He says major media companies should run their own streaming services, and if you’re running your own service, you can do it your way, so why not ditch DRM?
The major reason the streaming services use DRM is that the dumbass rightsholders twist their arms into it. But DRM doesn’t stop people from saving the videos they want to watch later (all DRM is broken, usually within a day). But no one signs up for a streaming service just to get a couple videos today — letting people download their videos today wouldn’t detract from the convenience and value of getting new videos and old favorites tomorrow.
A DRM-free service would be cheaper to operate, more reliable, and would plug into all devices and ecosystems without any special apps or services. Anyone could build services that improve the experience, too.
It’s a pretty radical notion for traditional content providers, but it makes a lot of practical sense. The official reason for locking media up with DRM is to prevent it from being copied, on the theory that distributing content that can be copied will mean fewer sales of that content. But as we saw with the music industry, that argument doesn’t hold much water. Even though all of the major digital music stores have ditched DRM, digital music sales continue to grow. And this justification makes even less sense for locking down streaming video with DRM. After all, while people listen to the same songs over and over again, that’s less true for TV shows and movies. After you watch an episode of a TV show, you often don’t watch it again: you move on to the next one. This means that even though someone might be able to download and re-watch a TV show they watched this week, they’ll still continue to pay a convenient subscription to be able to watch next week’s TV shows.
Another reason for using DRM is to prevent competition. We’ve seen e-books that can only be read by certain e-readers, printers that only accept ink cartridges from the same brand, and even garage door openers that only work with remotes from the same manufacturer. But in all of these cases the manufacturer is selling two or more different products. They want to make sure that once a customer buys one of their products (an e-reader, a printer, or a garage door opener) they’ll also be the only source for a customer who wants to buy matching accessories (e-books, ink cartridges, remotes). But this reasoning doesn’t make sense for media companies who want to sell streaming video, because they only have one product: the content. In fact, by ditching DRM media companies can guarantee that as many people as possible will be able to sign up for their service.
After all, DRM introduces unnecessary engineering complications. A streaming service without DRM is much easier to develop apps for, can be more easily integrated into smart TV products, and can otherwise foster all kinds of add-on innovation.1 (Plus it reduces the chances of DRM introducing unnecessary security risks into customers’ devices.) All of these opportunities means more potential subscribers, and that translates into more revenue, not less.
Dear Rupert Murdoch: Want to Compete with Netflix? Ditch DRM!
[Jeremy Gillula/EFF]