I agree that DRM is most often used against the user but I disagree that it has to be used against the user for it to be called DRM. DRM is Digital Rights Mana

I agree that DRM is most often used against the user but I disagree that it has to be used against the user for it to be called DRM. DRM is Digital Rights Management, there is nothing in the name about being used against a specific group of people. I could use it to prevent you from playing a song just as I could use it to prevent unsigned kernel modules from loading on a secure system, the only difference is that DRM is so often used against us consumers that the colloquial definition is shifting away from including things which are technically DRM but which aren't used against you. This is the same kind of thing that happened to the "native advertising" people who hide adverts as news stories and wonder why people have come yo loath the term native advertising. They've unintrntionally established a colloquial definition that is actually quite distant from the textbook definition through their abuse. I argue the same has happened to DRM.