Empirical Study Shows DRM Encourages Infringement 375
Hucko writes "Ars Technica has a story about a study by Cambridge law professor Patricia Akester that suggests (declares?) that DRM and its ilk does persuade citizens to infringe copyright and circumvent authors' protections. The name of the study is 'Technological accommodation of conflicts between freedom of expression and DRM: the first empirical assessment.'" The study itself is available for download (PDF); there's also a distillation here.
Re:At last (Score:5, Informative)
What happens when steam goes bust? And don't give me the "we will patch authentication out if we go under" crap. If they are going under they will not be releasing patches to strip the authentication as noone will be getting paid to perfom such a job.
DRM is always evil.
Re:At last (Score:3, Informative)
I do agree that DRM is always evil. No doubts about it.
But, if I am going to get saddled with DRM (and these days, I am) I'd rather get saddles with something like Steam. Yeah, the DRM-y bits suck... But there's also some value added. Unlike other DRM schemes that just suck completely, and don't add anything at all.
As for your question...
Well, there have been several occasions in the pas where failing companies have released patches to remove DRM or have open-sourced their codebase. So I wouldn't rule out the possibility completely. However, Steam is more of a distribution platform... And I don't think Valve could really release patches for other people's games. That'd be more up to the individual publishers to do... And I doubt if there'd be a terribly concerted movement to remove the DRM. It'd more likely be a concerted movement to make people re-purchase their games some other way, with a different DRM scheme installed.
However, Steam isn't all that hard to bypass. Most games released on Steam have a crack available within a week. So, should Steam go belly-up, I doubt if it would have much impact. Folks could very easily crack their games, burn backups, and call it done. They'll be no worse-off than if they'd purchased a retail disc with some sort of on-disc DRM that they didn't like.
Good Old Games (Score:5, Informative)
I'll cite the much debated Steam argument again. Once I buy a game, DRM (positive DRM) allows me to redownload whenever I want, and to play it on any computer whenever and wherever I want.
I'll see your Steam and raise you a GOG.com. No DRM at all, ever, and you can redownload your games whenever you want. Sure their catalog is still small and contains older games (although some are only 2-3 years old), but I'm hoping they'll go from strength to strength and I'm supporting them with my dollars
I'm still hoping to see LucasArts back catalog on there one day.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:5, Informative)
The majority of users probably have no idea what DRM is and are thus unaffected.
I believe the sentiment of the study is that BECAUSE people aren't aware of DRM, they still do things that are illegal, according to the DRM. I don't believe most people go out of their way to infringe--they just do by the nature of using their content in the context of the current laws.
Re:DRM is pushing me towards piracy (Score:2, Informative)
Um... It's only specifically illegal to distribute copies.
No, that's just completely incorrect. You should really consult a lawyer rather than rely on "he said, she said" in forums on Slashdot.
Here is the relevant law, Title 17, Chapter 1 Â 106 US Code: Exclusive rights in copyrighted works [cornell.edu]:
(empahsis mine). Only the copyright holder can make copies. As you (and the above0quoted text) allude to, there are limitations on these exclusive rights under Title 17, Chapter 1 Â 106 [cornell.edu]:
However, note the emphasized text: only if it is an essential step. Pirating a game for the purpose of running a game, even one that you legitimately purchased, doesn't fall under this exception. An "essential step" would include loading it onto a hard drive or the copy that is made in RAM when it is loaded from the hard drive, etc. Getting a cracked version from The Pirate Bay does not count as an essential step.
IANAL, and YMMV.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:4, Informative)
googled "HL:GoTY Edition ripoff", not seeing it. Link?
Re:Headstrong.mp3 (Score:4, Informative)
Good point... led me to this: http://uk.biz.yahoo.com/26052009/399/eu-nears-bloc-wide-music-licensing.html [yahoo.com]
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:3, Informative)
And why was the codec for the built-in DVD player not installed? DRM licensing.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, but you only have to do it once.
Re:At last (Score:2, Informative)
half of slashdot has
Re:It's 10 seconds to the wrong people (Score:5, Informative)
More like 5 minutes. You've obviously not had the misfortune of trying using a disney DVD when you miss the "fast menu" button window, before it goes into a ridiculous number of adverts that you cannot bypass.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:2, Informative)
You spend a few seconds setting it up, and it runs while you're making popcorn. Then you can stick the disc in the closet and watch your movie across the LAN without being forced to sit through propaganda every time you watch. It's a good deal more convenient, even if you do own the original media.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:2, Informative)
List of DRM-free games (Score:4, Informative)
You don't have to assume all PC games use DRM. ReclaimYourGame lists companies not using any form of securom etc. here is the link:
http://reclaimyourgame.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=14&Itemid=62 [reclaimyourgame.com]
Disclaimer: I'm one of the companies on there.
Re:DRM is pushing me towards piracy (Score:2, Informative)
I discovered that [Civilization4] too uses SecuROM so I will not install it. Instead, I think it's morally (and legally?) acceptable to download a pirate copy without DRM. [...] I've since discovered that the copy-protection on the [Sims2] DVD is known to cause installation errors, and one of the recommended workarounds is to install the disk imaging software Alcohol, and this indeed allowed us to install the game.
Is this what constitutes infringement according to the author? There doesn't appear to be any copyright infringement here, it is justifiable fair use. In the US, it could be a DMCA infringement.
Re:At last (Score:4, Informative)
DMR specifically restricts (manages) what you can do (rights) with a (digital) file. It is not, and cannot, be a positive thing from a consumer perspective ever.
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:5, Informative)
Ahh... now you're telling me it's impossible and/or impractical. Which is great, because it just so happens I already did it. As a matter of fact, I wrote a series of pieces for members of an eating disorder recovery group on how to avoid all the negative imagery and get healthier. It's on a private forum, so I'll just stick it in here.
--//--
How to avoid advertisements on the web:
If you're not using Firefox, you should be.
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/ [mozilla.com]
Once you've got Firefox, you should install tools to protect you from advertising. First one is Adblock Plus
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865 [mozilla.org]
This lets you block advertisements, and is configurable.
Next, if you want to block particular sites completely, you can use this tool, called BlockSite:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3145 [mozilla.org]
After you've done all this, you can customize Google to remove certain items you don't want to see with the CustomizeGoogle add on.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/743 [mozilla.org]
With this tool, you can remove advertisements, filter out sites you don't ever want to see in your search results, and remove google tracking. Which may screw up Muses website statistics tracking, but will prevent you from becoming a target for advertisements specifically related to eating disorders and dieting etc.
If you take the time to install and set up these tools, you will be amazed at the difference.
--//--
How to avoid advertisements in your mail:
First, install Thunderbird:
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/thunderbird/ [mozilla.com]
This mail reader has a built in spam blocker that learns how to identify spam as you mark things as spam/not spam. This will go a long way towards keeping your mailbox advertisement free.
Once you've got that installed, you want to be using it to read your web based mail, like Hotmail, Yahoo, GMail, etc.
So you need to install the Webmail add on.
http://webmail.mozdev.org/ [mozdev.org]
Once you've installed this, you'll be able to view your mail from all these websites without having to see their banners and other assorted crap.
After this is all done, you should set up folders for every piece of mail you expect to receive, and filters to automatically move them there. This will prefilter your pile, and your learning spam filters will also prefilter.
Between the two, you'll have an ever shrinking pile of messages that "might" be spam to wade through and mark as "is spam" or "is not spam".
--//--
How to avoid advertising in your multimedia:
Stop paying for cable television. Disconnect your service, and use the money you save to buy a DVD burner for backup, a video card for your computer that supports TV-Out, and a large external hard drive that you can use to carry files to and from your fr
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:4, Informative)
Well, I rarely watch a DVD more than once.
You DEFINITELY don't have kids, and you probably aren't married :)
My daughter watches the same 3 things over and over, and my wife is not much better :)
anoter empirical study ... (Score:4, Informative)
done by yours truly showed that the absense of DRM encourages infringement as well.
Sounds like a win-win situation, eh?
Re:A Zero DRM Experiment Is Successful (So Far) (Score:2, Informative)
Re:It's 10 seconds to the wrong people (Score:2, Informative)
Re:and the pirates win again (Score:3, Informative)
Don't feed the troll. Stewbacca is a well known MAFIAA shill.