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May 2009 
DRM is Toast!
Posted on Jun 7th, 2007
by 
~C4Chaos
~C4Chaos
(Crossposted from www.c4chaos.com)
I don't like buying music from iTunes. On the rare occasion I bought a music track, DRM got to me when I switched computers. Sooo not cool. Why do I have to buy that freakin' Billy Joel song again just because I switched to a Mac? I haven't bought a music track since then. That's why I prefer buying CDs and ripping them into my iPod to circumvent the stupid DRMs.
So, I definitely agree with Jon Bischke that DRM will die within 5 years, the sooner the better. Even Steve Jobs sees the light:
"The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.
"Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven’t worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy. Though the big four music companies require that all their music sold online be protected with DRMs, these same music companies continue to sell billions of CDs a year which contain completely unprotected music. That’s right! No DRM system was ever developed for the CD, so all the music distributed on CDs can be easily uploaded to the Internet, then (illegally) downloaded and played on any computer or player."
It's interesting to see how this would fair for movies and videos. That is another uphill battle in the making.
In a related topic, I also agree with Steve Pavlina on the issue of Copyright and Intellectual Property and the Truth About Piracy.
"Who knows where ideas come from? Do we invent ideas from somewhere within our brains? Do we tap into the collective consciousness? Are ideas divinely inspired? I think you’d agree it seems a bit unfair for someone to claim ownership of an idea. Fortunately, the law says we don’t own ideas. Ideas aren’t anyone’s property.
"What is considered property is the unique expression of an idea. By default the creator of that expression owns it, and copyright law gives that creator certain rights that aren’t automatically shared.
...
"With respect to sharing copyrighted files, I think we also have to look within and question our intentions. Are we downloading movies with scarcity-based thinking like, “Cool, this will save me money” or “Why should I pay for it when I can get something for nothing?” Are we resonating with greed or selfishness? Or is there truly a more noble purpose at work? When you look within, quiet down for 30 seconds, and just listen for a while, what do you hear? How do you feel about yourself?"
But while I fully support and respect copyright and intellectual property, DRM is a losing battle. So, die DRM, die!RETICULUM REX rules!
Access: PublicTagged with: DRM, Steve Jobs, Copyright, Intellectual Property, Creative Commons, Free Culture, RETICULUM REX
Are you going to buy the DRM free stuff at iTunes now? I'm curious to see if people will splurge the extra cents for DRM free + higher sample rate. I am a big backup person and have all my music backed up, but I would be screwed if I didn't! I'm much too lazy to drive to Best Buy for music. Plus the mailbox is a bit of a stroll to pickup Amazon shipments ;)
i'll be more inclined to buy DRM-free stuff. but actually, i'm more like a CD person. i like owning the CD and ripping them :)
In July, 1997 I joined Intertrust, the start-up that in competition with Xerox Parc first thought out and built a platform for DRM. I lasted two years (the only staff job I've ever had) before being fired. I wrote the company's first generation of public documents. I was booted before the ascension of the Google advertising model and of social networks (like Zaadz.com).
Now I am nothing if not an artist, having spent three full time years writing a literary novel set at a mind-body-spirit retreat–in today's counterculture. Every word in the 105,00 word story is as truthful as I could make it. But, actually, I'm not an artist at the moment–as I'm spending all of my time promoting my book, an activity that feels far more like working in Silicon Valley marketing (e.g., positioning) than like artistic composition.
Which brings me back to DRM. Two points. First, my book is worth $16.95, and I'd be sad to find you reading a copy you hadn't bought, or that your cousin or a library hadn't bought; sad in part because I earned no money for three years, and I really need money now. (If only a thousand people are willing to spend $16.95, and the novel goes nowhere, I can accept that as an artist.)
Second, as a member of the counterculture I believe that, long term, a problem far more insidious than DRM is the mixing up of honest talk with marketing talk. If readers are not to pay me for my book, I am left to write as a part-time hobby, to find a rich patron, or–this is the “promise” of Web 2.0–to use my book as a loss leader while I earn my keep off “secondary products” like lectures, Adsense revenues at my blog, etc. “Use the book (music, film, etc.) to sell yourself as a product”–this is what DRM opponents have been advising artists for ten years.
This advice scares me, as I know the tech/industrial complex has great cultural power now, as I know the Internet is integrating nearly all media , and as I know Google and its successors will want to put buy buttons and niche market adverts beside and within all of our media experiences. Give this a generation and the distinctions between true speech and marketing speech (that is, with positioning) will be greatly diminished or gone.
Thus, I want you to buy and care about my book, not its author. I want to trust that there is an authentic, operative firewall between my artistic struggles and my (or my publisher's) marketing efforts . Otherwise, well, screw my novel, screw Zaadz, I may as well focus on making money.
So, putting aside both DRM technology problems (which I know something about) and the baseness of media conglomerates, speaking ideally, I say, “free” doesn't really mean free, in fact it's really rather culturally costly, and so I'd rather have DRM.