Sometimes even the best intentions lead to horrible outcomes. We’re sure MTV meant well when they launched their Music Television network a couple decades ago – but today we have “My Sweet Sixteen.” Britney Spears and Kevin Federline undoubtedly had the best intentions – now we just feel so sorry for their children. You see where we’re going here?
Nokia has just announced that they have licensed Microsoft’s PlayReady digital rights-management (DRM) technology under the auspices of encouraging the use of wireless media. Apparently, the downsides of DRM are balanced by the ability to swap media files between mobile phones, PCs, and other devices. When the largest mobile phone maker on the planet and the largest computer software company get into bed together, you know they’re going to have a reasonable-sounding justification – they have armies of PR staff to put some positive spin on this deal. But, in the end, we can’t get over the fact that the oh-so-breakable DRM-model for media distribution has been embraced by Nokia.
At a time when DRM is arguably the reason that many media downloads are illegitimate, it seems like Nokia is going down the wrong path. Sure, it really would be nice to freely swap media between all our favorite gadgets. But, wouldn’t a DRM-free model work better to that end?