I now find myself in a position that i wouldn't ever think i would be in: I
recently found that i am in favor of DRM (at least some form of it).
Here's the thing: I would like to publish a monthly emagazine in PDF format
and charge a small amount for each issue, but i want to set a password for it
or some other mechanism of the sort in order to prevent anyone from just
copying it and giving it away for free, wasting all the work i've done. Is
this so bad?
Maybe you're just viewing this subject from the point of big corporations
inflating prices and making contents inaccessible to many people, but what
about my case? You see, you can't impose freedom. You can't say that with
libre software people have freedom and that the software users are in control
and then restrict what the users can do with the software.
You may argue that this doesn't contribute to society or that it may even be
harmful to it, but take teachers as an example: the work they do is
beneficial to society - should they work for free? That's not freedom -
that's exploitation. You might as well approve those slave work sweat shops
in some parts of the world, because they're "working for the benefit of
society".
LibreOffice3 Writer gives its users the option to export documents in PDF
format and set restrictions to the use of that document (disable print,
content copy, modifications,...) but those options aren't enforced. If those
options aren't going to be applied why give them in the first place? I'd say
this is fooling its users.
In the previous given example about LibreOffice the developers are in control
- not the users. You might as well ban encryption altogether or even
passwords for log ins.
There should be a more fair and balanced approach to these kind of issues,
from both parts: the corporations who support DRM but that do so trying to
impose draconian measures on users and the defenders of freedom that,
sometimes, forget the real significance of that word.
- [Trisquel-users] About DRM and Freedom apvp
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