Why I almost never buy DRM’d content. System is broken’ded.

DRM sucks redux: Microsoft to nuke MSN Music DRM keys

MSN Entertainment and Video Services general manager Rob Bennett sent out an e-mail this afternoon to customers, advising them to make any and all authorizations or deauthorizations before August 31. “As of August 31, 2008, we will no longer be able to support the retrieval of license keys for the songs you purchased from MSN Music or the authorization of additional computers,” reads the e-mail seen by Ars. “You will need to obtain a license key for each of your songs downloaded from MSN Music on any new computer, and you must do so before August 31, 2008. If you attempt to transfer your songs to additional computers after August 31, 2008, those songs will not successfully play.”

Patents Pondered: An AT&T-less iPhone World? - Phone different

Right now, when you pick up your iPhone, slide to unlock, and tap the Stocks widget, you get relatively up-to-date (within 20 min.) quotes. Right now, when you pick up your iPhone, slide to unlock, and tap the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store, you get a list of songs you can flick-scroll through and tap to purchase through your iTunes account. Come June, you’ll be able to do similar with the App Store.

In a different world, similar functionality would have existed via an “iCarrier” Store. Unlike traditional MVNOs, however, the patent filing indicates Apple may not have bought minutes in bulk from an MNO and simply resold them to iPhone users. Rather, they proposed a model combining the previously mentioned Stocks widget’s near realtime price quoting with the iTunes Wi-Fi Store’s (or App Store’s) near instant transactional processing and purchasing system.

With this system a (presumably WebObjects-based) server would store up-to-date rate information for all regional, affiliated networks and then select whichever provided the best option at the moment, or — in an even more utopian service — allow the end-user to select for themselves as simply and easily as buying a Tune or downloading an App.

NBC Wants Back on iPhone + More Money + Content Blocking

NBC is currently turning down $1.99 per 22-44 minutes of The Office or Battlestar Galactica. 2 bucks for content previously aired on FREE television, which can be easily, legally and much to their chagrin and previously failed efforts to block it taped or PVRd. Theyre turning down that EXTRA money because they want MORE of it, and they want iTunes to prevent you from, say, shifting that FREE content from your PVR or media center to your iPhone without paying MORE of that EXTRA money?

Dare I suggest the only reason the pirates exist is because of Big Medias greed and short sightedness. The minute they charge fair prices for fair use, given the low barrier of entry and elegance of use of iTunes interface, the piracy disappears for everyone but zealots. Never mind the marketing value of downloads alone — The Office being a prime example.

Granted, one cheap bastid downloading 30GB a night via P2P could unfairly monopolize bandwidth for an entire area, but mysterious packet-shaping and resetting on the hard wire seems just as jackassy a response. Transparency of policy is a must, and then consumer choice needs to follow. Want 3GB a night, charge them more*. Other’s want to P2P within reasonable bandwidth limits, leave them be.

* Actually, get Bell’s butt in gear and increase infrastructure and turn on that dark fiber so we’re drowning in bandwidth like Europe, k?

Canadian ISPs furious about Bell Canada’s traffic throttling

Damien Fox, one of the cofounders of Wireless Nomad mentioned above, tells Ars today that the situation is “unacceptable, and a symptom of Bell’s arrogance. It is blatant censorship of our users’ Internet connections, and Bell is not going to escape a fight on this one. Either they back down, or independent providers should go to the CRTC, or the Federal Court if need be, to get our Internet connections unblocked.”

From ISPs to drive traffic? It’s the only sane reason I can think of for their otherwise business-ending-ly moronic decisions which do nothing but encourage bit torrent. Seriously.

Seriously.

DirecTV DVR clampdown: a sober reminder of DRM suckitudeDirecTV DVR owners got some bad news from the satellite TV provider recently when the company announced that it will break some of the existing functionality of the DVRs. Effective April 15, subscribers will only have 24 hours to watch pay-per-view movies recorded to their DVRs. Once the movies are purchased, the clock starts ticking, and after 24 hours, the PPV movie saved to your DVR will become nothing more than an unreadable collection of zeros and ones.