DRM Moves Ahead With HTML5 Specification

[brosis]

Worst case scenario:

1. Microsoft gets market dominance, forces free alternatives out of the markets with lobbying and patent threats, keeps Apple around to avoid monopoly charges
2. Microsoft implements Trusted Computing, a scheme where every computer user is no longer in control of their computer, instead, the OS decides what is appropriate to do and what is not... basically, DRM hard-coded in the OS itself
3. There is now an avenue for content streaming and buying, all on their terms, riddled with the worst DRM ever - you can't copy files because the OS won't let you
4. Then, the copyright mafia manages to pass a law or trade treaty that cripples the internet for good. They implement a legislative scheme where no one can afford to release content on the internet, except those affiliated with the copyright mafia, eliminating the threat of self-publishing
5. Torrents are the last vestige of freedom, but not many people can use them, since the DRM in windows won't let you use a torrent client... some people probably try to fight this underground, maintaining their underground Linux distros that only stay functional by violating a bunch of software patents

And there you have it, that's the future the copyright mafia is looking after...

1. They failed, but strangely Google is rolling in this direction...
2. already done.
3. already here, hence I ignore them. But there are two interesting exceptions: spotify - where for a fair price one can listen and save music for personal usage without any limit; and steam - where one can pay and be assured his purchases are supported in long term. Those two are alternatives and in way considered "better" than open solutions.
4. nearly here. They also push DRM into internet. So pieces connect.
5. they are not, get on IRC and spawn some nice projects with different development scheme, good enough for people to be considered usable. Proprietary can attack torrents, but they can't do anything if people just switch to different provider, except crippling interchange standards (gates) - which they actively try and fail.

And that is exactly why they are trying to cripple the internet. They don't see it as a new opportunity and marketplace, they see it as a threat to their dominance.

+1

[dee.]

My viewpoint does not cancel this, only complements. Once they become enough money, they become self-sufficient and get strong desire to control those who support them. I only incline that those who pirate DRMed content:
a) spread its usage (marketshare), even if they don't pay
b) do not modify their own habits (think of a "start button" syndrome)
c) form good base for "anti-piracy" attack
d) are always vulnerable to this attack, because the license of the pieces they distribute prohibits what they do, so they are walking time-bombs

My viewpoint is that the efficient method is not to pirate DRMed content, but to quit this and start supporting those who develops in different way or at least is not this aggressive/pervasive.

No, don't you see? You are victim-blaming. Kind of like the obnoxious people who tell raped women they shouldn't have dressed so slutty...

Seriously though, you can't pin the blame on DRM to those who pirate DRM'd content. That's shifting the blame away from the perpetrator and on to the people who are merely interested in free sharing of content. And sharing is inevitable, because you can't just go and tell everyone who shares content to "stop doing that". Sharing, or "piracy" as you like to call it, will always exist and has always existed, DRM or not.

Your stance only serves to legitimize DRM, by basically saying "oh, it's understandable that they use DRM because people pirate their content otherwise". Sharing should not be a problem to be prevented, it should be seen as an ASSET. Why fight torrents? There you already have a distribution network, free of cost, why not take advantage of it? Design your business model around sharing instead of trying to fight the windmills!

So basically, you shouldn't be saying "stop pirating DRM content, people" because that's pointless. You should rather be saying "stop using DRM" because we CAN have business models that allow sharing. Examples are many... release your content for free, then monetize later on your fanbase by merchandise or whatever. Crowdsourcing/crowdfunding, get your money in advance and then let your content be shared every which way, building up reputation and hype for your next project. The possibilities are endless, all the content producers need to do is tell the copyright enforcers to shove it, forget DRM and embrace the future.

Good reading http://falkvinge.net/2013/04/22/corr...ness-problems/

1. They failed, but strangely Google is rolling in this direction...
2. already done.
3. already here, hence I ignore them. But there are two interesting exceptions: spotify - where for a fair price one can listen and save music for personal usage without any limit; and steam - where one can pay and be assured his purchases are supported in long term. Those two are alternatives and in way considered "better" than open solutions.
4. nearly here. They also push DRM into internet. So pieces connect.
5. they are not, get on IRC and spawn some nice projects with different development scheme, good enough for people to be considered usable. Proprietary can attack torrents, but they can't do anything if people just switch to different provider, except crippling interchange standards (gates) - which they actively try and fail.

1. That's debatable, I don't think they will be able to pull that off. On the desktop market, Microsoft is still dominant. That is likely to change, but I don't think Android or ChromeOS can satisfy the needs of the desktop niche - people who are satisfied with their functionality can often do better with tablets. Speaking of which, on the tablet market, Android is in the lead now, but that may change as we get some serious alternatives, when we get more open tablet hardware, and more startups with tablets running serious, real Linux OS's.

When it comes to smartphones, the situation is way more interesting, because it's still a growing market with plenty of room for new OS's to grab market share. Why? Because only about half of the world's phones are smartphones as of now, so even if Android dominates now, there's plenty of room for Sailfish, Tizen or Firefox to grab a sizable chunk of the market. The smartphone-to-dumbphone ratio is only going to grow, probably eventually to 100%, which means the smartphone market is going to grow about 100% from what it is now, giving room for new competitors.

2. Not to the extent to which they are planning to. Read this from the FSF: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html

Basically, a true TC scheme, as envisioned by Microsoft, would mean that you would be totally out of control of your own hardware. The OS could flag some files "protected content", and if you try to copy them to some other media, the computer would just say "I can't let you do that, Dave". Streaming video would be protected from screen recorders on the OS level. Trying to rip DVD's or BD's would be impossible. Even text could be protected, for example, your email client wouldn't allow you to copy-paste text from emails, and the email sender could remotely erase emails they'd already sent you.

As egregious as the DRM in windows is, it's not quite there yet, but that is the direction Microsoft is heading to: they've published those plans clearly, and even if they're dormant for now, you can bet your ass they haven't been forgotten. They're simply using the step-by-step tactic: if you try to take away people's freedoms all at once, you'll run in considerable resistance. But if you can do it sneakily, one small step at a time, and make every step seem a "necessary evil" for people's convenience/safety/whatever, you'll get to the result smoothly, until one day we awake and wonder where did all our freedoms go.

3. Like said, we're not quite there yet - we have services with really bad DRM, but even netflix can be ripped by screen capture/recording. In a true TC scheme, you couldn't even do that.

4. Nearly there, but it's not a foregone conclusion - we have lots of people pushing back, and it's only inevitable if we allow it to be. People have power, join the resistance before it's too late. Donate some funds to EFF today, or heck, join as a member to EFF, EDRi or your local equivalent, do what you can to push back against corporate interest and the copyright mafia. Support your local Pirate Party, vote for them, ask if they need help with anything. Take part in campaigns, go to protest rallies, sign petitions. There's plenty of stuff that you or anyone can do to help!

5. Yes, you're right, there's always resistance and ways for people to fight back. But the thing is, we shouldn't let things go that far in the first place, we shouldn't give up our freedoms to the point that they can control what goes on on our computers.

[GreatEmerald]

No, don't you see? You are victim-blaming. Kind of like the obnoxious people who tell raped women they shouldn't have dressed so slutty...

Seriously though, you can't pin the blame on DRM to those who pirate DRM'd content. That's shifting the blame away from the perpetrator and on to the people who are merely interested in free sharing of content. And sharing is inevitable, because you can't just go and tell everyone who shares content to "stop doing that". Sharing, or "piracy" as you like to call it, will always exist and has always existed, DRM or not.

Your stance only serves to legitimize DRM, by basically saying "oh, it's understandable that they use DRM because people pirate their content otherwise". Sharing should not be a problem to be prevented, it should be seen as an ASSET. Why fight torrents? There you already have a distribution network, free of cost, why not take advantage of it? Design your business model around sharing instead of trying to fight the windmills!

What? Piracy is illegal, and for a good reason. It infringes on copyright. And copyright in and of itself is not bad. The whole Copyleft idea is based on copyright, all code released depends on copyright to make sure that the author's wishes are followed. If you say that piracy is OK, you also say that closing GPL software is OK.

Piracy in and of itself is a concern. It's not that big of a concern that companies make it out to be (most pirates wouldn't buy the things they pirate, anyway), but the whole attitude of pirates is wrong. You are not supposed to just take content and do whatever. You're supposed to either buy the content or not use it in the first place. The money does go to the authors, even if indirectly. Sure, a lot of it is distribution and publishing fees, but distributors and publishers can still be useful. Distributors provide central hosting space and easy access. Publishers negotiate with distributors, do QA and other auxiliary tasks (like translation). Those all are services, and people deserve to get paid for them. Now, they don't deserve to get paid more than the authors do; it should be proportional to the actual work put in. But they deserve to get paid regardless.

Now you're right about the fact that most publishers are being stupid and not making use of the situation. For one, DRM is antithetical to what they want to achieve in the first place. And they could use the torrent system for distributing legal content - game demo versions, Fair Use size clips of music, books, movies etc. That would raise interest, and would still be perfectly fine with the law.

So basically, you shouldn't be saying "stop pirating DRM content, people" because that's pointless. You should rather be saying "stop using DRM" because we CAN have business models that allow sharing. Examples are many... release your content for free, then monetize later on your fanbase by merchandise or whatever. Crowdsourcing/crowdfunding, get your money in advance and then let your content be shared every which way, building up reputation and hype for your next project. The possibilities are endless, all the content producers need to do is tell the copyright enforcers to shove it, forget DRM and embrace the future.

Actually, you can't. Aside from the idea I had in the other thread (a central fund pool, but it's more about fair money allocation), there is nothing that would work if sharing was completely unrestricted. You can't cover your costs by selling merchandise. Merchandise itself costs to produce. You would have to sell 100 cups to every fan for it to work. Crowdfunding also doesn't work, since it again doesn't cover all the costs. Also, if the crowdfunded product would be slated to be released freely after production, the consumers would be put in a prisoner's dilemma. If one crowdfunds, and the other crowdfunds, you both lose money and receive a product. If one crowdfunds, and the other doesn't, they receive the product free of charge and you lose money. If you don't crowdfund and they crowdfund, you receive the product free of charge and they lose money. If you both don't crowdfund, nobody gets the product and nobody loses money. So you will choose not to crowdfund every time, because there is a chance that you will get the content for free anyway, and you won't lose anything, while if you do crowdfund, you will surely lose money.

[erendorn]

Can you think of a better way to stop people from pirating content?

Even humble indie bundle games get pirated.

There's a method that is just as effective as DRM: no DRM. The only thing that works are DMCA takedowns, because whatever the DRM, a cracked copy WILL be available.
What DRM stops: sharing content with family, lending a book or a movie to a friend (while that same behavior is completely acceptable for non digital versions)
What DRM doesn't stop: internet piracy.

It works: itunes and Amazon audio files, Tor and Baen books, Humble bundle games, Wakanim videos are all DRM free, and all of them are profitable..

[dee.]

What? Piracy is illegal, and for a good reason. It infringes on copyright. And copyright in and of itself is not bad. The whole Copyleft idea is based on copyright, all code released depends on copyright to make sure that the author's wishes are followed. If you say that piracy is OK, you also say that closing GPL software is OK.

Nope, not quite. First of all, "Copyright" is a complex umbrella term that contains many separate rights. The way it is currently defined by the copyright mafia is way too broad and restrictive. 70 years after the content creator dies, someone can retain a monopoly on content. That's already excessive, but that's not all - they copyright maximalists are constantly trying to get stricter enforcement and more draconian legislation. We don't need to throw out the concept of copyright altogether, just refine it and reel it back to more permissive legislation.

We need to separate the "right to copy" from "right of ownership" and "right of attribution". We can allow free sharing for noncommercial purposes, and still give content creators full rights of ownership and attribution to their works. Basically, if you publish something, then it's free to be shared accross the world, but you can't sell copies of it for profit without the author's permission.

The copyright mafia always likes to equate "piracy" with "stealing", which is pure propaganda. The term "intellectual property", which the copyright mafia loves to use, is misleading and deceptive, because when you buy copyrighted content, you don't get any of the usual rights of property ownership. When you buy a chair, you own that chair, and you're free to do what you want with it. You can rent that chair to your friends, allow them to sit in it for pay, you can buy your own materials and manufacture backup copies of the chair, in case the original chair gets destroyed. You can freely resell the chair to whoever wants to buy it. None of those rights currently apply to so-called "intellectual property". So when "intellectual property" is not in fact property at all, then you cannot use terms used for property such as "stealing" when discussing it.

Piracy in and of itself is a concern. It's not that big of a concern that companies make it out to be (most pirates wouldn't buy the things they pirate, anyway), but the whole attitude of pirates is wrong. You are not supposed to just take content and do whatever. You're supposed to either buy the content or not use it in the first place. The money does go to the authors, even if indirectly. Sure, a lot of it is distribution and publishing fees, but distributors and publishers can still be useful. Distributors provide central hosting space and easy access. Publishers negotiate with distributors, do QA and other auxiliary tasks (like translation). Those all are services, and people deserve to get paid for them. Now, they don't deserve to get paid more than the authors do; it should be proportional to the actual work put in. But they deserve to get paid regardless.

Sure they deserve to get paid. No one is contesting that. The content creators and distributors just need to create business models that allow sharing and still allow the creators to get paid. That's easy, it's something that has been done for centuries. Think of traveling musicians, they used to go to public rooms, put out their hat to go around the room, and once the hat is full of coin, they'd start playing. The phenomenon of recording music to media and selling individual copies of that media is a very recent one. The same applies to other types of content: in the past we had storytellers, then we got books. The same can be applied to online content: get paid first, release second. Allow sharing, build up reputation for your next project. That's just one example, there are countless ways to monetize content which allows free sharing. We're eventually going to move into such business models.

The thing is, the copyright maximalists always trot out the same argument: "think of the poor artists!" "Piracy will destroy the industry!" Just like before, C-casettes would destroy the industry, VCR recorders would destroy the industry, public libraries would destroy the industry, sheet music would destroy the industry... it goes all the way back, the arguments are always the same, and every time, the market has adapted around the new methods of sharing, the market disruptors, the innovative ones who have embraced these new developments, have succeeded. Why should it be any different this time?

Now you're right about the fact that most publishers are being stupid and not making use of the situation. For one, DRM is antithetical to what they want to achieve in the first place. And they could use the torrent system for distributing legal content - game demo versions, Fair Use size clips of music, books, movies etc. That would raise interest, and would still be perfectly fine with the law.

And they'd still be restricting the sharing of their other content.

Actually, you can't. Aside from the idea I had in the other thread (a central fund pool, but it's more about fair money allocation), there is nothing that would work if sharing was completely unrestricted.

Sharing for non-commercial use only would be unrestricted, so yes, there are plenty of business models that would work, PROVENLY. Think about it - the current legislation doesn't repel those who really want to "pirate" from doing so, yet people still manage to make a profit.

You can't cover your costs by selling merchandise. Merchandise itself costs to produce. You would have to sell 100 cups to every fan for it to work.

Untrue. As an example: There are literally hundreds of webcomics making a profit by releasing their content for free, then monetizing it by selling merchandise like t-shirts, mugs, figures, stuffed animals, you name it - they even sell printed books of the same webcomic that people can read for free online, and people still buy them, because it's cooler to own your own physical copy of the comic, as a high quality hardcover book, and also: because people really want to support the artists that they like. When you give people good and fair terms, and make it easy for them to contribute, they WILL. You don't have to force them to do it.

Crowdfunding also doesn't work, since it again doesn't cover all the costs. Also, if the crowdfunded product would be slated to be released freely after production, the consumers would be put in a prisoner's dilemma. If one crowdfunds, and the other crowdfunds, you both lose money and receive a product. If one crowdfunds, and the other doesn't, they receive the product free of charge and you lose money. If you don't crowdfund and they crowdfund, you receive the product free of charge and they lose money. If you both don't crowdfund, nobody gets the product and nobody loses money. So you will choose not to crowdfund every time, because there is a chance that you will get the content for free anyway, and you won't lose anything, while if you do crowdfund, you will surely lose money.

If your statement were true, then crowdfunding wouldn't work NOW. But see, the thing is, people aren't just some kind of rational-actor-robots from an economics textbook. People don't just think in terms of monetary profit and loss. When there's a project that people really want to support, they WILL. Because people are basically decent and want to support the creators, if you give them the possibility. The Humble Bundle is a good example of this. If your statement were true, no one would ever pay anything except the bare minimum amount, if that. But every bundle, you see some people paying as much as hundreds, even thousands of euros, even when they don't need to, because they want to support the creators.

Your statement is also easily proven wrong by the numerous crowdfunding projects, where the final project has been made available for everyone. A very recent example is the Openshot crowdfunding. If what you say were true, no one would have contributed, because they'd get the benefits from the open-source software regardless. There have been projects that have gathered millions of dollars, all from people who just want to support the creator of something they enjoy, entirely voluntarily.

There are plenty of other business models that allow or work around (or even take advantage of) free sharing. That's the thing, sharing should be seen as an ASSET. Why worry about distribution and building hype, when you can just let people do it for you, FOR FREE? Service-based models, crowdfunding models, sequential donationware models, depending on the product/media... they can all work and DO, provenly.

[startzz]

The thing is that piracy does no real damage to anyone, and it does no impact for other buyers, and all the laws is one big ****, it just shows what a big **** people made with their lifes. If someone would really want to make something good in this life, i would suggest A REAL gun control in america, like when NOBODY has any guns, or other things, that at least would make a difference.

[GreatEmerald]

Nope, not quite. First of all, "Copyright" is a complex umbrella term that contains many separate rights. The way it is currently defined by the copyright mafia is way too broad and restrictive. 70 years after the content creator dies, someone can retain a monopoly on content. That's already excessive, but that's not all - they copyright maximalists are constantly trying to get stricter enforcement and more draconian legislation. We don't need to throw out the concept of copyright altogether, just refine it and reel it back to more permissive legislation.

I'm not arguing semantics here. It most likely is imperfect, yes. But the idea is that authors should be the ones who have the say over how their content is used. If you don't accept that, you can't use the content. So if the author prohibits distribution, you can't distribute it, period.

We need to separate the "right to copy" from "right of ownership" and "right of attribution". We can allow free sharing for noncommercial purposes, and still give content creators full rights of ownership and attribution to their works. Basically, if you publish something, then it's free to be shared accross the world, but you can't sell copies of it for profit without the author's permission.

Again, no, if the author says that it must not be distributed, then it must not be distributed. Whether that's a good idea or not is for individual authors to decide. They are free to allow distribution as it is. And once again, Free Software essentially uses copyright to say that the code must be distributed. How would you like if a new law would mandate that every copyright work must only be distributed by certified publishers, regardless of the author's wishes? Because that's what you're suggesting, just the other way round. That's not the way to go. Making it optional, as it already is, is fine.

The copyright mafia always likes to equate "piracy" with "stealing", which is pure propaganda. The term "intellectual property", which the copyright mafia loves to use, is misleading and deceptive, because when you buy copyrighted content, you don't get any of the usual rights of property ownership. When you buy a chair, you own that chair, and you're free to do what you want with it. You can rent that chair to your friends, allow them to sit in it for pay, you can buy your own materials and manufacture backup copies of the chair, in case the original chair gets destroyed. You can freely resell the chair to whoever wants to buy it. None of those rights currently apply to so-called "intellectual property". So when "intellectual property" is not in fact property at all, then you cannot use terms used for property such as "stealing" when discussing it.

Yes, copying does not remove value, it just creates additional value without benefiting the author. So it's not quite stealing.

Sure they deserve to get paid. No one is contesting that. The content creators and distributors just need to create business models that allow sharing and still allow the creators to get paid. That's easy, it's something that has been done for centuries. Think of traveling musicians, they used to go to public rooms, put out their hat to go around the room, and once the hat is full of coin, they'd start playing. The phenomenon of recording music to media and selling individual copies of that media is a very recent one.

Exactly. Back then, there was no way to record music. You could memorise it and try to play yourself, but that takes skill. With current technology, it's just a push of a button for a perfect copy. Also do remember that if you wanted to hear the same music track several times, back then you had to pay for each play. Today we can replay music as many times as we like (although it does have its cons, as live replays are always different, which has a value of its own).

The same applies to other types of content: in the past we had storytellers, then we got books.

It indeed does. In the past you could try to remember what the storyteller said, but it was always imperfect. And when books came around, nothing much changed, you still could only get a new copy if you invested a lot of time rewriting the original. Now it's a click for a perfect copy.

The thing is, the copyright maximalists always trot out the same argument: "think of the poor artists!" "Piracy will destroy the industry!" Just like before, C-casettes would destroy the industry, VCR recorders would destroy the industry, public libraries would destroy the industry, sheet music would destroy the industry... it goes all the way back, the arguments are always the same, and every time, the market has adapted around the new methods of sharing, the market disruptors, the innovative ones who have embraced these new developments, have succeeded. Why should it be any different this time?

Even those methods were not nearly as convenient as we have these days. You could record the radio on a casette for a perfect copy, and replay it infinitely, but you couldn't share it. Because if you did, you lost it yourself. Only one person could listen to it at one time (or both of them would have to be in the same room). Same with VHS and library books. Only one person can use one copy at one time. Now, with digital media, everyone can use it simultaneously. So there is a distinct difference.

Though you're right about one thing ? despite all that, and given that DRM is useless, the movie and record industries don't seem to be in decline after all. I'm not entirely certain why, and getting rid of DRM would allow them to be even more profitable, but legalising free distribution most likely wouldn't.

And they'd still be restricting the sharing of their other content.

Yes, that's the point. Give people an incentive to buy it, instead of just putting what is for all intents and purposes a "donate" link.

Untrue. As an example: There are literally hundreds of webcomics making a profit by releasing their content for free, then monetizing it by selling merchandise like t-shirts, mugs, figures, stuffed animals, you name it - they even sell printed books of the same webcomic that people can read for free online, and people still buy them, because it's cooler to own your own physical copy of the comic, as a high quality hardcover book, and also: because people really want to support the artists that they like. When you give people good and fair terms, and make it easy for them to contribute, they WILL. You don't have to force them to do it.

The cost of manufacturing a single comic strip is extremely low compared to the cost of manufacturing an AAA game or a film. It works in case of the former, and by far does not in case of the latter.

If your statement were true, then crowdfunding wouldn't work NOW. But see, the thing is, people aren't just some kind of rational-actor-robots from an economics textbook. People don't just think in terms of monetary profit and loss. When there's a project that people really want to support, they WILL. Because people are basically decent and want to support the creators, if you give them the possibility. The Humble Bundle is a good example of this. If your statement were true, no one would ever pay anything except the bare minimum amount, if that. But every bundle, you see some people paying as much as hundreds, even thousands of euros, even when they don't need to, because they want to support the creators.

Your statement is also easily proven wrong by the numerous crowdfunding projects, where the final project has been made available for everyone. A very recent example is the Openshot crowdfunding. If what you say were true, no one would have contributed, because they'd get the benefits from the open-source software regardless. There have been projects that have gathered millions of dollars, all from people who just want to support the creator of something they enjoy, entirely voluntarily.

Well, sure, there are of course enthusiasts that just want to support the authors or the idea. But, at least from my perspective, there are many more freeloaders. It may work in some cases, where the cost of completing such a project is fairly low, but once again I don't see it working for AAA games or films.

[dee.]

I'm not arguing semantics here. It most likely is imperfect, yes. But the idea is that authors should be the ones who have the say over how their content is used. If you don't accept that, you can't use the content. So if the author prohibits distribution, you can't distribute it, period.

Again, no, if the author says that it must not be distributed, then it must not be distributed. Whether that's a good idea or not is for individual authors to decide. They are free to allow distribution as it is.

No, I don't accept that. If you publish something, put something available, then it's free game, people are free to share whatever content is available to them. Sharing is good. You don't get to put something online, then tell people "you're not allowed to distribute this" because that's not how it works. People will share things, if you don't want sharing, you shouldn't make your work public, period.

We need to decriminalize the sharing of content for noncommercial uses, because if a sufficient number of people don't consider something a crime, then it's immoral and unethical for that thing to be a crime. Studies estimate that over 70% of young people have engaged in "piracy", that strictly speaking, 70% of young people should be put in jail, according to the current laws. Is this sensible? What happens in 10 years when this generation that is used to just sharing things how they like without thinking about if it's "allowed" gets to the workforce? Will we keep prosecuting for something that most people don't consider a crime?

If the author doesn't want their work distributed, then they should not make it available, period. Because when you make something available online (or otherwise), it WILL get shared, that's just inevitable. We need to stop this silly "war on piracy".

And once again, Free Software essentially uses copyright to say that the code must be distributed. How would you like if a new law would mandate that every copyright work must only be distributed by certified publishers, regardless of the author's wishes? Because that's what you're suggesting, just the other way round. That's not the way to go. Making it optional, as it already is, is fine.

No, that's not comparable. If I go and buy a chair, the carpenter doesn't get to tell me how I can use that chair. He doesn't get to say "you're not allowed to make copies of this chair". I'm free to make my own copies of the chair and share them with my friends, because I pay for the labour and the materials. If I go to a bookstore and buy a book, I'm free to share that book with my friends. Everyone of my friend can take turns reading the book, and not everyone needs to buy their own copy.

Yet for some reason, if I buy a copy of some digital media, I'm not allowed to share it?

This is a simple concept: forced artificial scarcity. There is no scarcity in digital media. You could say that digital media is already post-scarcity. Sometime in the future, we might eliminate scarcity in everything else. We might develop a practically-infinite energy source, we might have technology to duplicate any material, and move on to a post-scarcity society. The question is: what then? If we can't deal with post-scarcity now, in a limited quantity, how will we deal with it in the future? We need to learn to cope with it eventually.

Legal sharing would not infringe on the rights of content producers. It's just like, if you put an image on an internet site, so that anyone can see it, and anyone can find that site on the google... then it's not reasonable for you to say "you're not allowed to look at this image unless you pay me". You put the image there, where people can see it, so people can freely share the link to that image - or even the image itself - for each other. People may not be allowed to use it commercially, but they can still share it.

So any content that is published, should be able to be freely shared. Because we own the entertainment. We, the people, own the content. Not the corporations, not the governments.

And even if sharing is legal, creators can still use the same business models they use now. They can still sell copies of their products. People who really like it and appreciate it, will pay for it, like is already evident.

Yes, copying does not remove value, it just creates additional value without benefiting the author. So it's not quite stealing.

It may or may not benefit the author. Depends on how the author plays it.

Exactly. Back then, there was no way to record music. You could memorise it and try to play yourself, but that takes skill. With current technology, it's just a push of a button for a perfect copy. Also do remember that if you wanted to hear the same music track several times, back then you had to pay for each play. Today we can replay music as many times as we like (although it does have its cons, as live replays are always different, which has a value of its own).

It indeed does. In the past you could try to remember what the storyteller said, but it was always imperfect. And when books came around, nothing much changed, you still could only get a new copy if you invested a lot of time rewriting the original. Now it's a click for a perfect copy.

Yes. Recordings that you can play back over and over (wouldn't the music industry want to get rid of that quality...) And yet, that didn't destroy the live music industry. And yeah, we can create perfect copies. So what? Should we cripple our technology just to protect the interests of gatekeeping corporations? I say the businesses just need to adapt to business models that allow sharing. If they can't do that, then they deserve to go out of business.

Even those methods were not nearly as convenient as we have these days. You could record the radio on a casette for a perfect copy, and replay it infinitely, but you couldn't share it. Because if you did, you lost it yourself. Only one person could listen to it at one time (or both of them would have to be in the same room). Same with VHS and library books. Only one person can use one copy at one time. Now, with digital media, everyone can use it simultaneously. So there is a distinct difference.

Yeah, and what we have now, probably isn't half as convenient as what we will have in 10 years. Technology marches on, can't stop progress. So what?

Though you're right about one thing ? despite all that, and given that DRM is useless, the movie and record industries don't seem to be in decline after all. I'm not entirely certain why, and getting rid of DRM would allow them to be even more profitable, but legalising free distribution most likely wouldn't.

So you're basically just guessing at this point? Ok.

Any industry that needs to restrict free sharing in order to stay in business DESERVES to go out of business. If they cannot adapt their business models, then bye bye dinosaurs.

And let me tell you why, since you're not certain. They're doing fine, because they've managed to externalize their business model to governments. They've got governments to enforce their monopoly position on content distribution. Piracy doesn't harm them, it's not piracy they're afraid of. It's a free internet, a free market without government subsidies, an uncontrollable, decentralized market place where anyone can bypass the gatekeepers... a future where they are irrelevant. And that's why the try so hard to push against internet freedom and try as hard as they can to implement forced scarcity.

Yes, that's the point. Give people an incentive to buy it, instead of just putting what is for all intents and purposes a "donate" link.

People don't need to be forced to contribute. Restricting sharing is not an "incentive", it's just strong-arming. Carrot works better than stick.

The cost of manufacturing a single comic strip is extremely low compared to the cost of manufacturing an AAA game or a film. It works in case of the former, and by far does not in case of the latter.

Yes, and? Who ever said that the same business model needs to work for every different product or business?

Games can and have been succesfully funded by crowdfunding. If sharing were legal, this type of business model would become much more popular, and by extension, new channels would be established, making it easy for gamers to contribute towards projects they were interested in. Games could also (and some already do) use a service model, where you can download the client for free, and then pay a subscription fee for the service of being able to play the game. That would also work with free sharing. Not as nice as the crowdfunding model, but it's definitely a possibility.

Movies have no problem with sharing. Movies can make profit from movie theaters. Market the movie-in-a-theater as an experience, a social event. Build a party around it, a whole thing of fan hype, people getting together to enjoy a movie in a good atmosphere and amazing playback system and humongous screen that's not feasible for a home studio... that's something that you can't copy or share over the internet.

But all of these great things won't happen until we give the content producers the push to pursue these business models. The push they need is the legalization of sharing. With legalized sharing, they will be forced to develop business models that provide better service, better experiences for consumers. And the old dinosaurs who only concentrate on being gatekeepers will die, as they should.

Well, sure, there are of course enthusiasts that just want to support the authors or the idea. But, at least from my perspective, there are many more freeloaders. It may work in some cases, where the cost of completing such a project is fairly low, but once again I don't see it working for AAA games or films.

There's absolutely no reason why it wouldn't work. Crowdsourcing as the major, primary way of funding games would give people the chance to be a part of the creation process. No longer would it be a top-down model with a fence between creators and consumers, instead, it would be a participatory experience. If sharing is legal, then there will be the incentive to develop these crowdfunding channels enough that they become popular and big enough to gather the money needed to produce AAA games.

[Zapitron]

If we are going to deal with DRM in our lives, the least they can do is to standardize its implementation.

That'll never happen. If they were ever to standardize the implementation, then it wouldn't be DRM anymore.

[Luke]

Even trusted computing and locked down networks can be countered

Worst case scenario:

1. Microsoft gets market dominance, forces free alternatives out of the markets with lobbying and patent threats, keeps Apple around to avoid monopoly charges
2. Microsoft implements Trusted Computing, a scheme where every computer user is no longer in control of their computer, instead, the OS decides what is appropriate to do and what is not... basically, DRM hard-coded in the OS itself
3. There is now an avenue for content streaming and buying, all on their terms, riddled with the worst DRM ever - you can't copy files because the OS won't let you
4. Then, the copyright mafia manages to pass a law or trade treaty that cripples the internet for good. They implement a legislative scheme where no one can afford to release content on the internet, except those affiliated with the copyright mafia, eliminating the threat of self-publishing
5. Torrents are the last vestige of freedom, but not many people can use them, since the DRM in windows won't let you use a torrent client... some people probably try to fight this underground, maintaining their underground Linux distros that only stay functional by violating a bunch of software patents
.

For every one of these, there is a countermeasure.

1: MS's patents effect only those who live in countries that recognize the patents or comply with trade agreements. A single noncomplying country could host everything from ffmpeg to pirate bay, reachable by international "voice" call and modem if blocked by ISP's. Once in the US or Japan, the files can be shared by flash drives, the way people used floppies and casette tapes.

2: Trusted computing: They have this in game consoles, illegal mod chips are available to root them. The ban affects only those who comply with the law, not those of us who refuse to recognize such laws. If the supply of older or unlocked motherboards runs out, new BIOS/UEFI chips, legal or not, will be made on chip programmers. Many enthusiest boards have socketed firmware chips! There will certainly be some individual chipsets or boards whose UEFI implementation is cracked, just like one specific DVD player killed DVD-CSS, and now certain specific Blu-ray players can be forced to bypass DRM.

Hell, anything that can be done with firmware can be un-done with firmware unless the firmware is mask-programmed into either the CPU itself, or a soldered BGA array chip on the motherboard. Then the manufacturer can't revoke keys or otherwise update the firmware. Put the firmware in flash, it can be changed. Buffer overflow anyone? That's what people do today to root certain phones, and nobody seems to ever be able to stop the all! I could see someone booting Windoze 10, starting a vulnerable program, getting root, replacing a binary in RAM after it has been loaded and hash checked and is running, then the modified code in RAM starts a program that "updates" UEFI with a modded version with all secure boot and DRM code stripped. You can bet all the best hackers are turning their biggest guns on Windoze 8 secure boot as I type this. Sooner or later, they will score a direct hit, and secure boot will lose 5 years or more to starting this arms race again from scratch. Just like in tanks and warships, arms always overcome armor in the end.

3: Can't copy? Wires to the speaker terminals inside that powered DRM'd HDCP powered speaker will recover analog audio just fine, forcibly reopening the "analog hole" with a homemade fix. Goodbye effective DRM for music, and goodbye "analog sunset" forever. Various algorithms can now corrupt any musical fingerprint, and any machine permittted to play ANY audio while disconnected from the net or firewalled from license servers will play them, as will all "illegal" /modchipped/custom firmware Linux boxes. Maybe these services go out of business when people don't patronize them, or are forced to scrap DRM the way iTunes was. Can't copy video directly? Sell a lot of HD cameras-and modified firmware for them, too if needed.

4: Lock down the Internet? You'd have to set the backbone servers to reject any encrypted packet they can't read. Goodbye Internet banking and store credit card transactions over the wires. Even if this worked, non-Telecom connected "mesh networks," darknets, flash drives (and hoarded older computers preserved like illegal guns if needed) will spread the "illegal" music and movie files like so many floppy-bourne viruses in 1994. One kid in school has an illegal Linux box to go with his illegal gun, downloads an encrypted file by hacked international phone call from a server in a coutry that boycotts all trade treaties. He then charges all his classmates $2 a flash drive for copies. Soon none of his classmates are buying anymore-the Digital Audio Tape nightmare Hollywood feared in action. Hell, Tunisia tried to simply shut down the Internet outright to muffle dissent, and everyone in urgan areas simly mesh networked their computers with the wifi devices they already had. You can ban that, but dissidents and pirates defy bans.

5: The underground can be a lot stronger than you think: A hacker in every school probaby exists now-enough to fileshare all popular music to 50%+ of that school's students, for instance. I've spent my whole life studying protest movements, revolutions, insurgency, and counter-law-enforcement, I am very familiar with how this kind of thing is done when a movement ignites and gathers steam. Seen it with the antiglobalization movement back in 1999, seen it come out of nowhere with Occupy back 2011. Between these to, and though the Bush years, the FBI and JTTF's never once were able to root out and kill the iron-hard networks of hard-bitten activsts that bridged those years. We took losses, but we survived to rise again!

6: SAVE all those Pentium III, Pentium 4, and from them up and excluding the first Windows 8 boxes! If MS gets their way, they will be like "pre-ban" large capacity magazines for rifles during the 1990's, very valuable once again, Never throw out unlocked hardware, no matter how slow! This becomes the case if enthusiest boards that can be or are by default unlocked are ever banned like game console mod chips.