The Technology Liberation Front - Latest Comments in DRM as Central Planning

Re: DRM as Central Planning

Solveig — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 09:31:27 -0000

May I gently remind you all of the insights of Coase's theory of the firm: It's all socialism, but as long as an enterprise can fail, there is accountability.

-SS

Re: DRM as Central Planning

Tim Lee — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 07:57:54 -0000

EF: That's interesting, I hadn't thought of the connection to Raymond's work. You're right that he makes a similar argument, although I think his point was about proprietary software in general rather than DRM in particular. I think DRM is technological central planning in a much stronger sense than proprietary software in general is.

Re: DRM as Central Planning

eee_eff — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 23:25:43 -0000

Consider a medical IT worker who's using a medical imaging PC while listening to audio/video played back by the computer (the CDROM drives installed in workplace PCs inevitably spend most of their working lives playing music or MP3 CDs to drown out workplace noise). If there's any premium content present in there, the image will be subtly altered by Vista's content protection, potentially creating exactly the life-threatening situation that the medical industry has worked so hard to avoid.

This is a real possibility, athough most medical imaging workstations that I have seen recently are running Solaris. Hope they don't change that.

Re: DRM as Central Planning

eee_eff — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 23:22:55 -0000

"This is particularly problematic because often the best ideas come from unexpected sources."

"The document I discussed in my previous post also provides concrete examples of a point I've made before: DRM is the technological equivalent of central planning."

Tim: you really should give credit to Eric Rayond here, this is almost exactly the argument from Cathedral and the Bazaar.

In the brave new world created by the DMCA, such modifications are federal crimes if they in any way modify "technological protection measures," which in this case is Vista's entire A/V subsystem.

The phrase I would suggest is Corporate Fascism, for the way our First Amendment rights are being eliminated for someone's business plans.

It's a real disgrace, especially considering the sacrifices many have made to keep us free...