Europe.. and DRM

some controversy here.

Comments

[gerd]

thanks for this post --- you are right indeed!!

[Bill Rosenblatt]

The report referenced had me going along until I got to this tidbit:

"The particular problem of the anti-circumvention rule in the EUCD is that it transfers regulatory power from governments (including the European Commission and Parliament) to the writer of the software protected by the anticircumvention legislation."

This is not only flat wrong but undermines the central argument of the paper, that the EUCD report was biased in favor of copyright owners and their proxies. The "regulatory power" is transferred not to the software writer but to the media company that configures the software.

Anti-DRM activists constantly amaze me in their lack of ability (or willingness?) to understand the configurability of DRM solutions that are *shipping today*, not just hypothetical or research lab technology, including configurability to allow (not all, admittedly, but some) consumer-friendly options as the market demands.

I don't usually respond to blogs but this one was just too good to pass up. I was particularly interested in this remark because it seemed on the verge of criticizing anticircumvention provisions for the right reason, i.e., that they protect software developers from the liabilities that result from developing software that doesn't work properly. But then it veered disastrously off course.