Opinion: The disgusting state of DRM

DRM, or Digital Rights Management, has, whether we like it or not, become part of pretty much every day for people involved in any way, shape or form with technology.  In its most basic form it has existed for almost 30 years ranging from the minor nuisances of looking up codes in a manual or inserting a disc, to the modern internet-enabled monster we've all come to hate.




But it's while, of all things, trying to watch a new movie that I find myself almost disgusted with myself that I actually paid for something.

As I'm typing this right now, I'm trying to watch a brand new BluRay - RoboCop, the 2014 reboot, for those playing at home.  I would like to say that I'm actually watching it but that would be a lie in part because I'm clearly typing this, and also because every 10-15 minutes or so the picture gets corrupted for about 30 seconds as a delightful byproduct of a new version of AACS, or the Advanced Access Content System, which makes up the DRM features of BluRay in tandem with BD+.

Obviously, every BluRay that is released comes with a message on somewhere, either in the presentation or on the packaging, stating that you need to have your player entirely up-to-date.  It's sound advice, given that Sony (and the various other companies involved in the DRM of media) are continually trying to stay ahead of the hacking and cracking community, so the legitimate users need to keep pace as well.

But what happens when the most up-to-date software isn't up-to-date enough?  What happens when you spend your hard-earned only to find that you can't, or at least cannot fully "use" what you've just paid for?  It used to be, with my old internet connection, that every time I purchased a new BluRay I would have to spend longer than it takes to actually watch the movie downloading a player update.  Once I even had to download an update to watch an older disc.

Yet, while I was busy downloading these patches, other people were downloading pirate copies of the same movies.  As soon as those downloads finished, they could watch the movie - start to finish - without any issues.  The next day they could do the same.  And the day after that.  And probably even now, many years after I purchased my first BluRay disc, they can still watch that same file without issue while I'll quite possibly have to download yet another update to watch my original movie.

Of course, it doesn't stop with movies.  Games are another sore spot for me.  It's almost impossible to actually "buy" a modern game if you're a PC user, and it is starting to get more that way for consoles as well.  You're effectively licensing them, and that comes with few benefits in exchange for some pretty severe negatives.

On the plus side, naturally there's now a system where you can re-acquire your purchase at almost any time.  The providers also tend to provide matchmaking services, player lobbies, forums and other potentially useful tools.  None of these specifically require these services and could easily exist without them, but they are provided so this can still be seen as a positive.

In exchange?  You only need to look tech websites whenever a new, big release occurs.  The Settlers VII launches in Australia, only to be completely unplayable for nearly a week as the authentication servers aren't there.  SimCity launches to massive fanfare, but it takes over a week before people can reliably play the game they purchased.  More recently, Blizzard forums are alight with complaints of latency and connection instability, which results in the inability for some users to even play single-player games.

Then, of course, there's what happens when these services shut down.  Most recently, GameSpy closed its doors - and with it the multiplayer for a large number of titles went down, along with all online multiplayer for the Nintendo Wii.  Some have been picked up by 3rd parties but the rest will probably be inoperable from this point on.  Granted this is only for multiplayer, but what happens when Steam, Origin or UPlay fold?

Ultimately all it does is cripple the people who pay good money for their entertainment.  The people who aren't paying for it are barely even being slowed down anymore - in the case of the specific example of this, I was actually able to download (though I didn't) a BluRay rip of RoboCop, which would have played perfectly, over a week before I could legitimately purchase a disc that I'm now not fully enjoying because of someone else's efforts to prevent me from doing so.

I realise this is probably a badly written post, and it's full of bitterness and obvious bias, but sometimes you just need to have a rant.  If I'm lucky, someone who reads this will either be someone or know someone who can help make things better for the people who pay money, because they're not doing anything to hurt the people who aren't.


PS I'm now not-enjoying the last half-hour of RoboCop.  The picture is still periodically glitching and now the audio is almost continually stuttering.  This anti-buyer behaviour simply cannot end soon enough, and I'll be very thankful when the tools I have at my disposal have been updated to a sufficient state to bypass it entirely.