For What It’s Worth

I was going to call this “‘Not paid for’ does not mean it’s stolen” but there’s more to it than that.

I’ll be honest. I like computers. They are my friend. They are a pretty darn-tootin’ powerful tool.

Deep down, though, a part of me is worried where America is going on this copyright crusade, and what this will do to ruin my views of computers as tools.

Today, I can go and buy pieces and parts, and assemble a computer. I can choose the pieces, I can choose the parts, I can assemble it as I wish. And as soon as I do, I immediately run into the corporate lawyers — I’ll need an operating system. Microsoft and others have suggested that computer manufacturers — which are, actually, computer assemblers who retail what they assemble — should be forced to sell computers that are loaded with an operating system, in order to use laws to help businesses — software businesses — fight software piracy.

This logic assumes that there’s no such thing as a free meal, that operating systems can only be paid for. Which, BTW, happens to be both stupid and false.

Let’s assume for a moment, though, that I don’t stick it to the man and use one of the bajillions of versions of Linux or other non-commercial / free / GNU/GPL / Creative Commons operating systems, but actually load some variant of Windows. I am main stream America, the bourgeois.

Today, we are at the tipping point for digital rights management for the everyday man. Microsoft’s new iPod rival, the Zune, ships with software that will forcibly add restrictions to music you have — to include music that isn’t copyrighted. Yes, they are going to forcibly treat non-copyrighted music — stuff licensed, for example, under Creative Commons, or stuff that you write and record yourself — as if it is copyrighted, and will restrict what you do with it. Microsoft is saying, in essence, that there is no such thing as non-copyrighted music.

“I made a song. I own it. How come, when I wirelessly send it to a girl I want to impress, the song has 3 days/3 plays?” Good question. There currently isn’t a way to sniff out what you are sending, so we wrap it all up in DRM. We can’t tell if you are sending a song from a known band or your own home recording so we default to the safety of encoding. And besides, she’ll come see you three days later. . . (link)

How wrong is that? You can read the details in simple language, here.

There’s a similar thing going on right now with Amazon’s new video online retail download rental service. Besides the obvious stupidity in how they set up Unbox (like a one-click “feature” that cannot be turned off), there’s language in their users agreement that just plain scares the crap out of me — the software for Unbox will not only inventory and report on the content of your computer (you know, so that Amazon can help you) but it will also be checking up on the digital rights management of your computer. You can read the details, here.

I read these two things — the changes with Zune, and this Unbox crap — on the same day. What I fear is this: When will the day come when the force of digital rights management surpasses my ability to use a computer as a tool? OK, that’s a bit misleading — that’ll never actually happen to me, because I’d walk away from that type of a computer and go running straight to Linux and that old 5.25″ floppy drive I keep in the attic. But still, I worry — when will it get so bad that the photos you load onto your computer, photos that you took with your digital camera, get so consumed by DRM and forcibly applied copyright crap that you can’t even send them to family and friends or do anything other than look at them on your own screen?

And DVD’s are the worst. Make a DVD of home movies with just about any program on a Windows machine, and that DVD is as uncopyable as if it came from MGM. Why? To protect the copyright holder — even if it’s you that holds the rights to the content of the DVD, and even if it’s you that is trying to copy it — and that’s irregardless of whether you protect the contect you created with a copyright or licensing under Creative Commons or something else. The lawyers would have you go back and made a new DVD in lieu of copying the DVD, all for the greater good of the world and to protect the failed business model of the movie and music industry (and probably the software industry, too).

Now, is it all purely evil? No. Of all things, Microsoft has issued a plug-in for Office, to add in licensing information for Creative Commons. A good thing, as I see it — my sister could create check sheets for her work or studies, and slap on the CC licensing so that others can use them under her terms without having the Kinko Nazis yell at anyone trying to photocopy them. This, though, is the exception, not the standard — the very uncommon.
But that’s still what I fear - the day when the media lawyers succeed in making computers unusable, turning them from being useful tools into something akin to a TV set with rabbit ears. That day is going to suck, and I think we’re at the turning point now.