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the drm sausaGe factory
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cable companies gather in a room to collude to cripple their offer-
ings, limit their innovation, and restrict the market, regulators
take notice.
That’s why the EU is taking a hard look at HD-DVD and Blu-
ray. These systems aren’t designed: they’re
governed,
and the gov-
ernors are a shadowy group of offshore giants who answer to no
one — not even their own members! I once called the DVD-Copy
Control Association (DVD-CCA) on behalf of a Time-Warner
magazine,
Popular Science,
for a comment about their DRM. Not
only wouldn’t they allow me to speak to a spokesman, the person
who denied my request also refused to be identified.
The sausage factory grinds away, but today, more activists than
ever are finding ways to participate in the negotiations, slowing
them up, making them account for themselves to the public. And
so long as you, the technology-buying public, pay attention to
what’s going on, the activists will continue to hold back the tide.
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