Making ToGo Products ToGo For Real...

from the and-so-it-goes... dept

With the launch of copy protected offerings from both TiVo and Napster bearing the "ToGo" designation, in an attempt to free up (ever so slightly) some content, it didn't take long for many people to realize the universal truth of copy protected material: If it can be accessed, it can be copied. So, it should come as no surprise that explanations for how to unencumber your ToGo products quickly made their way around the internet. Dave Zatz submitted a link to his own site about how to de-DRM TiVoToGo files while there's been way too much hype claiming that Napster's To Go was somehow "hacked." The reality is that it wasn't hacked at all, but that people knew enough to realize that if music is going to be played it can be recorded, and thus there's a workaround to take files you get via Napster and turn them into files that don't have DRM. While none of this is really new or surprising (except to what appears to be a very gullible press), it just emphasizes the uselessness of copy protection in these cases. Anyone who really wants these files without copy protection will get them that way. These files will end up on file sharing systems. The only people it really "stops" are those legitimate buyers who simply want to do something more with content they think they bought, but who don't know enough to find out how to free these files themselves. Instead, what this encourages them to do is go to file sharing programs to get duplicate copies of the files they bought legitimately, just so they can do what they want with them. This, in turn, makes them wonder why they bothered to pay in the first place.