This news is a few days old now, but I haven’t seen it get much coverage so far.
As we all know, Microsoft wants to stop you from abusing their software. So a few years ago implemented Digital Rights Management in MS proprietary media formats, in particular WMV and WMA format. What this means is that if you want to watch or listen to a file with DRM active on it you need to have a copy of Windows Media Player.
Apple, Sony and several other companies also use DRM. These three are well known for it due to their online download services and proprietary music players. Sony also attracted some controversy regarding CDs with DRM when it emerged that a large number of users had installed software which opened their computers to attack.
Last week, Bill Gates, the head of Microsoft, met with a group of bloggers ahead of the Mix 2007 Developer conference. The main topic of conversation was DRM, Gates’ opinion of it and possible future alternatives.
What is interesting is that Gates advocates a move away from DRM saying that no-one is happy with the way it is just now and that it ’causes too much pain for legitimate buyers’. He went on to say that the best option for many users at present was to ‘Just buy a cd and rip it.’ because ‘You are legal then.’
Other interesting tidbits from the meeting include free Zunes for those attending it (seriously, how do you get in on that action?) and some rather interesting questions for Mr Gates regarding the success of FireFox compared to IE6 and 7 and web standards. See the links below for more details.
[Via Techcrunch, Micro Persuasion & Molly.Com]
