Hmmm iRex or Sony (DRM question)

[bingle]

Originally Posted by lordvetinari2

Everytime good ole hackers try to open the PSP to homebrew software, Sony closes the hole. Of course, it's just a game of cat and mouse, but they don't like it. Game developers do not want their games copied, so Sony closes the system. If it were for Sony, they would leave it open and sell PSP like candy. Something similar will happen to the Mylo, probably. I don't think Skype will like the competition of a fan-port of other VoIP programs.

There's a couple reasons for this. One is that, indeed, cracking the device means overcoming the copy protection (for the PSP) and that allows piracy as much as homebrew games. The other is that the business model for game consoles depends on selling games and software, and even legitimate homebrew applications potentially detract from that market. It's interesting to note that a few days ago a Japanese analyst firm predicted that Sony would sell fewer PS3s than they promised. This led to them *upgrading* Sony's expected profits! Consoles are priced at such a loss that selling one with no games is worse than not selling one at all.

However, conversely to that, it's worth noting that Sony released an official homebrew kit for the PS2 - the PS2 Linux kit. It kept the proprietary DRM libraries secret, but opened up the rest of the system for development. It wasn't terribly useful for actual homebrew, because you couldn't easily distribute or run the software created, but it was, technically, an open platform.

Originally Posted by lordvetinari2

There's a difference between the PSP on one hand and Mylo and the Reader on the other, though. They both run on Linux. Now, the Linux kernel and other bits are licensed under GPL and Sony would be required to completely open the system. So, if they open the system, that would probably mean (I'm no programmer, but it fits) that their e-book DRM is cracked open. Publishers won't like it, and they stop supporting Sony. Sony doesn't get licence money and closes the security hole.

So, I'm still not sure about what's going to happen with the Reader. Looking at the reasons for the PlayStation platform being so closed, the Reader being open depends on a few things:

First, and most important, the Reader must be able to stand on its own financially. There has to be significant profit from selling a Reader alone. The profit must not depend on selling books to read - otherwise it'll be locked down as tightly as the PSP. The Librie was this way. But the fact that Sony is including txt and other formats probably means they're OK with people reading Gutenberg texts instead of Connect store texts (or they're just hoping no one knows about Gutenberg...) So that makes me hopeful.

Second, it must use a type of security that can be isolated from running applications. The PSP and PS2 depended on only running secured code that had been "blessed" by Sony. However, DRM generally doesn't need that level of security (well, it does in an absolute sense... That's why we're getting "Trusted Computing", but that's a topic for another time.) PCs are terribly insecure from a running-executables point of view, but they're OK at DRM. So I think the Reader also passes that hurdle.

But it's not all clear, yet - Sony isn't including any way to read books from *other* online stores, which they would do if they were totally secure in selling just the Reader. And allowing people to write their own apps means someone will inevitably write a non-DRM BBeB Reader. So it could be the case that they're going to lock down the Reader too.

As always, this is based entirely on my own speculations and publically-available knowledge, not on any special insider information :-) I don't know anything, I swear!

[NatCh]

Originally Posted by bingle

Sony isn't including any way to read books from *other* online stores, which they would do if they were totally secure in selling just the Reader.

Assuming the other on-line content stores want to cooperate, don't want to charge too much for said cooperation, etc., etc.

Now that you mention it, without "inside information" we can't know what they might be trying to negotiate. Just 'cause they aren't telling us that they want to include other readers, doesn't necessarily mean that they don't. I'm not saying it's so, only that we don't have any way of knowing that it's not so.

Then there's the whole, well worn point that the Sony Reader is a Linux OS, so other content providers can conceivably create reader software for it on their own.

Personally, I think an Audible client for these readers would be entirely too nifty to stand.