[Wylug-discuss] Re: Windows-only distribution of BBC Programs

[Smylers]

Gareth Eason writes:

> Smylers wrote:
> 
> > It's disappointing.  But is there a good alternative?
> > 
> > This analysis makes some good points in defence of the BBC's decision:
> > 
> >  http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2007/06/free_the_bbc_drm_debate.php
> 
> To say this article missed the point, is to me an understatement.

It was a blog entry, not an article, and it was specifically rebutting
points in an anti-BBC-DRM letter, not generally commenting on the issue;
I don't think it misses the point so much as makes points which others
have missed.

> The BBC use a DRM model, which is not available to license payers who
> want to legally use the valid content on a non-Windows system.

Yes.

> To make it absolutely clear, these are license payers, who are legally
> entitled to watch the BBC material, who own a legal copy of Linux (or
> Mac OS X, or BSD, or in fact some versions of Windows) and who wish to
> view this content.

Yes.  (It is also not available to those who legally own a toaster, or
have a licence to operate a forklift truck.  Nor to those licence payers
who are legally entitled to watch it but don't own a computer.  And for
that matter VideoPlus numbers that appear in BBC TV listings can only be
used by those who've paid for equipment which features a proprietory
VideoPlus chip.)

The fact that it would be good for a Linux user to have the material
isn't on its own sufficient to make it feasible for the BBC to release
the material in an appropriate format.  The blog entry is considering
things from the BBC's point of view (something that anybody who is
trying to persuade the BBC to change their point of view should do).

The blog entry suggests why DRM is useful to the BBC, and mentions why
it'd be problematic for them to release non-DRMed material.  A
consequence of their material being DRMed is that it doesn't work on
Linux; I'm irritated by that, but I don't (yet) know what to demand
instead:

* We could demand that since this material isn't available to all
  computing-owning licence payers, it shouldn't be released to any of
  them.  That would make things equal and fair, but I don't see how
  Windows users not getting this content helps Linux users or makes the
  world a better place.

* We could demand that the material be released without DRM.  But in
  order to do that we'd have to show why the issues highlighted in the
  blog entry I linked to aren't actually problems.  Hence why the entry
  _is_ relevant, and hasn't missed the point.
  
  I'd be delighted to campaign on these grounds.  But I don't like
  campaigning from a position of ignorance, and I'm not going to demand
  DRM-free content until somebody's explained to me why that won't be
  problematic for the BBC.

> The article claims that they will be catered for because they may be
> tech-savvy enough to obtain a DRM-free version of the content.

No it doesn't.  Again, the article is from the BBC's point of view.  It
isn't interested in showing how everybody will be able to get the
content.  Instead, this bit:

> ( c.f.  "Of course the DRM won't stop piracy, or stop the
> computer-savvy ripping Windows Media streams into their preferred Ogg
> Vorbis format, or stop people using UKNova, but it tends to make the
> expected level of piracy tolerable for the people investing in
> television production." )

is rebutting the claim made in the anti-BBC-DRM letter that there's no
point in the BBC using DRM because DRM won't stop piracy; it argues why
completely stopping piracy isn't necessary, and the protection that DRM
provides is sufficient for the purposes for which the BBC (and those
making programmes) think they want it.

I don't know enough about this field to have a good feel for how true
that is.  I'd be interested in hearing evidence against it, but I'm not
prepared _prima facie_ to entirely ignore the claim and demand that the
BBC provide me with Linux-friendly files, just because they would
personally suit me.

> It's an admission of failure before we even start. The article admits
> that DRM will not stop piracy,

It would be an admission if the aim of the DRM were to stop piracy, but
the part of the article you quote argues why this isn't the aim.

> ... but yet it makes it illegal for a subset of the consuming
> population ... to use otherwise legal content.

The release of the IPlayer does nothing of the sort; this one I'm sure
of, since it's a simple matter of chronology.  Currently, the content
we're talking about isn't published at all on the internet; it isn't, at
the moment, "otherwise legal", because it doesn't yet exist.

Next month the BBC will make some content legally available to a subset
of the population (in this case, Windows users).  Note that this is a
strict increase in the amount of legal content available; nobody is
worse off after the change than they were before it; nobody has less
content available after the change; there is no act which is currently
legal which will be made illegal after this change.

> Thus, the British public has a choice: they can either not avail of
> the service, or - for an already proven pointless reason - they can
> ensure legality only through purchasing and running a copy of
> Microsoft Windows.

Yes.  They will have a choice, one which they do not currently have.
The first of the options you mention is to ignore the new service,
thereby being in exactly the same position as if the BBC hadn't released
it.

> Please, make every effort to educate the BBC that their methods of
> applying DRM are fundamentally flawed,

I would like to do that, I'd like it very much.  I don't run Windows,
and I'd like IPlayer (and Channel 4's 4OD) to work on Linux.

But I can only do that if I myself first understand how this use of DRM
is "fundamentally flawed" (from the BBC's point of view).  And currently
I don't understand enough of this issue -- partially because the blog
entry I linked to mentions things which nobody has yet addressed.

> and that they are running the real risk of criminalising innocent
> people.

That strikes me as hyperbole.  If the BBC broadcast a film on TV, a
viewer may record the broadcast and keep it longer than is legal (or
distribute it to others or whatever); but it would be ridiculous to
claim that it's the BBC who, through broadcasting the film, have
criminalized that viewer!

Similarly here.  If the IPlayer makes a new service available to a
subset of the population, the BBC aren't criminalizing anybody; if some
people subsequently change their behaviour and act illegally, that isn't
the BBC's fault.

> By the same token, please stop accepting the flawed assertions and
> justifications for the DRM model detailed in this article.

I'm _not_ accepting them.  I'm wanting somebody to explain to me why
they are flawed.  All you've done is ignore them (and claim that it's
bad if Linux users can't get the programmes, which is true but doesn't
mean that the blog entry's claims are irrelevant).

> They are simply wrong, given the current litigious attitude of the
> world in which we live.

What's the world's litigious attitude got to do with anything?

> I shall dismount my soap box now, in the hope that perhaps content
> producers and providers will learn that a DRM model which criminalises
> a chunk of your audience is not the way forward :-)

And you still haven't presented a viable alternative.

Smylers