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July 28, 2008

stores

Apple Genius Bars draw the ire of anti-DRM campaigners

Posted Jul. 28, ’08, 2:24 PM PT by David Dahlquist
Category | Apple » Stores

drm.jpg

In the noble war against DRM, civilians may be hurt; we call this collateral damage, like that Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. This time, the collateral damage may end up being Apple customers in need of help at the Genius Bar.

Anti-DRM guerilla group Defective By Design is urging people to book slots at Apple’s Genius Bars and pester them with questions about DRM. They also have a number of gripes about the iPhone, but that’s another story.

Not only will this guerilla action waste the time of legitimate Apple customers and annoy the underpaid, already-hassled-enough Mac Geniuses, but it will also prove to be a futile effort on behalf of the anti-DRM crusaders, because, guess what? DRM isn’t really the fault of Apple Geniuses or even Apple, per se. It’s the big, greedy, clueless record labels that need to be told what’s up. They’re the guys who still think it’s a good idea to restrict their customer’s use of the music they paid for. Take it up to them.

Apple is more or less just trying to make due with what the labels will allow them. Sure they could do more to pressure the labels to allow DRM-free music and movies, but really, pestering the 20 year old Apple Genius at the mall isn’t going to do much.

[Via 9to5Mac]


4 Comments

nitpick said:

not to nitpick, but "Collateral Damage" was an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. "Collateral" was the movie with Tom Cruise.

July 28, 2008 2:44 PM
David Dahlquist said:

@nitpick: Ya got me there!

July 28, 2008 3:25 PM
Anonymous said:

Must be nice to be able to waste your time wasting other people's time. Seems this whole idea is 'defective by design'

July 28, 2008 4:30 PM
Jason said:

I wonder how defective by design would like to have their webserver bombarded with useless traffic? These types of lame "protests" do nothing to solve the problem - they don't even get the problem more publicity, they are just something to try and make innocent people's life much harder than it needs to be (Apple employees). I think it's a stupid idea and their poster looks like an 8 year old created it.

July 28, 2008 5:58 PM

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