If you read my blog I’m sure you know I’m no fan of DRM.  I have no problem with the underlying goal of keeping people from profiting from piracy but in general I believe that DRM simply makes things more difficult (or costly) for regular consumers.  While I’m not really a regular consumer and am pretty out on the fringe when it comes to digital media I’m doing what everyone else will at some point.  So why did DRM cost me $85, I’m so glad you asked…

This weekend my new Bluray drive finally showed up and I sat down to install it.  Everything went great with the hardware install (took about 20 minutes to physically install it) so I quickly moved to install the software.  Once I got that installed and going I popped in my first Bluray title and sat back on the couch ready to be blown away ready to be disappointed.  And disappointed I was.  The disk started to play and the FBI warning came on screen (since I must be a criminal).  A few seconds later an error message popped up which lead me to a tool to test my system for Bluray support.  I ran the tool and it found only one problem, my video card doesn’t support HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Copy Protection) – DRM.  So while my system runs great, my current video card works perfectly and looks beautifully AND everything I’m trying to do is perfectly legal (I’m not ripping, stealing, etc) I’m screwed.  I’m trying to play a disk that I rented in a machine that I own in my own home.  And because someone somewhere is afraid I’ll try to capture a digital stream of the 30GB movie as I watch it I have to get a new video card.  This is utterly ridiculous.

So thanks to DRM I still am unable to enjoy the $250 Bluray player I bought with the Bluray disk I rented.  I completely understand I’m out on the fringe here doing this in Windows Media Center, my point is if DRM is going to stop me from doing something that should be totally legal then how is this ever going to work for normal consumers.  The answer is it isn’t which is why we’re all seeing DRM slowly fall away.  Too bad it couldn’t have happened sooner, I really wanted to use the stuff I bought to entertain me, not give me another reason to bitch.