May 27 2006
Cory’s An Idiot
On many subjects, Cory Doctorow is quite bright. Copyright issues, online freedom issues, etc. are his strength.
On Digital Media, however, he’s an utter moron.
Take for instance this piece of unbridled stupidity:
iRiver makes several digital music players that come loaded with an operating system that obeys Microsoft’s crippling “Plays for Sure” specification — which ensures that the device obeys big music companies instead of its owner. Hackers have fixed this for months by providing an unauthorized firmware for the device that turns it into a real MP3 player, and now the company has taken the hint and released an official version.
This is an object lesson in how DRM fails in the marketplace. iRiver’s customers don’t want DRM — it makes their device less valuable. They want a device that obeys their wishes, and they’re willing to void their warranties to get one.
Cory, you ignorant ass. If you don’t want DRM on your player, here’s how to get around it.
Ready? Here’s the complicated procedure:
1. Rip your CD’s as MP3 files.
That’s it.
No firmware updates.
No disabling features.
No drama.
I find it amusing, actually, that people continue to rail against the DRM of all portable players including Apple’s mega successful iPod. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the included DRM means nothing if your songs are MP3 files.
Then again, maybe it does because apparently Cory couldn’t figure it out, and iRiver caved to the stupidity of its customers by releasing a firmware that, in effect, simply stops you from purchasing music from MSN Music, Yahoo Music, etc. There’s an enhancement.
No one forces you to buy your music from an online source. In effect, all this “upgrade” does is remove your ability to do so.
Technorati Tags: drm, cory doctorow
May 28th, 2006 at 8:52 am
Like Cory, I’m not a fan of DRM either. Unfotunately I made the mistake of buying an iRiver T-10 before realizing that I had to use WMP to load anything on it. This is a very nice player, but it was forcing me to use a piece of software I don’t ordinarily use because I don’t like it and have no use for it. I don’t buy DRM crippled music and only use regular MP3’s, nearly all ripped from my personal collection as you suggest. But getting these on to my player was a pain in the ass using WMP. Converting it to a UMS device has made this much easier as it now appears as an ordinary mass storage device. I can simply use my favorite file management utility to copy and delete files from my player. Much simpler and much more user friendly. If others choose to use DRM crippled music then they are free to stay locked in to using WMP. I for one am extremely happy to be be free of it.
May 28th, 2006 at 9:49 am
The difficulty in getting music from your computer to your player has nothing to do with DRM, though. That’s my point. WMP is not the greatest program for copying music to a portable player, but that’s not a DRM issue, it’s a WMP issue.
Unfortunately, Cory is so anti-DRM that he can’t separate the two.
May 30th, 2006 at 1:05 pm
That post pissed me off too.
It seems all iRiver did was upgrade the firmware so you could switch between MSC and MTP mode, which means you can connect it as a PlaysForSure device, or you could just make it look like a hard drive and drop mp3s on it.
Cory is so upset at DRM in principle that he doesn’t have an open mind about possible reasonable uses for it. I think paying $15 a month for *unlimited* legal music is a hell of a better deal than buying un-DRM’d CDs (at $15 a pop) that I have to rip and then store in a crate.
I agree that DRM is something the average consumer doesn’t quite understand, and the market will probably move towards better explaining it to consumers, on hardware and software, prior to purchase.