures, without having to search out discs. The removable drive is obsolete for me.

Re:No Shit

[rtb61]

That is not actually true. They always new DRM was bad, that it sucked and people would hate it, that is after all why DRM is called Digital Rights Management, a straight up marketing misdirection. The very name itself is in direct contradication to it's application. DRM is basically all about stealing the digital rights of the end user. That is why Digital Rights Management is not called what it actually is Copyright Enforcement Management. They knew from the get go it was bad, they knew people would hate it, they planned to steal people's purchasing rights with it, all they cared about was greed, current applications of greed and future applications of even greater greed. They did not give one fuck about how bad it was and now they are only 'temporarily' edging back on it because it is costing them customers and profit. They will be at it again, they will try to make it legally compulsary on all electronic devices, they will try to enforce prisons terms for interfering with DRM, as psychopathsy their only motivation is greed and they do not care about consequences for the end user.

Re:No Shit

[fractoid]

When you study business, management, or basically anything "non-technical" you don't give a shit and just want the nerds to go sit in the back room and do whatever it is they do so the computers magically keep working.

Re:No Shit

[Artifakt]

I don't see this as 'doing DRM right', so much as 'doing it less wrong'. Many of us tolerate Steam's DRM because it's less annoying than what other companies want to use, often much less annoying. Compared to Steam, some of the other DRM schemes we've seen are nightmarish. But saying Steam's DRM is good is still only true in the sense that brushing and flossing and having your teeth cleaned every 6 months is much less annoying than a root canal - it doesn't mean we actually wake up mornings thinking, "Oh swell, I get to have my teeth cleaned today!".

            You list several things Steam does that are advantagious, but any company distributing content online should give you the benefit of not having to search out discs, that's a core function of their business. Sequentially reinstalling games after a drive failure or three, and having it generally work smoothly and 'painlessly', is something that becomes more critical to get right because of DRM, as people also sometimes need to redownload and reinstall if the DRM itself screws something up. When DRM has just done something annoying to the customer, you want the experience of fixing it to be as pleasant as possible so the greater experience of your business as a whole doesn't leave a negative impression.

Re:No Shit

[cheekyjohnson]

_THIS_. I hate DRM in all its forms. I want it to go away.

They have done DRM right

Does not compute.

Also, I'm fairly certain that certain games on Steam don't have any DRM whatsoever and can be used without Steam (though, they're probably a minority).

Re:No Shit

[Opportunist]

That pretty much sums up how people feel about DRM. They also feel like that about security, btw.

It must not cut into what they want to do. It must not disrupt their experience. People don't mind DRM, just like they don't care about security. They're fine with either as long as it does not keep them from doing what they want to do. Within reason, of course. DRM will keep them from distributing copies, security will keep them from installing malware.

That certainly bugs a few users. But, and that's the important thing, not the majority of them.

While on the other end of the scale there is crap like the stunts that UBIsoft and EA have been trying to pull, with perpetual connection to servers for single player playing. Which predictably backfired to the point where you could not play their games if you bought them while your buddies who copied them could play them just fine. That does bother them. That bothers them like the overzealous security suite that keeps them from starting their games because they use some warped loader or because it doesn't like how the anticheat module hooks into the data stream to the server.

Steam found that sweet spot where most people put up with it. It's actually even more convenient for most people than the old "put the original CD in" DRM. Simply because you don't even need to have your CD ready. Steam also offers additional value, another key element if you want your DRM to take off.

DRM by its very definition lowers the value of the product to the user. At the very least it creates some kind of inconvenience. It forces you to do something to get what you want, even if that only means you have to insert that damn CD (which you can never find when you need it) or that you can only install it on one computer at a time. Steam offers that additional value, by keeping games up to date as well as setting some standards. Sadly not in terms of quality of the game, but at least the games have to install smoothly to be part of the fold. Something that can sadly not be said for all such services.

Re:No Shit

[AntiSol]

Ummm, No: What rights you have depends on your local laws. Sounds to me like you should read up on your rights.

It has never been considered copyright infringement to make a backup of something or to transfer it to another medium. DRM attempts to prevent exactly this. this is established all over the place. For me, the following excerpt from wikipedia seems relevant:

In late 2006, Australia added several 'private copying' exceptions. It is no longer an infringement of copyright to record a broadcast to watch or listen at a more convenient time (s 111), or to make a copy of a sound recording for private and domestic use (e.g., copy onto an iPod) (s 109A), or make a copy of a literary work, magazine, or newspaper article for private use (43C).

What DRM really does is two things: 1) waste resources on your computer providing absolutely nothing desirable and nothing that can't be bypassed in seconds, shortening its lifespan and increasing its energy consumption, and 2) piss off legitimate users who want to do things they're legally allowed to do, turning their customers into their enemies. Good job!

Re:No Shit

[Jaysyn]

Does not compute.

Also, I'm fairly certain that certain games on Steam don't have any DRM whatsoever and can be used without Steam (though, they're probably a minority).

That is correct. The amount of DRM that goes into a Steamworks game is controlled by the publisher, not by Valve.

http://steam.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games

Re:No Shit

[crashcy]

Never heard of Steam's offline mode? There's also this list of DRM-free games. You'll notice that all of Valve's games are on that list (except the multiplayer games). Steam is a distribution platform. Valve doesn't decide the DRM that people put into their games. Stop spreading FUD and do some research.

Re:No Shit

[nine-times]

In fairness, DRM is capable of preventing very casual misuse. The DRM on games keeps a kid from saying to his friend, "Oh, let me just copy that for you." If you could have something akin to DRM on guns, it might prevent little Jimmy from shooting himself accidentally while playing with it, and it might prevent a casual street thug with no expertise from stealing it.

But you're right, it won't stop a determined individual with expertise from gaining access. Even at best, you can't think of it as an absolute control over access. No security is absolute. The problem, to my mind, is not the abstract intention of embedding security to control the use of a product or technology. The problem is using security in digital media to restrict the access of people who have "purchased" that media. Specifically, the problem is that the people designing the DRM aren't able to anticipate (and therefore allow) all the possible legitimate uses. If they've sold me a movie, they don't know all the devices I might want to watch it on. They don't know what kind of conversion I might want to do on it 5 years from now. They can't separate the unlawful distribution from a legitimate fair-use distribution. What's worse, many people suspect that the media companies are actually attempting to use the DRM to restrict fair-use on purpose to force us all to constantly repurchase the same media.

So that's the problem. "DRM" is really just security. Security can be good, but poorly designed security will cause more trouble for authorized users than for unauthorized users. Security can also be designed, maliciously, to allow abuse by the designer. In short, the problem with "DRM" is that it's security for a product that I purchased, designed to benefit someone other than me. Putting a car alarm in my new car might make sense. Designing that car alarm so that the manufacturer can (and will) lock me out of my own car whenever they want... is not such a great idea.

Re:No Shit

[jedidiah]

> What rights you have depends on what rights the copyright holder wishes to give you when you hand over your money

WRONG. I have certain rights based on ancient notions of personal property.

DRM is an attempt to deny rights to individuals.

Corrupt laws that help enforce DRM are more of the same. They unjustly turn a purely technological limitation into a legal one.

Re:No Shit

[ArhcAngel]

That pretty much sums up how people feel about DRM. They also feel like that about security, btw.

BINGO! How many people wake up to go to the airport thinking "OH Goody! I get to go through the TSA checkpoints on my way to grandma's." but they do it because it's the only way to get on the plane. There are plenty of people who will not fly because of the hassle flying has become since the TSA was enacted but they are still a minority. Same thing with 2Factor authentication. It is a PITA but the threat of a security breach has made it a reality for most of us. Steam has made DRM as unobtrusive as I believe is possible with current technology. I still don't like having the DRM there but at least it gets out of my way.

Re:No Shit

[dragon-file]

Gratuitous Space Battles is one example. After installing the game the whole directory can be copied to a flash drive, transferred to another computer, and it will run standalone. No need to install steam or even take it off the flash drive. This is just one example and not all games have this level of freedom. DRM encountered in steam is entirely at the software developers discretion. Just look at Red Faction: Guerrilla. *Shudder* Microsoft DRM.

um, yeah... so?

[Anonymous Coward]

I expected a blog post with lots of citations and historical information... instead it's just some random guy's opinion... Hey, I have opinions too! Maybe I should submit them as slashdot stories?

Re:um, yeah... so?

[icebike]

Well, ok, but only as long as your blog posts count as "Mounting Evidence".

Re:um, yeah... so?

[Runaway1956]

Mounting evidence at Baen Books.

http://baen.ghostwheel.com/#RIAA

The more stuff they give away, the more money they make. Rest in peace, Jim Baen.

Score one for Disney!

[achbed]

And the guy doesnt even mention current events. Fail.

Define worked

[WillAffleckUW]

Last time I checked Disney was still raking in the cash and redefining copyright length to ensure their cash flow.

DRM does not work for a specific product, but backed with a vast array of lawyers and donations to lawmakers, it manages to persist and have a fairly high ROI - enough to give major bumps up to CEO pay.

Will it be defeated eventually? Sure.

Will it be defeated earlier by those who tend not to pay tons of money without thinking? Sure.

But it is intended to be an irritant to defeating reasonable copying. And on that score, for those markets that have the money to pay easily and the attention span of a gnat, it works fairly well.

Personally, I hate it, but that's another matter.

Re:Define worked

[swillden]

Last time I checked Disney was still raking in the cash and redefining copyright length to ensure their cash flow.

Yeah, just look at the billions Disney is raking in from sales of Steamboat Willie.

</sarcasm>

Disney makes lots of money, and has been instrumental in extending copyright terms, but I see no evidence that the latter has anything to do with the former. Oh, they occasionally make a few millions by re-releasing one of their older films (Bambi, Snow White, etc.), and then pulling it off the shelf again, but that's a pittance compared to the money they make from new releases and all of the other media they produce.

They want complete control.

[Anonymous Coward]

The reason we have piracy; when Copyright lasts longer than a single human lifetime, nothing ever produced during your lifetime will ever be released to enrich the public domain, therefor there is absolutely no benefit for an individual to participate in copyright.

Netflix, Amazon, Steam, Hulu; these are a ruse to weaken and ultimately control piracy. They License for a set term their works to said services and can Revoke those contracts at any time as has been demonstrated today by the lively article about Disney removing already-paid-for streaming content from Amazon.

It isn't "Mainstream Media" it's "Media Monopoly"; Get it Straight and stop using their words to make their crimes sound better than they actually are.

Because those works cannot ever be copied, there will always be a dwindling supply; Imagine Star Wars, Ghost in the Shell, or Iron Man being forgotten and all copies of them being tossed down the memory hole 100 years from now. This has already happened with old movies from the 30's through the 70's and is starting to happen to what was made in the 80's and 90's.

Re:They want complete control.

[M. Baranczak]

Imagine Star Wars, Ghost in the Shell, or Iron Man being forgotten and all copies of them being tossed down the memory hole 100 years from now.

It's already pretty hard to find a legal copy of the original version of Star Wars.

Re:They want complete control.

[gnasher719]

The reason we have piracy; when Copyright lasts longer than a single human lifetime, nothing ever produced during your lifetime will ever be released to enrich the public domain, therefor there is absolutely no benefit for an individual to participate in copyright.

That's a pathetic lie. Piracy happens because people are too cheap to pay for goods. Nobody pirates Kanye West or Adele (both in the top ten of pirated music) because they have to wait 90 years for copyright to run out. They pirate it because they want to listen to the music _now_ without paying.

Now if you can't get some work because it is under copyright but not for sale anywhere, that's one thing. But most works that get pirated are available to purchase, and the only difference is whether you want to pay or not.

Old skool history of copy protection

[Neo-Rio-101]

We don't have to look far into the past as to what happens when DRM enters the picture.

Take the humble Commodore 64. The most common home micro of the 80s.
Lots of users. Lots of software. Lots of piracy.
What happened in the end is that lots of companies making software made lots of money, despite the piracy, until the computer faded into obscurity with a dwindling userbase that had moved on to more powerful computers.

All DRM "disk copy protection" was eventually broken, and just about all game software ever released for the computer is downloadable online (you know where to look). The end result is that we have a nice digital archive, complete with emulators, left for historians or anyone who wants to relive what it was like to use the machine in the hight of it's heyday (or simply to see what all the fuss was about playing "Impossible Mission" or something)

If it wasn't for the pirates and crackers willing to ignore the ridiculous copyright law time extensions, copy programs to different countries where they were not available for sale (over the pre-internet BBSes) chances are we might not have a digital archive, or at least be missing important bits. By the time the copyrights expire, the magnetic media, if anyone still had any left, would be corrupted by bit rot, and the equipment needed to read it may not be in a working state or readily available.

So the Commodore 64 avoids a digital dark age, but I have my doubts about some heavily DRMed content going forward.
In many cases, if something is heavily DRMed and people do not make the effort to break it, it will likely be lost to the digital dustbin of time.

Re:Old skool history of copy protection

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

A fitting end, obscurity.

Only if you believe that creative works are owned by their creators rather than become part of the culture once published and thus owned by everyone in society. If you believe the later, than any creative work lost to DRM is a loss to all of us.

Re:Old skool history of copy protection

[Mandrel]

Take the humble Commodore 64. The most common home micro of the 80s. Lots of users. Lots of software. Lots of piracy. What happened in the end is that lots of companies making software made lots of money, despite the piracy, until the computer faded into obscurity with a dwindling userbase that had moved on to more powerful computers.

I've never owned a game console, but watching things it seemed to me that the reason the Playstation greatly outsold the Nintendo 64 was because the Playstation used crackable CDs while the N64 used cartridges. The weak DRM was a winner for Sony, while the game makers had their piracy losses offset by the bigger ecosystem.

However I don't think this is a good argument that content makers lose more than they gain from DRM. Weak DRM can be a net gain for publishers if some of the gains had by making piracy inconvenient is given back to users as lower prices or automatic updates.

Re:Anonymous Reader

[TheRealDevTrash]

you can make money on the web?

DRM has driven piracy for decades

[onyxruby]

DRM is probably the single greatest driver of privacy that their is. It has never particurlarly been very good at stopping people from accessing content. What is has been good at is creating artificial barriers that allow for greater market segmentation. It does things like allow for different regions for DVD's and Blu Ray's or making photoshop so expensive in Australia it used to cheaper to fly to America, buy a copy and fly back. DRM just has to be enough to make something clearly illegal and frustrate most users.

It gives an excuse to force people to provide marketing information to be able to use a product that they paid cash for. It creates a market in file trading from unusable media is used to justify the greatest land grab of civil rights in history (Trans Pacific Partnership AKA SOPA 2). DRM is an excuse to change the very concept of "I own that' to "I lease that".

You pair that with laws that will put people who break it into prison and now you have a society that is firmly in the grip of IP based companies. Throw in the patent wall that makes an upstart like Compaq all but impossible nowadays and you have an oligarchy that can effectively never be challenged due to insurmountable legal costs. You can't go around them with DRM or you go to prison, you can't fight it in court because it's a treaty and you can't beat them as a competitor. As long as they don't become a monopoly they are untouchable for decades at best.

Just remember that Obama was the president that drove the greatest takeaway of civil rights in history...

Dig Deeper

[ouachiski]

Watson.

Re:Anonymous Reader

[icebike]

That horse left the barn months ago.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/16/riaa-mpaa-would-like-to-scan-your-hard-drive-for-infringing-content/

Re:2003 called, they want their article back

[Todd Knarr]

The thing is, it's been just as much of a problem since, well, just about forever. Think back to how they railed against DVD burners, CD burners, the VCR, hell even cassette tapes. And yet the industry survived all of them by releasing content. You want to know what's killing the industry? Go read this article. Now, how enthusiastic do you think your average person's going to be about buying content when they've just been reminded that the companies "selling" it to them will jerk it away the moment it suits them? I sure wouldn't put my hard-earned money into that, at least not at the prices they want to charge. Charge me the kind of price the video rental place would charge and I'll think about it.

The music and movie industries are in decline simply because they won't provide content their customers want in the form their customers want it. And of course that results in them going out of business. You don't want to sell what people want to buy, don't be surprised when people take their business elsewhere. It doesn't take an MBA to figure that one out.

Re:2003 called, they want their article back

[jd2112]

You don't want to sell what people want to buy, don't be surprised when people take their business elsewhere. It doesn't take an MBA to figure that one out.

No, Apparently it takes someone who isn't an MBA to figure that one out.

Just because some DRM doesn't bug you does not mea

[Anonymous Coward]

I use Steam. I don't like that it inconveniences me. Offline mode works most of the time, but when it doesn't, I get f---ed! I realize most folks have internet available all the time, but I work in remote locations, and often don't. Last winter I was one week into a four week trip when Steam decided it would not work without going online. Fortunately I had some non-Steam games and was not completely out of luck. Leaves me feeling I would be better off pirating.

I pirate after I bought my first BluRay

[Anonymous Coward]

I purchased Futurama on BluRay after having purchased a reader for my PC. I was unable to watch the discs because of copy protection.

This is the best argument for NOT paying for the content ever invented, that's for damn sure.

Re:I pirate after I bought my first BluRay

[green1]

My TV provider has apps to let you watch TV shows and movies on your tablet, computer and phone, these are free with your subscription. I tried to do things legally, but the web app won't run on Linux on the PC due to it using DRM in silverlight, and refuses to run on rooted phones or tablets. Some of the TV shows also make sure you are on your home wifi before they allow you to play, and only 2 or 3 devices are allowed to be registered.
I download the content instead. Now I get shows and movies I can watch anywhere on any device at any time. As an added bonus the stuff I download is commercial free, unlike the stuff they won't let me watch on my terms. Now I look at my monthly TV bill and wonder why I pay it at all? I suppose it makes me feel more entitled to the downloads, even though they are being provided by the Internet community and not by the TV provider, (after all, I'm watching the same things I'm supposed be allowed to watch on the apps I can't run due to DRM) but I'm sure I'm not alone in seeing DRM as pushing me away from the media companies instead of toward them.

Re:DRM is technology misapplied

[Dunbal]

DRM is misapplied by design. Because my computer/reading device has to be able to decode it. Therefore I can decode it. It's just a question of figuring out how, be it scanning memory or playing around with a soldering iron on the motherboard. And of course only one person has to figure out how to break it. Then everyone can break it.

Re:What is this DRM of which you speak?

[Anonymous Coward]

And will it stop me from downloading music and films from the internet?

Not at all. Matter of fact, it will make the "public" incarnation stripped of DRM just that much more valuable.

I will post AC because I am going to reveal something a lot of us already know, but the business types have not caught onto it yet.

This is an example: I have two old DOS CAD systems which I still use to this day. Both of them originally came with dongles. I debugged one of them personally, the other I used a crack for de-dongling it. I could not have any trust for a program that relied on a single point of failure which would render the thing inoperable, just as I would never buy a delivery truck for my employer if I knew the water pump in it was special and no aftermarket product was legal. Which means a failed water pump would render the whole truck inoperable.

I would feel just as foolish building an executively appointed luxury hotel, deliberately designing it so when the toilet plugged, the cleanouts were inaccessible, and the entire hotel would be rendered inoperable. It seems only someone with a business education, not an engineering mindset, would buy into such a ridiculous thing.

Now, I do not have an MBA, but there seems to be a whole bunch of people out there which seem to completely lack the common sense to never buy a critical part of a business that cannot be replaced should it fail. To me, the infrastructure that allows a business to access its information certainly qualifies as a critical structure. To think that anyone would even consider having their access to their own information revokable by an arbitrary third party to me is absolutely inconceivable, yet there are people out there, with a business education - no less - that will accept such a thing.

When I see business accept such a thing, my respect for ones who buy into this drops by orders of magnitude.

I think of them more as the foolish kid who buys into some shell game some huckster is playing on them, and they yet have to figure out they are simply being had.

Re:2003 called, they want their article back

[TubeSteak]

It talks about how revenues went up after DRM was removed.

It'd be nice if these articles were a little less narrow minded, [...] and would, at least, acknowledge the fact that piracy has been a huge problem for the industry.

You don't dispute TFA's study that piracy increases music sales, yet you claim "piracy has been a huge problem for the industry."
Which is it?

See this graph to understand what I'm talking about (and this graph is a few years old, I'm sure it looks even worse than this, now): http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/4d5ea2acccd1d54e7c030000/music-industry.jpg

On its own, that graph proves nothing besides the fact that people are spending less on digital music and CDs.
Your argument-by-assertion holds no water at all.

Re:DRM the only long-term answer.

[Smauler]

Popular downloading sites have shown that people won't buy if they're given a choice. Indeed, compare the number of console games sold to the number of PC games sold

Bullshit. Diablo III sold getting on for 15 million copies, almost all on the PC.

Steam do not release sales figures. Steam is at least 50% of the PC download market, and do not release sales figures.

Well, That's A Mighty Courageous Stand

[Greyfox]

Wow, I know it must have taken a lot of courage to come out and take a stand against DRM here on Slashdot, but you just went ahead and did it, didn't you? Some day I'm sure there will be an epic song about this event which most of us won't hear because it's protected by DRM.

Re:Artsy types

[TheSeatOfMyPants]

*Publishers* are the ones that are stringently in favor of DRM, and they aren't remotely artsy -- they're MBA types the exist to squeeze every last cent out of both the consumers and the creators they represent.

Writers fit the same spectrum of beliefs & reactions as anyone else, and can't really be distinguished from the rest of the population. They don't have much control over whether DRMis used on their novel unless they're self-publishing (which very few capable of getting a publishing contract choose to do). The "artsy" stereotype applied to the now-rare beatnik &hippy subcultures, but that was about it.

Re:Just because some DRM doesn't bug you does not

[jones_supa]

Leaves me feeling I would be better off pirating.

Not so easy gringo...fortunately there exists services like GOG.com. Download the full installer (and a heap of bonus material), archive on your favorite storage medium, own forever and play when you want.

Valve's position as a data service

[Inflammatory Fallacy]

The trick to Steam's success isn't that it provides 'convenient' DRM. It doesn't. Steam doesn't allow client-free downloads and it becomes markedly more difficult to use without a steady Internet connection. But Steam makes up for this by giving the users a couple services that improve the overall experience. First off, Steam has automatic updates run through a single program. That's something that you can't get by pirating any of the games. Secondly, Steam Workshop, for the few games it's actually implemented in (Skyrim and Portal are the success stories), allows access to something fairly useful and convenient for modding games. Then, when you add in Steam Sales, easier installation and add-on installation, and verified access to online portions of games, it's more obvious that Steam isn't just a way to download games. Installers like it in the past never got off the ground because they failed to give a real tangible addition to the games it sold. That's the same reason Origin will never really get off the ground (instead of giving the users something they want, it forces them to download a bloated useless program to use what they already bought without providing any new service whatsoever). If all it did was download games, nobody would use it, because with the slightest bit of work and know-how, you can do the same thing without it for free. What Steam does right is add just enough of a reward to players to keep them coming back. It's a lesson that other companies might try to learn if they want to stave off the 'threat' of piracy in the future.

Re:2003 called, they want their article back

[FireFury03]

Source: "Slashdot: In a new Rasmussen poll, 75% of American adults would rather read a book in traditional print format than in an ebook format. Only 15% prefer the ebook format (the other 10% are undecided)." http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/07/21/1143210/poll-shows-that-75-prefer-printed-books-to-ebooks

Actually, the licencing policies of ebooks are the primary reason why I still read paper books instead of ebooks: I actually quite like the ebook format, and all other things being equal I would probably switch to ebooks.

However, with paper books, you buy a book and read it. Then you hand it to your partner, who reads it. Maybe you lend it to some friends to read. It sits on your bookshelf for a while. Then you have kids and in 20 years' time they read it and possibly pass it on to their kids. Maybe you decide to sell it for a small amount of pocket change. Conversely, if I buy an ebook from Google Play, I can read it... that's it - its tied to my Play account, I can't move it into my partner's Play aggount for her to read, I can't lend it to any friends, even if Play is even still around in 20 years time I won't be able to hand it on to my kids, and I can't sell it. In theory, I *could* lend my partner my entire tablet (tied to my play account) so that she can read it, but even this is explicitly disallowed by the Play T&Cs, so strictly speaking I can't even legally do that.

To my mind, this so greatly devalues the product that I'm not interested in handing over money for it. And, frankly, I'm surprised that anyone wants to buy an ebook with these terms attached to it - all of the things I've mentioned that I want to be able to do with my books are *normal* and acceptable things that most people have been doing with books for generations and I'm surprised that people aren't totally shocked and dismayed when they find they can't do any of this anymore with ebooks they had "bought".

Sounds like a lot of feel-good pirate nonsense. The music industry started selling DRM-free music years ago. It continues to decline.

Does it? The last figures I saw (admittedly around a year ago) seemed to clearly show a decline in album sales and a steep increase in single track sales. Even without copyright infringement this wouldn't surprise me at all - for CDs, except for a few selected tracks that are (expensively) made available as singles for a short period after their release, if you like one or two tracks you have to buy the entire album. Now, you can buy just the tracks you like, so is there any surprise that album sales are being rapidly surplanted by singles sales?

Also, its worth remembering that the economy has been utterly screwed over the past few years, so not entirely surprising that people might be cutting back on the amount they spend on nonessentials.

I think it's time to all admit to yourselves that *some* people will pay for stuff and some people are going to try to avoid spending money on music and movies so they can by expensive clothes, iPhones, expensive laptops, and other physical stuff.

Absolutely - some people are going to spend money on entertainment, irrespective of how badly they are treated by the industry, and some people are going to avoid spending money on entertainment (either by illegally copying, or simply by not consuming the products at all), irrespective of how well they are treated. The people the industry needs to keep happy are the middle-ground - the people who want reasonably priced entertainment and don't want to get screwed over - make the products too expensive, or artificially break them with DRM and the business from these people will be lost.

I do think that DRM is possibly doing a good job of training people to copy content who otherwise wouldn't - if you keep buying content and keep finding that the only way to do re

Science, engineering, and technology

[Pfhorrest]

Computer scientists are scientists. They study the theory of how computers can possibly work. They discover the tools nature gives us for building computers.

Software and hardware engineers take the results of computer science and use it to build computers. They create new tools for us to use for our specific purposes.

Information technologists take those tools which engineers have created using the discoveries of the scientists, select the best tools for the job at hand, and make sure that those tools keep working.

IT is to SE is to CS as an auto mechanic is to an automotive engineer is to a physicists studying the mechanics and thermodynamics of theoretical engines.

Re:Nope, absolutely wrong

[JazzLad]

You think copyright ends? How cute!