Slashdot Mirror
FSF Sees Hopeful Signs Before Sunday's 'Day Against DRM' (defectivebydesign.org)
The Free Software Foundation's anti-DRM initiative "Defective By Design" argues that since last year's annual Day Against DRM, "we've seen cracks appearing in the foundation of the DRM status quo."
The companies that profit from Digital Restrictions Management are still trying to expand the system of law and technology that weakens our security and curtails our rights, in an effort to prop up their exploitative business models. But since the last International Day Against DRM, the TPP trade agreement -- a key pro-DRM initiative -- crashed and burned. And our allies at the Electronic Frontier Foundation brought major legal and regulatory challenges against DRM in Washington DC... If we play our cards right, this may be the beginning of the end of DRM.
On Sunday, July 9, 2017, we will channel this momentum into the International Day Against DRM. We'll be gathering, protesting, and making -- showing the world that we insist on a future without Digital Restrictions Management. Will you join us? Here's what you can do now:
They're asking supporters to plan a protest, translate their fliers into more languages, voice support in videos and blog posts, or make endorsements. And you can also join the "DRM Elimination crew" mailing list or their Freenode IRC channel #dbd for year-round conversation and collaboration with the anti-DRM movement -- or simply make a donation to show your support.
On Sunday, July 9, 2017, we will channel this momentum into the International Day Against DRM. We'll be gathering, protesting, and making -- showing the world that we insist on a future without Digital Restrictions Management. Will you join us? Here's what you can do now:
They're asking supporters to plan a protest, translate their fliers into more languages, voice support in videos and blog posts, or make endorsements. And you can also join the "DRM Elimination crew" mailing list or their Freenode IRC channel #dbd for year-round conversation and collaboration with the anti-DRM movement -- or simply make a donation to show your support.
Whether you believe it's a misnomer or not, DRM usually refers to "digital rights management" instead of "digital restrictions management" like what's in the summary. The summary reads like propaganda and is full of rhetoric. Slashdot used to actually be a news site, hence the former motto of news for nerds, stuff that matters. Now, it's run by terrible editors and spews propaganda. Slashdot loses credibility with nonsense like that. The management and editors are doing a wonderful job of running this site into the ground.
... DRM has already won through mass stupidity. The rise of league of legends and "matckmaking" multiplayer services on console games and rebranding drm as "MMO" has already pushed DRM to extreme lenghts where game software is already held hostage on the other side of the net. Microtransactions, loot boxes, etc.
SHITTING OF INDIA 2 CELEBRATE
Sorry, you have NO RIGHT to steel other peoples property. That's why YOUR RIGHTS need to be managed by content owners because you won't do it yourself.
I'm with you, bro! Those fascists will rue the day they messed with our library books! It'll be a BLOODBATH!!!!
The companies that profit from Digital Restrictions Management are still trying to expand the system of law and technology that weakens our security and curtails our rights, in an effort to prop up their exploitative business models.
Everyone exploits everyone else. Our bosses exploit us, and we exploit them by walking out with office supplies, and extended lunch hours, and using company equipment for personal use. We exploit the government by not declaring stuff we should, and being less than forthright when filling out forms. We exploit family by asking for free help, from law, to medical, and even computers. We exploit our neighbors by borrowing things and not reciprocating.
OK, so can we also stop complaining when people refer to copyright infringement as fraud or theft, and start prosecuting it as a criminal offence rather than treating it as a civil matter? After all, it typically does have the overall effect of permanently removing compensation from a legitimate rightsholder for the benefit of the infringer, and you can only dress it up as "they might not have bought it anyway" or "the rightsholder didn't actually lose anything" if you're willing to completely ignore economics while discussing a concept that exists precisely to apply something like the economic incentives of physical works to creative works as well.
Also, can everyone who refers to all DRM as defective by design please confirm that they have never rented anything in their lives, nor bought a one-off ticket to visit somewhere or to see something? Because while applying DRM on works you're supplying as a permanent purchase is one thing, some form of restriction is necessary in practice for any business model that works on a less permanent basis. Far from being exploitative, those business models have been some of the most successful of the Internet age at both providing sustainable revenues for producers and providing more, cheaper and more easily accessible content to consumers.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Oh Donald, it was NEVER hard!
Creators and producers of content should have mechanisms to protect intellectual property and secure reveneue from content. Why is this group fighting against DRM?
Thanks Trump.
It's in quote blocks, it's a quote, the quote is correct.
To reword the FSF paragraph to something other than what they said would be FALSE.
"it's run by terrible editors and spews propaganda"
No, you don't like the stories, but you can always go watch Fox. Nancy Pelosi is a coke dealer in the basement of a pizza shop.... welcome to Fox News. Roger Aisles is dead but his ghost still writes the news copy. Perhaps that's more to your tastes?
...most people would not understand what I am talking about.
It does not matter whether it is Widevine CDM, HTML 5 standards, Trusted Computing or something else.
Most people roll their eyes, when I mention freedom, privacy, and rights in the context of electronics. They often say, "Let them track me. I am not doing anything wrong." or "I need this for work." or "I don't care how it works. Just make it work." They slowly accept their freedom crumbling away.
The general populace is not impressed by:
-Examples where people are stopped or pulled over to have their phones searched.
-By police raids based on incorrect information upon users of IP addresses.
-By illegal seizures of bank accounts.
-By texts used as courtroom evidence on a daily basis.
-By people who are rendered unemployable, stalked, or killed over social media content.
and many more stark examples of their rights being violated.
While I am a true believer in Richard Stallman's wisdom, I find it disheartening to work toward compelling the ignorant masses to do what is in their own best interest. Unfortunately, many seem to be perpetually immune to common sense.
voice support in videos
My endorsement videos will all be DRM protected, thank you very much.
More and more, folks are feeling entitled. Medical insurance is now considered a "basic right" by many whereas 100 years ago it was not.
More and more, corporations want longer and longer copyrights with copyright term going from 14 + 14 years to 95 or 120 years.
These two forces are on a collision course.
The law makers assume they have the final say. But they don't.
Laws such as the Micky Mouse Copyright law or the DMC that are not respected are weak. Enforcement of laws is mostly by self regulation. I choose to not run the red light on a deserted street at midnight out of respect of the law -- not fear of the consequences. Once the law has no respect, the self regulation disappears and the net result is a step closer to anarchy.
Instead of DRM, DMC, and EME, the law makers might take note of the public unrest and revise downward the lifetime of copyrights to the original and sensible 14 + 14 years. The publishers would very likely see a drop in copyright infringement and a slight uptick in profits.
Unfortunately, USA is not the only country that is doing this type of activity. And copyright law is just one area where law makers and society all across the world are progressing further and further astray from each other.
Right on! Jamal will bring some guns too.
Then let me rephrase the DRM issue in a more germane way that excludes your example of a customer who lacks any sort of screen: "I have purchased a copy of your motion picture and want to be able to watch it on any screen I already have, not just those few screens on your whitelist."
TPP was shot doen by Trump, after he had aggressively campaigned against it.
Why do none of these guys give Trump, and the American voter credit here? They all act like it was some mystifying yet benevolent event that passive-voice-occured.
But it was Trump! He just boastsd about defeating it again in his weekly address, in fact.
we the people last i checked are the ones that dictate OUR RIGHTS
not you....and this covenant between a rights holder and me states hes to continue doing with money he gets form me NOT MAKE IT FOR 2 generations , its become a perversion of a pyramid scam where your alzy kids get to sit on there buts or we get crap star trek OR crap star wars or crap tv none of us want
you sir need to get your lazy frickin ass out of non reality cause guess what happens boitch when all the jobs are done by robots
NO ONE WILL HAVE MONEY FOR YOU
DRM as software extortion.
Or DRM as computer extortion?
...I truly feel that freedom in all ways is going to be seen as foolish and childish idealization, and we will be living in a highly micromanaged, tightly controlled world where it
will be practicaly to the point you will have to ask permission to use the bathroom.
Sounds crazy? I wonder if the generation 30 years down the road will think it is, or if real freedom will be as real to them as a magic unicorn.
When you say that DRM's "real expansion" is "Digital Rights Managment" you have bought into some propaganda. It is a thing called "framing". This technology does not handle "Rights" at all. You can't show it your Fair Use rights and get it to do anything. What it actually implements is "Restrictions". So, using "Digital Restrictions Managment" is a fair and accurate term.
Consider it counter-propaganda resisting the original propaganda. I fully support this use and would never use the original expansion in any correspondence because the term itself presupposes something that is not true. Compare it against the Patriot Act, for example. There's nothing much patriotic in there. So, why is it called the Patriot Act? Pure propaganda, of course.
For this post I define "property" as "that which is subject to an exclusive right".
Compulsory licensing is a more difficult question. In theory it might be a good thing, but in practice I am wary of requiring anyone to surrender the control they have of their work by law
In Slashdot's home country, the owner of an exclusive right in a particular property, be it land or a work of authorship, has a Fifth Amendment right to "just compensation" for public use of the property. Constitutionally, a work can enter the eminent domain before it enters the public domain, and "control" doesn't enter into it. Once an author has been compensated enough to cover the cost of producing a work plus enough profit to cover the uncertainty of its becoming popular, what is the use of "control" anyway, other than in preventing competition?
without also providing real enforcement of their rights at government expense.
In Slashdot's home country, there are already criminal penalties for commercial infringement of copyright on a substantial scale.
The supplier chose to use DRM. It's entirely the supplier's fault.
How is it the supplier's fault when all relevant means of delivering a work to the public use digital restrictions management? For example, in the market of video games for handheld devices with physical buttons, both viable platforms (PlayStation Vita and Nintendo 3DS) require use of DRM. The only widely used handheld video game platform that allows DRM-free distribution is Android, which allows the user to temporarily allow installation of APK files from unknown sources. But the problem with Android as a platform is that the vast majority of devices have a touch screen as their only input device, and though a touch screen is ideal for point-and-click genres and games whose control is limited to a single jump button (such as the many SFCave clones), it's not quite so ideal for something in the vein of a run-and-gun or an Igavania.
And in the market for high-definition movies on disc, Blu-ray Disc players will refuse to play movies without AACS.