Digital media now in easy "ecosystem"

a new type of DRM that would allow customers more flexibility in playing content on multiple devices. The Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) would establish a list of devices in your personal "domain" (unrelated to web domains), and minimizes or removes restrictions within that domain. TechCrunch summarizes DECE and notes that many of the big corporations have decided to support it.
"The ecosystem envisioned by Singer et al revolves around a common set of formats, interfaces and other standards. Devices built to the DECE specifications would be able to play any DECE-branded content and work with any DECE-certified service. The goal is to create for downloads the same kind of interoperability that's been true for physical products, such as CDs and DVDs. Where it gets really interesting, though, is the group's stated intention to make digital files as flexible and permissive as CDs, at least within the confines of someone's personal domain. Once you've acquired a file, you could play it on any of your devices -- if it couldn't be passed directly from one DECE-ready device to another, you'd be allowed to download additional copies. And when you're away from home, you could stream the file to any device with a DECE-compatible Web browser."




10 years? Try 100.
Radio will kill the live music industry. Vinyl will kill radio and live music. Home taping will kill vinyl, radio and live music. Copying CDs will kill music. MP3s will kill music.
It wasn't true back then and it isn't true now. People want to listen to music, plain and simple. The RIAA know that damn well, they're not that stupid. Quite why they're so keen to describe every new piece of technology as the thing that will eventually kill them, I don't know. Some sort of control thi


DRM is inherently defective and bad for consumers. (Score:3, Interesting)
by Dirtside (91468) on Saturday September 13, @12:35PM (#24991211) Homepage Journal
Repeat after me: All DRM is inherently defective and bad for consumers. Consider the baseline: completely unfettered media. You can do with it whatever you want.
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A group of media industry companies said it is planning to build a digital world where video devices and content websites play together in perfect harmony, and consumers can safely store their digital content and access it anywhere in the world.

The consortium of Hollywood studios, retailers, service providers, and consumer electronics and information technology companies, called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem, or DECE, is working on a "uniform digital media experience" but won't announce details until the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

The consortium said it will call for interoperability of devices and websites, and usage rules that allow consumers to copy content onto household playback devices and to burn their content to physical media, DECE President Mitch Singer said.

The plan also would provide customers a "rights locker" or virtual library where consumers' digital video purchases would be stored for retrieval in a manner similar to accessing an email account, Singer said.

The consortium plans to design a logo that will be placed on products and websites to let consumers know that those products and services are compatible with DECE standards.

"We will be developing a ... specification that services and device makers can license. They can use the logo to associate their device, knowing that when the consumer goes to buy the content, they know it will play," Singer said.

The new digital framework would turn Apple Inc's "closed" iTunes model on its head, Singer said.

"This is very different from the Apple ecosystem," he said. "We encourage Apple to join the consortium. We don't ever anticipate Apple going away or this consortium replacing it


"They knew that when they brought (a DVD) home, they could play it on the device of their choice," Coblitz said. "We see this vision of 'buy once, play anywhere.'"

The consortium includes Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy Co Inc, Cisco Systems Inc, Comcast, News Corp's Fox Entertainment Group, Hewlett-Packard Co, Intel, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp, Microsoft Corp, General Electric Co's NBC Universal, Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony Corp, Toshiba, VeriSign, and Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros Entertainment.


All forms of DRM add fetters to that situation without giving any additional abilities or functionality. There is absolutely nothing that can be done with DRMed media that cannot be done (in a technical sense) with unfettered media.

24hoursnews

What Exactly?Gates and Seinfeld Selling?

Microsoft Launches 2nd Seinfeld Salvo
The iconic comedian and Bill Gates stumble through suburbia


I'm still amused by Apple's Mac vs. PC guy ads, especially the one where PC pokes his head up out of a pizza box and explains he wants to attract college students.
Microsoft apparently decided it was time to try it's own version of funny ads. Microsoft has teamed up Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld in a series of ads, that so far, only hint at anything Windows or Vista related. Gizmodo calls Gates and Seinfeld
the new Laural and Hardy of ambiguous advertising

The public hasn't seen many of the minute and a half ads yet, but there's a four and a half minute version that Karen at Unterekless Thoughts declares
New Gates/Seinfeld/Microsoft ad made me laugh so it must be good
You can see the long version at YouTube. In the long version, Bill and Jerry attempt to live with a normal (as in not filthy rich like them) family. They attempt a few normal things, like eating scalloped potatoes and playing ping pong before they get kicked out.
There are some funny lines, which is all there is to evaluate the ads on at this point—nothing technical is getting mentioned. Abbey Klaassen at Advertising Age agreed in Gates, Seinfeld Funnier Second Time Around. Klaassen pointed out,
What the latest spot brings – which seemed unlikely with the first spot, dubbed "The Conquistador," that broke last week – is the potential for the ad to go viral. An extended version of the new commercial, which is called "New Family" and broke last night on CBS during "Big Brother," is already being passed around on the web.
Even though I'm an avowed Mac person, I'm contributing to that "going viral" effect by talking about the ads here. This either proves A) it's going viral, or B) a $300 million contract between Crispin Porter + Bogusky, the ad agency, and Microsoft is paying off for Microsoft.
Alice Hill at RealTechNews commented
It’s a much, much better ad that the first one. And it makes Bill G almost lovable, if such a thing could be possible. But with Bill and Jerry retired, what does it really say about what they left behind?
Mary Jo Foley, in Keep the faith: More Windows-specific consumer ads coming soon quoted a Microsoft spokesperson who said that the ads will quickly move to being more about Windows, including desktop, laptop and mobile.
I've always been amused by the PC guy vs. Mac guy ads. It has done nothing to change my buying behavior. I thought the full four and a half minute ad on YouTube was amusing, too. I have a feeling that it won't change my buying behavior either. What is your reaction? Does it affect what you buy?

More
BOSTON The second salvo in Microsoft's Jerry Seinfeld-Bill Gates campaign has appeared in the form of a four-minute-plus video available on YouTube and elsewhere.

The iconic comedian and Microsoft chairman this time venture to suburbia, where they try to act like regular guys despite being surrounded by a highly irregular family. The off-kilter atmosphere is reminiscent of Seinfeld's classic '90s sitcom, and Jerry's wisecracks and his odd chemistry (or lack thereof) with the stiff yet likeable Gates coming to the fore in this installment.

Microsoft's first ad with the pair, set in a discount shoe store, broke last week during National Football League coverage. That commercial was 90 seconds long and was, for the most part, judged overly quirky and confusing by commentators. Adweek's ad critic Barbara Lippert gave the work a mixed review.

Much like that earlier effort, the new spot takes a soft-sell approach to its subject matter, with no overt product pitches and only a fleeting reference to Microsoft, mainly in the form of the logo at the end, though Gates, of course, is virtually synonymous with the company he cofounded.