Re: Well they already cut themselves off from a big portion of the "market"
DRM has always been unethical. Have we learned nothing from the 2000's?
"Hey Netflix, the year 2001 called and wants its Restrictions Management mentality back" comes to mind.
If DRM is to be used, we need to reform copyright. Thanks to some greedy people in the US who had no idea how to survive without Mickey Mouse we now have the common people having to wait almost 100 years before the public domain can see new works. It gets really mind bending when you realise that copyright created to prevent this, by protecting the right for someone to COPY a work for personal uses AGAINST any backlash from the creator of said work or publisher.
Imagine if this was applied to the use of forks. It being illegal to buy a fork, eat with it then wash it for further use the next day. Oh the humanity, how much money lost to the makers of forks because the everyday people "hijack" the cutlery instead of buying a new one for the next day.
Yes, a fork is physical so must be "Hijacked" like a plane. Fork hijackers are the fork equivalents to digital pirates.
Clever really as pirates typically attack ships. What nice mind control these corporations invented by calling someone who does the future generations a service in protecting a work, a pirate. Kids know pirates attack ships and kill people while wearing eye patches so its bad to be someone who share a film that should be shared with friends after 10 years (and not 70+). Its bad to share a fork, or anything really. Sharing is bad. How dare little Sarah bring in ONE BAG of sweets to school for everyone to share on her birthday. Thats illegal. Thats hijacking a sweet. The kids should be ashamed.
This is crazy talk dont you think? The artistic treasures of our generation and generations before, locked up in perpetual limbo for ever thanks to increasing terms of copyright and DRM designed to prevent the freeing of such works in protest.
Even I use netflix and that does not make me a hypocrite. Why is this? Well think about it. I either not watch these new works in protest, or I enjoy them while I can. Yet I am maddened knowing that the generations that follow me wont.
We are really, seriously, right now entering the beginnings of what future societies will know as the second dark ages. Only thanks to the continued existence of printed books and newspapers plus some digital works that are freed thanks for the efforts of the Creative Commons these ages will not be completely dark.
I will watch Netflix and enjoy what I can while I exist in this world. I will also find ways to try and further the cause of freeing our generations treasures from dark deep vaults. I will rip my DVD's to open formats when I want. If I have a blu-ray I will re-record it in realtime (I grew up in the 90's so real time recording does not scare me one bit) via analogue means if I can not rip it. I will keep the DVD and blu-ray too as better ripping methods may be possible in the future and players will work for many years and dont tend to "phone home".
To anyone who managed to read all this: Well done lol I do go on.
To anyone who disagrees with DRM being unethical and copyright being a "copyblight" on our generation then I say, go and take action like me. Find a library and lock it up nice and tight. Destroy the key and when people complain tell them about the evils of information sharing and freedom. Tell them that our descendants centuries to come have no right to know anything of our works or knowledge without perpetual payments. Ask them to join you in the fight against the public domain!
But you wont will you? ;-)