ANALYSIS
Advantages
As stated before, Digital Rights Management is very prominent in the entertainment business. DRM technologies are widely used in the music distribution business. The music industry in general has a fairly positive opinion about DRM as most music distributors claim that DRM help them safeguard their precious time and money investment. Since the music companies are being protected from piracy, they actually return profits out of their sales. This enables them to invest in future projects safely and with confidence. DRM tools also encourage more content creation from existing and past artists as well as encouraging new artists to begin their music career.
Digital Rights Management tools such as the one mentioned in the coursework …show more content…
For example, let’s say a customer buys a music album with DRM in the Windows Media Audio (WMA) format online, the latter will be unable to convert the music into MP3 for it to be compatible with a device he owns. This is unethical as once someone buys a product, he/she should have the right to do whatever pleases him/her with the product. This is also the case if someone buys a movie or music on a DVD with DRM; the buyer will be unable to extract the media from the DVD when technically, he/she should have the full rights to do so. In other words, DRM limits choice. This will discourage potential future customers of the company as they become aware of the issues in the product. For example, Apple used to provide music though iTunes which were only playable by their own iPod. In January 2009, the company announced that all the songs available on iTunes (10 million at that time) will be provided DRM free by March of the same year. Furthermore, DRM technology at the moment is not refined enough to provide a reasonable end-user experience while also trying to stop copyright infringement. The media company needs to find the correct balance between customer satisfaction and user …show more content…
However in my opinion, the advantaged of DRM applies mostly if not totally to the companies marketing the product rather than those who actually buy the product. Considering the disadvantages, we can also conclude that DRM technologies also negatively affects the media industry in some ways; the most impactful one being the loss potential clients.
I personally believe that the practise of DRM is quite unethical as most companies try too hard to prevent copyright infringement while their customers suffer for it. One example of such a situation is the DRM method Ubisoft used in the past. Ubisoft used the SecuROM software to strictly control the number of installations of the games they published. The issue was that if the buyer encountered a problem with his/her system and had to re-install the game, it was simply impossible despite being totally legal to do so. Purchasers had to use cracked versions of the game in order to install the games. After years of customer complaints, Ubisoft finally admitted that DRM is a very ineffective method of stopping PC game piracy. They also admitted that they believe any of their games can be cracked given enough effort and time despite the highly expensive methods of DRM. Ubisoft then acknowledged that they would now emphasis on delivering a better experience for the customers. Ubisoft found an intuitive way of countering piracy, that
Advantages
As stated before, Digital Rights Management is very prominent in the entertainment business. DRM technologies are widely used in the music distribution business. The music industry in general has a fairly positive opinion about DRM as most music distributors claim that DRM help them safeguard their precious time and money investment. Since the music companies are being protected from piracy, they actually return profits out of their sales. This enables them to invest in future projects safely and with confidence. DRM tools also encourage more content creation from existing and past artists as well as encouraging new artists to begin their music career.
Digital Rights Management tools such as the one mentioned in the coursework …show more content…
For example, let’s say a customer buys a music album with DRM in the Windows Media Audio (WMA) format online, the latter will be unable to convert the music into MP3 for it to be compatible with a device he owns. This is unethical as once someone buys a product, he/she should have the right to do whatever pleases him/her with the product. This is also the case if someone buys a movie or music on a DVD with DRM; the buyer will be unable to extract the media from the DVD when technically, he/she should have the full rights to do so. In other words, DRM limits choice. This will discourage potential future customers of the company as they become aware of the issues in the product. For example, Apple used to provide music though iTunes which were only playable by their own iPod. In January 2009, the company announced that all the songs available on iTunes (10 million at that time) will be provided DRM free by March of the same year. Furthermore, DRM technology at the moment is not refined enough to provide a reasonable end-user experience while also trying to stop copyright infringement. The media company needs to find the correct balance between customer satisfaction and user …show more content…
However in my opinion, the advantaged of DRM applies mostly if not totally to the companies marketing the product rather than those who actually buy the product. Considering the disadvantages, we can also conclude that DRM technologies also negatively affects the media industry in some ways; the most impactful one being the loss potential clients.
I personally believe that the practise of DRM is quite unethical as most companies try too hard to prevent copyright infringement while their customers suffer for it. One example of such a situation is the DRM method Ubisoft used in the past. Ubisoft used the SecuROM software to strictly control the number of installations of the games they published. The issue was that if the buyer encountered a problem with his/her system and had to re-install the game, it was simply impossible despite being totally legal to do so. Purchasers had to use cracked versions of the game in order to install the games. After years of customer complaints, Ubisoft finally admitted that DRM is a very ineffective method of stopping PC game piracy. They also admitted that they believe any of their games can be cracked given enough effort and time despite the highly expensive methods of DRM. Ubisoft then acknowledged that they would now emphasis on delivering a better experience for the customers. Ubisoft found an intuitive way of countering piracy, that