Sign the anti-DRM pledge to boycott Sony
Pledge to Boycott DRM!You can bet I signed this sucker and fast!DRM severely restricts our rights as users, creators, and members of the global community. We will not stand by and let fair use grow extinct as a consequence of poorly thought out technology and the laws that support it.I've been keeping up with the ongoing saga through boingboing.net
So yeah, definitely sign this Pledge because it's useful as a movement to get people more aware of our rights as consumers.Damn the Man!
Monday, December 5, 2005
Sony rootkit ripped off anti-DRM code to break into iTunes
Sony's DRM supplier XCP ripped off a free software project so that it could defeat Apple iTunes.Remember when Sony got nailed for including code an open-source crack for iTunes in its rootkit DRM? Princeton researcher Alex Halderman has been patiently teasing apart the rootkit, looking for an explanation. Why would Sony's arms-merchant rip off an anti-DRM program for its DRM?Halderman concludes that the XCP -- the Sony rootkit -- was intended to be used to crack open iTunes and insert Sony's music into it, without allowing Sony customers to convert their music into MP3s along the way.This exposes one of the things about DRM that most people miss: it doesn't really matter what permissions a given DRM grants or prohibits (as fun as it might be to point out the absurdity of a DRM that keeps you from listening to your own music). The important thing about DRM is that it gives the company or consortium that controls the DRM control over who can use the DRM.So Apple can make an iPod and shut Real and Microsoft and Sony out of it. Napster can make a subscription music service and shut Apple out of it. And so on.Reverse-engineering Apple's DRM is hard, but not overwhelmingly so. Jon Johansen and his pals generally went through each new release like a hot knife through butter (Jon's got a new job and says he's putting his Apple-coring hobby on hold for a while, so the iTunes 6 version of DRM has stood for longer than its predecessors).So when Sony's arms-dealer was making its munitions, it added an attractive new feature for Sony and others: the ability to break DRM to sneak music into iTunes.
So yeah, definitely sign this Pledge because it's useful as a movement to get people more aware of our rights as consumers.Damn the Man!