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How DRM And Trusted Computing Will Work

There’s a new breed of pro-DRM FUD doing the rounds. DRM, they say, is a means of protecting our secrets from prying eyes (apart from the backdoors), of keeping our baby photos from perverts (who won’t DRM their hard drives), and of selling our intellectual property to make money (because everyone will pay for bad guitar music and have DRM-ed systems to play it on).

This pleading has the quality of calling for easier eviction to make more empty homes available for homeless people.

To see how DRM and trusted computing will really work, here’s Microsoft’s next OS blurring DRM-ed content on monitors that aren’t “trusted” (locked) systems (via BoingBoing):

Windows Vista demands monitors with copy-protection for best viewing

The useful idiots telling you that DRM is voluntary and doesn’t affect non-DRM-ed content need to stop and think for a moment about whether the law will tolerate the inducement of copying by the existence of non-trusted hardware once trusted hardware and software is generally available. And about whether a technology that will allow governments, software corporations, employers, media conglomerates and criminals to lock away, lock down, lock out, erase and steal your content will even give any of the feeble and revocable benefits that are being bleated for individuals.

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