DRM has always represented an attempt on the part of content owners to seize more territory than the framers of US copyright law intended. Copyright was supposed to be a bargain between the creators and the commons. In return for the rightsholder's agreement to release the material into the public domain upon expiration, the government would grant a temporary legal monopoly.

Unfortunately the first part of the copyright bargain is implicit, not part of the law. With DRM, rightsholders get to have their cake -- our cake -- and eat it too. Not only is the protection granted by copyright now effectively perpetual, but they've purchased additional legislation such as the DMCA and endless copyright term extensions that punish people who are trying to claim their half of the bargain.

IMHO copyright should not apply to anything with DRM. Rightsholders should be forced to decide whether they want a temporary legal monopoly with no technical protection, or a permanent technical monopoly with no legal protection.

Completely agree on all counts. Regarding your last paragraph, that's an interesting point and similar to the tradeoff that patent protection provides -- you either openly publish the invention in return for legal protection, or you can leave it unpatented as a trade secret but no legal protection.

Copyright is not, and never was, for creators. It's for publishers.

Copyright was for authors a very long time ago[1]. It's been slowly corrupted by the greed of publishers over a very long time, but it is important to remember where copyright actually comes from and to reject emotional arguments about the rights of publishers (in truth, they don't deserve rights over creators' works -- they abuse creators enough as-is).

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Anne

Uhhhh....

> These restrictions were enforced by the Stationers' Company, a guild of printers given the exclusive power to print—and the responsibility to censor—literary works.

If you read the full paragraph in context (and the following paragraph), it says:

> Prior to the statute's enactment in 1710, copying restrictions were authorized by the Licensing of the Press Act 1662. [Your quote about the Stationers' Company]. The censorship administered under the Licensing Act led to public protest; as the act had to be renewed at two-year intervals, authors and others sought to prevent its reauthorisation. In 1694, Parliament refused to renew the Licensing Act, ending the Stationers' monopoly and press restrictions. Over the next 10 years the Stationers repeatedly advocated bills to re-authorize the old licensing system, but Parliament declined to enact them. Faced with this failure, the Stationers decided to emphasise the benefits of licensing to authors rather than publishers, and the Stationers succeeded in getting Parliament to consider a new bill.

Which means that your quote is quite out-of-context. The Stationers' Company lost their monopoly over printing rights due to public outcry, and they failed to get a new law passed until they made a change to it that emphasised the protection of authors. That law was called the Statute of Anne.

Even earlier on, copyright "law" was used as a tool of censorship by the Queen of England (who was Mary at the time). Effectively, a publisher would ask the monarch for the exclusive right to publish a particular book, and a guild of printers (the Stationers' Company) was formed later that then enforced their own version of Copyright under these monopolies they were given.

The Statute of Anne was the first time copyright was actually a public law, that anyone could enforce -- and it was the first time that something you could call a "copyright system" was intended to protect _authors_.

More specifically, it's for copyright holders, who rarely might be creators, but are more often than not publishers.

If copyrighted status itself keeps getting extended into eternity, then the intent in expiration is lost anyway.

I like this idea. I think it strikes a good balance between the rights of both sides and provides incentives for opening things up (which I believe is important to consumer freedom). But if a company doesn't want to open it up, they still have a reasonable path forward.

Reminds me of how AT&T used to basically own your telephone and wouldn't allow other companies to make things you could attach to the phone to improve or augment it.

Could work for media as well:

DRM? Then you have to provide clients, including bugfixes and security upgrades for all paying customers on all platforms.

No DRM: Oh, you just sold a file? The customer can then run it in whatever SW they want.

So a person who wants to release a game on steam now has to provide support for windows Mac and Linux, and provide support for whatever flavours they’re running?

You can release DRM-free software on Steam.

What counts as a repair and how would properitary components be made available for the repair? Under what markup do components need to be made available?

An example: If I’m Apple and I’m supply constrained on fancy new FaceID sensors I’m not going to want to loose an iPhoneX sale because I have to make a sensor available to a repair depot (internal or external). And the customer that was supposed to get that sensor is not going to like waiting even longer for their phone.

> What counts as a repair and how would properitary components be made available for the repair? Under what markup do components need to be made available?

The bare minimum would be to require an infinite warranty. So free, and with compensation to the customer for the repair time.

Don't want to deal with that? Get rid of the damn locks already.

What is a lock and how does it prevent repair?

I think we would both agree that iPhone 7 is DRM laden. However iFixit, who is quoted in the parent article and gives iPhone a repairability score of 7 of 10, seems to think there are some things which are repairable at the component level on an iPhone 7 even to a layman at home. https://www.ifixit.com/Device/iPhone_7

Do they glue stuff in? Use special screws and connectors just for the hell of it? Use software checks to prevent the system from operating correctly if components have been replaced?

This answer provides designers with no insight on how they can improve products to make them more reparable, even if they intended to try to adhere to your world view.

How does one interpret this? No glue allowed at all in any product or subassembly? Do you seriously believe any iPhone engineer would say a connector or screw was there "for the hell of it"? You claim a software check prevents a device from working. I'm sure their software engineer would claim the check ensures it works as advertised (or safely or whatever) because they don't know what you just did to it.

Your reply very clearly shows you have not thought through the consequences of your request.

In such a world, if they can’t repair or replace a broken device, they should offer a full refund.

That does not fix the e-waste problem. E.g. Apple has always been willing to repair or replace under warranty.

See this item: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14175771

Apple has also fought consumer laws in other nations to ensure no more than a 12 month warranty.

If they feel like including DRM in this hypothetical law situation, require the warranty be twice as long as otherwise.

And there are many countries where iPhones are popular but there are still no official Apple-sanctioned repair centers.

Me: "My phone broke randomly"

Them: "You dropped it in water didn't you?"

Me: "No, I didn't"

Them: "Yes, you did"

Me: "Nope"

Them: "Yep"

Me: "Nope" .......

I don't see how it changes the situation. Even if the owner intentionally damaged the phone they would still be entitled to having it repaired for $parts + $labor.

Genuine replacement screen: $450 2 hours labour from highly trained apple certified screen replacement technician: $180.

"....but I shouldn't have to pay these exorbitant fees - I didnt drop it in water...."

"Yes you did"

Shouldn't a $1000 phone be waterproof?

Isn't this behind the point?

For one, still not all $1000 phones are waterproof, and second, this can apply to all kind of other devices, like laptops, who can't be or is very difficult to make waterproof without major compromises (e.g. heat dissipation).

<sarcasm because="Poe's law">

Owners of $1000 phones don't go near water or need cases. They never make mistakes.

</sarcasm>

Anecdote: dropped an iPhone 6 to the bottom of a pool. Failed spectacularly bringing it back up a few times. Total about 2-3 minutes submerged at around 2m.

Put the phone in a rice bag for 2 days, charged and it's working fine :)

I've seen the rice treatment work also, but chances for success are reportedly better if you do not try to turn the device on first.

That red strip on iDevices that changed in temporary high-humidity conditions. If Apple actually produced good PCBs and conformally-coated them and capped their JTAGs, water damage and corrosion would be much less likely.

Why do say they don't produce good PCB's?

Conformal coating introduces problems too and, moreover, makes repair intractable.

I don't know if conformal coating even works properly with the very fine pitch BGA's that cover much of the surface area of the PCB in an iPhone.

>If Apple actually produced good PCBs and conformally-coated them and capped their JTAGs, water damage and corrosion would be much less likely.

If? In what world they don't, and compared to which alternative?

Do iPhones still have the water sensitivity marker?

Yep. It became a lot more pertinent after the iPhone 7 was water resistant, as the markers seem less protected than the boards.

> (including costs)

How about at a rate of $parts + $labor? If the device was defective and broke then it would still be the manufacturer's responsibility to fix it. But if it breaks due to wear and tear, accidental damage, or intentional damage then the user should reasonably foot but bill (either out of pocket or with insurance).

The idea here is to make a clear split between owning and licensing. If the company decides they are selling the items themselves then the items should be repairable by the new owner. If the company decides they are merely selling the rights to use the items then it is reasonable for the user to be unable to repair it, provided the owner (the company) is willing to keep it in working condition.

That should absolutely include wear and tear as well as accidental damage. Intentional damage is an issue, but there shouldn't be much motivation for it under such a system.

That doesn't work for the simple reason that there is no market, therefore there is no way to determine that price. The whole point is essentially that the manufacturer can only have the monopoly on repairs if they are free, if they want to charge for it, they have to allow competition.

As for intentional damage, I think that should not be handled based on costs at all, but simply based on depreciation. Based on normal durability of the device, if you damage the device, you have to pay the remaining value in order to get a new device.

> As for intentional damage, I think that should not be handled based on costs at all, but simply based on depreciation. Based on normal durability of the device, if you damage the device, you have to pay the remaining value in order to get a new device.

I think I'm not understanding your proposal here.

It seems that under such a scheme I could take a $1000 phone that is reasonably expected to last 3 years, intentionally destroy it on day 1, and pay less than a dollar [1/(3*365)] to get a new device. How would manufacturers not be bled dry under such a system?

I think you have it back to front.

Breakage on day 1 would mean replacement at $999...

You're absolutely right. I misread. Thank you.