Suhit Gupta
12-28-2005, 07:00 PM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051227-5852.html' target='_blank'>http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051227-5852.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"If Black Friday and Cyber Monday didn't sate your shopping hunger this holiday season, Wired Magazine can think of one more reason to go on a consumer electronics shopping spree, and soon: "2005 might be the last good year to get gizmos that aren't locked down." They are, of course, referring to the ongoing efforts by the RIAA and the MPAA to plug every last leak in their safeguards against unauthorized use and copying of their precious content. For fear of lawsuits or in anticipation of coming legislation, our gadgets are dropping consumer-friendly features—like copying media off of a ReplayTV box or ripping backups of retail CDs—at an alarming pace. We're right in the middle of a paradigm shift for the entertainment industry, and the big players are responding to the changes the only way they know how, which is to tighten their grubby little fists around what they consider their greatest treasures."</i><br /><br />It is almost sad to hear about stuff like this. I mean coupled with disasters like Sony's latest attempt with their CDs, I feel that moves like this are simply going to alienate a large number of consumers. There are already a large number of choices to pick from and consumers are normally weighing their options on features vs. price. But soon it is going to include - hmm, how am I going to be limited by this player. While I understand the need for DRM, I think that the policing of digital content has gone too far. Clearly if people are unhappy by these limitations then it means that they want to be able to move their digital content around flexibly and I sincerely believe that manufacturers should start recognizing that instead of simply figuring out ways of locking things down.