From: Hal Finney (hal@finney.org)
Date: Wed Apr 09 2003 - 15:54:47 MDT
Lee Crocker writes about "voluntary" restrictions on information distribution:
> This is really the core of the issue, and it's a very hard question.
> As a libertarian, certainly the knee-jerk response should be to allow
> more choices. But I think the choices here are illusory. One cannot
> separate the rights to use content from the content itself. A movie
> that I can view once on one machine is a very different product from
> a movie that I own and can view anywhere, any time, and analyze, and
> take clips from, etc. But the truth is that even if I agree to buy
> only the former product, the latter one still exists for the same
> price for those people who have technology to break to lock--and there
> will always be such technology. It simply isn't physically possible
> to fully control use of the content.
That makes sense overall, but I would quibble about a couple of points.
First, the unrestricted version is not just available for the same
price; in your model, I believe it is available for free! That makes
your argument even stronger in a way. And second, this only applies to
"static" content like movies and music; dynamic content like software
cannot necessarily be captured so easily. We might see interactive 3-D
movies in the future, where being able to view it is not the same as
being able to reproduce it.
> Since I can assume that copying technology will exist, and that full
> rights-enabled content will be available to me whether I agree to the
> restrictions or not, why would I agree to the restrictions? The only
> reason would be if the /law/ prevented me from using the rights-enabled
> content, as it might be argued that copyright law does (although even
> there, it's not clear; do the"fair use" provisions allow me to show
> clips to a film class even if I have to crack encryption to do so?)
Again, this makes sense... but any argument which includes the phrase
"the only reason would be..." is inherently somewhat weak. Can we really
be sure that is the *only* reason? Given the vast possibilities for
human motivation and creativity, and the tremendous diversity of human
needs and desires, I think we need to be extremely hesitant to claim
that there can only be one possible motivation for an action.
And I think your argument depends pretty crucially on this "only reason"
factor, as I'll discuss below.
> So the only way for the rights-limited content to have any value is
> for the law to recognize the author's rights to restrict access to
> his creations, and for the many reasons I've outlined on this forum
> and elsewhere, I don't support such laws. This technology legitimizes
> those laws: it makes the assumption that the author has the right to
> control access to information made public, and provides a means of
> enforcing that assumption. But it wouldn't be valuable without the
> laws behind it, and it's the laws I really object to.
Okay, I think this argument makes sense in its own terms: DRM only works
if there is the threat of force behind it, because otherwise people would
break the restrictions and get the data for free. It is this use of
force to restrict information that you find evil, and since DRM relies
on force, it is inherently evil as well.
But what happens if someone has other reasons for wanting to avoid the
unauthorized versions of data, and is willing to pay for the DRM version?
Maybe the content companies have started rumors that some of the
unauthorized versions carry viruses. Maybe they even taint the pirate
nets with bogus versions of the data. I think we've seen both of these
tactics already. Going forward, it's possible that we will see a long
series of such measures applied by the content companies and designed
to destroy faith in the black market nets. Someone who is convinced
of such dangers, justifiably or not, might prefer the perceived safety
and security of downloading the authorized version. And in exchange,
they would be willing to accept the use of DRM software.
Or maybe someone just doesn't think it is right to take a version for
free when the artist who worked hard to create it is begging people not to
"steal" their content and to buy from the authorized distributor.
It seems to me that there are any number of reasons why people might be
willing to voluntarily accept the restrictions imposed by DRM, even when
the same content is available in unauthorized form without restrictions.
And if you accept this, then the argument doesn't work that DRM is evil
because it depends on the threat of force.
Hal
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