Expectations, Great, Better, and Best of all, Adaptive

by on August 2, 2007 · 4 comments

There’s enormous interplay between the policy landscape and people’s expectations. Easy to forget, because expectations are an awful lot like assumptions… taken for granted.

DRMWatch reports on two new surveys finding that consumers are more accepting of DRM.

Assuming that these surveys were carefully conducted (and one does need to be careful about opinion surveys), the reasons for greater acceptance bear looking into. Part of it is likely to be because some of the clumsier DRM has been abandoned (early efforts at software protection, for example). But another part is likely that people are just getting used to it. Once it has been a few years since you’ve used a VCR, one forgets that one can speed forward and back without worrying about “story stops” or “YOU CANNOT DO THIS WITH THIS DISK AT THIS TIME.” And some if it is likely that consumers don’t feel as strongly about trading features of old media (from being able to play a record or move backwards to being able to make backup copies of things) as advocates want them to. Because all in all most consumers are there for the content, not to fiddle with the tech. And only the mediocre or half-hearted fiddlers stay fiddlers for long–the determined geniuses move on to become real creators.

Niches will remain discontent–those who do want to mix and mash and so on–and will gradually be accomodated, because they are a market too. But the main thrust of early efforts will be directed at experiments with capturing the mass market. Watch for third and fourth generation businesses to begin to figure out how best to license and supply avid fair and transformative users.

This is not a bad thing. If every aspect of every old business model had to be built into every new one, on the grounds that it had become part of the landscape of free speech or fair use, well, policy would become dreadfully conservative. Wanting this surely requires a sort of determined pessimism and demanding it an equally determined stridency; neither of these are likely to resonate with consumer behavior in the long run.

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About Solveig Singleton

Solveig Singleton is a lawyer and writer, with ventures into ceramic sculpture, photography, painting, and animal welfare work. Past venues for her policy work include the Cato Institute (mostly free speech, telecom, and privacy), the Competitive Enterprise Institute (mostly privacy and ecommerce), the Progress and Freedom Foundation (mostly IP). She is presently an adjunct fellow with the Institute for Policy Innovation and is working on a new nonprofit venture, the Convergence Law Institute. She holds degrees from Cornell Law School and Reed College. Favorite Movie: Persuasion. Favorite Books: Dhalgren; Villette; Freedom and the Law. Favorite Art: Kinetic sculpture--especially involving Roombas. Most obsolete current technology deployed: a 30 yr. old Canon AE-1. Music: these days, mostly old blues, classical guitar, Poe, Cowboy Junkies, Ministry. Phobia: Clowns.

Read more articles by Solveig Singleton.

  • http://techdirt.com/ Mike Masnick

    Funny, there were just some surveys a few months ago saying the exact opposite. Also, the study that came out earlier this week saying that more content was being downloaded than ever before.

    The thing that I find most amusing, however, is that you ignore the bigger points. It doesn’t matter whether people are “more accepting” of DRM. The fact that they’re downloading more content than ever shows that DRM isn’t working — no matter what people think of it.

    Also, in what other business would there be studies checking in on how much people like the products they buy being arbitrarily limited? All it means is that there’s a HUGE and wide open opportunity for those who recognize that there are better business models that don’t involve limiting your customers.

    As those business models become more popular, it won’t matter whether or not people like DRM. It will be financially pointless to bother with DRM.

  • http://techdirt.com/ Mike Masnick

    Funny, there were just some surveys a few months ago saying the exact opposite. Also, the study that came out earlier this week saying that more content was being downloaded than ever before.

    The thing that I find most amusing, however, is that you ignore the bigger points. It doesn’t matter whether people are “more accepting” of DRM. The fact that they’re downloading more content than ever shows that DRM isn’t working — no matter what people think of it.

    Also, in what other business would there be studies checking in on how much people like the products they buy being arbitrarily limited? All it means is that there’s a HUGE and wide open opportunity for those who recognize that there are better business models that don’t involve limiting your customers.

    As those business models become more popular, it won’t matter whether or not people like DRM. It will be financially pointless to bother with DRM.

  • Anonymous

    And only the mediocre or half-hearted fiddlers stay fiddlers for long—the determined geniuses move on to become real creators.

    What does that mean? I suspect it means get signed by the content cartel, or else STFU and consume what the cartel gives you. Sorry, that’s completely unacceptable.

  • Anonymous

    >> And only the mediocre or half-hearted fiddlers stay fiddlers for long—the determined geniuses move on to become real creators.

    What does that mean? I suspect it means get signed by the content cartel, or else STFU and consume what the cartel gives you. Sorry, that’s completely unacceptable.

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