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modoc 18y ago
Don't forget it was pretty much required by the music labels to get the songs into the ITMS in the first place. I don't doubt that there was a benefit analysis related to limiting people sharing around downloaded songs, but I think that the music labels bear the majority of the blame in this situation.
cabalamat 18y ago
Apple don't use DRM because they're anti-freedom. You misunderstand me. I don't think that's why Apple use DRM. Clearly, Apple use DRM becasue they think they will make more profits if they do than if they don't. Apple's end-goal is to increase profits. Their means-goal is DRM. Reducing my freedom is, from Apple's point of view, reducing my freedom is merely a side-effect, and not one they're particularly bothered about either way. Similarly, a burglar steals my stuff not because he wants to prevent me from having it, but because he wants himself to have it; preventing me from having it is merely a side effect. (I suspect the misunderstanding comes from my poor phrasing; instead of saying "The whole point of DRM to remove people's freedom" I should have said "DRM intrinsically invovles removing people's freedom".) But they're perfectly entitled to try to stop people from doing these things. It's true that the law allows Apple to make legal threats against those to wish to use their iPod or iPhone in creative ways. It's a bad law.
- boucher 18y ago
  Although its clear I'm not going to change your mind, I would only point out that the law you're talking about exists to allow companies to enforce other longstanding laws, specifically copyright. Just because you would like to be allowed to copy any media off any device doesn't mean that should be possible. Your interests are not the only ones to consider. Under the law, content producers have rights too, and it's reasonable to expect them to try to protect those rights. Anyone certainly has the capacity to (attempt to) rob a bank, but that doesn't mean adding a safe is taking away their freedom. Now, ultimately, I think DRM is both a waste of effort and bad business, but it's disingenuous to call it a moral issue; it isn't. It's a legitimate disagreement between competing interests.
  - BeeBopPlanet 18y ago
    Sure, adding a safe isn't taking away my freedom, but putting a safe in my house and putting anything in there, then telling me I can't touch IS taking away my freedom. If it's my house, I can do whatever I want inside it.
    - boucher 18y ago
      Taking up space isn't the same as taking up freedom. And, the analogy doesn't hold up: Power meters are in your house, but you're not allowed to tamper with them. So are mailboxes. Laws don't go away when you enter your front door. You can't murder, you can't beat your children, and you can't steal from people, even electronically. Being inside your house does grant you some rights, like to privacy, and against unreasonable searches. It isn't completely obvious, though, whether or not DRM violates those rights. Again, I don't like DRM anymore than the next guy, but it's not a black and white issue. And it's made worse by the fact that the laws it seeks to protect haven't been updated for far too long.
      - jgranby 18y ago
        Exactly. DRM is usually there to make it difficult to do something that is illegal anyway. With music, it's just as illegal to copy (copyrighted) non-DRM music as it is to copy DRM-protected music. The reason the DRM is there is because people still share music, even though it's illegal. It's the same reason we put locks on our doors: if everyone were law-abiding law, we wouldn't need them, but we do need them because people do break the law. It's not about freedom at all -- it's about stopping people breaking copyright (and other) laws, laws which still apply even when DRM isn't used.