The Clicker: Design your own DRM scheme and win!

Every Thursday Stephen Speicher contributes
The Clicker, a weekly column on entertainment and technology:

NOTE FROM AUTHOR: This week's column contains no real information. It is simply (more so than usual) some ramblings on DRM. If you don't like rambling, don't read this and certainly don't comment to that effect.
After all, you were warned. On the other hand, we're offering a prize with this entry.

After column upon column of "DRM is evil" talk, it's time to take the matter into our own hands. It's your turn to suggest a DRM scheme you'd be willing to live with. To that end we're giving away an iZon Bluetooth MP3 player to the person with the most interesting comment in this thread*. Let us know how you would balance the rights of all parties involved. Just how do you think this whole crazy thing should work?

My suggestion: let's get back to the basics. That's right, Mr. Peabody, we're hopping into the Wayback Machine and we're returning to the root of it all, accountability. Accountability? That's right, accountability.

Fundamentally, there are only two real ways to prevent piracy: you can a) make it impossible for people to distribute the media or you can b) convince people that it's not in their best interests to share the content.

While content-providers are doing their damnedest to implement the ?impossible? strategy, it?s really just that:
impossible. The tighter the regulatory grip becomes, the more likely someone will feel the ?need? to free the content.
Content providers like to pretend that this is the result of a Mountain-Dew-drinking subversive element. However, more often than not, it?s someone who simply wants to listen to his or her iTunes Music Store purchases on an iRiver device.
Extremely tight control all but forces the DRM to be cracked.

So the question becomes: What happens if the ?need? to break the encryption is removed? What happens if data and content are allowed to flow freely?

Am I suggesting chaos? Heck no. I?m tossing out an idea: that content-providers shift all their resources towards watermarking technology:

Step 1: Watermark the content with the user?s information.

Let?s say you buy a song from iTunes. Currently, encoded somewhere in the file is your name/account number. Apple does this as part of their DRM. Let?s take that a step further. Let?s put in your name, address, email address, etc. Let?s make it such that, if another person gets that file, they know it?s yours. Likewise, if a company discovers that file on a file-sharing network, they can easily track you down.

Step 2: Distribute a user-information reader.

User-information reader? Yes, the purpose of this program is to quickly ascertain the user information for any file.
This program will be placed prominently on all sorts of sites. If you have a question as to who owns the file, fire up your reader. Oh sure ? you can use a hex reader to see some of that information today, but let?s not hide it. Let?s celebrate it. Advertise it. Let people know that if they share their files, they are sharing their information. If they don?t want their information spread, they should show some discretion in sharing.

Step 3: Shift all resources towards maintaining the integrity of the file.

Hash it. Encrypt it. Do what you like, but make sure that the file only plays if it?s been unaltered. I agree; that?s not an easy problem. However, it?s really no harder than completely locking down the file. This of course would mean you would need to produce closed-source tools for all the major operating systems, but this could be done.

Step 4: Key Revocation

Design the system such that each piece of information (e.g. every copy of every song, movie, DVR?ed TV show, etc.) has its own globally unique identifier. The file will already contain your personal information. This will certainly aid the process of generating a unique identifier for that content.

If content owners find protected content in the wild, they can revoke that specific file and all the copies of that content that share that unique identifier. To me, this seems reasonable. If the content is being shared at large across the internet, it really deserves to be revoked.

The point of all this is to produce a semi-fluid system. Have forty devices? That?s fine; there are no restrictions on how you spread the files. Want to share a file with a friend? Go right ahead and email it over. Just be sure that it?s a close friend who will treat your files with the same respect as you would.

Spread the tools wildly. Put the technology in every device. If you take away the need to break the DRM, maybe, just maybe people would leave it alone.

Well? no doubt there are holes, but that?s what brainstorming is for. Let?s hear what you?ve got. Remember, the most interesting comment gets a new toy.

* As judged by Engadget?s illustrious editors. You have until noon EST on Tuesday, August 2nd to enter. One submission per person, so if you post multiple comments please make it explicitly clear which post is your entry for the contest.

If you have comments or suggestions for future columns, drop an email to
theclicker@theevilempire.com