Rant Buy real books, not DRM-laced bits

[Andy44]

Quote: in any case such laws are restrictions against your right to make agreements as well as Amazon's.

Originally Posted by Andy44
in any case such laws are restrictions against your right to make agreements as well as Amazon's.

That is an interesting perspective. Do you not agree that if some action is illegal then a contract clause requiring or permitting such an action should not be enforceable?

There is nothing illegal about allowing Amazon to access your machine if that is what you and they agreed on when you subscribed to their service.

By my way of thinking there are very few contract clauses that should be illegal, provided all parties agree in informed consent. Slavery, for instance, or a suicide pact. Allowing someone else to access your property is not illegal.

What makes it sneaky is the use of fine print to lure people into agreements before they know what they're getting into. Some people think that's unethical and some don't, and that's what courtrooms are for, I guess.

I think the problem with DRM is that there seems to be no escape from it, at least for the moment. Sure, I can choose not to buy a Kindle, but is there some other way for me to benefit from this new technology without being trapped in the web of DRM and losing all control over things I buy?

If I tried to start a rival company to compete with Kindle by honoring customers' privacy, would I be crushed by the DRM mafia of record company and publishing house lawyers?

 

[Ark]

The more DRM they pack into their products, the more people will just download free copies with the DRM stripped out of them. The fun thing about data is that it's rather easy to manipulate.

As for books, I likes my paper.

 

[Andy44]

The more DRM they pack into their products, the more people will just download free copies with the DRM stripped out of them. The fun thing about data is that it's rather easy to manipulate.

As for books, I likes my paper.

To quote Princess Leia, "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

 

[Ghostrider]

By purchasing software, music, books, or movies which have DRMs, you are agreeing to the license agreement. It doesn't matter whether it's just bits and bytes that can't be stolen, you agreed to the terms of use.

Our point is that those terms shouldn't be there in the first place. Would you agree if the car you bought had a remote control in it enabling the maker to disable it at a distance? Would you like it if ALL car manufacturer did the same?

And by the way, EULAs are not legal in a lot of countries.

 

[TSPenguin]

And I was having high hopes a few days ago, that the RIAA would abandon DRM schemes. But apparently, they don't seem to be afterall: http://torrentfreak.com/drm-is-dead-riaa-says-090719/

 

[Ghostrider]

Somehow I doubt that these agreements are actually illegal, considering how widely used they are and the fact that no one has ever so much as started a lawsuit regarding it, much less succeeded with one...

Rape is widespread, but fortunately it's still illegal.

 

[tblaxland]

By my way of thinking there are very few contract clauses that should be illegal, provided all parties agree in informed consent. Slavery, for instance, or a suicide pact.

Yes, but the reasons such things may be illegal (the law varies on these issues, in my understanding) is because of the difficulty of satisfying that informed consent has, or has not, been given (duress, coercion, mental illness, etc, may be factors).

Allowing someone else to access your property is not illegal.

Agreed.

What makes it sneaky is the use of fine print to lure people into agreements before they know what they're getting into. Some people think that's unethical and some don't, and that's what courtrooms are for, I guess.

We have some provisions against such conduct in our Trade Practices Act. Whether or not Amazon's actions would fall under such provisions is food for thought. Stating that you have a right to keep a permanent copy and yet retaining the right to delete such copies (not explicitly stated, but implied) I would say is deceptive. As you say, the courts should decide. Whether or not you have such laws in the US, I do not know.

I think the problem with DRM is that there seems to be no escape from it, at least for the moment. Sure, I can choose not to buy a Kindle, but is there some other way for me to benefit from this new technology without being trapped in the web of DRM and losing all control over things I buy?

Your options are more limited with regard to content but with a PDA and some digital libraries you can keep yourself occupied enough. Personally, the only electronic texts I have read on my PDA are the excellent Apollo Flight and Surface Journals.

 

[Hielor]

Rape is widespread, but fortunately it's still illegal.

My point was not "it's widespread so that means it's legal." My point was "If it were illegal, odds are that someone would have acted on it by this point, given how widespread it is."

The difference is that when a rape case is reported, authorities do things about it.

 

[Ghostrider]

My point was "If it were illegal, odds are that someone would have acted on it by this point, given how widespread it is."

Two problems with that: one, it's not yet felt as a BIG problem; two, the adversary has armies of lawyers and anyone who wants to take them on would need big reserves of cash.

There is a lot of illegal stuff being done with no reaction on the part of authorities - especially in the debt collecting department - because individual citizens cannot afford to take on big business.

 

[Linguofreak]

Heck: The widespread use of Social Security numbers in the US as a means of identification is illegal. You're not supposed to use SSN's for anything but Social Security business, but even the government does it. But nobody seems to have acted on that yet.

 

[Ark]

Heck: The widespread use of Social Security numbers in the US as a means of identification is illegal. You're not supposed to use SSN's for anything but Social Security business, but even the government does it. But nobody seems to have acted on that yet.

I don't know when that became the de facto standard ID number for all of the US, but you can't apply for a job, sign up for college classes, or do essentially anything anymore without giving out your SSN.

 

[Urwumpe]

Large companies such as Amazon have their own lawyers who write these. IANAL, but I'd be willing to bet that they write the things carefully.

The biggest convicted Internet criminals in Germany in the last years had been lawyers. I would not be too impressed by a lawyer team being behind the license agreement at all. They did work carefully, you can be sure, but not with good or even just lawful intentions.

 

[Andy44]

Our point is that those terms shouldn't be there in the first place. Would you agree if the car you bought had a remote control in it enabling the maker to disable it at a distance? Would you like it if ALL car manufacturer did the same?

I don't want to buy a car with an airbag. Unfortunately, ALL car manufacturers do the same. It's a law, of course, that "forces" them to do it, but whether it's by law or by DRM-type shenanigans, I can't buy the car I want, even though not having an airbag is no hazard to anyone else but me (maybe).

Worse is OnStar and similar systems which allow all cars to be tracked, and internal conversations to be eavesdropped on. There is a famous case in which the FBI used a car's OnStar system to eavesdrop on its occupants.

The last truck I bought I specifically asked not to have a built-in OnStar-type system for this reason, but as time goes on and more and more things become standard or even mandatory, what you suggest is coming true.

Systems are in the works which may allow the police to turn off your car remotely if they get them to work. If they can mandate a remote kill switch be installed in every new car, you can bet the farm the police state and security and MADD and safety lobbies will make it happen, probably in a late-night legislative session on a Friday night when no one's paying much attention.

 

[tblaxland]

I don't want to buy a car with an airbag.

Your choice of course, but I am curious as to why not?

Worse is OnStar and similar systems which allow all cars to be tracked, and internal conversations to be eavesdropped on. There is a famous case in which the FBI used a car's OnStar system to eavesdrop on its occupants.

The last truck I bought I specifically asked not to have a built-in OnStar-type system for this reason, but as time goes on and more and more things become standard or even mandatory, what you suggest is coming true.

:blink: I had heard of these systems but are they becoming so common there that they are standard equipment? Certainly I can see how such technology could be used to invade privacy. It is disturbing that a police authority could not resist the temptation.

 

[Andy44]

Your choice of course, but I am curious as to why not?

Well, I don't trust them completely. I also don't like how the modern steering wheel's style has suffered because of it.

But mostly, it was a hypothetical example. I don't believe in being forced to be safe, to wear helmets, to take medicine, to eat healthy food, or any of these other infringements on my freedom done "for my own good" in the name of safety. I don't mind airbags or seatbelts; it's being forced to buy and use them that rankles me.

I'll go even further and say that as a free man I shouldn't have to explain my choice to anyone in authority, either. Irrationality, so long as it only hurts me, is my business alone.

My views seem extreme to some, but I don't think they would seem extreme to an American of, say, 150 years ago, or even 50 years ago. I can't speak for Australia or anywhere else, but I see the entire West following a similar trajectory. Society today is so programmed to listen to authority and accept compulsory safety measures and other "necessary" things that my argument shocks some people. But I've put a lot of thought into it.

 

[tblaxland]

I don't believe in being forced to be safe, to wear helmets, to take medicine, to eat healthy food, or any of these other infringements on my freedom done "for my own good" in the name of safety. I don't mind airbags or seatbelts; it's being forced to buy and use them that rankles me.

Ah well, I think we are mostly on the same page here. Of course, the argument here for such mandatory safety measures is often that introducing them will reduce the publicly funded health care costs associated with not using them. That is a fairly rational argument if you are prepared to take the universal health care system we have here as a given.

My views seem extreme to some, but I don't think they would seem extreme to an American of, say, 150 years ago, or even 50 years ago. I can't speak for Australia or anywhere else, but I see the entire West following a similar trajectory. Society today is so programmed to listen to authority and accept compulsory safety measures and other "necessary" things that my argument shocks some people. But I've put a lot of thought into it.

I am inclined to agree with you here. I may not always buck authority just for the prinicple's sake, but I am at least willing to question and discuss the issues rather than take them as presented.

BTW, I was doing some reading and I think that the use of OnStar type systems for eavesdropping would be fully allowable under Australia's Privacy Act, subject to some possible restrictions on whether or not it collection was "fair". I would read the user agreement/license very carefully first.

 

[Linguofreak]

I don't know when that became the de facto standard ID number for all of the US, but you can't apply for a job, sign up for college classes, or do essentially anything anymore without giving out your SSN.

Well, applying for a job is a legitimate use of your SSN. Your employer has to give your Social Security witholding to the government, so they need to know your SSN. That was part of the system from the beginning. But applying for college, drivers licenses, etc, are not legit uses of your SSN.

 

[Andy44]

Ah well, I think we are mostly on the same page here. Of course, the argument here for such mandatory safety measures is often that introducing them will reduce the publicly funded health care costs associated with not using them. That is a fairly rational argument if you are prepared to take the universal health care system we have here as a given.

As you might expect, I do not take such socialistic health care schemes as a given. Especially if the consequence of being forced to pay for someone else's medical care means accepting even more restrictions on my freedoms. It's a vicious circle.

Well, applying for a job is a legitimate use of your SSN. Your employer has to give your Social Security witholding to the government, so they need to know your SSN. That was part of the system from the beginning. But applying for college, drivers licenses, etc, are not legit uses of your SSN.

Indeed. Virginia, IIRC, used to put people's SSN's on drivers' licenses, but the state either lost a lawsuit or passed a law, or both, and now they just make up a number for the license.

 

[Linguofreak]

Indeed. Virginia, IIRC, used to put people's SSN's on drivers' licenses, but the state either lost a lawsuit or passed a law, or both, and now they just make up a number for the license.

Texas doesn't put it on the license, but IIRC they do ask for your Social.

---------- Post added at 01:06 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:52 AM ----------

Ah well, I think we are mostly on the same page here. Of course, the argument here for such mandatory safety measures is often that introducing them will reduce the publicly funded health care costs associated with not using them. That is a fairly rational argument if you are prepared to take the universal health care system we have here as a given.

That's a toughie. On the one hand, I don't like what I see in other nation's universal health care systems, and I shudder at the thought of having such a system here. On the other, our health care system is in fairly bad shape as it is, and I shudder at how deeply even a fairly minor medical emergency could put me into debt... Of course my solution to that would be tort reform: Alot of the cost of medical care comes from our lawsuit-happy culture in which doctors have to have liability insurance up the ying-yang against malpractice suits. The solution is not universal health care, but rather limitations on what and how much people can sue for.

 

[Ark]

Applying for a job shouldn't require a SSN, they can have that when they actually hire me. Currently there's about 50 pieces of paper with my SSN floating around in business' dumpsters and filing cabinets, to my best estimation.

As for the whole OnStar thing, it's not that hard to disable it. It's just wiring, same as anything else. Cut the power wire, pull the antenna, whatever. Worst case scenario is every time you go in for service and they plug in a scan tool, they bother you about having active error codes in the OnStar module.

Or you could just drive an old car like I do and accept the fact that if you hit something hard enough, instead of getting a nice bag of air in the face, you get speared through the chest with a steering column.