Comments about free, open, and transparent DRM and micropayment standards

Dear WWW DRM list,

After several days of investigating documents and mailing list archives
about digital rights management, I find I have a vast amount I would like
to say about DRM and ODRL (and XrML; etc....) and so instead I will be as
brief as I can.

I feel strongly that a free open standard for DRM on the Internet will
allow an unprecedented flowering of world-wide art and commerce; and also
that to do this most successfully, the standard needs to be one that
facilitates a simple and efficient micropayment system.

The ODRL initiative seems like a good underpinning for such a DRM system;
however I wish to stress my belief that such a system is urgently needed
and is at least two years overdue (the delay possibly causing the 'dot-com
crash'), with many people and businesses being badly affected by the wait.

Overdue or not, an open standard like ODRL is what is required; in
contrast, I believe that trying to do Internet DRM with a proprietary
system (like XrML) would be doomed to failure, since it amounts to a
monopolistic tax on a basic right of information transaction; in effect an
unelected government who is taxing a language; this is very close to a tax
on our thoughts themselves. This will not be tolerated by the Internet
community once they see through the rhetoric and understand what is
happening.

However, even when this battle is won, and an open DRM like ODRL takes its
rightful place, in order to successfully maintain what the Internet has
already achieved such a DRM system must also allow the direct and
unencumbered communication between users and creators to continue. That is
to say, at present on the Internet a person creates a work of science or
art, and puts it up onto the Internet; a user downloads and uses it. No
middleperson chooses what can be said by whom. (You might wish to see my
essay expanding on this, "Money and the Internet: New Payment Sytem
Required," at:
http://www.rowatworks.com/Overview_Indexes/Money_Internet_Blurb.html)

This levelling of the playing field of human knowledge transmission is the
great achievement of the Internet, in my opinion, and hence must be
continued in any DRM system. More specifically, a DRM system, including a
micropayment system, must merely insert itself transparently, like HTTP
itself does, without needing "companies" to take over and become middlemen
between creators and users. What is being transferred in digital content is
almost pure human thought, and we have enough middlemen guiding our thought
processes as it is.

In fact, I believe that if the new DRM is correctly configured, then
without regret we can say goodbye to the large entertainment and other
types of publishing companies who intervene between solitary creators and
solitary users primarily for their own bottom line gain, while limiting and
distorting the content itself in the transaction. These companies are
already dinosaurs who are being by-passed by a new generation of savvy
internet users. With an effective, transparent, and open DRM, such
companies can be allowed to almost completely disappear, to be replaced in
most cases by a direct, orderly and fair exchange of information and money
between creator and user.

Disclosure Relative To The Above:
For several decades I have lived a type of life that now being referred to
as 'content provider' (scientist, inventor, musician) whose publically
available work in each of these has achieved professional status
(respectively: peer-reviewed publication in respected bioscience journals;
patents; international radio play). In addition to what has already been
published, I have a large amount of newer or newly-edited material that I
am ready to distribute, for fair return, on the Internet.
     While waiting for DRM and micropayment to mature, I have experimented
with free Internet distribution (1998-2003) and technically it works well
(500,000 pages downloaded, 2,000,000 hits; www.rowatworks.com). But I am
finished with this phase, and am currently in the process of dismantling my
free-access site. It's now time to charge for my work. From my experience
so far I have strong indication that there are portions of the society who
need various parts of my work and would be willing to pay for it, if it
were part of a viable and fair Internet distribution system.
    Therefore, like many others on the Internet, I badly need a good DRM
system that can handle micropayment, and until an open DRM emerges, I am at
a stalemate.

Offer:
I am willing to work part-time for a non-profit body in helping a free and
open DRM/micropayment system emerge. If necessary, I will work without
charge, in whatever capacity is most appropriate.
   I would very much appreciate any contacts or leads as to what I can do
to aid in this situation.

Afterthought:
I have often been guided in my life-choices by the interesting saying
(whose author I have long forgotten):

 "Whatever prevents you from doing your work has become your work."

For me, needing functional DRM and micropayment appears to be one of the
times in my life when this saying applies.


Sincerely,

Steven Rowat

http://www.rowatworks.com
(1998-2003; parts of site currently being dismantled)

e-mail:
steven_rowat@sunshine.net

Received on Thursday, 17 April 2003 13:50:34 UTC