DRM Debate Continues
An afternoon panel on digital rights management at the Tech Policy Summit featured a familiar face-off -- a representative from the content industry (Dean Garfield of the Motion Picture Association of America) versus a "fair use" advocate (Gigi Sohn of Public Knowledge). The San Jose showdown was similar to ones I've reported on back in Washington.
Garfield argued that DRM keeps Hollywood afloat by fighting high-tech pirates, which encourages investment in movies and music. Sohn claimed that DRM holds legitimate consumers hostage, blocking them from experiencing audio and video in new and innovative ways. DRM "doesn’t do a darned thing" to fight those who want to unlawfully copy and distribute content, she said. "If someone wants to steal, they're going to steal."
Sohn criticized the online video rental services that MPAA has endorsed for barring users from burning movies to digital videodisc or transferring the content to a platform other than the computer on which it was downloaded. Sites like Movielink are "destined to fail," she said.
But Garfield said it is "too early to judge" how successful MPAA-approved distribution services will be in the marketplace. Studio bosses are "smart people" and they are "not in the business of chasing away consumers." The industry is committed to giving consumers what they want but it has to be careful "not to end up in the same position as record companies where the expectation is that content wants to be free and all content should be free."
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Tech Policy Summit
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