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> Democracy only works when the population is properly informed and understands the implications. That's hardly the case in the sort of situation I mentioned ab

> Democracy only works when the population is properly informed and understands the implications. That's hardly the case in the sort of situation I mentioned above. And so we install draconian enforcement technology in everyone's home ... in order to make people more informed on the issue?

Silhouette 9y ago
Who said anything about draconian measures? Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users, particularly the technologies used with rental models rather than permanent purchases (where as I've said elsewhere I think both the ethics and practicalities are somewhat different). It's easy to snipe from the cheap seats, so let me ask you some questions now instead. Do you believe that financial models other than a complete, permanent purchase of a copy of a work are useful? And if so, how would you propose to set up a realistic rental/library/PPV scheme for digital content without relying on anything that could be called DRM?
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
  > Who said anything about draconian measures? DRM is a draconian measure, by necessity. > Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users What do you mean by that and how is it relevant? > Do you believe that financial models other than a complete, permanent purchase of a copy of a work are useful? Maybe. > And if so, how would you propose to set up a realistic rental/library/PPV scheme for digital content without relying on anything that could be called DRM? By just leaving out the DRM?
  - Silhouette 9y ago
    By just leaving out the DRM? I once thought as you do. Then I ran a business that invested significant money, some of it my own, in making original content. We really tried to avoid going down the DRM path, because I didn't like the idea of risking inconveniencing any legitimate customers. Today, in light of the experience doing that, I am much, much less sympathetic to claims that DRM doesn't do anything or should be abolished or whatever. The degree to which some people will just blatantly rip you off and even lie to your face about it afterwards is staggering. The arguments that if people are going to copy your stuff then they're going to get it somewhere else anyway so taking steps to make it harder have no benefits are simply wrong. There is nothing hypothetical about this. It is not conjecture or thought experiment. It is based on cold, hard data and experience with real money at risk. Incidentally, in the entire history of that business, as far as I'm aware we've never received a single complaint from a legitimate user that any of our safeguards was interfering with their normal enjoyment of the content. There have been one or two cases we couldn't absolutely prove but were pretty sure about, and otherwise basically 100% of people who complained about not being able to do something turned out to be trying to violate our terms and getting upset when our safeguards stopped them. BTW, in case you think we're just being paranoid, we have literally had people asking us why they couldn't access our material with well-known ripping software, to give one example of how blatant the abuse can be.
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
      Well, as for your business I obviously can't tell whether it was a deserved market failure, but in the end, it mostly doesn't matter, because DRM is just such a fundamentally broken idea with so many negative externalities that it would be hard to find anything that I couldn't live without if it depended on DRM to exist. However, I wonder about this: > BTW, in case you think we're just being paranoid, we have literally had people asking us why they couldn't access our material with well-known ripping software, to give one example of how blatant the abuse can be. What exactly is abuse about this? I mean, I get from what you are saying that you don't like it, but how is it abusive to use some tool to convert some content that you paid for into a format/transfer it into an environment of your own choice that you want to use it in? If your terms said that you couldn't do that, I would rather consider your terms abusive.
      - Silhouette 9y ago
        The business I mentioned didn't fail. We were just forced to become more aggressive about protecting our IP, and contrary to everyone telling me otherwise, that strategy was very obviously effective even with still a relatively light touch. Like A/B testing a web site and hitting on a simple change that bumps your conversions by 20%, even making something a little less convenient to rip and share can make quite a big difference. The objection to rippers is that we were effectively operating on a form of rental model. If someone is paying a lower price to rent your stuff, you can't let them rip all of it and keep it permanently anyway, and this was explicitly contrary to our terms. Obviously so was sharing it on major hosting services and even trying to monetize it, which sadly wasn't unheard of either.
        zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
        > The objection to rippers is that we were effectively operating on a form of rental model. If someone is paying a lower price to rent your stuff, you can't let them rip all of it and keep it permanently anyway, and this was explicitly contrary to our terms. Now, did they ask for help with how to keep it permanently or with ripping it to their own device? You are constantly confusing those. If I paid for some content rental, I sure as hell would expect that I can put a copy of it on my laptop to watch/listen/read while offline on the train, and I would expect support for that.
- icebraining 9y ago
  Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users, particularly the technologies used with rental models rather than permanent purchases (where as I've said elsewhere I think both the ethics and practicalities are somewhat different). I disagree, please provides examples of commonly used and almost completely transparent DRM. I'll start with a counterpoint: a user on Chrome (not exactly a minority), Firefox or Opera can't watch Netflix with a resolution over 720p.
  - Silhouette 9y ago
    I disagree, please provides examples of commonly used and almost completely transparent DRM. I use several major business software packages. I run the program. It loads and I use it. I put a DVD or Blu-ray into my player. I play the disc. I watch the movie. I'm not a big gamer myself these days, but I've rarely heard anyone complain about Steam's DRM in years.
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
      So ... DRM is completely transparent if it doesn't get in your way when you only do what the DRM allows you to do? That's a whole lot like you are completely free to do whatever you want to do, as long as it's what we told you to do, isn't it?
      - Silhouette 9y ago
        That's a whole lot like you are completely free to do whatever you want to do, as long as it's what we told you to do, isn't it? Well, since that's fundamentally what copyright is about... yes. What were you expecting?
        zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
        I guess I was expecting something that explains your argument? I mean, unless I completely misunderstood you, you justified DRM by saying that it was ok because it doesn't get in your way ("it's transparent"). And now you are essentially saying that if it did get in your way, that would also be ok, because that's the purpose of DRM. Or in other words: Whether it does get in your way is completely irrelevant as to whether or not you think DRM is acceptable. So, what was your argument, then?

Silhouette 9y ago

Who said anything about draconian measures? Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users, particularly the technologies used with rental models rather than permanent purchases (where as I've said elsewhere I think both the ethics and practicalities are somewhat different). It's easy to snipe from the cheap seats, so let me ask you some questions now instead. Do you believe that financial models other than a complete, permanent purchase of a copy of a work are useful? And if so, how would you propose to set up a realistic rental/library/PPV scheme for digital content without relying on anything that could be called DRM?

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
> Who said anything about draconian measures? DRM is a draconian measure, by necessity. > Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users What do you mean by that and how is it relevant? > Do you believe that financial models other than a complete, permanent purchase of a copy of a work are useful? Maybe. > And if so, how would you propose to set up a realistic rental/library/PPV scheme for digital content without relying on anything that could be called DRM? By just leaving out the DRM?
- Silhouette 9y ago
  By just leaving out the DRM? I once thought as you do. Then I ran a business that invested significant money, some of it my own, in making original content. We really tried to avoid going down the DRM path, because I didn't like the idea of risking inconveniencing any legitimate customers. Today, in light of the experience doing that, I am much, much less sympathetic to claims that DRM doesn't do anything or should be abolished or whatever. The degree to which some people will just blatantly rip you off and even lie to your face about it afterwards is staggering. The arguments that if people are going to copy your stuff then they're going to get it somewhere else anyway so taking steps to make it harder have no benefits are simply wrong. There is nothing hypothetical about this. It is not conjecture or thought experiment. It is based on cold, hard data and experience with real money at risk. Incidentally, in the entire history of that business, as far as I'm aware we've never received a single complaint from a legitimate user that any of our safeguards was interfering with their normal enjoyment of the content. There have been one or two cases we couldn't absolutely prove but were pretty sure about, and otherwise basically 100% of people who complained about not being able to do something turned out to be trying to violate our terms and getting upset when our safeguards stopped them. BTW, in case you think we're just being paranoid, we have literally had people asking us why they couldn't access our material with well-known ripping software, to give one example of how blatant the abuse can be.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
    Well, as for your business I obviously can't tell whether it was a deserved market failure, but in the end, it mostly doesn't matter, because DRM is just such a fundamentally broken idea with so many negative externalities that it would be hard to find anything that I couldn't live without if it depended on DRM to exist. However, I wonder about this: > BTW, in case you think we're just being paranoid, we have literally had people asking us why they couldn't access our material with well-known ripping software, to give one example of how blatant the abuse can be. What exactly is abuse about this? I mean, I get from what you are saying that you don't like it, but how is it abusive to use some tool to convert some content that you paid for into a format/transfer it into an environment of your own choice that you want to use it in? If your terms said that you couldn't do that, I would rather consider your terms abusive.
    - Silhouette 9y ago
      The business I mentioned didn't fail. We were just forced to become more aggressive about protecting our IP, and contrary to everyone telling me otherwise, that strategy was very obviously effective even with still a relatively light touch. Like A/B testing a web site and hitting on a simple change that bumps your conversions by 20%, even making something a little less convenient to rip and share can make quite a big difference. The objection to rippers is that we were effectively operating on a form of rental model. If someone is paying a lower price to rent your stuff, you can't let them rip all of it and keep it permanently anyway, and this was explicitly contrary to our terms. Obviously so was sharing it on major hosting services and even trying to monetize it, which sadly wasn't unheard of either.
      - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
        > The objection to rippers is that we were effectively operating on a form of rental model. If someone is paying a lower price to rent your stuff, you can't let them rip all of it and keep it permanently anyway, and this was explicitly contrary to our terms. Now, did they ask for help with how to keep it permanently or with ripping it to their own device? You are constantly confusing those. If I paid for some content rental, I sure as hell would expect that I can put a copy of it on my laptop to watch/listen/read while offline on the train, and I would expect support for that.
icebraining 9y ago
Most modern DRM is almost completely transparent to legitimate users, particularly the technologies used with rental models rather than permanent purchases (where as I've said elsewhere I think both the ethics and practicalities are somewhat different). I disagree, please provides examples of commonly used and almost completely transparent DRM. I'll start with a counterpoint: a user on Chrome (not exactly a minority), Firefox or Opera can't watch Netflix with a resolution over 720p.
- Silhouette 9y ago
  I disagree, please provides examples of commonly used and almost completely transparent DRM. I use several major business software packages. I run the program. It loads and I use it. I put a DVD or Blu-ray into my player. I play the disc. I watch the movie. I'm not a big gamer myself these days, but I've rarely heard anyone complain about Steam's DRM in years.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
    So ... DRM is completely transparent if it doesn't get in your way when you only do what the DRM allows you to do? That's a whole lot like you are completely free to do whatever you want to do, as long as it's what we told you to do, isn't it?
    - Silhouette 9y ago
      That's a whole lot like you are completely free to do whatever you want to do, as long as it's what we told you to do, isn't it? Well, since that's fundamentally what copyright is about... yes. What were you expecting?
      - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 9y ago
        I guess I was expecting something that explains your argument? I mean, unless I completely misunderstood you, you justified DRM by saying that it was ok because it doesn't get in your way ("it's transparent"). And now you are essentially saying that if it did get in your way, that would also be ok, because that's the purpose of DRM. Or in other words: Whether it does get in your way is completely irrelevant as to whether or not you think DRM is acceptable. So, what was your argument, then?