5 ms·

This is nitpicking. He clearly meant to say: > If you bought it, you should own it. If the "real" meaning if the transaction is "rent till we decide you can't

This is nitpicking. He clearly meant to say: > If you bought it, you should own it. If the "real" meaning if the transaction is "rent till we decide you can't anymore", then it shouldn't be misrepresented as a purchase.

mikeryan 14y ago
If the "real" meaning if the transaction is "rent till we decide you can't anymore", then it shouldn't be misrepresented as a purchase. it is a purchase, you purchased the rights to some piece of content for some period of time.
- shmerl 14y ago
  No, if you want to keep it formal - it's not a purchase. It's rental. But since it's presented to people as purchase, people should treat it as purchase. And don't claim that people who buy it are buying any "rights" (i.e. keeping in mind to buy some abstract "rights"). They are buying content.
  - rayiner 14y ago
    There isn't a dichotomy between rent and purchase. In both cases, you're buying a bundle of rights with respect to somemthing. You may buy use of something yet be restricted in that use. Consider buying a condo. You "own" the condo, but there are all sorts of restrictions on what you can do. The real question is: are people aware of the terms of the deal? Are the aware of the specific rights they are purchasing when they buy DRM content? I think they are.
    - shmerl 14y ago
      Dichotomy is in perception. Rental can be formally called "buying rights to use it for limited time". Still there are two distinctly perceived use cases (even if not fully formal) - "buying" and "renting". Buying implies owning it, renting implies limited usage (not owning it). Distributed content is presented to people as "purchase", while DRM attempts to limit the use case to "renting". It's misleading and unfair. As long as it's presented as "buying", people should treat it as buying. Explicitly presenting it as "renting" decreases the attractiveness, that's why DRM inclined distributors mislead their users with avoiding the usage of the "rent" term. But it only strengthens my point - since they rely on implicit perception of buying to attract people, people should treat this interaction as buying and these distributors should not complain when their DRM is scraped.
      - gamblor956 14y ago
        A lease and a purchase are legally distinct concepts. Generally, a lease is a time-limited acquisition of rights. A purchase is an unlimited (with respect to time) acquisition of rights. A license can be purchased, even if it does not carry all of the rights associated with the underlying product. A license can also be leased, in which case the license is of a limited duration. A purchase of a DRM-protected good is a purchase of a license to use an IP on the condition that the usage is subject to a rights management policy. This is not a rental, because the license is not time-limited in the acquisition agreement itself. (Thus, even if the DRM servers were disabled the next day, it would not have been a lease--the terms of the acquisition agreement itself are what matter.)
        shmerl 14y ago
        If this is not a time limited acquisition of rights, then what about all the "time windows" and potential revocations? If they exist - it means it's not unlimited in time and therefore it's similar to the lease (of the content), rather than to a purchase. That was my point above - when people buy, they don't care to buy any "licenses". They buy content. Those who sell it, fool them with selling a license, while making them think they actually buy what they want to buy (i.e. the content). I.e. in essence they lease them the content, while making people think they buy the content.
        drucken 14y ago
        Renting does not have to involve a lease, as in being time-limited. Renting can be open-ended. The key differentiating characteristic of renting vs buying is that in renting ownership of the expected good has not changed or has not fully transferred. When you buy a good, legal ownership (whatever that means in any given jurisdiction) of that specific good has been transferred in full. Entities using DRM are exploiting not the ownership transfer but the expectations for that good. The corporate, as it almost always is, transfers ownership of a substitute good which requires a license/renting to access the expected good. The end users therefore have not bought the expected good, but a substitute good plus an access license "option". With DRM, this "option" can be (technically or legally) revoked or is callable at any time thereby disabling access or removing the expected good. So, the obvious solution is not to buy a substitute good + callable option when you actually want the underlying (expected) good. Otherwise, you are just creating demand for substitute goods and all the fancy methods to create the callable options.

mikeryan 14y ago

If the "real" meaning if the transaction is "rent till we decide you can't anymore", then it shouldn't be misrepresented as a purchase. it is a purchase, you purchased the rights to some piece of content for some period of time.

shmerl 14y ago
No, if you want to keep it formal - it's not a purchase. It's rental. But since it's presented to people as purchase, people should treat it as purchase. And don't claim that people who buy it are buying any "rights" (i.e. keeping in mind to buy some abstract "rights"). They are buying content.
- rayiner 14y ago
  There isn't a dichotomy between rent and purchase. In both cases, you're buying a bundle of rights with respect to somemthing. You may buy use of something yet be restricted in that use. Consider buying a condo. You "own" the condo, but there are all sorts of restrictions on what you can do. The real question is: are people aware of the terms of the deal? Are the aware of the specific rights they are purchasing when they buy DRM content? I think they are.
  - shmerl 14y ago
    Dichotomy is in perception. Rental can be formally called "buying rights to use it for limited time". Still there are two distinctly perceived use cases (even if not fully formal) - "buying" and "renting". Buying implies owning it, renting implies limited usage (not owning it). Distributed content is presented to people as "purchase", while DRM attempts to limit the use case to "renting". It's misleading and unfair. As long as it's presented as "buying", people should treat it as buying. Explicitly presenting it as "renting" decreases the attractiveness, that's why DRM inclined distributors mislead their users with avoiding the usage of the "rent" term. But it only strengthens my point - since they rely on implicit perception of buying to attract people, people should treat this interaction as buying and these distributors should not complain when their DRM is scraped.
    - gamblor956 14y ago
      A lease and a purchase are legally distinct concepts. Generally, a lease is a time-limited acquisition of rights. A purchase is an unlimited (with respect to time) acquisition of rights. A license can be purchased, even if it does not carry all of the rights associated with the underlying product. A license can also be leased, in which case the license is of a limited duration. A purchase of a DRM-protected good is a purchase of a license to use an IP on the condition that the usage is subject to a rights management policy. This is not a rental, because the license is not time-limited in the acquisition agreement itself. (Thus, even if the DRM servers were disabled the next day, it would not have been a lease--the terms of the acquisition agreement itself are what matter.)
      - shmerl 14y ago
        If this is not a time limited acquisition of rights, then what about all the "time windows" and potential revocations? If they exist - it means it's not unlimited in time and therefore it's similar to the lease (of the content), rather than to a purchase. That was my point above - when people buy, they don't care to buy any "licenses". They buy content. Those who sell it, fool them with selling a license, while making them think they actually buy what they want to buy (i.e. the content). I.e. in essence they lease them the content, while making people think they buy the content.
      - drucken 14y ago
        Renting does not have to involve a lease, as in being time-limited. Renting can be open-ended. The key differentiating characteristic of renting vs buying is that in renting ownership of the expected good has not changed or has not fully transferred. When you buy a good, legal ownership (whatever that means in any given jurisdiction) of that specific good has been transferred in full. Entities using DRM are exploiting not the ownership transfer but the expectations for that good. The corporate, as it almost always is, transfers ownership of a substitute good which requires a license/renting to access the expected good. The end users therefore have not bought the expected good, but a substitute good plus an access license "option". With DRM, this "option" can be (technically or legally) revoked or is callable at any time thereby disabling access or removing the expected good. So, the obvious solution is not to buy a substitute good + callable option when you actually want the underlying (expected) good. Otherwise, you are just creating demand for substitute goods and all the fancy methods to create the callable options.