DRM Drives Recalcitrants Mad

While discussing the internet’s Feudalisation, this week’s area of research raised a topic I have been passionately outspoken about since it’s inception; digital rights management and the way it inconveniences the end user to the point that they are driven to piracy. The following comic produced by Randall Monroe of xkcd perfectly illustrates my main gripe with this intrusive and ineffective form of copyright protection.

http://xkcd.com/488/

In the current digital market, obtaining your preferred form of media through legitimate channels leaves you with a product inferior to that you would find on any number of so-called ‘pirating’ websites. Did you enjoy that song you bought on iTunes so much that you wish to load it onto your MP3 player not produced by Apple and listen to it on the move? Too bad. Feel like watching that DVD you purchased while overseas in a country that is in another arbitrary ‘region’ to your own? Good luck. These are just a few examples of how new technologies are being hamstrung to the detriment of users who chose to not take the much easier route of downloading content illegally.

Doctorow (2012) outlines the two key problems with DRM that have been obvious since it’s first implementation in the early 90s and are still issues today; the inconvenience they cause the average users who attempt to operate with legitimacy and the ease with which even the mildly tech-savvy can get around them. Akester’s (2009) empirical study into the conflicts between freedom of expression and DRM raises a number of relevant examples, such as the experience of Lynn Holdsworth, a visually impaired individual who purchased a digital version of the Bible through Amazon.com and was refused a refund after DRM prevented her screen reader application from providing an audio file. After lengthy discussions with both Amazon.com and the publisher responsible for the e-Book, Lynn was left with no alternative but to illegally download a copy of the work (Akester 2009, pp.47-49).

In our tutorial we discussed legitimate forms of attaining content and Charlotte made the point that by downloading content illegally, I was taking money out of the pockets of producers. While this might be true, I morally object to paying for anything, digital content or any other product, that I am then forced to use in a particular way. I’m sure the day will come when digital distribution networks are finally up to scratch and at that time, I will happily lay down my micro-transactions and pay for what I consume. Until that day comes however, I say; power to the pirates!

http://thepiratebay.sx/

References:

Akester, P 2009, ‘Technological accommodation of conflicts between freedom of expression and DRM: the first empirical assessment’, University of Cambridge, accessed 3/5/2013, http://www.law.cam.ac.uk/faculty-resources/summary/technological-accommodation-of-conflicts-between-freedom-of-expression-and-drm-the-first-empirical-assessment/6286

Doctorow, C 2012, ‘Lockdown: The coming war on general purpose computing’, weblog post, Boing Boing, accessed 3/5/2013, http://boingboing.net/2012/01/10/lockdown.html