Quoting xganon <nobody@xganon.com>:
So DRM systems are evil? Why? What makes them evil? There is no justification offered for this claim! Are we all supposed to accept it as obvious?
I consider DRM systems (even the not-secure, not-mandated versions) evil due to the high likelyhood they will be used as technical building blocks upon which to deploy mandated, draconian DRM systems. DRM systems inevitably slide toward being more mandated, and more draconian. DRM-capable TCPA-type systems are evil by the same argument, even if not used for DRM. The primary reason they are evil is not the stated goal of DRM systems (copy protection in various forms), but the ease with which they could be used to eliminate cypherpunk applications.
How can any software which people adopt voluntarily be evil? If Alice releases music with DRM restrictions, and Bob runs DRM compliant software to play it, which of them is evil? Is it Alice, for releasing her music with restrictions? Is it just because she encoded them in a file format, or is it evil to release any creative product and ask people not to copy it freely? Or is Bob evil, for voluntarily choosing to run DRM compliant software in order to listen to Alice's music? Or perhaps the software developer is the evil one, for giving people more options and choices in the world?
If DRM systems were truly general purpose themselves, capable of being used for good and bad purposes, I would agree they are not inherently evil. However, because they never do anything but remove power over bits from people who would otherwise have complete control over them, I can't think of any good they could possibly accomplish. Taken in the context where if a technical solution exists, lawmakers will mandate it even if it isn't necessary, sometimes technologies which are not innately evil are so dangerous as to be necessarily rejected to avoid a legislative consequence. If, for instance, a perfect control chip were possible so that firearms could never be used to kill an employee of the US Government, even if this technology were optional, I would consider it evil, as it both prevents a possibly-acceptable use of the technology, and removes power from whoever controls the technology at the time. I wouldn't consider an electronic payment system which prevents counterfeiting of currency to be "evil" in the same way as a DRM system is, because the electronic payment system technology is not trivially transformed into a gatekeeper on the use of secure private computation.
Are we to read this as an endorsement of the "wanting-widespread-piracy standpoint"? Is the implicit assumption here that widespread piracy is GOOD??? Well, that would certainly explain why DRM is evil in Ryan's eyes.
Copyright is legal enforcement of restrictions on the possessor of bits. As such, I consider it morally bad. Additionally, it has outlived its practical utility (which I agree it had at one point). I support technologies which enable end-users to defeat restrictions placed on them by content creators, governments, or others. Defeating legislative solutions to problems also serves the useful social purpose of reducing confidence in people's minds that the government can control anything at all. Defeating purely technical restrictions on how you can use something is hacking at its most pure form. This is not really on the axis of good vs. evil; it is simply an example of man's desire to control the world around him. Admittedly, defeating fundamental physical limitations on what something can do is a lot more rewarding than defeating restrictions artificially imposed by another person, but it's still a worthwhile challenge.
If so, in Ryan's ideal world, every creative artist has no choice but to do nothing, or release their works with permission that anyone can copy them for free. This is not just an unfortunate consequence of technological reality, in this view. It is an outcome to be desired and even fought for, to the extent that voluntary technologies which would give people other options must be opposed from the beginning.
I think those who create should be free to use technical, social, or other non-coercive means to accomplish their goals. However, creating technologies which can be easily legislatively mandated, or relying on legislative solutions to business problems, is wrong. While I'd certainly prefer a world where creation of worthwhile content is rewarded and encouraged, I would far prefer if every artist starved rather than a world where general purpose computing is restricted at all. The "military" applications of computing are far more important than art or culture. -- Ryan Lackey [RL7618 RL5931-RIPE] ryan@havenco.com CTO and Co-founder, HavenCo Ltd. +44 7970 633 277 the free world just milliseconds away http://www.havenco.com/ OpenPGP 4096: B8B8 3D95 F940 9760 C64B DE90 07AD BE07 D2E0 301F