Sun DRM hooey
p2pnet.net DRM News:- “No one woke up this morning and said, ‘I wish Sun would figure out a way to let me do less with my music and movies’.”
That`s Cory Doctorow`s response to Sun Microsystems “Open Media Commons” open source DRM project.
Sun claims its initiative is to develop royalty-free copy protection technology for all. But of course, it’s real purpose is to cramp Microsoft’s style.
Doctorow, the EFF`s (Electronic Frontier Foundation’ European affairs coordinator, says, “DRM doesn’t sell hardware, software, or movies.”
The only reason for it is, “to trade your users’ freedoms for a bit of favor from the entertainment companies, a promise that they’ll generously allow your record player to play their records – provided it meets with their approval, he points out, continuing that making DRM “open” and “royalty-free” doesn’t make it any less capable of restricting the public’s rights under copyright.
Using `commons` in the name is unfortunate, because it suggests an online community committed to sharing creative works, says Doctorow, adding:
DRM systems are about restricting access and use of creative works. A better way to protect the public’s ability to make fair use of their media is to support the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act (DMCRA, HR 1201). That bill would permit people to circumvent DRM on media in order to make a legal use of that media.
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See:-
cramp Microsoft’s style – Sun touts open Source DRM, August 22, 2005
EFF – Sun’s “Open Media Commons” Is More Like a Gated Community, August 24, 2005
August 24th, 2005 at 9:10 pm
I don’t like DRM. Don’t want DRM. I wish it were not even an issue, but it is. If someone (like Sun?) does not step up to the plate and develop/standardize a DRM scheme that the entertainment robber barons will accept I fear that Microsoft DRM and by default sucky Microsoft media formats will become defacto standards. I’d much rather have a “format/brand agnostic” third party DRM system in place rather than let MS get a hold of all the marbles. Longhorn (or whatever they’re calling that abomination now…) is gonna be ugly enough as it is. If someone like Sun developes an “open” royalty free DRM system they would most likely support other OS like Linux and non-MS media players. A third party royalty free system would not be as likely to push smaller hardware/software/content providers out of the mix as well, whereas an MS controlled DRM system would be yet another tool for Bill & Company to dominate it’s competitors, and you.
We may not want DRM at all (duh), but if we have to have it, lets at least get it in a flavor we can choke down, rather than something totally unpalatable.
August 25th, 2005 at 4:21 am
There’s one little problem for all these companies hoping to force DRM onto us… Well, 2 that i can think of off the top of my head. Those little problems are called India, and China, and with them around, US owned and controlled DRM is gonna run into major problems. You see together India and China make up a huge percentage of the world’s population, and they have their own movie and music industries.
Does anyone really think they’ll just roll over and allow US industries to dictate who is allowed to watch Chinese or Indian created and owned media? I don’t think so. China is already making their own processors as they consider intel’s and amd’s cpu’s too expensive, and possibly as a matter of national pride also.
Taiwan makes just about everything else you put into pc’s so i’m sure China could get Non-US-DRM’d mainboards etc for their processors fairly easily. Which means there goes the hardware layer of DRM right out the window. People will be able to import the non-DRM’d hardware and use it instead of the probably more expensive DRM’d hardware.
Since MS will have to make a version of windows that works on the chinese hardware or watch china mass migrate to linux, there will be versions of vista that won’t require DRM’d hardware to run. Let’s face it, the Chinese govt is NOT going to allow US owned companies to have unrestricted “back door” access to pc’s owned by Chinese people, companies or the chinese govt itself.
Now if this Chinese version of Vista can’t naturally, someone will hack that version of it to work with english fonts and hey presto – no more drm woes for anyone smart enough to buy from china, or chinese importers…
You know what, all the technology importers in Australia are chinese, whether born in China or Taiwan… Get the message Hollywood? DRM is gonna be a very expensive flop. It’ll cost the US owned tech companies a bucketload of money too.
The xxAA’s better hope the US govt doesn’t decide that giving the chinese pc industry such a huge handup isn’t treason.
Hmmmm didn’t China buy IBM’s pc division recently? Muahahahahahaha!!! Silly Hollywood!
August 25th, 2005 at 9:51 am
Here here!
I totaly agree, DRM is bad, but open standard DRM is the only way to do it.
I will not use M$ software after the time for WinXP support runs out, and I don’t not like to be forced upon a specific platform to be a “good” customer…
August 26th, 2005 at 5:40 am
Wow! That is a good point, and well written if I say so myself.
And let’s not forget BRAZIL. They are a “free culture” and the government is support the mix culture, so no DRM again!
And let’s not forget RUSSIA. The mp3s and Movies P2P and BT are still going strong in Russia. The xxAA has sent Ceast & Desist letters to the Russians, and so far they are the only ones who told them to F@#$ off, time and time again!
And let’s not forget about some countries in Europe, Africa, Latin America. The list goes on and on.
Ha ha ha — LONG LIVE FREEDOM!!!
August 26th, 2005 at 2:02 pm
If I am forced to buy DRM’ed hardware to play their crap, I will make sure the output get converted to non DRM for all to download. The message to Hollywood is simple, please your customers or go out of business.
August 29th, 2005 at 5:36 pm
Tony makes a point about Chinese made PCs, but doesn’t answer the fact that even in China and India there is a huge demand for Western (read:overwhelmingly Californian) content, especially among the tech-literate people most likely to have a PC, mobile phone or other media device. Anyone who’s seen an Indian movie will know why.
Hollywood (music and movies) are the big drivers for DRM. Not device manufactuers, and not network operators. And fair is fair, they have a point, artists deserve to get paid: the Russian approach is criminal, and we all know it.
Protection via software and tied into the content file itself is not going to go away, it’s going to get more and more sophisticated. The Sun approach is at least an attempt to get the cost of that DRM to the consumer to be negligible. The MPEG LA gang want to put $1 onto your phone cost and take 1% of the cost of all downloads – who’s going to end up footing that bill? S’right, you and me. MS are presenting themselves as a cheaper option, hands up how many think MS will stay cheap once they have market dominance…ok, put your hand down now Bill!
No-one likes DRM, but if you gotta have it, lets make it cheap and non MS. Otherwise, who’s for another Hindi musical comedy?