DRM and object control vs network control
I've been reading Lessig's article on Digital-Right-Management, Anti-trusting Microsoft, and various comments I found the article very clear. Let me try to boil it down, in my prosaic paraphrase. I believe the key ideas are as follows:
1) Usage control can be either object-based or network-based.
2) IF control is object-based, THEN it doesn't have to be network-based.
3) Coming from Microsoft doesn't automatically make it a bad idea.
In some reactions, I'd say too much emphasis is being placed on aspect#3. Now, being suspicious of anything from Microsoft is formally an ad-hominem argument, though that suspicion is also prudent. This Microsoft element is generating much attention, since it's at the start of the article, expressed in a humorous way, and has the word "Microsoft" in it. It's generally great pundit-fodder, allowing asking how truly evil is Microsoft in the first place, whether it's thought to be more evil than it deserves versus an overwrought image of evil, and then whether such a stench of evil is clouding our perceptions.
However, this isn't the fundamental problem with the piece, as I see it. The difficulty is in aspect #2. That portion is an appealing thought. The argument runs IF, IF, IF, the desired usage control is put in objects THEN THEN THEN, the network control is unnecessary.
It's such a seductive proposition. I've seen the idea so many times in various contexts. Years ago, it was roughly the same scheme of argument I called censorware-is-our-saviour, during the time censorware was being promoted by some people as a "solution" to censorship laws. Implement control locally, it's thought, and the powers at issue will let the global net alone.
Every time I see one of these arguments, I have the same question:
Show me that the other side believes it.
Not that one would think the other side should accept it, based on the theory which has been elucidated. No, no, no, that is not my question, why they'll be happy. Don't repeat back to me the theory. I understood the theory. Rather, show me some evidence that the other side does in fact consider this enough. Because perhaps the theory is wrong. Here, perhaps they won't consider object-control to be sufficient, and will rather take it as precedent for network-control in addition.
And that's the subtle flaw in aspect #1. The argument is:
1) Usage control can be either object-based OR network-based.
I think the reality is best rendered:
1') Usage control is desired as object-based AND network-based.
The theory fails in the same way for all these types of arguments - they start out by setting up two things as opposites (object versus network), which the other side sees as complements (object plus network). In programming terms, it argues an exclusive "or", where the opponent believes in an inclusive "and".
What I think will happen, is that if object-control is implemented, then lack of network-control will be viewed as a threat. Since, unless the machine is limited to using only those objects which are "domesticated", those which are "wild" will proliferate. That is, all the P2P music and video trading will still be a "problem", just using one-generation-down "wild" copies made from speakers or screens, or otherwise "cracked".
In fact, the fallacy is very clear from thinking of the days of copy-protected software packages (object control). That didn't stop all the illegal file-trading sites (uncontrolled network) - they tended to be full of "cracked" copies (uncontrolled objects). And sometimes the "cracked" copies were even preferred for legitimate users, since they were often less hassle overall, to back-up and re-install. I can hear Jack Valenti now, saying something along the lines of perhaps "the open network is like a diseased sewer which threatens the sterile environment of the industry".
Moreover, there is a terrible social cost attached to such an argument. If people pin their hopes on object-control as the answer against network-control, then the flaws in object-control - exactly those uncertified, unapproved, unMicrosoft materials - will be cast as threats to the "solution", as spoilers against the supposed means of defeating network-control.
I should stress my points here aren't particularly ideological. It's not about whether Microsoft can be trusted with power, or if open-source is good. Rather, the proposed architectural code has a subtle bug in it - it has an XOR (exclusive "or") early in its model, where the system will want an AND (i.e. "both"). We will not save the network by object sacrifice.
By Seth Finkelstein |
posted in copyblight
, infothought
|
on September 13, 2002 10:21 AM
(Infothought permalink)
