Steve Jobs today wrote a response to various European countries that have demanding an “opening up” of the FairPlay DRM scheme that iTunes uses (link).  He refers to a third option as the one that’s best for consumers, an option in which there is no DRM attached to songs purchased off of iTunes.  I would argue that it is best for labels as well as long as certain measures are also put in place.

There is room for a middle ground. We as consumers wish to be able to use content that we have purchased in any device. Regardless of the legal status of music as a “license,” when most people purchase a CD, they feel that they own the CD.  This means that if I want to “rip” a CD onto my computer and then transfer it to my iPod, I should be completely allowed, because I “own” that CD. When I purchase content from iTunes, I no longer seem to own my music. I am blessed in that I have an iPod, a computer, and the funds to make frivolous purchases of music online, but I have to be. There is no expectation that I own this music. Why is it that now, in this day and age of progress, I seem to have have less rights than I did three years ago?

I know that terrorism cannot be made the scapegoat of this foray into my personal life. So, as a consumer or music, my rights have been infringed at the expense of the rights of the content managers (note that I did not say the artists). My arguments place me well within the camp of users that are philosophically opposed to DRM (a camp that, with knowledge, I suspect would be a vast majority of people blessed enough to purchase music). So, what is the solution for the industry?

The content industries fear technological change more than anything else, despite the fact that it is these companies who have seen profits soar because of these very same technologies. Even with this fact, the content industries fear change.  The movie industries feared the video tape; the recording industry feared the audio tape.  These are industries in which every aspect of the performance must be controlled by the industry, from planning to creation to production to marketing and finally to experiencing.  The loss of any one of these arenas is threat to continued profits.  Amazingly, these companies have longer memories than our own governments, by using technology such as DRM to regain control lost to earlier forms of content ownership. They sweeten the medicine bay saying that it is to stop piracy, as if all customers are pirates of media.  I can think of no other arena in which the customer, consumer, or client is treated with such disdain, and I work in IT. These changes have happened slowly, so that the user is for the most part ignorant of it.

When I put a newly purchased DVD into my laptop, a number of things happen before I am allowed to view it. One such thing is a check to see if I am allowed to play this DVD, by way of a mechanism called a region code.  It is by this mechanism that i am unable to play DVDs legally purchased in the UK (I am a citizen of the United States) and am forced to find other methods to access content that I have purchased (in this case, either downloading an “illegal” copy of material I own or committing a felony in order to circumvent these controls).  FairPlay DRM is, as usual, “good enough” for most people. In fact, it is slightly more open than systems put in place by competitors.

That shouldn’t be an endorsement, however. The lock-downs that exist serve no purpose beyond controlling the experience of listening to music. The claim that it stems wholesale illegal piracy is laughable, as Mr. Jobs has stated. I challenge an executive of the recording industry to consider another path, one that will ultimately help your organization more than DRM both in gathering goodwill and by locating those who operate outside the bounds of law.

Add a digital fingerprint to every song purchased from any online store. Use this data to track a song through piracy sites, and if you find a song purchased from this future iTunes, go back to Apple and request the information of the person responsible for purchasing the song in the first place. In this future, unlike the current “well, we are pretty sure it was Mr. Smith,” you have irrefutable evidence as to who illegally distributed your copyrighted works and are able to charge him or her accordingly. This way, you stop charging elderly people who don’t even own computers with electronic copyright infringement and start charging the people actually responsible. In fact (as proven by the success of iTunes), I think you would find that this system would (slightly) help in stemming theft of music and ultimately help your bottom line.

You just need to let go of your control of my eardrums. I do actually own them, not you.

As per Om Malik and The Apple Blog, the record companies are again trying to claim that if we own an iPod (or Zune, or whatever), we are simply theives (billboard.com). To this end, I think we should state approximately how much legal music we have on our iPods (Zunes/Rios/whatevers). That way, even a quick Google search will prove just how wrong these asshats are.

For me personally, that number is is 3800 songs at about 20 GB of data. This music was either purchased at iTMS, ripped from a CD that I own, or offered online by the artist for free.

In a democracy, if a significant minority, not even a majority of the population does something, then it is immoral to legislate against it. If that something is theft, then perhaps instead of legislating a significant minority into felons, a better system should be implemented.

The internet is interesting due in no small part to the international communications it enables. For example, I know that I have readers from all over the world (including places that if you had asked me, I would have said they didn’t even have electricity let alone internet access). I and many others like me believe that this cross-cultural discussion battles ignorance and xenophobia.

If during discussions (active or otherwise), a television show or music artist is mentioned or recommended, I want to experience what is being spoken of. While the United States is probably the single biggest producer of media content, we are far from the only producer of such content. In fact, an unfortunate side effect of our massive production is that there is a great degree of inertia regarding other counry’s content, an issue most apparent in television.

It is through the internet that I discovered a number of clever foreign television programs: The I.T. Crowd from the UK and ReGenesis from Canada. Out of desire to view these wonderful programs, I was forced into using a now siezed bittorrent tracker site, known as ThePirateBay. I tried to find other avenues in both cases, but there weren’t even DVDs sold in the native countries (although I would be breaking other laws by viewing those DVDs).

It’s not that I want to deprive the actors, producers, and crews of these television shows. It is that I wanted to experience exactly what they had to offer and bask in the experience. I enjoy movies, TV, and music. I spend a great deal of money on all three (about half of my income). It is not that I begrudge them really anything, except that I do find myself thinking about the repercussions of my purchases more and more. Can I ethically support and finance organizations that work to remove
and hamper my cross-cultural experiences.

I have purchased all of the software I use (that can be purchased). I have spent (as of this publishing) over $40 on media this week. And, yes, I am a pirate. But, to be fair, I was forced into the position.