Comment Number: 539814-00612
Received: 1/16/2009 7:16:39 PM
Organization:
Commenter: Beth Mejia
State: CA
Agency: Federal Trade Commission
Rule: FTC Town Hall to Address Digital Rights Management Technologies - Event Takes Place Wednesday, March 25, 2009, in Seattle
Attachments:
Comments:

I think DRM is unfair to the consumer.--1. When you BUY a digital product, then it's not made clear that it's a rental. If the DRM company goes out of business, changes or upgrades DRM schemes, is bought by another owner, or for any other reason (since there's there's no guarantee of replacement), then you lose access to your purchased digital product.-- It should be mandatory by law that if there are any problems of access in the future, then the publishing company/DRM company/retailer MUST provide an exact digital copy of the digital product OR they must give the consumer simple, easy software to be allowed to legally and easily remove the DRM from the digital product for the consumer's own use.-- 2. Any company that installs spyware/adware/malware/viruses/trojans/rootkits that harms a user's computer or computer user's privacy, security such that a user has to take time and/or money to get it fixed, then that company should not be allowed to do business, even if it's allowed in their fine print agreement. Just because most of the US population are not lawyers shouldn't mean we all get our computers damaged, slowed, computer resources stolen, etc. --If there is ANY adware/spyware/malware related to the product that won't damage the computer, then it should be CLEARLY VISIBLE ATTHE EXACT LOCATION WHERE THE PRODUCT IS BEING PURCHASED AND/OR ADVERTISED. If the company has the time and the resources to put up a picture of their product, then they should be able to tack this on, too.-- 3. DRM is too onerous and kills our society of sharing ideas and education and culture easily with each other. Why can't you copy/print pages from a digital book that you paid for? So I can view it but not copy a few pages as an example to show others? Why can't I share the copy legally with 1 or 2 friends or family or even someone in the 3rd world who has little access to the work which is the same as going to borrow a book from the library and sharing it? Also, as an aside of DRM and digital products, if a publisher/author/creator no longer distributes the digital product, then why can not people freely share it? Why is the average citizen penalized for furthering culture throughout society? It's our duty as global citizens to help further culture and learning in 3rd world countries as well as to our own citizens who have little or no access to digital products. More culture and learning in other parts of the world mean less violence and fewer wars for scarce resources. -- 4. Easy ability to stop forever any automatic or manual upgrades without being tortured to death with popup ads to accept upgrades. I've upgraded to what i was told by the software manufacturer was SUPPOSEDLY BETTER software upgrades and sometimes, these have damaged my computer with adware/spyware/malware, etc. and I've had to have my computers repaired. I was quite happy without any upgrades or requests/reminders for upgrades. Every computer is different, especially older computers and so not everyone should be forced to upgrade unless it's for the safety of the internet such as operating software patches. -- 5. I'm sure I'm not the only citizen who feels divided, that DRM is onerous but also that creators should be minimally compensated to further culture in society. If creators/authors/writers/musicians/publishers feel they are being unfairly recompensed via digital piracy, then a private or governmental body can be set up to monitor popularity usage of digital products on the web. A tax can be put on ISP's, computers, computer components, computer devices, mobile phone devices to recompense the creators fairly from the taxes.