I would say the farm equipment DRM isn't even giving the illusion of control. It's plainly obvious it restricts the equipment's use to everyone who owns them, a

I would say the farm equipment DRM isn't even giving the illusion of control. It's plainly obvious it restricts the equipment's use to everyone who owns them, and not in some lawfully required way. Backdoored/coincidentally-flawed software and hardware and things like that which are pervasive in tech don't get in people's way so much. As soon as flaws become more widely known they get patched. Surveillance doesn't get in people's way, directly. DRM like EME stops some copying but goes unnoticed by most, and can be rationalized easier than the farm equipment.