Un nouvel article avec des commentaires est à lire en ligne ici :
Sony has far to go in rootkit case
news analysis Sony BMG is making amends in California and Texas for secretly loading antipiracy software onto customers' computers. But the record label has a long way to go before putting the public relations nightmare behind it.
Sony BMG, which Sony operates jointly with Bertelsmann Music Group, agreed earlier this week to pay $1.5 million in fines and pay customers in California and Texas whose computers suffered damage as a result of Sony's surreptitiously installed digital rights management (DRM) software. The company declined to comment for this story other than to say that it was pleased to have reached the agreement with California and Texas.
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"I think that there was a lot of record labels who got carried away with the idea of DRM," said Cindy Cohn, legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, one of the groups that filed a class-action suit against Sony last year on behalf of those affected by the antipiracy software. "I don't think many of them stopped to think about the impact to their customers when they used DRM."
McGrath, who is a member of the Los Angeles district attorney's high-tech crime unit, said he understands what Sony BMG was trying to do when it loaded the software.
"Much of what we do is go after pirates," McGrath said. "We are keenly aware of the individual's right to protect intellectual property. But if you're installing some kind of content protection and altering peoples' systems, you have to do it in a way that you're not damaging property. You also must be certain to fully disclose what you're doing."
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The EFF's Cohn said that something positive may come from the fiasco: the case provides another reason for entertainment companies to abandon DRM.
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"I think we're seeing a growing consensus that DRM isn't working," Cohn said. "I think DRM was a bad idea that had a heyday but that it will be fading away soon. The (entertainment companies) are learning that DRM is an anticompetitive tool that ultimately hurts their business."
Bein, il me semble que : "la messe est dite" ...
