B&N Claims It Must DRM Public Domain Books To Protect The Copyright On Them

from the say-what-now? dept

Now, it's no surprise that plenty of people don't quite "get" the public domain or why it's important (though, if you are interested, you should read James Boyle's excellent book on the subject, which you can also order -- signed -- as a part of the Techdirt Book Club). And we've seen more than a few instances where people falsely claim copyright on public domain material. However, none of that really explains Barnes & Noble's bizarre and contradictory response to someone's question about why public domain ebooks were locked up with DRM (thanks Mark for sending this in). B&N is apparently offering a promotion for "free" ebooks, but it turns out that all of them are in the public domain (meaning most are already available for free online). But, oddly, these books were locked up by DRM, and someone decided to ask why. The original question goes a bit too far in claiming that the DRM "infringes" on the "right to print the works" (there's no such right, and B&N has no requirement to allow you to print), but that's no excuse for the way B&N "explains" why the public domain books its giving away "free" are protected by DRM:

We selected public domain titles as our free eBooks because these books are traditionally among our customers' favorite works of literature.... Also, for copyright protection purposes, these files are encrypted and cannot be converted or printed.

So, they recognize that the works are in the public domain... but they encrypt them with DRM to protect the copyright that doesn't exist on those works. That's convincing.

Filed Under: books, copyfraud, copyright, drm, ebooks, public domain

Associated Press Tries To DRM The News

from the good-luck-with-that dept

DRM has failed in almost every instance it's been tried. Not only does it fail to actually prevent copying, it tends to piss off legitimate users and limit value rather than enhance it. And yet... people keep trying. But, honestly, I can't think of anything as pointless as the latest move from the Associated Press which appears to be an attempt to DRM the news. That's not what they call it, but that's what it sounds like:

The Associated Press Board of Directors today directed The Associated Press to create a news registry that will tag and track all AP content online to assure compliance with terms of use. The system will register key identifying information about each piece of content that AP distributes as well as the terms of use of that content, and employ a built-in beacon to notify AP about how the content is used....

The registry will employ a microformat for news developed by AP and which was endorsed two weeks ago by the Media Standards Trust, a London-based nonprofit research and development organization that has called on news organizations to adopt consistent news formats for online content. The microformat will essentially encapsulate AP and member content in an informational "wrapper" that includes a digital permissions framework that lets publishers specify how their content is to be used online and which also supplies the critical information needed to track and monitor its usage.

Hopefully I haven't "violated" that rule by quoting the section above. It really does sound like the mythical dreams of DRM that the software industry discussed two decades ago and the music industry discussed a decade ago. Neither one worked -- and both of those were (theoretically) a lot more "protectable" than news. Honestly, it's difficult to think of anything quite this useless:

1. It won't work. It physically can't work. News is news. You can't put any real DRM on it, because it's so easy to copy text and remove any sort of "registry" tags.
2. It removes value. Nothing in this move increases the value of the AP's content to anyone. It does the opposite. It significantly limits the value, and for those who actually want to help promote the content, it now gives you extra incentives not to do so.
3. It's a waste of AP resources. At a time when the AP should be focusing on looking for ways to add value to create a better business model, it's now about to throw away money, time and staff on putting together a DRM for news that doesn't work? Talk about screwed up priorities.

This has been said before (multiple times) but you don't rescue your business model by "protecting" against what people want to do. You don't rescue your business model by wasting resources trying to hold back what people want to do. You rescue your business by providing more value and figuring out a way to monetize that value. Putting bogus DRM on news does none of that. It only hastens failure.

Filed Under: drm, journalism, news
Companies: associated press

EA To Require Internet Connection For Command & Conquer

from the but-why? dept

A bunch of folks have been sending in this story that EA has said that, while it won't have DRM, on Command and Conquer 4, it will require an internet connection to play, and this already has people up in arms. The company is quick to say that this is so it can include certain useful features, but it still is upsetting people. It's hard to believe that EA wouldn't realize this would be an issue. Why not offer an "offline" version with limited features then? While, yes, we have reached an online world where most people are online most of the time, not everyone is online all of the time, and some of that offline time is time when people might like playing a video game...

Filed Under: command and conquer, drm, internet connection, video games
Companies: ea

Amazon Kindle DRM Strikes Again: You Don't Really Own Your eBooks

from the know-what-you're-buying dept

We've pointed out a few times that, no matter how cool a device the Amazon Kindle may be, it's got some serious DRM problems, highlighting that, unlike with a real book, you don't actually "own" the books on your Kindle. Yet another example of why is getting some attention this week. Consumerist points us to a guy who suddenly was having trouble redownloading ebooks he had bought, despite the fact that Amazon supposedly allows you to download the books again and again. At first, he was told that some publishers put a secret-hidden-nobody-can-tell-you limit on how many times you could download, but then after multiple confusing discussions with multiple different Amazon customer service reps, the guy thinks the real issue is actually that some publishers can put a secret-hidden-nobody-can-tell-you limit on how many devices you can download the books to.

While the "updated" version isn't as bad as the original, it's still pretty bad. These are secret limitations on what people bought that were not clearly laid out at all -- and, in fact, which seem to contradict what customers have been told about the ability to do multiple downloads of a purchased book. Furthermore, the fact that you would need multiple customer service reps -- many of whom provided the wrong info -- to try to figure out why you can't access a book you purchased legally means you've got a problem. Every time you think that content providers have learned that DRM is a bad thing that does nothing but harm customer value, it crops up again, with someone believing that it actually has some sort of benefit.

Filed Under: drm, ebooks, kindle
Companies: amazon

Blu-Ray To Allow Users To Make 'Copies' -- With Lots Of Strings Attached

from the asterisk dept

"Beginning next year, studios and other content holders will be required to give consumers the ability to make one copy of any Blu-ray Disc they buy," says the article (via Engadget). Sounds great -- movie studios and others finally realizing that people should be able to freely back up DVDs they legitimately purchase. The devil, of course, is in the details. While discs will have to support this "managed copy" feature, it will require new hardware, and there's no mandate that DVD player manufacturers include support for it at all. The copy, as you'd expect, is all DRM'ed up, and in order to make the copy, the Blu-ray player will have to connect to an "authorization server". This is the sort of model that's caused lots of problems in the past, when companies decide to pull the plug on the servers, rendering the feature useless. But the biggest potential problem with the feature is that movie studios and others will be free to charge whatever they wish for it. That means this really isn't a backup or a copy at all, it's simply the distribution means for the latest incarnation of the entertainment industry's favorite business model: getting people to pay for the same content over and over. That's why the studios want to block things like Real DVD -- not because they'll increase piracy, but because they cut off the only business model the studios can see for digital content.

Filed Under: blu-ray, copies, drm, dvds

US Switches To Digital TV And The World Doesn't End -- Nor Does Hollywood

from the phew dept

We were quite surprised to find no further calls for delays on the switchover to digital over the air TV from analog -- but we're not at all surprised to find out that the actual switchover happened with relatively few problems. Sure there are some people who are confused or who are having difficulty getting their new converter boxes working properly, but there's been no catastrophic failure or problems, and most of the issues seem to have been resolved pretty quickly. Perhaps the gov't really did need a few extra months, but my guess is that the same thing likely would have happened back in February... or if we had done the switchover years ago. So, now can we put the old spectrum to good use, finally?

Separately, the EFF is noting that (once again) it appears that Hollywood lied and exaggerated its claim that it needed a broadcast flag that would stop DVR copying of digital TV or it would start pulling content off the air. Funny thing... that didn't happen. As the EFF notes:

Entertainment industries like to argue that they "need" DRM to make works available. And policymakers have eagerly adopted this argument. But when the bluff is called, it turns out that the DRM wasn't so necessary after all.

So will our politicians recognize this? Or will they continue to believe Hollywood, everytime it insists it needs some new kind of DRM with legal backing from the gov't?

Filed Under: broadcast flag, digital tv, drm, hollywood, politics, transition

Is EA Realizing That Pirates Are Just Underserved Customers?

from the that-would-be-nice dept

Perhaps no video gaming company has had more trouble with the gaming community when it comes to things like DRM than EA. The company received tons of negative publicity for its aggressive and annoying DRM found in the release of Spore (which did little to nothing in actually slowing the unauthorized spread of the game). More recently, the company went with a much less troubling DRM solution on its latest version of The Sims (though, despite its attempt to call it something other than DRM, it is still DRM -- and, I should note, we've received a bunch of submissions from people who have found the DRM to be cumbersome).

However, the biggest change may be (possibly?) in the attitude of execs at the company -- who at least appear to be trying to become more accepting of the fact that some people will always download and/or share unauthorized versions of games. In an interview with Kotaku (thanks William for sending this in), the CEO of EA tries to put a positive spin on things:

And speaking of pirates, no matter what EA charges for a game, there will be people who want to make EA's games free-to-play on their own terms. That's the nice way of saying what happened to The Sims 3 recently. "We got pirated three weeks before the game launched," Riccitiello said. "And we were really quite nervous about it. We had a lot of telemetry about what the pirates were doing because the launcher was in the version of the disc [that got out.]... There's a lot of Chinese and Polish among those consumers. We know what they're doing. And we finally concluded that we were very happy that almost a million people downloaded the Fight Night demo in the first couple of days we put it out. And in a weird sort of way, the behavior we're starting to see based on sell-through and registration [with the Sims 3] is that we really might have just put out a really good demo."

Riccitiello laughed at his own remark, because he doesn't quite mean it seriously. I pointed out that he might not want to hold his breath waiting for all those Sims 3 pirates to convert to paying customers. "I don't think they will, based on their geography," he said. The point he was making, he said, is that EA's concern over being pirated gave way to a new, more constructive thought: "We were like, 'I think they've demoed the game.' That's probably good. We probably should have posted it on our website."

It's clear he's not entirely comfortable with this position, but perhaps that will come over time. It seems like he's beginning to recognize what folks at Valve had said for a while: "pirates" are just underserved customers. Focusing on giving those underserved customers more reasons to buy seems like a much better strategy than punishing all of the legitimate customers.

Filed Under: drm, underserved customers, video games
Companies: ea

Study On How DRM Harms Free Expression

from the free-speech-or-copyright? dept

We've been seeing a growing realization about the clear conflicts between copyright and freedom of expression -- an issue that has often been brushed aside, but in a world where nearly all communication suddenly is covered by copyright, it becomes a much bigger issue. Michael Scott points us to a UK-based study that doesn't focus on copyright and free expression specifically, but on DRM and how it limits free expression in the UK. While this may not seem directly relevant to copyright law, it absolutely is, especially with the push for global laws that make any circumvention of DRM -- even if for legal uses -- illegal. As such, DRM that prevents freedom of expression is using copyright law to back that up, which can be a violation of First Amendment rights (yes, I recognize the First Amendment is a US issue, and this study is in the UK, but it's likely the results of the study apply to the US as well).

The study says that there hasn't been a catastrophic blockage of free expression, but clearly some had occurred, even though technology measures could have allowed the expression without seriously compromising the purpose of the DRM. More importantly, the study found that those who were stymied from performing legal expression due to DRM rarely used mechanisms provided by UK law to complain. This isn't that surprising, but it does make an important point: gov't officials are probably unaware of how much legal activity is stifled due to DRM, backed via gov't enforcement of copyright laws. While there are many other areas of study to be done around these issues, this is a worthwhile study in looking at how copyright and free expression can conflict.

Filed Under: copyright, drm, free expression, free speech

Study Says DRM Pushes Users To Illegal Downloads

from the thought-we'd-been-over-this dept

A new study from a Cambridge law professor says that DRM doesn't stop piracy, but rather prompts users to illegally download DRM-free pirated content (via Boing Boing). In short, the study found that users get frustrated by the restrictions put on legally purchased content by DRM and copy-protection technologies. Instead of rolling over and accepting this, they often change their behavior -- choosing to download unrestricted, illegal content in the future. This goes along with what's been pretty clear for a long time. DRM doesn't work at stopping piracy, it makes products less valuable and less attractive to users, and in turn leads them to look elsewhere for unrestricted content and products they can use how they best see fit.

Filed Under: downloads, drm, study

Do We Need A Technology Bill Of Rights? Or Just More Common Sense?

from the one-or-the-other... dept

A bunch of folks have sent in a proposal by Paul Venezia at Infoworld, suggesting a special "Technology Bill of Rights." While I actually tend to agree with a lot of what he talks about preserving in this Bill of Rights (online anonymity, net neutrality -- especially if there's no competition, and a right to make copies of content you bought, software used for public policy needs to have its source available, etc.) I don't see how it helps to necessarily have it set as a special "Bill of Rights" (not that anyone is seriously considering it). Instead, many of these issues seem like ones that we should strive for through good competition in the market, not enforce by any sort of law.

Filed Under: bill of rights, drm, net neutrality, privacy, security, technology