HBO Exec Proposes DRM Name Change
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu May 10, 2007 02:07 PM
from the that's-all-that's-in-the-way dept.
from the that's-all-that's-in-the-way dept.
surfingmarmot writes "An HBO executive has figured out the problem with DRM acceptance — it's the name. HBO's chief technology officer Bob Zitter now wants to refer to the technology as Digital Consumer Enablement. Because, you see, DRM actually helps consumers by getting more content into their hands. The company already has HD movies on demand ready to go, but is delaying them because of ownership concerns. Says Zitter, 'Digital Consumer Enablement would more accurately describe technology that allows consumers "to use content in ways they haven't before," such as enjoying TV shows and movies on portable video players like iPods. "I don't want to use the term DRM any longer," said Zitter, who added that content-protection technology could enable various new applications for cable operators.'"
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Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm still waiting to see how long it takes these people to realize that they're actually driving piracy with every day they wait. They should consider the data gathered in the "freakanomics" research [freakonomics.com]. The data clearly shows that most people are honest, and those that aren't simply aren't. If you offer up content at a fair price, the majority of users will purchase that content rather than resorting to illegal or immoral means to obtain it. Meanwhile, the DRM restrictions will do little to stop those looking for a free ride. They're not going to pay for it in the first place, so why worry about it now? If they can't get past your DRM scheme (not likely), they'll rip it from the DVDs or HD-DVDs.
The software industry had to learn the same thing many years ago. Copy protection annoyed the paying users while doing little to stop the pirates. Why can't anyone get that lesson through their head?
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
As far as I can tell, the software industry to this day has never learned this.
-Tommy
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes they do. Check a little further into CD protection schemes. That's exactly what they do.
Instead of the words in the manual, they now have the software check online to see if it's valid.
Software DRM has changed considerably over the last 20 years, but it still exists.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, what is the deal with that? Why do I have to have the CD in to play? Given the right software, which anyone can get, the CD is trivially easy to copy to my hard drive. Or I can download a no-CD crack off the Internet. Why do they make this little hoop for me to jump through? Look, I bought the game. I have the sales receipt and everything!
My theory is that the people who make DRM technologies are kind of like telephone sanitizers. We've just been paying them for so long that if we suddenly give up on this utterly wasteful technology, then we'll be stuck with a lot of out-of-work DRM people, and they'll be meddling in the kitchen cupboards, rearranging them so we can never find anything anymore.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
yeah..that';s why it takes moments after release for there to be a crack.
I have downloaded a no CD crack for every game. Yeah I bought the game, I just want to play it without hearing the cd whine up and down and cause a stutter in the game.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Informative)
1) Decompile the code into assembly.
2) Search for usage of a string that you expect to be near the validity check you're hoping to remove.
3) Find any conditional jumps in the current block of code (following branches as you come to them).
4) Invert them.
5) Try the program out and see if you get past. If you do, you're done. If not, continue on.
6) Find all callers of the piece of code you're looking at.
7) For each of them, go back to step #3 and repeat the process.
You can also do variants like adding your own jumps in or replacing existing jumps with nops.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
Many programs today start running CRCs of themselves to disable exactly this practice (i.e. making a conditional jump unconditional or inverting it, which used to create the funny side effect of the game only running without the CD inserted, but not when it was present
Cracking games was a fun pastime in the 80s and 90s, with people competing who can do it first. Someone who cannot be me (of course not, I'd never ever do anything illegal) holds a personal record of just under 10 minutes, including the disassembly process (which took quite a while in the old days). But that changed big time with the advent of "professional" (read: done for profit, not done with a lot of knowledge) copy protection mechanisms.
If the computer content industry really wants to find out who cracks their games, all they gotta do is take a close look at the times when people take days off. Whenever a new version of a copy protection program comes out, I bet a lot of very good people take a day or two off.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Funny)
No it's not! Remember, it's "Digital Consumer Enablement" now!
I, for one, welcome this change. Nothing makes the public dislike something faster than giving it an Orwellian, "War-Is-Peace" type name. I mean, picture these name changes:
SUV: "Environment Enhancing Vehicle"
Semi-Automatic Rifle: "Bloodshed Prevention Device"
Watching paint dry: "Paint's Amazing Adventure!"
Shooting fish in a barrel: "Experts-only Marksmanship Challenge"
Zombie invasion: "Undead Welcoming Party"
Invading Iraq to pursue your hairbrained geopolitical theories at the expense of the local population: "Freedom"
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
To "dispose" of the heat, the MAFIAA decides to rename it Digital Consumer Enablement... I'll write it off as "Digital Consumer Extortion" in my book as I expect every control-freak measures to be implemented in the name of DCA to be at least as potentially restrictive and encumbering as anything else that got introduced in the name of DRM.
I hate those moronic execs who try to convince the general public that the likes of DRM allows people to do stuff people could not already do... the only thing DRM enables is taking the willing consumers' wallets to the cleaners without said consumers being able to do anything about it when they hit a DRM brick wall they did not see coming.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
Otherwise I agree completely and in a serious fashion with your premise.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a better one yet. How about we call non-commercial copyright infringement "Fair Use."
Has a nice ring to it, no?
Re:I am a person! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
This baffles me more than it should, I guess. The idea that there should be some invisible barrier between me and the 1's and 0's in my computer's memory (solid state or otherwise) is insane. This shit honestly needs to be explained, slowly and forcefully, to the higher ups that keep greenlighting this shit.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
Preferably with brickbats and pointy implements.
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
The media executives have for so long held onto their positions of power, privilege and wealth, that they have lost any notions of reality. As far as they are concerned, they are gods, and the consumers are the worshipers.
When they get a whiff of even a minute challenge to this doctrine, they are engulfed in rage, because it is something they cannot control, regardless of how much money they throw at the issue. After all, as far as they're concerned, the consumers are the commodity - they own your eyes, and sell them as they please (not quite that simple in the case of HBO, but you get the idea). So they get angrier and angrier, until this rage spills over as utter stupidity.
P.S. They might as well call executions a "happy express to heaven".
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
But jeez, 140 bucks for TV???
I called them and cancelled everything except my broadband internet connection. My monthly bill went from 144 bucks to 44 bucks. I saved a hundred bucks a month by dropping cable television!
The girl on the line sounded positively HURT by this. She asked me "But why do you want to cancel TV?" I told her it just wasn't interesting and she said "oh" in a quiet voice.
I felt at that moment as if I'd just dumped a sweet, loving girlfriend and broken her heart. It was a bizarre thing.
It didn't stop me from saving a hundred bucks, though! Woo HOO! That's two cases of beer a week!
YouTube and AtomFilms are better anyway...
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Interesting)
On a side note: what are you drinking? I would hope $100 would get you four cases. My "default" beer is Sam Adams and it runs about $25 for a case, when you can find it by the case, and most people consider it expensive. (In reality MY cost is much less since I now buy kegs, but in terms of cost by the case...)
Re:Freakanomics (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to break the circle, just don't consume. It's not like what the media companies are putting out is a necessity for life.
It's not buggery (Score:5, Funny)
how about... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:how about... (Score:5, Funny)
Prior art (Score:5, Interesting)
Marketing over content (Score:5, Informative)
Why not call it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Okay, It's just a term (Score:5, Insightful)
Redefine 'rape' as 'enthusiastic love-making.'
Re:Okay, It's just a term (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Okay, It's just a term (Score:5, Funny)
DRM = Digitally Restricted Media (Score:5, Funny)
DCE = Digitally Constrained Entertainment
A turd by any other name would still smell as foul... er, or something like that.
-S
Translating service. (Score:5, Insightful)
I must send a gift to Bob Zitter (Score:5, Funny)
A bouquet of "fully organic fecal aroma enhancers". Don't worry - they're just like roses.
Suddenly I feel enabled! (Score:4, Insightful)
Enablement? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the fundamental conflict (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, you know that *somebody* will set up their PC with a cablecard (or whatever) and just start downloading everything they can get and then uploading it to the internet where non-subscribers can get it for free.
HBO is understandably worried that if their most popular content is available for free, some customers will stop paying for it. Based on prior experience with people "pirating" cable, I can't say that they're wrong. People used to regularly break into our cable company's distribution boxes and strip off the notch filters back in the days of analog cable, and there's a brisk business out there on the internet for devices to help people to cheat cable & satellite TV channel restrictions.
I'd like to believe that DRM-free media will eventually win out, because it's so much more convenient for everybody involved, from the producers, to the consumer electronics industry, to the end-user. Unfortunately, there's some anecdotal evidence from the recent experiences of the music industry that the existence of DRM-free digital coipies of content just leads to rampant copying, and that does have some negative effect on sales. The music industry went digital without an effective DRM system in place, and now they're stuck with it - you can't stop making CDs, or nobody would buy your music.
That's a "mistake" video companies are eager not to repeat.
Makes as much sense... (Score:5, Insightful)
... as Windows Genuine Advantage.
Put a positive spin on the name and you can fool anyone!
Renaming fun (Score:5, Funny)
I no longer want anyone to call it 'copyright violation', but instead lets call it 'early retirement to the public domain'
Yeah, right. (Score:5, Funny)
When are they going to actually SELL something? (Score:5, Interesting)
Wake me up when they're ready to actually SELL me a record or a movie. I don't want no 'license' to listen/watch something or any shit of the sort. I want to OWN a COPY. Copyright says I can't redistribute copies. Fine. But I want MINE to be MY OWN, and do with it whatever the fuck I want.
They can't have their cake and eat it too... and if they can.. well, they shouldn't.
Sadly, correct (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's play the name game (Score:5, Insightful)
People keep thinking that the order and choice of letters is all it takes to turn something bad into something great.
This has been happening also in the way people have called people with mental handicaps throughout the years, and the constant "reinvention" of the terms, to keep the names less insulting:
-----
Socially responsible guy: We shouldn't call them "idiots" anymore. That's insulting. We'll call it people with mental retardation: retards.
General public: Yea, that is a nice neutral name, no bad connotations.
One year later:
General public: My brother is a damn retard, I hate him.
Socially responsible guy: That's insulting. We shouldn't call them retards anymore. We'll call them people with "slow mental development". Slow people.
General public: Yea, that's neutral and nice. Cool.
One year later:
General public: My neighbour is "slow" or something. Huhuhu.
Socially responsible guy: We shouldn't call them "slow", that's insulting. Well call them "people with special education needs". Special people.
One year later:
General public: My new coworker is "special". Huhuu, get it? "Special". Hehehe.
----------
Basically you can change a name any times you want. Bad fame will come to haunt you never mind how hard you try.
Call it what it is... (Score:5, Funny)
The term Fair Use Circumvention Kit is not only much more descriptive of the true nature of the beast, the acronym is also easy to remember, catchy, and equally descriptive.
Obligatory Futurama (Score:5, Funny)
Slurm Queen: As for you, you will be submerged in Royal Slurm which, in a matter of minutes, will transform you into a Slurm Queen like myself.
Small Glurmo #1: But, Your Highness, she's a commoner. Her Slurm will taste foul.
Slurm Queen: Yes! Which is why we'll market it as New Slurm. Then, when everyone hates it, we'll bring back Slurm Classic, and make billions!
(thanks to The Neutral Planet [geocities.com])
Excellent Idea! (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah I would rip that song from the CD to my ipod but the herpes kept me from doing it.
Yeah I would post that clip from Colbert on Youtube but... you know... the herpes...
That'd be awesome!
Re: H.E.R.P.E.S. (Score:5, Funny)
* Had Ecstasy, Resigned to Pretty Excruciating Software
* Hamstrung Electronic Reuse Platform--Extra Stupid
* Half-assed Extra Rotten Playing Encryption Setup
* Helps Evil Recording People Eat Sushi
Great quote (Score:5, Insightful)
That would be the meddlesome laws of physics right?
Rightsizing (Score:4, Funny)
So they need to come up with a term that starts with "right". "Rightlocking" sounds about right since you're locked to the industry's restrictions.
So: "Rightlocking". Remember, you read it first on
That's funny (Score:4, Insightful)
I suspect he and I disagree on ways and means, though.
I've heard this one... (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, folks, you got people to quit calling it "Copy Protection" because people got tired of the smell. Now it seems like it smells just as bad when you call it "Digital Rights Management". Calling it empowered this or enabled that isn't going to make it smell any better.