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"FOSS advocates think everything should be free" - Sorry, not true | 215 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
hmmm, well advertizing has been around for a while
Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 09:40 PM EDT
Maybe you should advertise like TV shows or Movie theatres. Google seems to
make quite a bit of money in advertising. I think you should look at other ways
of raising income or paying costs. The most money usually comes with unique
simple processes. Imposing something on people only causes them to try to make
a way to get what you protect without compensation to you. Copyright will
protect you. And advertising (if it is good) will compensate. Just my opinion.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: Gringo_ on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 10:19 PM EDT

Actually, having given this a bit more thought, I can understand some of the concerns that the EFF is talking about. I suppose we could keep DRM out of the HTML5 spec, because that does not preclude dedicated non-HTML5 apps like Netflix for those of us who want it.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: PolR on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 10:34 PM EDT
No FOSS people don't say everything should be free. They don't advocate
violating copyright law.

The issue is whether the owner of the computer has the control on his own
computer. DRM is a form of encryption where the viewer must have the decryption
key in order to see the contents but he is not allowed to know this key because
otherwise the encryption is broken. If you are sane, hilarity should ensue
here.

The solution(s) contents provider have come up with are meant to control what
the user can do with his own computer. Then they think the user won't be able to
find the keys. For example there is the so-called Trusted Computing where only
signed operating system can be booted on a computer and legal roadblocks like
the DMCA that criminalize efforts to find the keys in the code you own, even for
fair use purposes.

These abusive behaviors is what FOSS people object to. They have no business in
an open standard.

Don't tell me it kills a potential market for you. You have no rights to get
control over my computer in order to gain a market. It is your responsibility to
find a business model that respects my rights. If you insist on DRM your should
use a separate proprietary program and not something built into the standard.
Then I will be free to keep it off my computer. Needless to say, I am not your
potential market.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

I don't care about your maket
Authored by: marcosdumay on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 11:23 PM EDT
Well, ok, it shouldn't sound that rude, but I don't know any other way of saying
that. I really don't care about your maket. If I want some entretainement from
you, and you want to sell it to me, great! But if you don't want to sell it to
me, I don't care. It's just entretainement.

One thing I certainly won't accept is making my computer less usefull for
important tasks as a condition to buy your entretainement. Nor I'll accept you
controlling my important data.

I may, if you are good enough, accept you controlling a separeted device,
brought just for that, where I'll keep no important data. (And it seems that
lots of people have that same opinoin.) But you won't touch anything actualy
usefull.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 11:41 PM EDT
If we say there should be no DRM available in HTML5, then you have just killed a potential market for me.

And I want a market for my flatulence, too! I've heard there is this scene that's really into it!

What on Earth makes you think anybody else is somehow responsible for providing you with a market?

You say you use Netflix. So use it. If you need DRM, you have your client or browser plugins, and be done with it. Why should the world provide you with a market? Why should the world ensure your old-fashioned business model survives?

The world does not owe you anything. Especially not a market. You are not special; there are about seven billion of us here, all equally valuable.

There is no benefit for the standard or the end users for adding DRM. It does not bring any added functionality, it simply makes DRM-applying-plugin construction easier -- cheaper.

If the browser makers want to help out with that, fine. Yet, there is no reason to pollute the standard with that. Or should we be adding everything that happens to provide somebody with a business opportunity? Or is entertainment somehow more important than everything else?

Funnily enough, the best argument for adding DRM into the standard thus far boils down to most plugins being atrocious: crash often, are slow, use too much CPU or other resources, only work with specific browser versions. The poor big businesses that have difficulty in implementing are basically asking for everybody else to help them, because they don't feel like paying for actually working plugins. In effect, that users would get a better service, if others pitch in -- because their providers don't want to pay the developers themselves.

Current independent research shows that DRM is irrelevant. Not just because the independent ones show that those who share, also buy the most, but because we can look at music and music market, to see what works. Or do you think audio entertainment is totally different to audiovisual entertainment?

The true problem with DRM is that it has the singular purpose of shafting both end users and authors, by maximizing profits for the middleman, the publisher or the service provider. That business model is dying. Not because most people are pirates, but because that business model does not work anymore.

I for one believe it is morally corrupt to even defend the model, where most authors -- aside from a microscopic fraction of superstars -- and media workers get paid in peanuts, while the distributors reap in the profits. In the past, the distributors were needed; they had the channels of actually getting the products to the customers.

Now, we have this ubiquitous information network that can be used as a very very cheap distribution and marketing channel. It removed the need for large distributor organizations; the raison d'etre for the powerful middle man is gone. We have something better; in fact, the content producers could easily provide the content directly to the customers completely without a middleman -- and some do, quite successfully. But, because entertainment is such a huge business, the Owners are spending a lot of political money to tweak the very laws our societies work by -- just look at copyright extensions and so on --, instead of competing equally and honestly in the market place.

I'm personally very happy that equitable music services have started cropping up. Ten years ago, I thought it would never happen, and simply stopped listening to anything. If I were to listen to music (I really don't), there are already a couple of services I could be happy with. They work fine without DRM. So, why would movies/shows/TV need DRM? It may take a decade or two, but they too will be dragged to this century.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, May 29 2013 @ 11:41 PM EDT
>Without DRM, I can't see how else to make it available for online
viewing.

What makes you think that DRM will prevent third parties from
offering your content gratis, streamed over the Internet?

Try not to present reasons that demonstrate why you would buy
prime ocean front property in Denver, Colorado.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 01:58 PM EDT
DRM is fundamentally at odds with FOSS, to the point where supporters of DRM
will NEVER allow a free software module to play their content. If HTML5
supports DRM, this makes any FOSS browsers automatically second class as there
would be "HTML5" content they could never support.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

DRM protects spyware, not content
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 04:18 PM EDT
The content was already available, the DRM only enables them to make you pay for
it.
To take an example from the (Dutch TV) marked:

unencrypted TV could be recorded,
DRM wanted that too so they sold 'special boxes" with hard discs
unencrypted TV could be played to all TV's
DRM wanted in, and started shipping more devices per user (for a fee)
unencrypted could have multiple tuners, DRM moved into teh cloud
unencrypted could play on mobile devices
DRM released 'apps'
unencrypted created 'web-streams'
some people forwarded those apps to a web stream like they did with unencrypted
content:
DRM freaked out and blocked all rooted devices including firewalls, ad-blocks,
visualization of data, Cyanogen mods etc....

MBB

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Sell me a hard copy please
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 04:22 PM EDT

If I'm going to see your movie, it's because I've added it to my movie library.

I do so preferably via the Blue Ray sets that included the dvd and digital versions. I'm willing to pay the $30 range for that because for myself, I view that as a fair price. And yes... I do that knowing the digital copy may not actually be on the disk and that it quite likely is DRM protected anyway.

I don't want your DRM protected on-line copy. If your host server goes down for one reason or another (licensing being invalidated is the same for the purposes expressed) - then I loose an item from my library.

I didn't loose it because I treated it badly and damaged it. Or because my home caught fire. Or because it got lost in the shuffle of moving.

I lost my legally purchased copy because of - potentially - your whim to disable the product.

You have a right to have your work copyright protected. That means you have a right to me not copying your work and selling it for my own profit.

That does not mean you have the right to arbitrarily decide I don't get to keep that movie in my library. That is not one of your rights under Copyright Law.

On the note of renting: I don't do it. It's like going to the theatre. You pay and only get to see it once.

If you don't wish to make a "copy for purchase" available - you only ever want to rent your movie - then I'm not in your target market. I don't want to be your target market. I have no need of such software on my computer and don't want it.

Standards should include the minimum required for the public. "this is something everyone will need if they do X". Since DRM software is not something I will ever need - it should not be part of a standard.

There's absolutely nothing stopping you from creating your own software to wrap around your movie. That way, the customers that want to rent your movie can also rent your software.

RAS

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

"FOSS advocates think everything should be free" - Sorry, not true
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 04:26 PM EDT

I'm an FOSS advocate and I don't think everything should be free. I can't say what portion of the "foss advocate group" feels the same, but I wouldn't be surprised to find out it's the larger portion.

I do believe:

    everything should be freedom of choice!
And there's a chasm of difference between "freedom of choice" and "free cost".

Shouldn't I have the freedom to choose not to have DRM software on my computer? It is my computer after all.

And the simple bottom line is:

    If it goes into a standard, unless you remove yourself from that technology, you have no choice!

RAS

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EFF Makes Formal Objection to DRM in HTML5
Authored by: coats on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 05:26 PM EDT
As to why, have a look at this:

http://www.baen.com/librar y/prime_palaver6.asp

where successful writer Eric Flint describes why he makes some of his books available on-line for free, and analyzes how that has in fact increased his income.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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