Nokia Urges Linux Developers To Be Cool With DRM 536
superglaze writes in to note that according to Nokia's software chief, its plans for open source include getting developers to accept things like DRM, commercial IP rights, and SIM locks. "Jaaksi admitted that concepts like these 'go against the open-source philosophy,' but said they were necessary components of the current mobile industry. 'Why do we need closed vehicles? We do,' he said. 'Some of these things harm the industry but they're here [as things stand]. These are touchy, emotional issues, but this dialogue is very much needed. As an industry, we plan to use open-source technologies, but we are not yet ready to play by the rules; but this needs to work the other way round too.'"
Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sorry, it sounds like you have your head firmly rooted somewhere dark and unnatural.
"These things suck and hurt both you and us, and we won't bend on that. But we want you to work for us for free anyway."
Holy cow man, listen to yourself. This is our playground and we give you an opportunity to play in it for free; in return we purchase the goods you produce as a result. You play by our rules or we take our playground and our purchasing power to someone who will.
Here's an idea? Want DRM in your product? (Score:5, Insightful)
Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
Pretty typical attitude in the industry I'd say.
Emotional? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's about money. It's about vendor lock-in, it's about customer control and about avoiding competition.
They want cheap/free (the beer kind) software, but under their sole control, without allowing the user of the software to apply it to their needs. Sorry, OSS doesn't swing that way.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
SIM locks?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Based on the quotes in the article header, (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm cool with DRM (Score:5, Insightful)
... as long as it doesn't interfere with my rights to reprogram anything using any free/libre software and doesn't intefere with my fair use rights to use the content I pay for.
Have cake, eat it too. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like they are not yet in a position to use open-source technologies.
It would be interesting to see if turnabout is fair play. I'd love to have a free high-end smartphone, but that means taking up an expensive monthly airtime contract. Instead, I'll just declare that I am "not yet ready to play by the rules", take the benefit of the free handset now, and later on I'll sign up for a contract when I am ready to play by the rules.
OK?
Re:They need us more than we need them (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you imagine what a cell could become if it is "OSS friendly"? Yes, you will most likely not lock your customers into having to use it, but here's a really novel, radical and completely unthinkable idea: They just might want to use your product because it caters to their needs.
I know it is so last century, but how about making a product again that the customer wants to buy instead of trying to force him to buy it with vendor lock-in snares?
Two simple principles: (Score:5, Insightful)
If I don't own it, I can't trust it.
even open source cant make DRM work (Score:5, Insightful)
2) send encrypted data to their computer
3) send key to their computer
4) wait for somebody to take a memory dump
5) NO profit
Even if somebody was to make a binary blob to prevent memory dumps at kernel level, all you need is to run linux in a virtual machine (i hear its good at that) or use some rootkit.
actually, could just be closed source? kthx. (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh wait. They want DRM, which needs the software to be closed source. So I guess that's already what they are asking for.
And the "we need closed vehicles" bit? Worst car analogy ever. If you want to "close" your music, you encrypt it. What nokia wants are cars that locks from the outside when you get in, so you can't escape from them. Not sure that we really need those.
(*)fake quote. Keep the pony if you've already bought it.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Emotional? (Score:5, Insightful)
My guess is that he fell for the fallacy of considering the "free" in OSS as "doesn't cost anything". OSS can actually cost something. Nowhere does it say you can't ask for money to write it. The "free" part means that it is released openly. And that's something he appearantly simply doesn't get.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:2, Insightful)
Project Mayo used this model. Then they took the contributers code, closed it, and started DivX Networks.
MySQL used this model. The only reason they haven't closed the code and started selling it was because Sun bought them to prevent it, and it's only by the good graces of Sun that the situation persists.
QT used this model. Then they sold all the code they collected over the years to Nokia. And here we are.
The moral of the story is, don't make compromises with these assholes. Don't put them in a position where they can screw you, because they can't be trusted, or they wouldn't have made the arrangement that set you up to be screwed in the first place.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Blah blah blah rahhh rahh (Score:5, Insightful)
No, they are not. There are very rational and well-explained reasons for being against DRM, closed platforms, vendor lock-in and the like.
I'm not even going to repeat them here, because I assume them to be well-known (certainly to the Slashdot audience).
So that's some nice bullshitting and spin doctoring going on there, but no. Really, no.
Re:Based on the quotes in the article header, (Score:3, Insightful)
Interesting you say that. My thoughts were more along the lines of Open Source is to the Native Americans as Nokia is to the U.S. Government. That is to say there's many Open Source organizations and no single collective leader over all of them, making it very difficult to negotiate a, to resume the metaphor, peace treaty.
The fortunate thing is that I don't believe there is anything to be the proverbial bison that can be killed off to, in turn, wipe out Open Source.
Re:What are they worried about... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:They need us more than we need them (Score:2, Insightful)
In many ways. The article notes that "because the industry has not yet moved beyond old business models.", "they (drm/simlock/subsidisies) were necessary components of the current mobile industry", and "Some of these things harm the industry but they're here".
The conclusion: Instead of the industry evolving, the programmers (namely, the Open Source crowd) need to go back to the old outdated model.
When you recognise yourself that your business model is flawed and doesn't work, the LAST thing you want is to attempt to perpetuate it. You can hold on it by brute force for a while, but you'll lose your short-term gains in the long term.
Of course, very few companies really think long term. The tyranny of publically owned companies and their stock.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
I read this, and interpret it as this:
I love this guy.
Re:Here's an idea? Want DRM in your product? (Score:5, Insightful)
An open source DRM module couldn't possibly work. Well, it could, but it would be very easily crackable - instead of sending the unencrypted stream to the screen and speakers, send it instead to ff4mpeg or to a disk and have it re-encoded.
Every major DRM scheme has been broken to date, and that's without having the source code available. Having the source means you just redirect the output to some place you can capture it, and you're done.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Project Mayo used this model...
MySQL used this model...
QT used this model...
And here we are.
MySQL, QT and DivX networks are *NO* better than Nokia. I don't care if MySQL never went commercial, it was much better as LGPL. Now everybody else is considering going to PostgreSQL.
Compare with wxWidgets. It may not be as popular in the Linux area, but a lot of Windows developers use it.
Re:Translation (Score:4, Insightful)
Its unfortunately typical of a lot of bosses, regardless of the industry. Many bosses will arragantly use others, but don't want to give anything back (for fear of giving others a helping hand, as they may well end up being a competitor. So in their mind, its better to keep others down. They take, but don't give back. Its why they don't like open source, (when they have to compete with it), as its a threat to their way of treating others, as much as a threat to their products).
From the summary, "Why do we need closed vehicles? We do"
Yeah they do, as they want to control whats on their products, so they can charge whatever they like for them and if we don't like it, tough, as we will not get a choice, as they will prevent us having a choice, as they control whats on their products.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, I think most Linux developers don't really enjoy the bit they are working on. They do it because they are being paid by a company who needs that part improved. With X.org, for the most part, it was not a problem for what companies want to use it for (mostly as a server). As companies start to use Linux for more applications (to sell consumer laptops, for example) they will invest more in areas like improving X.org in ways that will facilitate those uses.
Nokia could get out of developing QT, but someone else would move into the niche and undercut the prices of their proprietary replacement. It is simply too hot of a business opportunity to be ignored right now. Maybe the companies dumping money into QT development would go down for a while without Nokia's support, or maybe they would go up because people see an opportunity to make money. Either way, Nokia trying to use it as leverage is not going to get them too far.
Poor Ari (Score:2, Insightful)
And now he's stuck with the GPLv3 and the whole lock-the-phone/DRM/etc business model becomes very hard to do. Now that major parts of the infrastructure (think glibc) are turning LGPLv3, he's stuck between a rock (freedom) and a hard place (loosing face/being stuck with Symbian)...
Re:SIM locks?! (Score:3, Insightful)
In North America, providers sell most phones (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What are they worried about... (Score:3, Insightful)
Carriers? You mean those companies who don't want to allow consumers the freedom of choice? The companies that want to prevent you from playing any music you have legally obtained from somewhere else (whether it was paid for, or given away for free) and want to force us to buy everything from them?
Jaaksi, you seem to have misunderstood (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
See. That is the reason for my comment on the Xorg article to the fact of "if someone insists on something being in your code tell them to pay you or f'off". Projects shouldn't be a matter of "getting enough people together to produce something". FOSS projects should be love'm or leave'm.
QT isn't exactly the only game in town for foss_gui. If QT fell off the map the underlying technology that lets QT draw the pretty pictures will continue to work fine.
I'm right there with you as far as principles go. Which brings it back to "pay or f'off". If someone wants something from you that is in addition to what you were planning or had time to do they should pay you. If these guys want QT to have BSware in it then they should pay someone to write it then ask for hooks to implement it within QT. If they kill QT over it then it is the original developers that get screwed. And trust me, if you screw the original developers on a project you will already have your "enough people" to fork the project.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Emotional? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Which is a better outcome than one could have hoped for. Postgresql is so unbelievably more stable and robust it isn't even funny anymore. MySQL might have been OK for read-only web backends, but let's not pretend it is a real RDBMS.
Postgresql, however, is technologically better and has a better license. What's not to love?
Re:Say what?!? (Score:2, Insightful)
Wouldn't have to - IIRC it uses the GPL version(s) - Can't close what's already open, y'know? The only real effort would be in forking what you've already got.
(besides, GNOME is the default in many distros these days anyhoo, even the newbie-friendly ones. It is very, very capable of taking KDE's place).
Oh Dear: Nokia Does *Not* Get It (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Divx networks? We made Xvid.
If QT goes that route then we do have wxWidgets as you mentioned (which is a toolkit that I REALLY like - you mentioned Linux and Windows but the code also ports over to MacOS as well), or the obvious choice of GTK.
We will suh-vive.
KDE Free Qt Foundation (Score:5, Insightful)
Here it is: the KDE Free Qt Foundation [kde.org].
If Nokia screws up and stops releasing FOSS versions of Qt or otherwise messes with it, Qt's forcefully taken from them. The Foundation is there to ensure that Qt remains available. In a lot of ways, it would make more sense to do this now before Nokia starts using it as a hammer to pound DRM where it doesn't belong. Further, Nokia's competitors would be stupid to use it while Nokia controls it. Tools like Qt belong under an independent company or foundation. Jaaksi is just making that very clear.
What Jaaksi seems to be saying on behalf of his employer, Nokia, is that the company is unwilling to abide by the license (the GPL) under which their new business model is founded upon. That's not a way to appear clever. Though it's good of them to put the cards on the table so early after acquisition, it's still rather shameful of Nokia to try to bullshit us like that. Probably time to check the resume's of Nokia execs and dismiss any moles from Redmond.
I'm not planning on giving up on Qt anytime soon, but I do resent the increased level of alertness required by these probes.
Re:Emotional? (Score:2, Insightful)
Moderate TFA funny (Score:3, Insightful)
I really appreciate the : "We want to educate open-source developers. There are certain business rules [developers] need to obey, such as DRM, IPR [intellectual property rights], SIM locks and subsidised business models."
Who educates who ? You simply did not grasp the inner meaning of Open Source. You seem confused the world does not work as you want it to be. Your solution is then to "Educate", to teach reality to all this dreamers because you know the true. It's so pathetic that it's funny. You do not understand your model is obsolete, people do not want DRM, they do not want SIM lock.
You present these "technologies" as natural, but they are not. Coalition of network operators, manufacturers, and content providers want to impose it to the users. It's nothing natural, it's just the easiest way to keep high margin business. Or so you think, because users will not keep buying this s**t if they have choice. And FLOSS gives this choice.
Qt is not the loss, Trolltech is... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Here's an idea? Want DRM in your product? (Score:1, Insightful)
Isn't that the gist?
Is it some kinda law named after some guy (Moore, Murphy...) or something?
There are a few more good parts too... (Score:5, Insightful)
"In this industry, we don't care about our customers. If you want to work with us, you'll have to respect that."
"Our business models are very fragile. Please don't break them."
"Our business is based on customer lock-in, rather than customer satisfaction. Don't interfere."
"We accept that we have problems, and that if we followed your rules we wouldn't have these problems. But instead, we want you to follow our rules and enjoy our problems with us."
Ok.
A common fear about BSD-style licenses is that people will make closed forks. If the project is active, this fear is very likely overblown.
Ok.
Some people think that Nokia wants to go play by itself.
Dune (Score:2, Insightful)
In this case they don't control shit other than a phone. What an arrogant prick...and here I was actually thinking about getting a Nokia phone this year, silly me. Guess I can tell my friends and family they can cross Nokia off their lists since I won't help them with it.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
(which is not to say that there aren't any good projects, but the ones with crappy interfaces and lacking documentation are certainly in the majority...)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
This entire no DRM stand is basically saying that I can't have the option to purchase something or enter into some agreement with a company in a fair and free society. Actually, as long as the licenses are followed and a proper disclosure is don't so someone doesn't think they are buying something just to find out later that they got a right to use it in a certain way with a certain device, the open source community should be pretty agnostic about the DRM. There really is no reason to fear it and there certainly isn't a reason to promote Microsoft's agenda by forcing companies looking for DRM to deliver some product in some way to use their crap ware. DRM and the GPL isn't incompatible is it? Certainly not that I am aware of unless it is being used to thwart the GPL terms. As long as that isn't happening, where is the beef?
Re:Linux has two choices (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't see any evidence of linux being marginalized.
Re:Can an AC be at -2? Let's find out. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Oh Dear: Nokia Does *Not* Get It (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm amazed to see how hostile this reaction was towards a company that does contribute quite a lot to Open Source community and tries to work out a working solution for the conflicts that are currently present. I would imagine other companies won't dare to venture into Open Source realm because of the hostility and uncompromising attitude. Taking reality into account might help sometimes.
Bottom line is that Nokia won't be using Open Source Software as much as it would like to due to these restrictions. In my opinion this is not only loss on Nokia's part but also on OSS community is losing it's breakthrough to wider market and crucial steps towards general openness. The demand to meet every and all OSS requirement is not currently possible now and OSS community alone cannot figure out steps that would bring society as a whole closer to the ultimate openness target. What Nokia (and Ari Jaaksi) in my understanding is trying to suggest here is that OSS would relax a bit on some deal breakers on manufacturers side and allow them to embrace OSS more. Alternatively we will end up completely closed source solutions and this opportunity to change society in large scale is lost for now.
Nokia says "we like open source" (Score:4, Insightful)
It's about the carriers (Score:4, Insightful)
Coming from someone that just bought a Nokia N810, that might sound biased, but... I think most posters here completely missed the point.
Nokia sells cellphones, and most of them are sold to carriers that want to use SIM locks and DRM to lock in customers to their plans and those stupid ringtones at $1.
Why do you think they use Linux almost only for "Internet Tablets"? No carriers would never sell a phone that's unlocked out of the box, and the vast majority of cellphones are bought with a plan, not unlocked.
Why do you guys think the iPhone is selling so well? Because it's unlocked? Because it's Open Source? And why do you guys think the iTunes music store grew so big at first? Because it was DRM free?
Nokia, RedHat, Sun are not making the rules. Business, cellphone carriers, and media companies are the ones lobbying governments, and until that changes there is no way Open Source software will grow unless we gradually change those rules.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Implementing DRM in free software is in direct violation of that goal. DRM is a paradigm that, once again, is designed to build obstructions to the development and use of software and media. Asking OSS developers to build DRM solutions is like asking OSS developers to make "Linux Genuine Advantage" software to prevent Apt from working when the system is not "authorized", or activation software to brick your computer if you change the video card one too many times. Why in the world would an OSS developer do such a stupid thing? There simply isn't any utility.
So in short, the following question is purposeless: "is DRM compatible with OSS?" The question you should be asking: "why would an OSS developer donate his time to make his and everybody else's life harder?".
Dr. Ari Jaaski has convinced me... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
The changes in GPLv3 to fight DRM are entirely about the free market: either DRM adds enough benefit that companies implement their own codes or it doesn't and they use open source codes. It's up to the market to decide whether open source or DRM can coexist or if one dies. As open source developers, we write code for free and give it away under some license. If licenses with anti-DRM in them out-compete the others like say BSD then that is the market deciding that collaboration and spirit is more valuable than DRM.
When companies complain 'how can we compete with andriod when most of the cost was donated free by open source developers?' they are just whining. If they can't figure out how to compete then they need to drop DRM or die in the market -- that is a free market in action.
Re:Say what?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
Because in this case KDE agreement kicks in and the last published version of QT will be automatically relicensed under BSD license.
Nokia is in this for their own survival. (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:2, Insightful)
The inflammatory, anti-corporate view may seem more interesting, but people should read it again with a cool head. "We are not yet ready to play by the [FLOSS world's] rules", and neither is the FLOSS world (yet) ready to play by the mobile industry's rules. Only by communicating those rules, expectations and prejudices can be removed so that we can all play by the same rules.
You can't seriously expect phone manufacturers to remove the possibility of a SIM lock. You can't also seriously expect FLOSS developers not to want the modifications you made to their code to make the phone lockable. But if we want to work together (and we do), we need to find a way that makes everyone happy. This was his point, not "GIMME DRM IN LINUX OR I'LL KILL QT!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!"
Re:I don't know where to begin... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, it pretty much does. Unless your DRM system is a full-blown AI (with all the knowledge of a competent lawyer (for your jurisdiction)), how is it going to judge whether the mashup video that you want to create, using someone's DRM-encumbered audio stream, is a copyright violation or fair use? Does it depend on whether you are going to view your mashup in your own home, or send it to friends? Does it matter if you intend a commercial use for your mashup? Even an IP lawyer can't necessarily tell you how a judge is going to rule on a license violation issue (or whether the license is valid, meaningful, unconcionable, etc)
With DRM, the answer to your request to access encumbered content can never be "maybe" or "sometimes"; it pretty much has to be "yes" or "no".
I love DRM (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire point of Free Software is to allow you, the user, to have control over your device.* The entire point of DRM is to prevent you, the user, from having control over your device.
Do you see the problem yet?
(* Ensuring that you have both the source code to the software (what all versions of the GPL did) and the ability to install and run it (what the GPL3 does, which is why it was necessary) is merely the mechanism by which the Free Software Foundation attempts to accomplish this.)
Re:Say what?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
Am I saying it's perfect right now? No. But cut the guy some slack.
Also, both reports of his talk I've seen have misrepresented what he said. He also talked about [blogspot.com] businesses needing to learn how to do things the open-source way:
It's not just lip service. I've read elsewhere (can't remember where) that he genuinely regards the open-source development model as generally superior.
A fairer article would have titled the article "Nokia: Business and Open-Source Should Work to Understand Each Other and Compromise". But that doesn't generate traffic, now, does it?