FairUse4WM Breaks Windows DRM 617
An anonymous reader writes "FairUse4WM, according to engadget, "can be used to strip Windows Media DRM 10 and 11". What does the slashdot community think of this development in the ongoing cat-and-mouse game going on between big media and what is available online?"
Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
should read:
FairUse4WM Fixes Windows DRM
'cause it makes something previously unusable, usable. (Not that I will ever be using this app, I've never been stupid enough to buy a DRM encumbered piece of content).
Oh - and for those hoping it stripped the DRM from WMV9. Nope, WMA DRM only.
Re:Actually hope they fix this (Score:5, Insightful)
But I'd rather these services died a market death than a technolocial one. Then maybe the media companies would realize that people don't want to pay for something continually.
And, well, if other idiots think that renting music is better than buying than maybe they should be allowed too.
Good news (Score:3, Insightful)
Cat and Mouse? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bittorrent breaks Windows DRM (Score:4, Insightful)
But to me there is a clear distinction -- in one case, you're manipulating a file that you acquired (likely legally, since it's DRM'd). In the other case, someone is distributing a file that is a copyrighted work -- not fair use.
I don't want to get into the whole debate about whether copyright is Evil (tm), but from a personal liability point-of-view, I'd think it also much easier to justify fair use when you remove the DRM yourself than if you acquire a DRM-free version via bittorrent. Maybe not easier to justify it to **AA lawyers, but at least easier to justify it to yourself
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
You may not have hit a DRM wall but that could because
1. You're not an enthuiast
2. You don't know what your rights are anyways [fairuse?]
3. You're not doing anything special with your media.
Try making a backup [shock! that's legal!] or a clip for a class or
Try to watch that movie on a "non-approved" device? Try to listen to that music CD in your computer, try to
DRM breaks otherwise valid products in a futile attempt to extract more money out of you.
Tom
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
FairUse4WM Circumvents Windows DRM
Now, "fair use" is another argument altogether. I understand that, given the chance, most consumers will steal media without a second thought. I also think that the current DRM implementations are stepping on consumer rights. Is there a balance?
Yes. This discussion is left as an excercise for the reader.
DRM doesn't make sense (Score:3, Insightful)
easy (Score:4, Insightful)
Information is public property, DRM is just a challenge
Predicted. (Score:5, Insightful)
Everyone knows the DRM is nothing but an inconvenience to normal users suckered into repurchasing music they have owned for decades in format after format. It had zero impact on wholesale media rip off, where "pirates" duplicate the original distribution medium. It's had zero impact on file sharing. Sooner or later, legitimate users are going to get fed up with format changes and eternal copyright. DRM is the last gasp of industries that depended on expensive physical distribution and government broadcast franchises to survive. No one else wants it and it's going away. Until it does, I've given up on their content. Big media won't be seeing any of my money till they make life easier for me and their artists.
Re:Bittorrent breaks Windows DRM (Score:5, Insightful)
Granted, a better way to be would simply to have avoided buying DRMed music in the first place, but not everyone has that foresight.
That would be better, if music distribution was not run by a cartel, repeatedly convicted of abusing their control of the market. I'd love to see everyone become enlightened and move to all DRM-free indy music, but realistically, the market will not properly counter a monopoly or cartel and the legal system and legislature are corrupt and easily bribed.
Re:If only it were so easy... (Score:5, Insightful)
As zoning laws apply to your property by precdent, licensing applies to the ones and zeros on your HD by precedent.
Wow. that's quite the analogy.
I don't understand how one is related to the other. Putting up a replica of the Taj Mahal is (arguably) an eye sore, and should have community consultation before said replica is built. I don't understand the parallels you've drawn. I don't understand how doing anything to my hard drive has any affect on my neighbours.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
So even if you assume Morailty==Legality, legality does differ from country to country.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
But I was talking about me! Neither my preferred music software, nor my mp3 player support fairplay *spits* music. To me it is unusable.
Some of us don't have this fixation on the thought that software and music should be free.
Strawman.
I have a fixation that I should be free to listen how I like to music I've paid for.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
One encourages the other. And I'll let you in on a little secret, it's not the one the RIAA wants you to think.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
What if you were the teacher? (dumbass)
basically with Apple DRM *I* can do whatever *I* want to do,
As the GP said:
Oh - and congratulations. I've never seen a post disagreeing with it's parent backup the parents POV as thoroughly as you just did!
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
I know well what my rights are. They are listed right in the EULA when I installed the various Music Stores.
Then you don't know what your rights are - because all those Music Store licenses allow them to change your rights, without notice, at any time, for any reason.
I hope you wouldn't accept the same conditions for your constitutional rights.
Where there is a will... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
Every class I've been to, the teachers have made all of their teaching material electronically available to the students.
A good teacher will show the clip during class, and have that clip available for students if they need to refresh their memory, had a conflicting class, dentists appointment, were sick (or just at the beach) (d.a)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
This has nothing to do with privacy. It has to do with being usable under the rights granted by fair use under the United States Copyright Act and similar laws in other countries.
Under fair use, it is my right to be able to take copyrighted music that I have legally purchased and be able to play that on any device I own. That would include being able to burn music to CDs, listen to it on an MP3 player, convert it from one format to another (say, WMA -> OGG or MP3, listen to it on my PC regardless of underlying OS (i.e., under Linux or *BSD), sample it into my music synthesizer/audio sequencer, etc. DRM prevents me from excercising my legal rights.
Or maybe you don't care about your legal rights... but one day, you will get a right taken from you that you care about. We'll see who's complaining then.
Re:DRM doesn't have to be unbeatable (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you make an important point here. One thing that people have lost sight of is that copyright is, in effect, a deal. Companies are too frightened of changing their business models to propose reasonable deals to consumers; and in their fear they place complicated restrictions on their customers.
Like many acts borne of fear, it is bound to produce the effects it fears most.
This puts me in mind of Lord Macaulay's speech on copyright extension:
Lord Macaulay's position on intellectual property was one of moderation and pragmatism. He had no truck with either form of absolutism: that which states and absolute right to use whatever information falls into our hands, or that which states and absolute right of an author to control his work as his personal property. He sees this as a deal whose terms should be set in a way that provides income to the author while minimizing inconvenience to the public. In the case of copyright extension, I think this position is sound: the gulf between what a copyright term needs to be to incent an author and the point at which the public is seriously inconvenienced is large enough to permit a whole range of pragmatic solutions that maximize the production of new books equally.
DRM for recorded music performances is possibly a different situation, and more challenging to forge a pragmatic solution for. A service like the original Napster is so convenient the bar for inconvenience is set very low. Low enough that the business models for music distribution that worked at the start of the 1990s no longer work. Apple has shown the way here: low price with high convenience converts into high volume. Keeping the DRM relaxed, basically only strict enough to prevent wholesale redistribution, keeps convenience reasonably comparable to the original Napster service. I don't think a monthly subscription service works, because it is inherently more complicated, because you are buying a relationship, not music.
The problem is greed, which I'd define as demanding more than is good for you. Or at least demanding what, if others in your position did likewise, would encourage the kind of reaction Macaulay envisions to excessive restrictions.
Re:easy (Score:3, Insightful)
Information IS free as soon as you publish it.
That's rather the point.
Your weak attempts at analogy creation fail to capture that one key element of the information actually under discussion: It's already being spread far and wide by it's creator. The creator actually wants it that way.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Because that's the whole justification for it? If you can't copy it, you obviously can't violate copyright*. Any other reason why you would want in whole or in part to copy it is collateral damage.
But you can copy DRM'd materials. You can make an exact copy, you can strip the DRM, or you can plug your speakers straight into a recording jack. It is an inconvenience to copying, but for the most part you can just download a DRM-free copy elsewhere and the fact that it is illegal does not matter if you're a pirate to start with.
I thought the myth that DRM stops piracy or even is intended to stop piracy was debunked long ago by a huge variety of different people. It is useful to make things hard for the law abiding, not for pirates.
Marketplace Sets All Price & Terms (Score:3, Insightful)
My bet is that the media companies have done and are doing EVERYTHING possible to keep the "old pricing" at the top of their requirements for the sale of their products.
In the end, I predict the consumers will pay what they want to pay or not buy, and that will force prices down. Why should a person have to pay a premium for a DVD movie, once the first run week has gone by? Is a movie download going to be more than a movie ticket? Would people ultimately by more movies if the price were $3/movie?
I still think the consumer, collectively, will ultimately set the price, by whether he buys a single piece of entertainment in volume or not.
DRM is dead as far as I am concerned, because I won't buy content with it, so I have already voted. The media companies just don't know it, as they have not asked me.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
I have albums over 50 years old that I can still play, and due to the lack of DRM I can easily convert them into OGG / MP3 and play them on the latest music players. I can keep converting them and enjoy my DRM free music for the rest of my life. It's VERY VERY unlikely that the GP will have that same ability.
Re:easy (Score:3, Insightful)
You are confusing two types of information. A song is released into the public domain. The rights holders release the song for all the public. What you are talking about is private information. It is considered a "trade secret" and can only have that status if it is never publically released. It's the difference between Scientology's internal writings (private, never printed in a book for sale to the general public) and a song that is offered for free to everyone and broadcast multiple times to millions of people in various formats.
If you'd like to restrict your analogies to the same type of information, then it will be a whole lot more useful. It's as bad as people that whine about trademarks every time a patent article comes through.
Re:Actually hope they fix this (Score:3, Insightful)
Just because YOU want to buy only doesn't mean everybody else wants to. Just like some people prefer to rent DVDs instead of buying 'em. Nobody prevents you from buying.
But I'd rather these services died a market death than a technolocial one.
Why want them to die at all? Because less options is a good thing? Perhaps you want netflix-like services to die too? Because people renting contents is a bad thing from your standpoint seemingly...
Then maybe the media companies would realize that people don't want to pay for something continually.
You're not paying for the songs directly... You're paying for a monthly service, with tons of great new contents every month, totally unlimited. That's EXACTLY like saying "people don't want to pay for a netflix-like service continually" (and LOTS of people seem pretty happy to do just that - or just like millions of people pay every month for cable TV and such, stop paying, and you have nothing left either)
And, well, if other idiots think that renting music is better than buying than maybe they should be allowed too.
Yeah, all them idiots who think renting DVDs is better than buying than [sic] maybe they should be allowed too.
Big deal. Some people don't mind paying a few bucks for a month's worth of unlimited music, from a ridiculously huge selection (both on their portable mp3 players and home PCs). That full month of music cost pretty much the same as renting a couple DVDs from my local blockbuster (thousands of hours of music from a huge library, or ~3h worth of movies). Such a bad deal... Great for finding what new CDs are worth buying, finding new interesting stuff and such.
No one's forcing you to pay for a montly rental service, but others understand what it is (I don't think I'm buying the music there any more than I'm buying movies from netflix when using their service) and are more than happy to use it for what it is. Don't like the monthly service? Fine, just don't use it and just buy it instead. No one's preventing you from doing so...
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words, you can't force people to obey the law. Well, you can, but you have to have some sort of fascist state in order to do so - fine if you're a hive dwelling insect, but not acceptable for humans (at least not for me!). Write me a ticket if you catch me speeding, but don't put a governor on my car that won't allow me to speed. Lock me up if I bash someone with a club, but don't handcuff me at birth. That's the way it has to work.
I absolutely disagree with that statement. In fact, I don't think most people would do that even if it were not illegal.Woah.. Napster and Yahoo? (Score:3, Insightful)
In this case, removing the DRM is more like making a copy of a DVD or VHS tape that you rent from Blockbuster.
I'm more interested in converting my iTunes m4p files (that I bought and paid for to own) to MP3 so I can play them in my car. This is illegal, and qualified as illegal before any DMCA. You're copying something you don't own if you use it on Napster.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
My music collection is roughly the same size, but I use MP3 files instead. I have many more playback devices (two car stereos, two discman units, several PCs running various OSes, component stereo in sitting room, home theatre system in living room, and a boombox).
99% of the songs I have in MP3 format are ripped from my own CDs. I also know what my rights are, and since I did not have to sign or accept a EULA I suspect I have signicantly more flexibility than you do in terms of what I can legally do with the music I've purchased over the years. :-)
It's a term I sometimes use to describe people who are willing to accept a severe curtailing of their rights and think the whole concept is a really neat idea. It isn't, except to the middle men who do the distributing, and both the artist and the listener get screwed in the process.
I've been collecting LPs since 1976 and CDs since 1986, and I pirate neither music nor software. That doesn't mean I agree with DRM schemes or the rationale behind them.
I also believe that some software is far more efficiently produced in a free environment, but acknowledge that proprietary software development has its place. I don't pirate software -- open source provides most of my new applications and utilities on all of the platforms I use, but I'll register shareware I use and purchase retail software when necessary.
Face it: history is against you, and against those who would use DRM. In the end, DRM will not work. It's as effective as classic software copy protection schemes were -- only those who are legitimate customers are limited by them, and actual pirates typically have cracks to the various schemes within days if not hours.
It's fine if you accet DRM and its limitations, but that doesn't mean *I* have to.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it isn't. It is their music before they publish it. Then they have two choices:
- Release it into the public domain, or
- Copyright it.
If they choose option two, then they are making an agreement with the state that they will release the work into the public domain in exchange for a time-limited monopoly on distribution. This is all you get. You don't get a monopoly on telling people how they may enjoy your material.If you want to retain all of the rights to something, then don't publish it. Copyright is not for you.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
In many jurisdictions, there are "fair uses" for copyrighted material in an educational context. DRM ignores those fair uses - that's why tomstdenis used 'or a clip for a class or
Jesus Christ, I can't see how people can be so thick about this issue...
Yes - I agree with you there - but perhaps with a different definition of 'people' to you
How freaking self-centered does a person have to be to believe that their rights to pirate music are more relevant than the rights of the people who actually own the music?
How freaking self-centered are those who put the protection of entertainment over the education of our children?*
* (won't somebody think of the children?)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sadly, although what you're saying is complete common sense, it seems to be frequently lost on people making laws. I don't know if they perform some sort of lobotomy on you when you run for office, and disconnect the part of your brain that normally would say "Hey buddy, done a reality check in a while?" but it sure seems like it.
My personal opinion is that the pro-DRM argument smells a lot like the pro-gun-control argument, in that both of them put restrictions on law-abiding people in order to modify the behavior of people who frequently just ignore the law anyway; when you ignore the difference between law-abiding people and those who just don't give a damn, it's quite easy to descend into a "feedback loop," where in response to your last restrictive law not working, you pass a more restrictive one
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
That one sentence manages to sum up the exact reason why DRM-encumbered western societies of the future will find themselves severely outclassed by those cultures that can manage to maintain a free exchange of ideas. While the other cultures continue to develop, we're setting up to fire (and even jail) our teachers.
And all just because a bunch of suits find this to be an opportune way to guarantee their own profits.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:4, Insightful)
NOW, the legal problem isn't the DRM. in the U.S., it's the DMCA which makes it illegal to break/bypass/strip the DRM. SO, DRM doesn't block fair use (just impedes it), the DMCA is what blocks fair use. So, again, DRM doesn't limit your rights. The legal backing (the DMCA, or your country's equivalent) limits your rights.
NOW, on top of this, any contract you sign can modify your legal right to act in certain ways. If you sign a valid contract saying 'I will not say 'thud' in your presence', and then say 'thud' in his presence, you may be contractually bound by any penalties stipulated in the contract, free speech be damned. Why? BECAUSE YOU LEGALLY AGREED TO LIMIT YOUR OWN RIGHTS.
Until proven otherwise in a court of law, EULA's and TOS's seem to be considered part of the purchase agreement, whether you like that or not. You have the option of attempting to modify the contract prior to ratification (good luck), or you refuse to enter into the contract, where the seller will likely refuse sale, as is his right.
So, reviewing, your fair-use rights are currently limited by:
(a) laws making protection removal/circumvention illegal (DMCA or equiv.)
(b) contracts your voluntarily entered into.
(a) is a tough one, and where the focus needs to be. (b) should be able to be determined by the fair market, but won't until (a) is taken care of. The majority of this topic seems to be that (b) is somehow the fault of the selling side, and not the buying side. But, as long as rule of law is on their side, they'd be stupid not to use DRM if it would mean more sales in the end. (which the Marketing dept currently says is so.)
The solution, if you can't change (a)? Don't buy DRM'd music, and don't give away your rights via EULA's. Yes, it limits your available options, but that's your choice. And (Chicken and egg) more people making that choice will give those options more market share.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Doug,
The point is that if DRM continues to creep into our world, there won't much music/video/etc available that come with a use agreement that I can abide by.
Beyond personal use, those who oppose DRM do so realizing that this is in part a struggle of how we want our society to operate- more open and free, or more closed and proprietary. More broadly, it's a struggle/conversation/battle/whatever about how best to distribute rights between content creators and consumers.
So while I don't endorse violating copyright law any more than I endorse violating any law, I do endorse getting copyright law modified to benefit society more fully- or at least getting people to use copyright law in a more beneficial manner (eg Creative Commons).
Bottom line, I don't accept the 'just do what works for you' apology for DRM, because that's a sinking ship. I oppose DRM because it represents a value system that I don't like so much.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
And how sad for a society that requires entertainment in order to provide education. If we can't teach without flashy shiny media clips then something is wrong, and it isn't DRM.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:4, Insightful)
No, the people who are complaining the most and trying to find software to break DRM protections are the people who don't want to pay for the latest CD they heard on the radio. That is all that this discussion is about.
Re:What does the slashdot community think of this. (Score:1, Insightful)
Disclaimer, I work on Windows Media DRM for portable devices(PD) and network devices(ND) porting it to a secure computing(trusted computing) enviornment running Linux.
With WMDRM each peice of content has their own unique symmetric key created by the content manufacturer. This key is encrypted using a public key of a device. During the decryption stage the content key is decrypted using a private key on the device. This private key is *also* encrypted, but is used very breifly to decrypt the content key.
That means this key sits in resident memory for a few microseconds while the decryption operation takes place, and I am %99 sure that these guys have figured out a way to either intercept one of the decryption calls, or calculate a memory offset for this content key.
Not a very difficult hack, but it takes some in depth knowledge of the DRM(I've worked on it for 6 months and doing such a thing would be non-trivial for me). However, Microsoft knows that WMDRM can be cracked easily using these methods on any non-trusted machine. Hence the trusted computing group and devices like the one I work on.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
I can back up my media, but in order to do so I absolutely have to break the law...kind of seems like they limiting that original light.
Contracts should be extremely limited in giving up rights. Most contracts are already extremely limited when it comes to giving up a right...except when dealing with IP. That contract you agree to is inside the box, but the way the world works....you have to agree to it at the point of sale otherwise you lose your money.
That would absolutely never fly in any other arena of the world, but for some reason it does in software.
Contracts that modify after signing are blatantly illegal everywhere else...but for some reason it is just dandy with software. I wish someone with a lot of money would force that issue and some sanity would return to software licenses.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
You only get that impression because the laws that were enacted to implement copyright happen to vaguely make it look that way. However, those laws have big exceptions to letting people "sell things as they choose". You simply never had these rights of total control you think you're "giving up"; they don't exist, and they never did, either government law or natural law.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
More generally, whenever a person infringes copyright, a benefit occurs, although not neccesarily a net benefit. It's a fun thing to do. In that sense, it may be true to say that the restrictions of copyright should be kept as limited as possible; big enough that people are willing to create creative works, but not so high that it starts to cut in unneccesarily on people's "fun." It's not selfishness (although I probably am selfish) but merely that the interests of pirates often outweighs the interests of creators.
I see no reason to believe that just because you create an idea that you should be free to put whatever restrictions on it you want. Yes, you put your blood, sweat, and tears into it, but you also put a whole lot of other ideas into it. No idea is absolutely new, so it seems unfair to give someone a absolute monopoly on an idea just because they put last pieces together.
How is this funny? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If only it were so easy... (Score:3, Insightful)
At least in the US you have this backward. Historically, taking land for private development was the norm for decades if not centuries (contrary to what media uproar after the recent Kelo v. New London case would have you believe). See Berman v. Parker, Luxton v. North River Bridge, Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff, etc. Even before the US was formed such takings were considered legitimate.
It's only recently (in June) that the use of eminent domain was banned by executive order "for the purpose of advancing the economic interest of private parties to be given ownership or use of the property taken." (whether such an order is binding remains untested).
While property laws regarding physical property have had centuries to sort themselves out via the legal system, Intellectual property has only had about a full half century to sort itself out.
Much bigger nit:
Intellectual property laws have been a big part of at least European legal systems for centuries as well.
Copyright law in Western law goes back at least to 1557 when the Stationer's Company was granted monopoly over publishing and the right to regulate copyright, and modern-style laws go back to the 1709 Statute of Anne.
Patent law goes back to the Venetian Statute of 1474, crown letters patent granted in England from the late 1400s-1623, and the Statute of Monopolies passed in England in 1623 (the latter of which looks very much like the US Constitutional guarantees, being the first patent law to allow only new inventions to be patented, limiting the duration of patents, etc).
I'm less familiar with trade marks, service marks, and trade dress, but they all go back far longer than a half a century as well.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
For educational use is but one example. What if I want to remix a song that I have? As long as I do not re-distrbute the derivative work, I am abiding by copyright law. How do you think bands end up with material from sampled songs in the FIRST place? They don't sign a separate contract from the RIAA for unrestricted access before the creative period starts, but rather, license the material after the matter. People use the educational angle to appeal to a broad range of individuals, but it is by no means the only reason for fair use.
Even Apple's DRM makes this sort of thing a huge pain in the ass. You can't import an iTunes song into Garage Band, for example. You have to burn it to a CD, and then re-rip it back (which is technically illegal*).
*For RIAA/MPAA values of legal
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:4, Insightful)
This is not like you crashing on my bed without my permission; this is like me wanting to put my bedsheets on my couch and sleep there, but for some reason the bedsheet makers only want me to put bedsheets on a bed, so it's illegal. Why would people not want me to put my bedsheets on my couch? I don't know, I guess for the same reasons they don't want me to play my DVDs in my computer...
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:2, Insightful)
Because that is what we are talking about here... You are kidding yourself you you actually believe that this argument is about fair use.
I understand that the very nature of copy protection and the newer concepts of digital rights management is part of a battle that has gone on for a very long time. I remember decades ago when there were software parties where people would get together to distribute pirated copies of programs simply because it feels fun to do things that you aren't suppossed to do. Hell, I'll admit that I did it myself, but I never tried to claim that I had a moral right to do what I was doing.
Don't try to claim some sort of moral righteousness over these actions when all that is going on is theft.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:5, Insightful)
So you're telling me that you never played with Legos as a kid? or Barbies? Or Lincoln Logs? Or the little games where you stick shapes into their corresponding holes? Did your teacher never read you books in class? Did you never sing songs for a school concert? Did you ever watch Donald in Mathmagic Land [imdb.com]?
I know I did all these things in school. In fact, I'm sure I learned just about everything from playing games (entertainment), watching movies (entertainment), and listening to/singing songs (entertainment).
In fact, short of a direct brain interface, not sure how you would teach children anything if you couldn't entertain them in the process. They just wouldn't pay attention. Heck, the only reason I practiced multiplication tables was to win our math races... and we spent a week during our poetry unit in Junior english listening to and analyzing song lyrics (The Sound of Silence and Stairway to Heaven included)... and I expressly remember singing along to that Kokomo song (by the Beach Boys) in first grade at a school play... it would've been a shame if the RIAA had shown up then and busted poor Mrs. Sanderson for playing it...
How sad society would be if our kids had to learn without entertainment...
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
Incorrect.
DRM hasn't seemed to hinder the p2p networks at all, I can't imagine it doing so in the future.
DRM only inhibits legitimate users of content.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
To refresh everyone's memory...
So in theory after a limited time the public should be legally able to digitally copy and distributes others work and secondly your work must promote Science and useful Arts.
If it fails these criteria... Then it fails the spirit of the copyright law. DRM breaks this comprimise since it is forever and often promotes neither science nor arts.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
No, the people who are complaining the most and trying to find software to break DRM protections are the people who don't want to pay for the latest CD they heard on the radio.
Perhaps true, definitely irrelevant. The fact is that copyright law contains some important exceptions that are completely ignored by DRM implementations. What that means is that "It prevents copyright infringement" is not a valid defense of DRM, because it also prevents non-infringing copies. DRM is not a technological implementation of copyright law, it is a technological mechanism for effectively writing new extensions to copyright law.
Corporate America already has too much ability to write the laws that they like. Let's at least try to avoid removing Congress from the process.
BTW, I do not pirate anything. I do break DRM on a regular basis to make backups, format-shift and time-shift, but I'm scrupulously careful to honor copyright law, in spite of the fact that it's so horribly unbalanced I feel no real moral obligation to do so.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
Informative? (Score:2, Insightful)
You've somehow decided that factoring in the cost of a fairly expensive player makes sense (what, did you give it back?) -- and have neglected to tell us why you purchase what was apparently a 20+GB model and only loaded 150 songs on it when you had made the choice to use a subscription service. (Hint--subscription services are so that you can experience a large amount of music without having to buy it all.)
You still paid only $60 for 150 songs (~ $0.40 per song) for 7 months. And then you want to keep the songs?
I don't feel that a subscription model fits my music habits, so I don't use one. Apparently you shouldn't either. However, there are some people for whom it makes perfect sense.
The only argument FOR FairUse4WM is that you want to use your subscription-based songs on an incompatible player (be it your Linux box or your ipod).
Wanting to KEEP the songs that are SPECIFICALLY sold as a rental is just wrong. You want to keep the songs, BUY THEM. (Walmart will sell them to you for $0.90 IIRC.) THEN you have an argument for removing the DRM because you paid to keep the songs, not rent them.
People who want to abuse the subscription model just give everyone wanting exercise their actual fair use rights a bad name.
Re:Curious. (Score:3, Insightful)
Ahh.. but the don't.
A normal recording contract requires that the artists sign any rights away to the music they record. Its the record companies that own all the rights to all music produced by the artist while under contract.
Actually most artists hate DRM as it prevents the free propagation of their music and therefore impacts the growth of their popularity.
Re:Headline incorrect. (Score:3, Insightful)
Buyer Beware (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think anyone has ever BOUGHT content that had DRM.
The only way to get DRMed content is to LICENSE it or to STEAL it....
Only fools think they own it!
[Yes, these are sad times]