[GLLUG] DRM run in

[Karl Schuttler]

I had an interesting experience this weekend when we rented the DVD of
the film Pi from her university's media library. Playing it on her
kubuntu-clad dell laptop, we found that it had been encrypted with
DeCSS, and thus could not watch it unless we broke the law and
downloaded libdvdcss.

The interesting point was when she asked me why the error came up and
I told her it was DRM, she explaimed, "But we're not trying to copy
it, we just want to watch it." It was really the first instance of
this that i've came across in the wild, although I've seen it used
time and time again in arguments against DRM (and had agreed without
actually experiencing the frustration).

I've personally seen an AVI file of the film at several LAN parties,
so it just goes to prove how DRM doesn't keep file-sharers from
getting the file, but only makes it more difficult for average joe to
watch it.

I just thought this was interesting and worth sharing; I'm fairly
certain most of you feel the same way about DRM (but not necessarily
file sharing as a whole).

Karl