DRM and Movies

Digital Rights Management is a tough subject.  As a moral subject, I believe it comes down to “intent.”  As a legal subject, it comes down to who “owns” the rights to digital art.  The famous “fair use” clause makes this tricky.  However, there are a galaxy of questions one must ask to understand “intent.”

Am I trying to defraud the artist by copying this DVD?  As an artist, do I only want paying people to enjoy my work?  Do paying people understand my work better?  What rights does an artist have over his/her art?

Well, theoretically and legally, an artist has all the rights to the spawn of his/her creativity. However, there are very few artists that create art just to make money. Music, painting, movies — these things aim at communicating something. Arguably, all art is aimed at the pursuit of what is true.  Art seeks to break down preconceptions and prejudices.   It shatters the normal and shows us a different point of view. Great art reveals a world of beauty previously obscured by our own laziness or social conditioning.

In the past it wasn’t so easy to share art. Wealthy Roman’s had copies made of famous and fashionable Greek statues and paintings. Renaissance painters copied each other. There are several copies of Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. However, before digital technology, the process of copying was a painstaking art in itself – and prohibitively expense.

On the other hand, digital art can be copied endlessly, without loss of quality. A DVD copy is identical to the original. Thus, digital rights management is a very new problem. The real battle is between those seeking to make money from art, and those wanting to enjoy art. The artists themselves are pretty much ambivalent to the debate over DRM.

As this Harvard Law Journal abstract states, the DRM mechanisms are often contradictory with other digital rights laws.

“Most DRM mechanisms are not engineered to include exceptions for fair use, and user circumvention of the DRM may violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act even if the use for which the circumvention occurs is itself noninfringing.”

My opinion is: don’t fight a losing battle. If I’m playing on the record company’s team, I would try to delay the inevitable for as long as possible, squeezing as much profit from people willing to purchase DRM-limited MP3′s and CD’s. But, in the end, unlimited, free online distribution is what will be the norm.  It will be the norm, because it can’t be stopped.  The ability to record the audio/visual arts is a relatively new phenomenon.  Perhaps we’re moving back toward a world more focused on live events.

Groups like DefectiveByDesign.org are simply voicing the inevitable. There’s no need to start a movement. The economics of the situation will play out. Just as record companies are investing more money in live tours, I believe that movie studios will invest more money is the movie theater experience. These kinds of experiences cannot be pirated.

DRM can often lead to a diminished user experience.  But not always.  Apple is a case in point.  Though, they too will have to adapt to new consumer expectations.  Successful media companies of the future will find ways to profit from digital art without decreasing the user experience.