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May 06, 2008
DRM
DRM stands for Digital Rights Management. In laymans terms, it means a company mangling your purchased media, whether CDs, DVDs, MP3s or games, so that you are restricted in the manner in which you enjoy it. If you have an iPod, and you've bought standard music from the iTunes Store, you've been DRM'd. Have you ever tried taking the file you downloaded and putting it onto a Sony MP3 player? Don't bother, it won't work.
Most people have no idea that this is being done to them, and don't care. You should care. One day, someone will decide that they can't be bothered licensing your music to you any more, and you'll lose the right to listen to it. Think that's far-fetched? Microsoft have already announced they are doing just that - read about it here in Mark Pilgrim's great blog post
DRM is crippled music - don't buy it!
I've been tidying my garage, 30 odd years of accumulated stuff, which is a still a lot even after the three skipfuls of crap I've already disposed of. While out there, I'm listening to old audio cassettes, some of which I have in fact owned for more than 30 years. I can do this forever, or until the tape wears out or breaks. I can do this because no one ever decided to encrypt the data so that I would only be able to play it on one particular cassette player. Think about that. What if each cassette was tied to one cassette player. You can't make a mixtape and send it to a girl/boyfriend. You can't take your tape on holiday with you and play it in a rental car. You can't play it in the living room, and the garage? If the company who sold you the tape suddenly say they've stopped supporting it, and you change your player, you can't play it any more, at all!
Thst's what DRM is all about, it stops you having the right to listen to your own music whenever you like. I'm not prepared to give up that right, and neither should you.
Posted by se71 at May 6, 2008 09:58 AM
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