jasong
07-03-2006, 07:12 PM
I wanted to create the thread with a nice broad title, so it would have less of a chance of dying out. I'm hoping this will be a good discussion about DRM in general. Obviously, we want to respect Bok by not discussing ways to defeat DRM. But other than that, I guess it's open-season.
The first thing I want to touch on involves an idea I had after thinking about the XBOX360:
Would it be possible to create hardware or software-based DRM where a file could be freely distributed with the DRM intact, and the decoding file(yes, file) would change depending on (1) the filename, (2) the person's ordering identifier(probably an email address), (3) the machine(s) the file is approved for and (4) The date and possibly hour and minute the person loses the rights to the file.
The reason it would be this complicated is so that people could have fair use copying rights, but you wouldn't be able to transfer the rights to watch something without losing them yourself. So if your friend wanted to borrow your copy of Big Mama's House, you could transfer it to him, but you would lose the right to watch it until he transferred it back. So you could basically have all the Hollywood movies ever made, plus automatically download the new ones as soon as their available, and not ever be accused of stealing anything because it would be totally legal.
There would be a chip that's only job would be to create, change, and modify DRM files, plus approve or deny the watching of media.
Obviously, it would take a lot of work, but the question is, would it work, and could it answer the thorny dilemma of Fair Use vs. DRM?
The first thing I want to touch on involves an idea I had after thinking about the XBOX360:
Would it be possible to create hardware or software-based DRM where a file could be freely distributed with the DRM intact, and the decoding file(yes, file) would change depending on (1) the filename, (2) the person's ordering identifier(probably an email address), (3) the machine(s) the file is approved for and (4) The date and possibly hour and minute the person loses the rights to the file.
The reason it would be this complicated is so that people could have fair use copying rights, but you wouldn't be able to transfer the rights to watch something without losing them yourself. So if your friend wanted to borrow your copy of Big Mama's House, you could transfer it to him, but you would lose the right to watch it until he transferred it back. So you could basically have all the Hollywood movies ever made, plus automatically download the new ones as soon as their available, and not ever be accused of stealing anything because it would be totally legal.
There would be a chip that's only job would be to create, change, and modify DRM files, plus approve or deny the watching of media.
Obviously, it would take a lot of work, but the question is, would it work, and could it answer the thorny dilemma of Fair Use vs. DRM?