O geeks, what has become of us? (Register) [LWN.net]

Here's an editorial in The Register expressing fears that the "geek worldview" is becoming too uniform. "If geekdom becomes tied to a Little Red Book of permitted beliefs, it is likely to go the same way as so many other fixed belief systems, into decline. Another way of putting this is to ask this question: If DRM comes crashing down on our heads, and we can't do anything about it, do we all have to spend the rest of eternity fighting the last war? And if we're fighting that war, who's going to be taking care of the next one?"

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O geeks, what has become of us? (Register)

Posted Oct 4, 2002 14:39 UTC (Fri) by beejaybee (guest, #1581) [Link]

Yep; if DRM comes crashing down on us & we can't do anything about it, we're dead. Dead soldiers get to spend the whole of eternity re-fighting their last battle - so it's bound to be the last war, for us.

I have confidence that we _will_ find a way to do something about it. That's not to say it isn't a Darned Good Idea (tm) to try to prevent the sky from falling in the first place, though.

Good Example : Fraunhoffer

Posted Oct 4, 2002 17:16 UTC (Fri) by torsten (guest, #4137) [Link]

Remember the media blitz surrounding the Fraunhoffer change in licensing terms? They now charge a unit fee (or one time fee) per encoder AND decoder.

http://www.mp3licensing.com/royalty/software.html

The sky has crashed - they have every right under the current political climate to charge for these things. While people can continue trading mp3's and divx files, it is the sad truth that this fight is over. From the point of view of Fraunhoffer (and politicians), DRM is inevitable. The only question now, is how to implement it.

Since the mp3 encoder/decoder profits outweigh the cost of lobbying, Fraunhoffer will undoubtedly purchase some powerful mp3-tarriff collection legislation. Similar to annual losses due to piracy, the amount of money Fraunhoffer believes to be losing is a complete farce.

It is a farce for one simple reason. Where there is money, there is greed. If Fraunhoffer were actually realizing their entire mp3 profits, if music companies were realizing every penny they could charge for traded music, if movie studios realized every dime for every copy fo their films made, then this cash flow would attract hundreds of viable competitors, all looking for a piece of the pie.

I only have one real concern about DRM, in collusion with "Intellectual Property." Scientists and researchers can not be made afraid to take information and material, and use it to increase the public body of knowledge. It is the control of thoughts and ideas that really concerns me.

For example, if one company knew how the AIDS virus worked, and bundled this information in an ebook with very specific prohibitions about how that information can be used, I think this is wrong. Anyone reading such material should be free to develop the research further, without limitation on the ideas involved. Copyright should restrict how the document itself is replicated (with notable academic exceptions) - not how the information is used (a la the EULA).

Torsten

Good grief, what rubbish.

Posted Oct 5, 2002 7:36 UTC (Sat) by GreyWizard (subscriber, #1026) [Link]

What a seriously misguided article. First of all, the basic premise is false: plenty of geeks I know believe and are happy to advocate unpopular positions -- including defending Microsoft. Second, being prepared for the consequences of failure does not require advocating that outcome. Finally, and more importantly, a widespread consensus isn't always the result of a lack of critical thought.

The author should consider the possibility that there could in fact be a right answer in there somewhere. Clearly there are many people who don't think carefully about the opinions they adopt, among technical people just like any other demographic group. But surely it's better to pursuade them through reasoned debate rather than taking up a modern sophistry by ensuring that people are evenly distributed among the posssible opinions.