wired.com — Sun Microsystems is pushing an open-source copy protection scheme designed to let you listen to your music across a broad range of platforms. Critics say there's no such thing as good DRM. Here's why they're wrong
Apr 3, 2006 View in Crawl 4
natchApr 4, 2006
Sun's DReaM becomes a nightmare when I try to share protected content with others. Let's say I work at a restaurant and the crew likes to listen to a certain tape, and the person who made the tape isn't always there. Possible under DReaM? No.Let's say I live in a dorm, and my friend wants to borrow a few tapes for his party while I'm out of town. Possible under DReaM? No.Let's say I have a wonderful music collection that my children enjoy growing up with, and suddenly I die. Can my kids just keep on enjoying that nice music? No.Can they copy the music so when they each move away to different towns they can enjoy the music of their childhood memories? No.Let's say I'm a government bureaucrat in an Islamic regime. I want to make sure that only proper, Islamic tapes (readings of the Koran, etc.) are played in my country. Music is banned under Islam, as everyone knows. I'll just require that any device imported into my country have the proper key, so it will only run content signed by my Office of Moral Rectitude. Possible with DReaM? YES.
Closed AccountApr 4, 2006
@bieberYou might want to read <a class="user" href="http://www.publish.com/article2/0,1759,1815768,00.asp">http://www.publish.com/article2/0,1759,1815768,00.asp</a> about digital cinema.
mirandajanellApr 4, 2006
I agree with the author, the fair-use provisions absolutely need to be mandatory. The idea of assigning the rights to the individual as opposed to the device is definitely a major plus. It's almost there, but unprotected content still wins in my book. It's easy enough to buy a CD and rip and then transfer to my various devices. Since I only use cheapy ear buds with my mp3 player i don't have a dramatic need for the higher bitrates that I like on my home computer since it's hooked up to a stereo system. Protected content with out fair use provisions wouldn't allow this freedom. Also decryption of the protected content require computational power which decreases battery life in portable devices. It gets a Digg because it's better than the current systems, but it's just not there yet.
meshyfApr 4, 2006
DRM is still crap.
pauldonnellyApr 4, 2006
@Cyclotron:I wouldn't be happy if I had to burn my music to a CD and re-rip it to move it elsewhere, could only listen to it on five computers, and had to get an iPod to take it on the go. Those all sound like tremendous hassles to me.Of course I'm happy to see that there's a more open DRM system around. If it's going to be there, I'd prefer that the media it restricts at least be accessible on every platform. That doesn't mean I like DRM though. I don't think it's at all inevitable that all digital media in the future will be DRM encumbered, and I don't think it's desirable either. It's possible that it will happen, but I don't think there's any way to make an accurate prediction at this point. Even if everyone does try to cripple the digital media they sell, given DRM's track record, it's not likely that it will remain undefeated for long. If DRM does pervade, then I'm willing to make the effort it takes to get clean media.
pauldonnellyApr 4, 2006
I don't know why this got -dugg. It's a good point. Why in the world would a person who is against DRM in any form (no matter how open) be especially happy about yet another DRM system? And why would they love it?
aragon127Apr 4, 2006
;-)
aragon127Apr 4, 2006
Doh! Why can Digg have an edit feature but no delete feature?