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Sent: 29 September 2006 20:11
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Cc: CDT Policy Posts
Subject: Policy Post 12.18: CDT Offers Metrics for Evaluating DRM
A Briefing On Public Policy Issues Affecting Civil Liberties Online
from The Center For Democracy and Technology
1) CDT Offers Metrics for Evaluating DRM
2) Questions To Ask in Measuring and Comparing DRM Technologies
3) The Importance of Competition in the DRM Marketplace
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1) CDT Offers Metrics for Evaluating DRM
The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) has issued a paper
outlining specific questions that product reviewers and, ultimately,
the public may want to consider when evaluating media devices and
services incorporating digital rights management (DRM) technologies.
Content creators view DRM as an important tool to help protect their
content from widespread uncontrolled distribution in the digital
environment. Critics question DRM's effectiveness, but CDT's premise
is that DRM is already an established feature of the media
marketplace and is likely to remain so. Moreover, while a number of
policy debates touch on issues relating to DRM, for the foreseeable
future it is the market, rather than government, that is likely to
play the primary role in shaping DRM.
It therefore will be important for the public and product reviewers
to understand how to evaluate the impact of DRM on the media user's
experience. Different DRM systems will provide different
capabilities for users. An informed base of consumers capable of
comparing products and expressing and acting on their preferences can
help ensure that the marketplace for digital media products is
diverse, competitive, and responsive to reasonable consumer
expectations. The extent of the public's current understanding of
DRM, however, is at best unclear. A 2005 survey of European digital
music users, for example, found that 71 percent did not know whether
the music they purchased was subject to usage restrictions.
CDT's paper seeks to promote greater public understanding and
discussion of DRM by providing consumers, product reviewers, and
consumer advocates some concrete guidance concerning the factors to
look at when evaluating DRM in the marketplace. The goal is not to
suggest that any particular DRM schemes are "good" or "bad" in any
general sense, but rather to provide tools for consumers to assess
the DRM-related tradeoffs associated with different marketplace
offerings.
Evaluating DRM: Building a Marketplace for the Convergent World
http://www.cdt.org/copyright/20060907drm.pdf
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2) Questions To Ask in Measuring and Comparing DRM Technologies
DRM has already been widely deployed in several common digital media
products, including prerecorded DVDs, digital video recorders such as
those made by TiVo, copy-protected CDs, and online digital music
services. CDT's paper starts by discussing the DRM in these
products, focusing both on the ways in which DRM limits certain
consumer uses of digital media and on the ways in which it
facilitates new channels for the distribution of content.
These various implementations of DRM in the media marketplace
illustrate that DRM can operate in a variety of ways, with a variety
of consequences for consumer choices. Therefore, CDT's paper seeks
to set out some different dimensions against which DRM products may
be measured and compared, on the theory that the ability of consumers
to compare DRM products will be essential to driving competition
between different DRM offerings.
CDT's list of consumer metrics for DRM-equipped digital devices and
services is not necessarily exhaustive, but it identifies some
specific questions that CDT believes product testers and reviewers
should be asking as they evaluate media products. CDT's proposed
metrics fall into four main categories.
(1) Transparency
Is there clear disclosure to users of the effects of DRM?
-Relevant information for disclosure: Are users given fair notice of
product characteristics that may be relevant to them?
-Manner of disclosure: Is notice provided in a manner that is
sufficiently prominent and understandable? Is important information
buried in long license agreements or similar fine print?
-Timing of disclosure: Is notice provided at appropriate times? For
example, is notice provided both up front, and as part of ongoing
interactions with the product or service?
(2) Effect on Use
What are the specific parameters and limitations for the use of a work?
Personal use and copying of works: To what extent do DRM measures
facilitate or permit personal uses and copying of content, for
purposes such as time shifting, place shifting, and limited sharing?
-Choice and interoperability: Do DRM protections allow consumers to
use media they buy on a wide variety of platforms and devices, or
with a wide range of services - or is interoperability narrowly
limited?
-Facilitating end-user creativity: To what extent do DRM measures
facilitate end-user creativity, by allowing users to interact with
and create content rather than just passively receiving it?
-Permanence / risk of unexpected loss of access: Does a DRM scheme
create risks that users could unexpectedly lose access to their
content?
(3) Collateral Impact
Does the DRM have any other potential impact on a user, aside from
its direct impact on the ways the user can use or distribute the
protected content?
-Privacy and anonymity: Are users' privacy and anonymity preserved?
What data is "phoned home" to a central server of the content
distributor or other party?
-Security: Does the DRM carry any risk of impairing the security of
users' computers or other devices?
-Device functionality: Are there other ways in which in which the
DRM could impair the functionality of users' computers or other
devices?
(4) Purpose and Consumer Benefit.
-Does it appear that DRM is being used to innovate and facilitate new
business models that fill previously unaddressed demand and give
consumers new choices?
-Or is DRM being used to lock consumers into old business models or
to limit consumers' choices in services and devices?
In assessing how a particular DRM performs with respect to these
criteria, there are a number of things to keep in mind. Naturally,
different types of media products may carry different consumer
expectations and raise different issues; some of the questions above
may be more relevant to some types of media than others, and in some
cases direct comparisons may present apples-to-oranges problems.
Different types of business arrangements may be relevant as well.
For example, a movie downloaded for rental may come with more
restrictive DRM than a movie downloaded for purchase, but consumers
and product reviewers might view the difference as reflecting an
attractive tradeoff in light of the difference in price.
CDT also believes that product reviewers and others should not limit
their analysis to comparisons with prior or existing products or
services. Advances in digital media technologies make possible an
evolving set of capabilities and uses. A forward-looking frame of
reference would consider what an honest and law-abiding consumer
would be able to do with networked, general-purpose computers and
open-format media, and use this as one basis of comparison.
CDT's point here is not that everything that is possible with
unprotected content on general purpose computers should immediately
be possible for DRM-protected content; after all, unprotected content
is easily susceptible to massive piracy. But comparisons to an
unprotected media environment, by highlighting what might be possible
from a purely technical perspective, may help illustrate the
technical choices and tradeoffs associated with DRM. Over time,
product reviewers and consumer advocates may fairly press
manufacturers and content owners to develop secure ways of
implementing the missing capabilities.
Evaluating DRM quick-reference guide
http://www.cdt.org/copyright/20060907drm-metrics.php
------------------------------------------------
3) The Importance of Competition in the DRM Marketplace
Development of a well-functioning market for DRM is important for
achieving balanced solutions to the policy challenges posed by the
problem of copyright infringement on the Internet. As CDT discussed
in a 2005 paper, Protecting Copyright and Internet Values: A
Balanced Path Forward, the deployment of new models for lawfully
accessing content online and in digital form is an essential
component of a viable strategy for digital copyright policy. New
distribution models are likely to rely on DRM to prevent widespread
infringement and enable services - such as online movie rentals -
that consumers will find attractive.
In short, DRM can be a key component of a vibrant digital media
marketplace. But this requires the development of a robust content
delivery and DRM market in which consumers have multiple choices and
sufficient information, and in which reasonable consumer concerns
about issues such as DRM's privacy impact are satisfactorily
addressed.
Attractive, lawful digital content offerings, combined with strong
enforcement of copyright law to make infringement unattractive, can
provide the foundations for a sound and balanced approach to the
issue of copyright infringement on the Internet. Finding balanced
solutions is crucial, because the likely alternatives are technology
mandates or regulatory restrictions that are inconsistent with
innovation and the open architecture of the Internet.
Protecting Copyright and Internet Values: A Balanced Path Forward
http://www.cdt.org/copyright/20050607framing.pdf
_______________________________________________
Detailed information about online civil liberties issues may be
found at http://www.cdt.org/.
This document may be redistributed freely in full or linked to
http://www.cdt.org/publications/policyposts/2006/18
Excerpts may be re-posted with prior permission of [log in to unmask]
Policy Post 12.18 Copyright 2006 Center for Democracy and Technology
_______________________________________________
http://www.cdt.org/mailman/listinfo/policy-posts
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