Why Intel's DRM strategy is flawed

Conclusions: what Intel should be doing

All of these problems show why the model Intel is espousing of DTCP-IP and DRM is a fundamentally flawed one. The model will not protect content, because it is fundamentally hackable. It can break people's computers, and it can take away the rights you legally have to enjoy your content. It does not support the most popular legal music available, and it makes for a lousy deal for equipment manufacturers who are hung out to dry when the inevitable happens.

At its core, Intel's support for DTCP-IP and for DRM in general does not gel with its stated aim of making Viiv a great experience for the end user.

We've mentioned that everyone knows that DRM will not stop piracy, and the question is that if everyone knows that, why are we still having it thrust upon us? The answer is well laid out in Charlie Demerjian's piece on 'Walled gardens'. The purpose of DRM is not to prevent you from pirating content, it is to lock you in to one system of using and obtaining content. DRM is about making it so that you can only use certain devices with certain types of content. Does Apple care about music piracy? No. It just wants to make sure that if you want to use the most comprehensive music store, you have to use an iPod. Does Microsoft care about piracy? No, it just wants to make sure that if you want to use Napster or MTV Urge, you have to buy a player which uses Microsoft technology in it. Does Intel care about piracy? Hell no. It just wants to make sure you need a Viiv PC and Viiv-compliant devices in your home to do what you would expect to be able to do with your digital content.

DRM, and DTCP-IP as an enabling mechanism, is about locking you into one system so that you become a repeat customer. It's about getting rid of competition by squeezing you into a system, and then it's about making sure that you pay as many times as possible to move content between devices in the system.

Intel claims that it is DRM agnostic and that it is not imposing restrictions: that ultimately, restrictions are up to the content providers and that users will go to content providers who give them what they want. However, Intel is complicit in enabling those content providers to run roughshod over users. To take a topical analogy, essentially, Intel is selling content providers the metaphorical weapons they need to repress their people. That makes Intel just as culpable, as much as they'd like to pretend that it's really nothing to do with them.

What should Intel be doing? If Intel really wants to make sure that Viiv is a great user experience, it should be working on our side. If Intel really wants to make Viiv a great user experience, it should be making sure that our legal rights to use content are protected. If it really wants to make Viiv a great user experience, it should define a certain set of content management criteria that are necessary for a great user experience - such as the ability to easily be moved, used, copied and backed up - and should then make sure that the content industry adheres by its standards, not vice versa. Ideally, it should be showing the content industry how, by embracing new technology wholly rather than by attempting to restrict how its usages evolve and how the future plays out, the content industry can ultimately make more money, as it always has.

It should not be, as it is now, letting the content industry set its own standards, because the content industry wants to screw the user, and that does not a happy Intel-owner make.

It must stop this facade of pretending that DRM is nothing to do with it, and it should engage with the industry to make sure that consumers get what they deserve, which is a future that is not worse, or more limited, than the situation now.

It should stop facilitating the imposing of DRM by promoting DTCP-IP as a great way for content providers to restrict their content.

Final thoughts

Intel is to be congratulated for recognising that multiple DRM systems can make for a nightmare for the consumer, and its attempts to get around this with DTCP-IP, even if misguided, are to be applauded.

However, above all, Intel needs to face up to the reality of content in the future if providers get their way - before it discovers that everybody hates DRM, nobody has bought Viiv, and reality has smacked it in the face. With great power, comes great responsibility: Intel needs to use its industry clout to make sure that entertainment consumers in the future really do get the experience they'd hope for -

One that's better than today, not worse.