git ssb

title: "The BBC Mis­understands DRM" date: 2008-01-30 16:08 status: published tags: BBC, technology, DRM

links:

• url: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7214240.stm
  title: "BBC News: Technology: Aboriginal archive offers new DRM" description: "No it doesn't—it offers example of common search technology" rel: related type: text/html

<p>With the furore over <a href="/msplayer">the <abbr class="caps">BBC</abbr>'s unfair use of <abbr class="caps" title="Digital rights/restrictions management">DRM</abbr> in its iPlayer</a>, one would expect them to know what <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> was. Apparently, they don't. </p>
<p>(At least, their technology editor doesn't.) <abbr class="caps">BBC</abbr> News has <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7214240.stm" title="BBC News: Technology: Aboriginal archive offers new DRM">an article about “a new method of <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>” being used by indigenous Australians to make it easier to respect their societal customs</a>. The thing is, the system as the article describes it is <em>not</em> <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>. </p>
<hr>
<p><abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> is where a file (a document, some software, or a piece of audio or video) is designed to be unreadable without a key (a cipher—like a password). Crucially, the key must remain unknown to (or unusable by) the file's intended audience. </p>
<p>The <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> acts as a gatekeeper, and only allows access to the file (lowers the drawbridge) if the audience can demonstrate that they are entitled to access the file. The audience may only access the file if the key-holder allows it. </p>
<p>Making a copy of a <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>-encumbered file and giving it to someone else typically results in their not being able to use it, because the <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> recognises them as someone else. (If it doesn't recognise them at all, they <em>still</em> won't be able to use the file.) </p>
<p>That's the intention, anyway. <a href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20060825/1447213.shtml">It's not actually possible to implement <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> so that it works</a>—it can only ever make viewing the content a bit more awkward, for determined copyright-infringers and ordinary consumers alike. </p>
<p>The key point here is that the <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>—and thus the key-holder—controls the audience's ability to access the file. </p>
<hr>
<p>In the situation described by the <abbr class="caps">BBC</abbr> article, the audience <em>chooses</em> to avoid certain content, based on a set of cultural rules. The “<abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>” system allows the audience to filter the content, by taking cultural information about the audience and applying those rules. </p>
<p>There is no key (that the article mentions, anyway); no-one is <em>prevented</em> from accessing any content—it's just made easier to avoid content that's inappropriate for that particular person. </p>
<p>This system sounds rather more like a simple set of filters that work on metadata associated with each bit of content. That's a lot more like a porn-&-swearing blocker than <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr>. It's very similar to <a href="http://www.flickr.com/search/advanced/">Flickr's search engine</a>. </p>
<p>Indeed, it's very similar to <em>any</em> search engine, except the criteria are “appropriate for <var>this</var> age, <var>that</var> gender and <var>this</var> community” instead of the more typical “must contain the words <var>foo</var>, <var>bar</var> and <var>baz</var>”. </p>
<hr>
<p>So this <em>is</em>, as the article describes, an example of applying search logic and technology (that itself originates from European-influenced cultures) to solve a cultural problem that many from European-influenced cultures would find surprising. </p>
<p>It has nothing, however, to do with <abbr class="caps">DRM</abbr> (which is an example of unfeasibly clinging to a business model that's been made obsolete and unworkable by technological improvements), as the article erroneously suggests. </p>