Harvard team to copyright office: Let consumers hack DRM abandonware

[admin]

When a DRM based music, video or software product shuts down, as has happened in the past with Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and Wal-Mart, one thing is guaranteed: customers lose legal access to works that they paid for.

Existing copyright law makes it a crime to attempt to circumvent digital rights management (DRM) protections, even on legally purchased music, and so consumers are generally dependent upon the failing media store to provide some remedy -- perhaps a refund, or a temporary delay of a few months in the death of the DRM authenticating servers that are necessary for full use of the music. However, the store instead may simply choose to say "bah humbug," shut down, and leave consumers high and dry.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13739_3-10112022-46.html

[drfsupercenter]

Well, the company can't really do much about it if you hack their DRM, now, can they? It's like with Abandonia (and other abandonware sites)... if the game goes off the market, what's wrong with hosting it? It becomes the only way to get it.

And that's the case with the DRM stuff... I used to use Wal-Mart's music store a lot and have a large amount of their WMAs still. Luckily, they allow you to burn them to CDs... so I don't need to worry about it so much.

[admin]

The thing is that if you're caught doing it, you could still be fined or prosecuted (more like persecuted) for it, even though the content owners have abandoned their customers with no penalty. DRM is like a contract between content owners and consumers, except only one party has to hold up to it - the other party can walk away at any moment without penalty even though they're the ones who have profited from it all.