DRM confrontation day

May 6 is the International Day of Confrontation of Digital Rights Management (DRM). The Free Software Foundation at www.defectivebydesign.org explains why DRM does not justify itself.

FSF urges to abandon the use of products subject to DRM. Many companies have joined the shares of FSF:

• Oreilly : 50% discount on all e-books and videos, 60% on purchases above $ 100;
• Packt Publishing : $ 10 any e-book or video;
• NoStarch : 50% discount on all e-books (when buying, specify the code RIGHT2READ).

Quick reference

DRM refers to any technology that controls the use of media data and hardware that you buy. It can restrict any type of legal action: the right to repair, alter, or resell items you own. To tighten controls, software and hardware typically follow user actions. The impact of DRM on rights has increased due to the United States Digital Copyright Protection Act (DMCA), which declared illegal to bypass DRM and even spread knowledge about how to do it. “Anti-bypass” policies are exported to the rest of the world. Attempts are being made to embed DRM in HTML5, a key technology of WWW.

How will you celebrate the day against DRM? I offer these options:

• think about moving from closed OS to open (GNU / Linux, BSD);
• already linuksoid? Remove a couple of non-free packages or rebuild ffmpeg with the keys - enable-gpl - discount-nonfree;
• Do not buy products that are embedded in DRM;
• instead, make a purchase on GOG, HumbleBundle, Oreilly, NoStarch.