BIOS maker Phoenix Technologies said it is currently shopping a digital-rights-enabled BIOS system to top PC OEMs, the most aggressive use of DRM technology to date. On other DRM news, Microsoft has made available for download the first of several components of its forthcoming stable of rights-management software.
Phoenix Developing DRM-Equipped BIOS
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Imagine the legions of skilled Windows geeks, who could learn to use linux but don’t bother because it’s so much harder, given that they are already Windows gurus. Now picture all of them as one big camel.
Now picture all the straws that have been laid on their backs: worms, viruses, expensive software, the guilt of being a software pirate/thief/fence, lack of command line access to their OS, etc.
Could DRM be the final straw?
Imagine a computer that won’t let you play your mp3’s because he can’t find the licence, a computer that won’t even let you run a program because of a licence, imagine your windows won’t start because you didn’t renew the licence at M$. This is where all this is going…
Who wants to live like that? I don’t. Who does???
)
Don’t buy such things, don’t use such tings. They’re EVIL!
Me, I guess I’ll keep my AthlonXP, without DRM… It’s easyer for my life.
For those that seem to be unwilling to spend even 10 seconds into thinking about the dimension of the DRM issue, maybe this quote from the article could give them a little hint:
quote= Since a personal computer must have BIOS installed to boot, a user could be forced to use the DRM technology whether he or she chooses to or not.
It is only the first time (that I am aware of) a PC manufacturer shows a true commitment to DRM, and it already shows the direction it will take.
If I am not wrong there has been (still is?) an issue with Phoenix bioses having a “PhoenixNet” “feature” which would connect to the Internet and send some kind of information without user’s knowledge.
So this would be their dream come true…
A friend of mine asked me why I use Windows2000 but haven’t yet moved beyond service pack2… I responce was to ask him if he had problems with movies and mp3’s since upgrading to SP3/4… his responce was, mp3’s are no problem, but a lot of movies he has now no longer run… how did I know?
This sort of thing will become more and more the common problem in future…
Oh, and kiss anything other than windows as an operating system on x86/variants goodbye…
If and when I have kids, the question I’m beginning to cringe about from them is not “where do babies come from” but “You used to be able to do what you wanted on a computer? Without having to pay a subscription?” or similarly themed questions.
Finally we have computers that can give us almost photorealistic graphics, run computations that scientists took years to do 30 years ago, and the choice and the rights to be able to do as we please on our computers. Yet we (AND I MEAN ALL OF US) are giving up our rights to use computers as we choose to.
Perhaps I’m overeacting, but I see a day when you will only be able to use your computer if you pay a hefty monthly subscription to a huge multinational company.
DRM…. if M$ want it than you can bet your backside that it will become a standard part of computer hardware.
I guess I’ll be sticking with my old hardware for a lot longer than I planned to afterall.
If I ever get a machine with any DRM stuff that prevents me from using my machine the way i want to, I’ll find a way to disable it. If that becomes illegal where i live (Canada), I’ll just disable it anyway. I’ll be a criminal, but I don’t really give a damn. My machine, my rules. They will NOT dictate what operating system I can and cannot run, and they will NOT dictate what media I can and cannot play on my computer.
this will fail. becuase there will be alternative manufacturers or modifiers who will have sufficient demand to take business away from the big DRM players.
the only way they can win is if they push through laws. and that won’t happen because laws are made by politicians who represent their consituents, and not large corporations.
did i say that?
DRM is badly needed. Everybody and his mother steals digital property because it’s so easy. The music, movie and videogame industry has real problems because of this.
DRM is not something “evil” or “oppressive”. It is the opposite. It protects the freedom of the creators, the freedom to decide what they want to do with their creations/property, it protects their rights on their own creation. There is no civil right to steal. Stealing music, movies and videogames is just like stealin’ cars. All the people who do this would be terribly pissed off if their property was stolen still they think it’s ok to steal the property of others. It’s not and DRM will finally put an end to this pest.
Only cyber pirates can complain. GPL software for example will still be as free as always on a DRM-enabled sytem. ‘Cause if the creator of some digital product allows you for example to freely copy the product this will be no problem. Linus has said that he has no problem with integrating DRM support into Linux and why should he?
Linux doesn’t contain stolen code, right?
Why would anyone buy DRM-enabled systems? Well easy all the creative commercial people will ship their products in formats that require a DRM-enabled system to protect their rights. New games, music, movies all will require DRM enabled systems. So people will buy DRM-enabled systems.
Why should the people have problems with that? Private property is a concept generally accepted in society.
I know again the anti-social geek scum at OSNews will be incredibly pissed off because of this comment but I don’t care. Whine, complain, bitch as much as you please you will see DRM everywhere in a few years you petty thiefs.
Polititians tend to support the people who support them, so if the big companies donate generously to a given polititian then they will be more likely to listen to their requests than that of your average Joe who only elected them….
TPCA will be in the law books in the USA before too long. I doubt that it would be long after that, that similar laws would be passed in the EU or Japan when that happens.
This is the first step on the way to Palladium. A small step, but a step none the less.
And yes you said that lmao!
—
Another one from future kids:
“Daddy? You mean that you could watch an AVI movie without renting the codec and player to do it? That you could just download it? Wow! But why can’t I do that now??”
@tech_user
The DRM legislation already exists so I assume that this was meant to be ironic:
“the only way they can win is if they push through laws. and that won’t happen because laws are made by politicians who represent their constituents, and not large corporations.”
The sad reality is that the public ONLY VOTES, the big corporates FUND THE ELECTION CAMPAIGNS….
I for one intend to put my $$$ into any “alternative” Hardware and OS that is willing to “buck the system”.
Unfortunately, I suspect that these efforts will eventually become illegal.
Oh well, If I have to be a criminal… I may as well go to jail for something worth while…
Regards
Darren
Every move like this in history has failed.
The development of moveable type by Gutenberg allowed ordinary people to read widely for the first time and started the Reformation and Renaissance (the authority of the church was undermined bcause the bible contradicted much of the doctrine – for example it was forbidden to teach that Jesus was poor.)
They couldn’t stop audio or video cassettes from copying LPs and TV programs.
There will be plenty of hacks/modchips to get around the bios – game consoles are routindly modded
Laws: it is illegal in Russia to copy protect software.DRM almost certainly breaks many national privacy laws in the EU and elsewhere.
The US may be a military superpower but it is likely to be soon surpassed by the EU as an economic power (the EU already has a considerably larger population (400 million +)and is rapidly growing.
In a decade Taiwan (and China) will control hardware and India will control software.
If you can’t play your MP3s or movies on your handheld you simply won’t buy the devices.
Petty theif? Anti social geek scum?? I don’t think so chum.
The only people it will benefit will be a handfull of executives at the movie/music/software studios, not the artists or programmers, or the end user. This can already be seen in the music industry, where the artists are royally shafted by the massive companies who have over the years sewn up the competition. We pay inflated prices that they themselves have fixed, you think that this wont happen even more under DRM?? M$ themselves have said that once DRM is in place they will start charging people on a regular basis for just about everything they can. From updates to being able to use your computer from one year to the next. Then we get into the whole issue of being able to listen to what you want to in the format of your choice…
Yeah this sounds like a great idea! I must give up my rights to listen to music or videos, and my choice of OS and or application… Why didn’t I think of that before?
</sarcasm>
If you think for one second that this DRM will be used to do anything but line the pockets of the big players execs at our expense you are sadly deluded.
Now picture all the straws that have been laid on their backs: worms, viruses, expensive software, the guilt of being a software pirate/thief/fence, lack of command line access to their OS, etc.
Could DRM be the final straw?
In short, the answer is no. You Linux lackeys just don’t get it, do you? Those of us ‘skilled users’ running Windows are in it mainly for the apps. As far as apps go, Linux pretty much has the basics down, but is missing a couple of ‘industrial strength’ and ‘niche’ apps that I currently need.
And as long as that is the case, those of us who are ‘app-centric’ will either stick with Windows, or consider a G5 on our next go-round.
It’s been reported today that it is illegal to play a non-Edison cylinder on an Edison Phonographic player.
Will this make all of out Victrollacylinders illegal? Who will stop the powe mad Edison industries from completely controlling the media that we listen to our favorite music with?
All I can say is DRM will never work like the ‘copyright holders’ want it too.
Bring it on, all of the coders out there need a new challenge.
Max, enlighten me, could you explain me what is the benefit of, let’s say, having DVDs released in different zones and players not being able to play discs from other zone than its own? How does that effectively protect the industry instead of only leaving people from those other zones with a lot less titles to choose from? (and please don’t tell me that issue was not a first attempt at something like DRM)
Oh, one more thing, there is no need to be insulting between grown up people. right?
I will not have MS or any other corporation dictate to me what I can use to create my music with. I will support software companies with my purchasing dollar unlike many of my contemporaries because I believe in Carma and keeping the good software tools alive and developing.
Music Studio Execs are nothing more than leaches on the artistic community and until now musicians have not had a way to distribute their own material. Now we do. They know it and they know they will have a hard time trying to justify their sponging. I also want to be able to use the medium of my choice and that includes the codecs ( personally an Ogg man, I hate MP3’s and refuse to encode and listen to material in that format ).
My money will go to whomever is able to provide me with the tools I want with the ability not to be locked down to proprietry standards. Hell, even music charts are no longer determined by the music listening public but the bloody studio’s trying to peddel their wares. It makes me sick so F- them.
My 2cents
Piers
Opera singer, contemporary musician and tech head.
OMG THIS IS SO FUC*&@ RET@RTED! NOOOOOOOOO! Now I can’t go to Europe and show off my cool mdvds on my laptop, stupid POS!
Does anybody disagree with the idea that if there are no copyright laws everbody would just copy everything using our new and super efficient distribution methods? If everthing that can be converted to a digital format is free do you think we’ll see movie and game publishers spending millions of dollars developing talent or buying Gigantic Linux clusters to render scenes from the next LOTR or Pixar Film?
I guess it’s inevitable. Movie theaters will have to recoup the cost for film producers similar to how musicians recoup the cost of file sharing by charging $150 for concert tickets.
i am not a thief – i use free software and pay for software when no good free software exists – recognition that sometimes effort goes into things.
but – i don’t trust the big DRM players. not only do they take my flexibility and freedom away – i simply don’t trust that they can cope with what _I_ want to do with my computer. who am i going to phone at 4am when my computer won’t boot due to some “DRM error”? not microsoft. and why should i pay for a phone and a phonecall to them?
music – if they produced music that was worth buying – i’d buy it. if they pump out albums of 15 tracks with one decent track – then i;’m not going to buy the overpriced album. what percentage does the artist get? the internet provides an alternative distribution channel to these artists. and the greedy music execs know their old game is up…
this is a nightmare even they, who want it, won’t be be able to cope with. leaving thousands and millians angry and unable to do what they paid to do. the same lesson can be drawn from the whole iraq failure.
and “yes its f***ing political” to crudely quote a singer from london…
Remember these are commercisl businesses. If no one buys in, then they have to drop it. Remember Circuit City’s DIV marketing fiasco. No one wanted it and it died.
Unfortunately, we have 3 types of people who will love to use Word’s DRM. Paranoids, dihonest people. with a trail of lies to hide and idiots with an inferity complex, these will hand out DRM copies of works, to anyone (sorta defeat DRM) but you got to ask! Politicians of course are in all three classes simutaneously. Simply insist on non-DRM copy and refuse any DRM content.
I think it’s much more likely that crippled content will be introduced as a feature. You will be able to say (more effectively than you can now) that this protected file can only be listened to on this computer. This will not affect any mp3’s you rip from your CDs, or download from Kazaa. Think of it as a new file format, with abilities to limit user control. Yes the “doomsday scenario” that everyone here seems to be spouting about where all of your current DVD rippers and CD copiers stop working magically, and you can only use Microsoft software to burn CDs and it only takes the new protected file, but that’s a little unrealistic, IMHO. Linux users have and always will be paranoid. (cheapshot, sorry)
Anyone making the comment that DRM is badly needed to protect content is spreading FUD.
There are dozens of protection systems in existence to choose from (network servers, smartcards, fingerprint recognition, hardware-locked serial numbers, and down to simple serial number systems) which provide adequate security and do not require something as outlandish as hardware-based phone-home DRM.
It all boils down to how much is the product worth that you are protecting. Or how much cash you want to squeeze out of your customers. Software companies have been using existing systems with success for the last 20 years. Hardware-based protection is too expensive to offset against the small percentage of lost revenue most companies with a clue have. (A clue meaning they have tried to protect their content from theft). DRM sure as heck isn’t going to be cheaper, since they will now have to pay a 3rd party like Microsoft in addition to using their own protection system.
So where does the net worth come in? MS sure as heck isn’t pursuing this for the good of mankind. They need to profit off it. The only logical purpose of MS-based DRM protection is to enable them to do time-based rental of software and lock out other vendors. If other vendors want to use the technology, they must pay a license fee. And all this money flows in the direction of one company.
there is not much quality coming out of Hollywood of late. I mean, the budgets big movies go on now, its shameful that they produce such rubbish. How many movies this year have had budgets over 100 million dollars. They complain because they do not recoup their ridiculously high spendings. They also make some markets second fiddle. I am in South Africa and Blockbusters such as Finding Nemo are yet to make their way here. That encourages piracy. If they do not respect the market, the market will not respect them too.
This is the very reason the same recording execs decided to partition the world into regions. To maximise profits at the expense of the people who actually pay for these movies. for that reason, I would prefer a Divx movie, even accepting a reduction in quality for it. I know enough people whose drives have become useless because they used DVDs from multiple regions. These things bring resentment to consumers, and encourage consumers to seek the easy way out.
DRM is not a solution, it is a control measure. I for one will not buy a major brand computer with DRM enabled BIOS. I would promptly download my own BIOS if need be. I hate these controls anyway. Otherwise I would give up computers if it came to the worst, and maybe brainstorm for an alternative.
The main reason that I’ll never like DRM is that in giving the rights back to the copyright holders, it forgets about the poor user. Even if I was willing to pay, though the price was fair, and though that the artists where getting paid properly, I would NEVER download a song with a whole pile of restrictions. What happens to the music collection when the computer crashs? Fork out big bucks? I mean, if any DRM has a hope in hell of success, it should be able to prove to the consumer backwards and forwards that there purchased rights are “backed up”, safe, etc.
my 2 cents
Good enough reason to buy a Mac I’d say. Until the twits in charge of America go and make this garbage mandatory.
This message brought to you by the RIAA, the letter M, and the number 1.
I think DRM is great if the software loaded on the system is not copyrighted.
Really, producing a product that is protected with copyright AND DRM breaks copyright law.
DRM is Microsoft’s little wet dream. Let’s go through this one point at a time:
1) Microsoft’s biggest threat is interoperable software. There is a huge existing base of content in MS-friendly formats. If other platforms have easy access to this content, than Microsoft software becomes a whole lot less attractive.
2) Alternative software is making very quick progress on accessing this content. OO’s MS Office filters keep getting better, Samba keeps getting better, etc.
2) New Microsoft programs will be DRM enabled. It will be trivially easy for Microsoft to DRM encrypt all your documents, but default to open access for everyone. So grandma will happily send you Word documents, and your version of Word will open them, and you’ll never realize that there is a protection underneath.
3) Now, consider what happens when you forward grandma’s document to a Linux user. He suddenly can’t read grandma’s document, even though he is supposed to be able to. Further, he can’t reverse engineer the file, or crack the encryption, because that’s illegal under the DMCA.
The DRM is a powerful, legal way for MS to get around the part of US law that says reverse engineering for the purposes of interoperability is legal. Without interoperability, there is no competing with MS.
Microsoft doesn’t *have* to do heavy-handed things like disallowing Linux from booting on DRM-enabled systems. It can do totally subtle things like this.
Anti-DRM users are paranoid for a good reason. If this whole DRM mess turns out to be nothing harmful, he just look a little silly. Most people can deal with that. If this DRM stuff is as bad as we though, we have a change to change things before they get bad, and we can prepare for whatever does happen.
Beyond that, believing in DRM means trusting Microsoft. Given their past history, do *you* trust Microsoft?
this is an excellent source of information
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq.html
Of course there will be some people who will say “well, copying digital content is against the law and we don’t mind having our hands tied behind our backs to ensure we don’t do that” but most sensible people who still have heads on their shoulders and brains to fill those heads will fight against this and win.
Hurting the music and movie industry?! How paying even more money to those POS “industries” will make them any better?! Look at all those poor, hard-working Metallicas ripped off in the broad daylight by those evil college students listening to MP3s. Look at all the movie actors who have to meet the ends meet with only a few measly millions per movie. How unfair!!! They bring such joy to the world! The clean our streets, they feed us, they cure our children, they are the only reason the WW3 doesn’t break out and an gigantic asteroid doesn’t hit Earth. And this is how we are repaying them? By listening to MP3s and watching MPEGs for free?
I am currently a PC/Windows guy who is not into hacking at all, but I will hack, I will learn and use Linux, hell, I will even buy a Mac if that means not heaving my hands tied behind my back.
Imagine no M$
I wonder if you can,
No need for DRM and M$
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…
You may say I’m a dreameIr,
but I’m not the only one,
I hope some day you’ll join us
And world will live as one.
Thanks John
I still miss you
hope you dont mind the changes
It’s time to do something. Find your nearest Phoenix sales office at
<http://www.phoenix.com/en/about+phoenix/contact+us/>
and write to tell them that you’ll never, ever buy anything tainted by the touch of their hand, OEM or otherwise and that you’ll personally evangelize any and all DRM-free, freedom-preserving alternatives, until they remove their handcuffware.
That’ll teach ’em.
Dammit, that should have been
http://www.phoenix.com/en/about+phoenix/contact+us/
Don’t forget that!
http://www.againsttcpa.com/
DRM will be about as (un)successful as DVD zones were in Australia.
They sell AU$99 (about US$70) zone free DVD players just about everywhere – even supermarkets. Our online retailers all sell zone-free DVDs. DVDs can be purchased from any zone via the internet.
I watched a DVD of the animated feature ‘Nemo’ a month before its cinema release. Had I wished I could have ripped it to DivX and placed it on Kazaa in a matter of hours. It probably would have been on sale in China for 49 cents in a day or two.
Corporations are the real thieves. They pay politicians to create laws so it’s legal to steal from people. Corps want money for *nothing* and now they even own ideas. Ferenheit 451 will come true in a twisted way: the only people who can read (or use computers) are those who pay for the momentary glimpse at a pay-per-view DRM device. Textbook mfg’s have already tried this.
We are all becoming slaves to the uber-rich who rape us for all they can get.
No, really. It has its use. For example, it’s a great way for the government to keep their top secret documents secret. That would give an harder time to spies (although they would still be able to use more “analogic” methods, like photography
. It’s also a great way to keep your privacy. DRM could help me to make sure that the letter I write for my girlfriend will only be readable by my girlfriend. And hell, if I create something and a l33t h4x0r r00t my b0x3n, well, he will have a hard time distributing it to everyone.
The problem is that a powerful system like this will probably abused by everyone. For example, criminals will be able to cover their tracks much easier. They would just have to delete the keys, and voilà, no more proofs! It would also be much easier for them to impersonate somebody else. It can be hard to prove that a compromising document wasn’t made by you if it’s fingerprinted to your unique key, after all. However, the worst is the control that corporations could have over us. Personally, I don’t really trust my government. Why should I trust corporations more where their only goal is making profits? DRM would probably give a new meaning to monopoly. Their bad intentions are already proven by how they market DRM… They said that it’ll allow you to protect your content. That’s BS. It’ll allow them to protect their content from you. It’ll allow them to let you read what they want when they want and for the price they want.
Oh well… That’s my bag of 2¢’s.
DRM is not something “evil” or “oppressive”. It is the opposite. It protects the freedom of the creators, the freedom to decide what they want to do with their creations/property, it protects their rights on their own creation. There is no civil right to steal. Stealing music, movies and videogames is just like stealin’ cars. All the people who do this would be terribly pissed off if their property was stolen still they think it’s ok to steal the property of others. It’s not and DRM will finally put an end to this pest.
OK, so Microsoft introduces Word 2005 with DRM. Now, they make you pay a monthly subscription or else it just won’t run. Now what do you do? Oh, use an older version like Office XP? Well guess what — the file your boss just sent you is in 2005 format, which Office XP can’t read. And neither can OpenOffice for that matter.
This isn’t really about civil rights or stealing MP3’s. It’s all about hardware and software companies cooperating to create a locked consumer environment where you are forced to purchase stuff you don’t want. Period.
And thanks to laws like DMCA, bypassing any of the above would result in a criminal offense.
“This isn’t really about civil rights or stealing MP3’s. It’s all about hardware and software companies cooperating to create a locked consumer environment where you are forced to purchase stuff you don’t want. Period.”
Yes, but thats not the worst of it. When Homeland Security and the Patriot Act are fully implemented, it will be impossible to create and control intellectual property privately, except within the confines of a large corporation, or government institution. Since most debit card toting Americans have all the creativity and free-will of walking mind-slaves, they won’t care. When the WW2 folks have finally died off, the replacement of the US Constitution will become merely a formality. Brother Bill becomes the Anti-Christ of the information age, and RMS becomes the Timothy Leary of the OSS movement, whose followers were possessed of flowery ideals, and strange ambitions.
Max, do you truly honestly not see the difference between stealing cars and “stealing” songs? I’ll try to break it down for you then.
Every car needs to be manufactured. It requires a certain amount of materials and labor put into it, which costs money. After building one car, if you want to build another one you have to spend the same amount of materials and labor and it will cost you the same amount of money. Cars cannot be digitally copied. Once a car is stolen the original owner no longer has the car and therefore cannot drive it for A to B.
A song is written and recorded once. After that it can be copied as many times as desired at virtually no cost. The author still has the song and can still make profit off of it through royalties from the events when his music is used to make money (like radio or clubs). The author can still sell the CDs to the hardcore fans who’d like to have an official merchandize. The author can still play the same song on the concerts. The song is still there, nobody else claims the ownership of it and nobody else collects royalties on it. Just some people listen to it for their own private enjoyment. Is that really all that unfair that it must be deemed illegal?
I guess all of you think that the world is a place where everyone can buy the soft and the media of choice, but for some reason some would like to stay on the dark syde and not pay…
Now, imagine a part of the world (a big one) where the medium wage is less about 150$. How could you buy WindowsXP (2-300$) or a dvd (30$) or another software like office (4-500$). You can’t. You must survive first.
With DRM, all these people will be forced to remain in the dark. No home computer, no software, no music, no films. So what will they gain through DRM? The total privacy, the right to silence?
And if you think that this is only a scenario, guess again… I live there and so do other billions of people.
What do you think about this?
>>>Now, imagine a part of the world (a big one) where the medium wage is less about 150$. How could you buy WindowsXP (2-300$) or a dvd (30$) or another software like office (4-500$). You can’t. You must survive first.
Except for the fact that Microsoft offers Windows XP and Office XP for $36 in Thailand without product activation.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=11058
In Thailand, the “Thai government’s plan to sell a million cheapo Linux PCs” is real. Microsoft just wants to demonstrate that it can compete even with the government of a country. At that money it is ok for people to buy windows and office, but for now it isn’t reality, it’s just big corporation’s ideea of crushing the concurence.
Thailand has milions of people. What about the rest, the vast majority? In my contry WindowsXP + OfficeXP can be bought for 800$
)). And my mom’s wage is 150$. And my government doesn’t plan to sell linux pc’s soon.
Software companies would then tie their software to individual BIOS’s based on a unique HostID thus the whole idea of requestion an activation code from the software company (when you re-install) a thing of the past.
As for DRM protecting music, it seems there are people here who just “don’t get it”(tm). This is a persons intellectual property we are taking about, aka, their livelihood. I am no pro-big business, however, I have seen small software businesses ruined because certain customers decide not to do the honest thing and purchase the appropriate number of licenses.
> DRM is badly needed. Everybody and his mother steals digital property
> because it’s so easy. The music, movie and videogame industry has real
> problems because of this.
Well… the perpetuum mobile is badly needed… nobody makes that.
DRM is NOT possible with open standards. THis will only lock culture into a proprietary marked. …most likely owned by Microsoft.
Unfortunately, those with their jumbo macdonalds’ combos in one hand and their home theater’s rmote control in the other just don’t care a damn vyte about the rest of the world, they don’t even know it exists ….
I am with you, in the future, the access to information (forget about brainless movies and empty pop music) will be restricted to those who can pay for it, and the rest will be illiterate cheap work horses.
Time for new hardware standards?
http://www.pegasosppc.com/
“If I ever get a machine with any DRM stuff that prevents me from using my machine the way i want to, I’ll find a way to disable it. If that becomes illegal where i live (Canada), I’ll just disable it anyway. I’ll be a criminal, but I don’t really give a damn. My machine, my rules. They will NOT dictate what operating system I can and cannot run, and they will NOT dictate what media I can and cannot play on my computer.”
That’s what Americans who smoked marijuana used to say in the 1970’s. I wonder—how many of those people have had their cars, boats, houses, and other prized possessions *stolen* by the United States Government, in the name of whatever the Hell their coporate masters came up with?
Friends, it may be time for grass-roots revolution. No one has the right to tell you how to use your personal property, and people who attempt to do so belong *in jail.*
Ya listening, all you Windows advocates?
Are you happy now?
“I am with you, in the future, the access to information (forget about brainless movies and empty pop music) will be restricted to those who can pay for it, and the rest will be illiterate cheap work horses.”
If this is true, you pigs have *made your beds.” I hope you can sleep in them, come the day of the deluge.
Commie bastards and evil longhairs have seen this coming apparently. Check out the LinuxBIOS website ( http://www.linuxbios.org/index.html )
The 1% who own 90% of the wealth aren’t happy with that amount, they want it ALL.
Given the choice between DRM and nothing, I choose nothing.
If a motherboard I buy has DRM, it gets returned PRONTO!!!
btw, who uses phoenix bios? all the motherboards I own (>20) are either award or ami bios.
and in the future, if I get a motherboard with phoenix bios, it goes back, DRM or not… as a reward for their contempt for the consumer.
After reading all these infos, to summarize…
– It could help computer security … but it will not, to not damage the rest of the security market.
– It could help prevent exchange of child pornography… but it will not, as pedophiles will be able to create pics visible only to their “customers” and not by the police.
– It could protect the right of artists… but it’s unlikely as DRM is to the advvantage of the music companies to control how you buy music.
Hummm, let me think if I want that in my PC !!!!!
Let’s just hope we still have that choice in 10 years.
btw, who uses phoenix bios? all the motherboards I own (>20) are either award or ami bios.
and in the future, if I get a motherboard with phoenix bios, it goes back, DRM or not… as a reward for their contempt for the consumer.
Well, Award was bought by Phoenix 3 or 4 years ago… So I suppose you’ll have to find AMIBIOS boards. Good luck.