» It's not logical, Captain
"Now, as an experiment, imagine that you had a Star Trek replicator in your home and could get any book you wanted for free with the simple command of your voice. Would anyone still buy a book? No way. Would anyone still want to write a book? Not a good one."
But this is exactly the same situation we have now with music - if anyone wants it for free, they can have it for free with minimal effort. Yet people still do buy music. Not just since the digital revolution: even cassette tapes, when combined with a social environment such as a school for example, gave people the ability to copy almost anything. Yet Madonna is still wealthy. EMI remain. Few would argue there has been no good music produced.
The majority of people are reasonable. The minute they stop being reasonable, it won't matter what DRM is in place. People are ruled in this way by consent; in a sense, if you can have DRM then you probably don't need it.
I have always said that companies behaving in this fashion are not protecting their 'bottom lines', but securing future control over consumer behaviour and market competition. DRM is not about 'digital rights' at all. Flag this | Edit this post |
