Friday, April 25, 2008

The problem with DRM

Okay, there is no one "problem with DRM", besides that it is DRM. The problem with DRM is that the way it exists is really worthless.

Let's take an example of a system that I think is awesome, but flawed - Amazon Unbox. The biggest issue with DRM is that it cannot handle exceptions that happen in real life. I personally have an unbox account, and I had it linked to a system where the HD is now longer viable, I cannot load the operating system such to "uninstall" my copy of unbox and release the license. Thus I have content that I cannot use on one of my allowed machines, because that machine is no longer viable.

The second is the thought of $1.99 for broadcast shows. Why in the world has no-one thought about adding in-show adds to these, and requiring you to re-download new adds every number of views to continue watching the shows? I mean, it's a great concept to be able to get the ultimate "on demand" for shows you like, but I'm not going to honestly pay $1.99 to watch something I can DVR technically for "free". If I really wanted to watch that old episode of Babylon 5, for example, I'd rather just buy the DVD and not have to deal with download DRM in the mix.

At some point the content providers need to find a better way to provide their content to bring about new revenue models, instead of trying to shove unproven and ineffective ways to bring folks to content down the consumers throat, while having the old models be painless and relatively simple to keep using.

1 comment:

MotherDiva said...

Preach it, honey! :D