Much thanks to ZeroPaid for interviewing Russell McOrmond. In
the last installment of this interview, McOrmond gives a poignant summary of how the mess of DRM came about. In addition to the history lesson, McOrmond points out a flaw in how most people think of digital rights management and how this shortsightedness allows device DRM (rather than content DRM) to harm consumers.
In my opinion the key to the discussion isn't how much content is encoded in formats that tie people to specific access technology, but how many people are using technology that is locked down by the vendor where the owner is not allowed (legally and technologically) to unlock it.
To see where we are in this battle, we only need to look at the cell phone market. More and more people are moving more of their computing off of desktops and onto mobile platforms. These platforms are locked down to disallow their owners to be in control of them. If anything, I see this harm on the rise, not on the decline.
The more people look at "DRM" as something that is only applied to content, rather than primarily something applied to our devices, the more they will simply miss the debate entirely.
