RE: FN-FORUM: Advice on DRM needed

date posted 6th November 2007 17:24

I would have to agree as well - I have yet to see anything good about DRM.

I seem to remember somewhere that Virgin decided there was no longer a
future in offering downloads of music for sale, from its website; it has
since stopped this, and the retail outlets have been sold out on a
management buyout(?) and rebranded as Zavvi. However, HMV are still doing
downloads - I wonder if the thorny issue of DRM was one factor that swayed
Richard Branson to sell out? The music show "Top of the Pops" was retired,
on the grounds that people were buying more online in the form of digital
downloads, and less so on CDs. If you were to go to DRM, which formats would
you cater for? Are the same formats available worldwide, where naturally you
would want to be selling, or do you add code to prevent sales from say a US
site to UK or European customers, for example?

I think DRM is too limiting; it is asking for people to attempt to hack the
format, and find a way to remove it and allow people to play it on whatever
format they desire. I am not in any way shape or form advocating this, but
believe that the harder life is made for people, the more likely people are
going to want to "stop / change / circumvent" it. I would personally be
asking - what would you want to achieve by adding DRM? Can you be sure that
the devices you limit playback on are the ones your client's clients are
likely to be using? What extra feature are you adding, if DRM is used? The
reality is nothing - all DRM does is make life more difficult, not easier
for the client - this will put them off from buying, IMHO.

Alex.



-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL REMOVED] [EMAIL REMOVED] On Behalf Of Ben Moxon
Sent: 06 November 2007 11:32
To: FN-FORUM / [EMAIL REMOVED]
Subject: Re: FN-FORUM: Advice on DRM needed




Vicki Sivess wrote:
>
> A client has asked me to look into the possibility of implementing an
> itunes-like domain rights management system on a forthcoming music
> downloads part of his website.
>
> Knowing little about it I approached it with an open mind and soon
> discovered it is a very controversial subject.
>
> I have read Steve Job's open letter where he says he would take it off
> itunes if the record companies did not insist on it and I've also read
> the series of Guardian articles by Cory Doctorow who is vehemently
> opposed to the concept.
>
> I conclude that DRM is a bad idea because, in essence, it
> inconveniences the honest people who have paid for the music while not
> stopping dishonest people from stealing it.
>
> Is that about it? Has anyone here had a positive experience of using
> or implementing such a system or are there any important articles I
> should read on the subject?
I would shop around a bit if they are committed to it- if you look around
the place there are a lot of digital rights specialist companies and I would
be surprised if there weren't some fairly useful products you could licence.
Quite possibly other people have other ideas.

I've never implemented one, but I used to do the digital releases for a
small label and we just sorted it out through AIM and their DSP, which I
think has since been bought out by someone else but still does a good job.
That got our stuff onto most of the major download services right away.

-ben

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