Re: Flame Linus to a crisp!

[Timothy Miller]

Downing, Thomas wrote:

>IMHO the DRM issue is not one that will be settled in either the software
>or hardware area, but in the legal one.
>
>[snip]
>
>So this leads me to a position I would have, without reflection, not taken;
>while I despise the current subversion of fair use and first point of sale
>undertaken by MPAA, RIAA, et al., I agree with what I understand Linus to
>say - DRM yes or no should not be mandated by license.
>-
>
>  
>

I feel like I'm late into this discussion, but anyhow...

Do we have any kind of agenda to spread Linux?  I mean, it sure is 
spreading, eating into other markets, for instance Windows.  But how 
interested are we in doing things specifically to accelerate that?  

One of the things that we could do to accelerate the adoption of Linux 
is to support DRM.  Yes, we know it's evil, but if we are the ones 
developing it, at least we know what it is and is not doing and how it 
works.  

As much as I dislike Microsoft for its business practices, I still feel 
uneasy having illegal copies of their Office suite.  So I use OpenOffice 
instead.  Likewise, I prefer to use Linux because having a free copy of 
it is perfectly legal.  And finally, although I do like the idea of 
being able to sample music before I buy it, I feel an attachment to 
artists I listen to, so I buy their CD's (despite the fact that it helps 
the RIAA).

So the idea of having something which prevents me from illegally 
pirating something doesn't bother me so much.  Whenever I have to do 
serious work, I either use an OSS tool, or I pay money for a piece of 
software so I can get support -- sometimes, I even pay for OSS stuff. 
 The idea of a DRM system malfunctioning and preventing me from 
accessing my legally-licensed material DOES bother me very much, but I 
think only in the hands of people like us can it be done right, because 
we're the very ones who would suffer were it to break.

In the end, of course, this is up to Linus, at least in terms of the 
mainline tree.  Whatever his opinion might be, we're going to have to 
make a bullet-proof argument to officially go one way or the other on this.