How Much is Stronger DRM Worth?
Stephen Lewis · Kluwer Academic Publishers eBooks · 2006
There are many stakeholders in the production and use of Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems, and the incentives influencing their behaviour and the interactions between them are complex. In this paper I argue that it may well be more socially efficient to use market mechanisms to protect copyright holders, rather than spending large amounts of money on the development and deployment of stronger DRM mechanisms. The most publicly visible proponents of DRM systems are those whose economic rights would be protected by them. Of these, the most prominent in the media are the record and movie industry associations. The message that they seem anxious to communicate to the public is that unauthorized duplication of music tracks will destroy the industry. They conflate the effects of commercial and private copying, and most of the messages seem to portray a general nervousness reminiscent of the Y2K ‘crisis’. Within the industry, though, organizations such as the British Phonographic Industry are painting a very different picture. The BPI’s ‘Market Information’