Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
Hi Shane, I think DRM will annoy people, but I also believe they will substantially accept it simply because most large companies will use it. It'll be the norm. Yes I see what you are saying especially in the context of products "off the shelf"; they'll get what they're given. However, there is another side to it. I was reading an article in PC Pro about HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray and it seems they are concerned that if the copy protection is too tough it may actually put off home users because they're used to being able to record to DVD and VCR. Of course the DRM camp will say "it's fine" you can copy to other "authorised" equipment. This appears to be how it works with iTunes - you can have up to five "authorised" computers. From what I can tell Blu-Ray is much more restrictive than HD-DVD. I noticed that in the Microsoft DirectShow SDK they actually back-tracked on their earlier "tough" DRM because too many people complained. Perhaps people accepted Apple's DRM more that Microsoft's because it was more flexible (and maybe more reliable?). There have certainly been cases of angry Microsoft customers who ended up locked out of their own music and "upgrade" software versions that also require activation (and then didn't). I don't have much sympathy for these users because it's their own fault for buying into those products in the first place. They should stick to free and open-source software. AMD has no reason to reject DRM and 'Trusted Computing.' Yes I guess you're right, what a sad state of affairs, but (to me) it's not so different to how it's always been; the big commercial vendors will restrict their products to the point of extreme user annoyance and then someone will say "let's make Linux" or "let's make FreeDOS". In terms of the film industry, I think they'll damage their own sales regardless of DRM! They have ZERO imagination and simply try to re-hash movies with trashy sequels. For music and TV, my take on it is this; I don't use iTunes or MP3 because they're compressed; I only listen to 44Khz 16bit PCM or analogue music and with TV I just intercept the signal from the PCI bus and encode using open-source xvid so it's unlikely it will affect my personal media for some time, but for work I do need to deal with media players for my users. Hell, it's bad enough with three different formats, WMV, QT, RAM let alone DRM as well! -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
Gerry Hickman wrote: > As I see it, the way forward for DRM and trusted computing will annoy > people and they will end up shunning it. To some extent this is > happening already, but even Adobe is in on the act now with their secure > PDFs and most end users will simply end up with what they're given with > their next hardware purchase - e.g. Windows Vista with everything locked > down and DRM enabled. I hope the GNU people get it together to outlaw > DRM in their new license. One other thing to note is that no one outside > the US/UK gives a damn about any corporation's rights to anything; in > Japan and China, copying is the "norm". Hi Gerry, thank you so much for your thoughtful and useful feedback. I think DRM will annoy people, but I also believe they will substantially accept it simply because most large companies will use it. It'll be the norm. AMD has no reason to reject DRM and 'Trusted Computing.' It will be profitable for AMD to work with the system, as it'll mean that the next generation of media products will work on their platform. To deny 'Trusted Computing' could mean losing market share. The Free Software Foundations around the world are working very hard to engage with this issue. If you are in the USA, please consider joining in at www.fsf.org, and helping with either a donation or be donating your time. If you are based in Europe, please consider becoming a fellow of the FSFE at www.fsfe.org. We're working really hard to counter patents (http://fsfeurope.org/projects/swpat/fsfe-patstrat-response.pdf) and to make sure that DRM is not going to take over our lives. Regards Shane -- Shane Martin Coughlan e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] m: +447773180107 w: www.shaneland.co.uk --- Projects: http://mobility.opendawn.comhttp://gem.opendawn.com http://enigmail.mozdev.org http://www.winpt.org --- Organisations: http://www.fsfeurope.orghttp://www.fsf.org http://www.labour.org.ukhttp://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk --- OpenPGP: http://www.shaneland.co.uk/personalpages/shane/files/publickey.asc --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
chris evans wrote: > Who defines this assumed trust in software? The user of the > manufacturer? The way I see it the file can have a crc or md5 signed > trusted info block to verify who wrote/and distributed it. and the user > can have control over which is excluded. In 'Trusted Computing' the user does not decide what is trusted. The companies get to decide this. That's the main problem with the system. Shane -- Shane Martin Coughlan e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] m: +447773180107 w: www.shaneland.co.uk --- Projects: http://mobility.opendawn.comhttp://gem.opendawn.com http://enigmail.mozdev.org http://www.winpt.org --- Organisations: http://www.fsfeurope.orghttp://www.fsf.org http://www.labour.org.ukhttp://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk --- OpenPGP: http://www.shaneland.co.uk/personalpages/shane/files/publickey.asc --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA256 BruceIrving wrote: > That is a very thoughtful and interesting article, Shane. We need more > information of this type and, you are right, we NEED to discuss it. In the > past, DRM fell into the same category as Microsoft's COM -- it does > something, but I haven't the slightest idea what it is supposed to do! Bruce, thank you so much for your comments. I believe you hit the nail on the (DRM) head when you said "I haven't the slightest idea what it is supposed to do!" The entire subject has been so wrapped up in FUD from both sides that sometimes it's hard to work out what's going on. This reminds me of my own research into Six Sigma, that quantitative management analysis technique from Japan that was "American Hippified" and has become the key methodology for many major companies. When I first started researching Six Sigma everyone was so busy saying how cool it was, and how it would change everything, that they completely forgot to explain what it really is. I guess it just sounds boring to say "it's a statistical approach to problem solving, with the inherent assumption that all problems can be expressed and solved through numbers." We need to cut through the nonsense with DRM, ask "what is this?", "what will it mean to people?" and "what are the long-term implications." Once we do that, we'll be able to make sensible decisions about the subject. Shane - -- Shane Martin Coughlan e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] m: +447773180107 w: www.shaneland.co.uk - --- Projects: http://mobility.opendawn.comhttp://gem.opendawn.com http://enigmail.mozdev.org http://www.winpt.org - --- Organisations: http://www.fsfeurope.orghttp://www.fsf.org http://www.labour.org.ukhttp://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk - --- OpenPGP: http://www.shaneland.co.uk/personalpages/shane/files/publickey.asc -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.3-cvs4067* (MingW32) iQCVAwUBRCwrjdwG3M95JPpzAQjVfwP/Yr+2krbtMWX7YuPPz7wc7ljoi6nRvgzU 7gXTxuBJ9lc/CMSJpwfVWk62/0sUXPwBojx6U9RpiLM1F7uaLZh8TPPlJBQ0MXtC HDPyPXjFTp/pI0cVFhoVu316cgCpp9JDXQkpY2Es8TnZWSZc26EPMGgqQ5JZ6I8m 6SkUqlvnKnE= =0XRW -END PGP SIGNATURE- --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
Hi Shane, I think there are four aspects to this that should probably be treated separately, but are somewhat lumped together in your article. 1. Copyright Protection 2. The reality of what corporates claim is "copyright protection" 3. Controlling what people can/can't do with their own kit (and more) 4. Government spying claiming it's for "National Security" In the case of #1, if a game company puts a scratch on their CD and a big warning saying it's copy protected, but this CD does not harm anyone's computer in any way, then I don't see the end user has a justified complaint. If they don't like games they can't copy, then go to a different company. In the case of #2, this is where corporation X secretly installs SpyWare onto the end-user's computer as soon as the end-user opens their music/software (or in some cases merely visits their internet site). This has been going on for years, but was more heavily publicized in the case of Sony BMG and the root-kit. The corporations claim they are merely "protecting their intellectual property" and "informing customers about our wonderful products and services". In this case, the corporation is COMPLETELY in the wrong, and should be attacked and boycotted. In the US it seems people assume anything installed by a big-name corporation is safe? Thing is, these back-doors can see a lot more than any corporation's legitimate claim of it's use for tracking copyright breach. A common defense is that the end-user clicked some button and therefore "must have agreed" to our terms, but sometimes those terms are not legal outside the US, especially where privacy and minors are concerned. In the case of #3 and trusted computing, this is just plain WRONG. Imagine if Intel and Microsoft struck a deal where suddenly you can only run Windows on your Intel based machine? You try to install Linux and it says "WARNING UNTRUSTED EXECUTION, SYSTEM HALTED". But a more likely scenario is where you'll find all Microsoft programs "just work", but every time you try to run an Open Source program you get an annoying dialog "YOU ARE TRYING TO RUN AN UNTRUSTED PROGRAM", and then some long drawn out list of how to obtain certificates etc. (Actually, from what I've heard about Vista, even Microsoft's OWN programs cause pop-up warnings). In the case of #4, the idea is that the "government knows best" and therefore everyone should allow government SpyWare on their machines and anyone who protests must be a "terrorist". As I see it, the way forward for DRM and trusted computing will annoy people and they will end up shunning it. To some extent this is happening already, but even Adobe is in on the act now with their secure PDFs and most end users will simply end up with what they're given with their next hardware purchase - e.g. Windows Vista with everything locked down and DRM enabled. I hope the GNU people get it together to outlaw DRM in their new license. One other thing to note is that no one outside the US/UK gives a damn about any corporation's rights to anything; in Japan and China, copying is the "norm". I'd be interested to know if it makes any difference if you use AMD/Sun processors? Shane M. Coughlan wrote: Hi FreeDOS guys :) As well as making OpenGEM for FreeDOS, I spend time helping the Free Software Foundation Europe. One of our big topics of late has been DRM and 'Trusted Computing', and I have just written a little article about it: https://www.fsfe.org/en/fellows/shane/communicating_freely/drm_trusted_computing_and_the_future_of_our_children I'd really value any comments you may have. I think these issues are really important to all Free Software development. FreeDOS (for instance) does not really help spread multimedia and therefore is largely excluded from the DRM conversation. But what about in the future when only trusted software runs on trusted hardware? Suddenly this wonderful system (FreeDOS) might not be usable by people, even if they want to try it. We could be a victim of circumstances. Just a though...it's something that has been concerning me lately. Shane -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
Well, they could stamp all purchased music and stuff with a digital ID and if it is played back on the other computer user has to verify identity with purchaser ID. BruceIrving wrote: That is a very thoughtful and interesting article, Shane. We need more information of this type and, you are right, we NEED to discuss it. In the past, DRM fell into the same category as Microsoft's COM -- it does something, but I haven't the slightest idea what it is supposed to do! --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
I think these issues are really important to all Free Software development. FreeDOS (for instance) does not really help spread multimedia and therefore is largely excluded from the DRM conversation. Who defines this assumed trust in software? The user of the manufacturer? The way I see it the file can have a crc or md5 signed trusted info block to verify who wrote/and distributed it. and the user can have control over which is excluded. --chris http://nxdos.sourceforge.net/ --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap
That is a very thoughtful and interesting article, Shane. We need more information of this type and, you are right, we NEED to discuss it. In the past, DRM fell into the same category as Microsoft's COM -- it does something, but I haven't the slightest idea what it is supposed to do! Bruce Idaho, USA - Original Message - From: "Shane M. Coughlan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "FreeDOS User List" Sent: Tuesday, March 28, 2006 2:49 PM Subject: [Freedos-user] [OT] DRM and Free Software...the perspective of the OpenGEM chap > Hi FreeDOS guys :) > > As well as making OpenGEM for FreeDOS, I spend time helping the Free > Software Foundation Europe. One of our big topics of late has been DRM > and 'Trusted Computing', and I have just written a little article about > it: > https://www.fsfe.org/en/fellows/shane/communicating_freely/drm_trusted_computing_and_the_future_of_our_children > > I'd really value any comments you may have. > > I think these issues are really important to all Free Software > development. FreeDOS (for instance) does not really help spread > multimedia and therefore is largely excluded from the DRM conversation. > But what about in the future when only trusted software runs on trusted > hardware? Suddenly this wonderful system (FreeDOS) might not be usable > by people, even if they want to try it. We could be a victim of > circumstances. > > Just a though...it's something that has been concerning me lately. > > Shane > > -- > Shane Martin Coughlan > e: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > m: +447773180107 > w: www.shaneland.co.uk > --- > Projects: > http://mobility.opendawn.com http://gem.opendawn.com > http://enigmail.mozdev.org http://www.winpt.org > --- > Organisations: > http://www.fsfeurope.org http://www.fsf.org > http://www.labour.org.uk http://www.opensourceacademy.gov.uk > --- > OpenPGP: http://www.shaneland.co.uk/personalpages/shane/files/publickey.asc > > > --- > This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language > that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast > and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! > http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 > ___ > Freedos-user mailing list > Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user > --- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
