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Comment by shmerl | Hacker News Reader

That's a good breakdown of how much effort is spent on unethical application of technology.

But advertising DRM on the site: "buy DRM"? That's already disgusting.

The post was apparently sponsored by them. I've got to at least applaud them for bringing a lot of this info out into the open.

True that.

If you know anyone involved in creative work, you would bite your tongue before saying DRM is unethical.

Such people universally, to a man (or woman) believe that unauthorized distribution of their output is unethical because it makes them unable to make money for all their hard work. Inasmuch as DRM prevents this, it is a boon to these people.

DRM is a part of life now. Without it, you would not be able to enjoy the rich variety of content available on today's internet.

Some people in the creative field have sense and don't respect DRM. Check Lexy Alexander's posts on this topic. Check also releases by CD Projekt Red and their DRM-free games store GOG.

We need something like this to eventually succeed and disrupt current messed up DRM situation in video too:

https://www.gog.com/forum/general/introducing_gogcom_drmfree...

DRM is and will remain unethical, no matter how much its proponents will try to whitewash it with demagoguery, claiming it's "part of life now".

And for the reference, DRM doesn't do anything good for creators. It's always a crooked tool, especially when combined with policy laundering that produces stuff like DMCA 1201.

And if you know anyone who has paid for content that suddenly they had lost access to because of shut down DRM servers or intermittent internet connectivity, then you might be inclined to think a bit differently.

Ultimately I think there needs to be a balance here, and most importantly users ought to be made more aware of what they're usually getting when purchasing DRM-protected content: a limited license to consume their paid-for content for a (possibly unspecified) period of time on a specific set of devices under certain circumstances that often lie well beyond their control.

I'd like to think that some kind of free market-based approach of consumers choosing to support the content creators who take a more balanced approach to DRM (or just avoid it entirely) would "solve" these problems, but I'm not too hopeful of this ever working out given the enormous knowledge asymmetry between content creators/distributors and consumers about how stuff like this works.

> DRM is a part of life now.

So is piracy^Wcopyright infringement.

> Without it, you would not be able to enjoy the rich variety of content available on today's internet.

Why not?

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