3 ms·

> So, in my view, a standard cross-platform secure DRM model for the web is required. If you want to consume it, you should be prepared to pay for it. These ar

by pedrocr 10y ago

> So, in my view, a standard cross-platform secure DRM model for the web is required. If you want to consume it, you should be prepared to pay for it. These are completely orthogonal to one another. People pay for content when they can get a good service at a fair price. For the longest time it was much easier to torrent movies and shows than to try and navigate through the cesspool of TV scheduling, ads, etc. Netflix fixed that and now people pay for content. The same happened with music. DRM solves nothing as it only takes one determined person to break it and then everyone else gets a great experience. Meanwhile all your paying customers have to suffer through a poor experience thanks to DRM. It's self-defeating.

Jaruzel 10y ago
> Meanwhile all your paying customers have to suffer through a poor experience thanks to DRM. No, that's all thanks to rubbish DRM. You are confusing the concept of DRM with the implementation. Good DRM should be seamless and no-different (to the end user) to non-DRM content - it's this area that is failing, and why the current failure to settle on a good DRM standard is resulting in so many badly implemented proprietary systems.
- unimpressive 10y ago
  Can you point to a secure, non-intrusive DRM scheme?
  - Jaruzel 10y ago
    Nope. That's the whole point. There isn't a good implementation of DRM (yet). I think people are reading what I wrote and saw me championing the current DRM implementations we have (hence the down-votes). I wasn't. I was simply pointing out that DRM is necessary if we want people to continue to create quality work. Not every is an Open-Source/FOSS advocate, and also starving artists need to eat.
    - unimpressive 10y ago
      Can you point to any theoretical approaches that might yield a non-intrusive secure implementation of DRM?
      - Jaruzel 10y ago
        What, and continue to get down-voted on this thread? :)
- gcp 10y ago
  You are confusing the concept of DRM with the implementation He's not confusing it. Due to its nature, it's not possible for DRM to be un-intruisive. The concept is broken, and consequently, the implementations too. It's not like smart people haven't looked at this problem!
- pedrocr 10y ago
  >Good DRM should be seamless and no-different (to the end user) to non-DRM content There is no such thing. DRM tries to do something that's fundamentally impossible. It wants to allow you to view content while at the same time not allow you to copy it but that's a distinction that only exists in intent not technically. It's also impossible in practice since at best it could aim to be as good as not existing at all but since it's not made of magic pixie dust but is actual hardware and software it will both fail open and fail closed. The fail open cases will be used to get the content out of it. The fail closed ones will frustrate users who just want to be able to view their content who will then grab the illegal copies and will soon figure out that they are paying for an inferior experience.
  - Jaruzel 10y ago
    I kinda agree there. If you can see it - it can be copied. Maybe the best counter to DRM is for people to be more honest :)
- imtringued 10y ago
  At some point encrypted data has to be decrypted, image data has to be displayed through a monitor and sound data has to be played through a speaker. It's impossible. The only "good" DRM is Steam because it pretends to be strong DRM when in reality it's just talking to the steam client and decrypting an executable with a key that is stored locally. All you need to do to bypass it is find the original entry point, set a breakpoint there, dump the unencrypted data and modify the dumped executable to start at the now unencrypted entry point.
- ska 10y ago
  You are implicitly asserting that a "good implementation" is technically possible, but that is not at all clear.
- 794CD01 10y ago
  Good DRM can be as unintrusive as possible, but it cannot be as good as a non-DRM solution because it has additional requirements. It needs to check that you've paid for the content and therefore you must log in to use the service. It needs to enforce regional licensing restrictions, etc. See popcorn time vs netflix. Netflix is probably as usable as it can be given the requirements. But it's still not good enough.
edem 10y ago
I can second this. For example one of my favourite artists' work was so rare at some point in the past that it was only possible to get my hands on his work is to torrent it. Now we have Spotify and bandcamp so I can listen to whatever I want wherever I want whenever I want and I'm willing to pay a nominal monthly fee for the service.
- gcp 10y ago
  Conversely, bands that aren't on Spotify no longer exist to me.
  - edem 10y ago
    True. Spotify is also a leaky abstraction. For example there were all albums of Atrium Carceri on Spotify and 6 of them were removed more than a year ago. I asked AC what happened and he told me that they are "reprinting" the old albums. I don't know what does that have to do with Spotify but now I'm in the limbo of sometimes navigating to bandcamp to listen to an older album and then navigating back to Spofity...I won't buy his albums because of the promise that he will put them back sometime but it haven't happened yet.

by pedrocr 10y ago

Jaruzel 10y ago

> Meanwhile all your paying customers have to suffer through a poor experience thanks to DRM. No, that's all thanks to rubbish DRM. You are confusing the concept of DRM with the implementation. Good DRM should be seamless and no-different (to the end user) to non-DRM content - it's this area that is failing, and why the current failure to settle on a good DRM standard is resulting in so many badly implemented proprietary systems.

unimpressive 10y ago
Can you point to a secure, non-intrusive DRM scheme?
- Jaruzel 10y ago
  Nope. That's the whole point. There isn't a good implementation of DRM (yet). I think people are reading what I wrote and saw me championing the current DRM implementations we have (hence the down-votes). I wasn't. I was simply pointing out that DRM is necessary if we want people to continue to create quality work. Not every is an Open-Source/FOSS advocate, and also starving artists need to eat.
  - unimpressive 10y ago
    Can you point to any theoretical approaches that might yield a non-intrusive secure implementation of DRM?
    - Jaruzel 10y ago
      What, and continue to get down-voted on this thread? :)
gcp 10y ago
You are confusing the concept of DRM with the implementation He's not confusing it. Due to its nature, it's not possible for DRM to be un-intruisive. The concept is broken, and consequently, the implementations too. It's not like smart people haven't looked at this problem!
pedrocr 10y ago
>Good DRM should be seamless and no-different (to the end user) to non-DRM content There is no such thing. DRM tries to do something that's fundamentally impossible. It wants to allow you to view content while at the same time not allow you to copy it but that's a distinction that only exists in intent not technically. It's also impossible in practice since at best it could aim to be as good as not existing at all but since it's not made of magic pixie dust but is actual hardware and software it will both fail open and fail closed. The fail open cases will be used to get the content out of it. The fail closed ones will frustrate users who just want to be able to view their content who will then grab the illegal copies and will soon figure out that they are paying for an inferior experience.
- Jaruzel 10y ago
  I kinda agree there. If you can see it - it can be copied. Maybe the best counter to DRM is for people to be more honest :)
imtringued 10y ago
At some point encrypted data has to be decrypted, image data has to be displayed through a monitor and sound data has to be played through a speaker. It's impossible. The only "good" DRM is Steam because it pretends to be strong DRM when in reality it's just talking to the steam client and decrypting an executable with a key that is stored locally. All you need to do to bypass it is find the original entry point, set a breakpoint there, dump the unencrypted data and modify the dumped executable to start at the now unencrypted entry point.
ska 10y ago
You are implicitly asserting that a "good implementation" is technically possible, but that is not at all clear.
794CD01 10y ago
Good DRM can be as unintrusive as possible, but it cannot be as good as a non-DRM solution because it has additional requirements. It needs to check that you've paid for the content and therefore you must log in to use the service. It needs to enforce regional licensing restrictions, etc. See popcorn time vs netflix. Netflix is probably as usable as it can be given the requirements. But it's still not good enough.

edem 10y ago

I can second this. For example one of my favourite artists' work was so rare at some point in the past that it was only possible to get my hands on his work is to torrent it. Now we have Spotify and bandcamp so I can listen to whatever I want wherever I want whenever I want and I'm willing to pay a nominal monthly fee for the service.

gcp 10y ago
Conversely, bands that aren't on Spotify no longer exist to me.
- edem 10y ago
  True. Spotify is also a leaky abstraction. For example there were all albums of Atrium Carceri on Spotify and 6 of them were removed more than a year ago. I asked AC what happened and he told me that they are "reprinting" the old albums. I don't know what does that have to do with Spotify but now I'm in the limbo of sometimes navigating to bandcamp to listen to an older album and then navigating back to Spofity...I won't buy his albums because of the promise that he will put them back sometime but it haven't happened yet.