Category: Politics/Government

DRM: A Personal Story is another excellent article from ZDNet on the topic of Digital Restrictions Management.

The Digital Millenium Copyright Act was supposed to be legislation to update the copyright laws to protect copyright in an age of computers and one minute downloads. The biggest change to come from it was the idea that circumventing copy protection, no matter how simple and no matter what your intent, is now a felony. Unfortunately, technology talk goes over most heads, and when you mix in copyright, most people will have their eyes glaze over.

Well, this article makes it quite clear how DRM and the DMCA can affect customers adversely. Imagine trying to take a copy of a television program from your TiVo and copy it to your new video-playing iPod. It’s easy. It’s simple. It’s a felony.

And the fact that it is a felony is stupid.

Let’s ignore the fact that it is already illegal to upload a copyrighted file to a friend and that making it illegal to circumvent copy protection is just absurd overkill that doesn’t do much to discourage it anyway. What public benefit comes from turning your customers into felons just because they wanted to interoperate with other devices they own? You know, Fair Use? The reason why I am allowed to use my VCR to copy a television program for later viewing? The reason why I can take a VHS tape and convert it to DVD? The reason I can rip my music collection to OGG Vorbis or MP3 and play it on my computer? Why do my potential Fair Use rights have to be nullified simply because it would be illegal to take action to exercise those rights?

Who benefits? TiVo gets to keep its business model? Yeah, that’s nice. I can only watch a video on a device because that device makes it impossible to play the video on another device without requiring a law to be broken.

So, I will never get a TiVo. I will never get an iPod. I will never get a device that prides itself on being so proprietary and restrictive.

I would really love to read some decent pro-DRM articles, but any that I’ve found are just spreading Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. I really don’t believe that paying $15-$20 for a Dave Matthews CD and ripping it to my computer would actually bring about the downfall of the music entertainment industry. I really don’t think that the lack of a Broadcast Flag on television signals is going to destroy television. After all, the VCR didn’t bring about the ruin of the movie industry, even though the movie industry would have loved to have made the VCR illegal.

The Chicago Tribune: “TERROR STRIKES JORDAN”

The Chicago Sun-Times: “SEX BLANKETS TV”

Both are supposed to be alarming headlines. The sad thing is that I think more people would be shocked and concerned about the latter. Last I checked, tens of people weren’t killed by televised sexual innuendo exploding into their living rooms.

America’s National Institute on Media and the Family sent out an open letter asking Jack Thompson to stop acting as if the institute is an ally in his fight against the video game industry.

Your commentary has included extreme hyperbole and your tactics have included personally attacking individuals for whom I have a great deal of respect. I believe that respect is essential in all our dealings, including respect for those with whom we disagree. Some of the people that you have publicly criticized are not only people of integrity, but are people who have worked to improve the lives of children.

Even though we have no formal relationship your use of my name and your inclusion of my name in correspondence have created the impression that we condone these tactics. We do not. The result is that our position and reputation as a research based, non-partisan, solution-focused organization has been jeopardized. Consequently, I ask that you cease using the Institute’s or my name in any way that would give the impression that we support your efforts. I also ask that you remove the link to our website that appears on your site.

Maybe it might not mean much, but it shows that it isn’t just 13-year video game fans and predatorial game developers who think Thompson goes a bit too far.

Code Union, Code Better in the latest Escapist talks about the benefits of organizing software developers to reverse the pendulum which has currently swung “in the direction of upper management, to the point where workers are forced to accept low pay and long hours out of fear”.

The author fears that besides the threat of outsourcing cogs in a wheel to cheaper nations, the current developers are working for longer hours and little pay as it is. He compares the situation with the meatpacking or coal mining industries of yesteryear.

In ea_spouse, we had our Upton Sinclair, but we’re without a Teddy Roosevelt. Without a friend in politics, we’re a massive blob with no direction, no drive. Someone is going to have to step up from within to give us a figurehead. The industry is in the middle of a rockstar drought, but we need someone like the industry’s founding fathers, able to capture our hearts and minds, not only with a game, but with a personality and a cause. But with corporate cultures disintegrating as bottom lines and mergers usurp artistic vision, rockstars are getting harder and harder to come by.

Pray for one to rise from the bowels of some dungeon-like cube farm. We need a savior-caliber leader to keep us together, and to keep us employed.

I’m not intimately familiar with EA’s work practices, but I’m familiar with the stories. Near-80-hour weeks without pay to make up for it. If you can’t handle it, we’ll find someone who will. With EA being such a giant in the game industry, a lot of people feel that they have no choice but to work in such dismal conditions.

But Blancato has brought up a good point: where is the strong leader to say “No!” to EA? With EA working with so many development teams and such big names as Will Wright and now Steven Spielberg, why haven’t any of them said anything?

Obviously some people love working for EA, and the bad news is getting a lot more press than it might otherwise have at some other company. Still, if people hate the conditions so much, wouldn’t some of their major game developers have a say? Will Wright at EA Maxis? Rick Hall at EA Origin? Heck, Peter Molyneux’s games get published by EA. Why not him? Wouldn’t someone want to step up for their teams and say, “You know, I don’t think you should treat the rest of them so badly. They need better work conditions, or I’m out of here.”? Would it be too farfetched to hear one day that Spielberg decided not to work with EA due to the conditions of the developers?

It’s generally considered normal in the game industry to work long hours and go through crunch periods to meet deadlines. It’s almost been a badge of honor. Still, plenty of studies have shown that there are fewer errors when working sane hours and people get to take breaks and go get some sleep. Forcing people to work 60+ hour weeks for months at a time is not only abuse but also counterproductive. EA took it to an extreme.

Some EA studios apparently do better than others as far as employee satisfaction. They come in expecting crunch periods towards the end of a project, but they also get great benefits and extra vacation time. According to ea_spouse, some or all of these benefits were going to be revoked. It definitely can’t be all good there.

I write all this not being someone on the inside. I’ve never worked at any major game company, let alone any of EA’s studios. I don’t really know too many game developers, but I’ve heard and read from some of them. Everyone knows the horror stories, whether they are glorified or not. Maybe someone will read what I have to say and dismiss it as just another irrelavant opinion. Still, why haven’t we heard from some of the studio’s major figures regarding EA’s work practices? Obviously no one wants to lose his/her job, but they can’t really fire everyone, nor could they allow some non-EA game studio to pick up their stars, right?

I was about to make a huge post about Jack Thompson’s “modest proposal”, but I just realized that besides the game industry magazines and news sites, no one is reporting it. It is probably just as well.

If you’re curious, I’ll link to the Joystiq article.

I gained slightly more respect for him after listening to the interview podcast on Game Politics, but this proposal sank my opinion of him.

EDIT: Ctrl-Alt-Delete has a comic and an open letter about the “modest proposal”.