[YLUG] BBC DRM protest in Manchester

[Dave Berkeley]

On Thursday 02 August 2007 19:42:43 Matt Lee wrote:
> It's now official!
>
> http://www.defectivebydesign.org/BBCSignUpManchester
>
> I have some hazmat suits, and some helmets.
>
> Best,
>
> matt

What worries me about this is the confusion of two issues. The BBC have 
copyright issues to consider, and have a duty to their contributors, 
subcontractors etc. to protect that copyright. Doing so with platform 
dependant software is the problem. It is clearly wrong to exclude parts of 
their audience, particularly when it requires a proprietary OS to run. This 
is in breach of their charter, and it is the problem that is likely to 
persuade politicians etc to act.

More worrying is their association with M$. If they tie themselves to M$ 
technology it is a waste of money and restricts alternatives. They should 
instead be developing an open source solution to their problem. The open 
source community should be helping them with that and encouraging them.

What we have on this website is an attack on DRM. I think that it is best to 
separate the two issues. You are more likely to win the simpler "access for 
all" case, but attacking DRM will probably just get people's backs up. That 
debate needs to be had, and people need convincing, but I don't think that it 
helps in the BBC case.

In short, I think that the campaign would be better served with a different 
approach. Using DRM is not in breach of their charter. Having a propriety OS 
specific player is.

Cheers

Dave Berkeley