Digital wrongs management

From the Department of What the Meaning of the Word "is" is:

In a brief entry about "digital rights management," Steven Shaviro shares the following gem from the "Terms of Use Agreement" of buymusic.com:

“All downloaded music, images, video, artwork, text, software and other copyrightable materials (“Content”) are sublicensed to End Users and not sold, notwithstanding use of the terms “sell,” “purchase,” “order,” or “buy” on the Site or this Agreement…End User may only download, transfer, copy and use the Digital Downloads as stated in the particular song, partial album or album’s Metadata Information, which is hereby incorporated by reference. No other downloads, transfers, copies or uses of Digital Downloads are permitted.

Back in the old days, before acronyms, I think we called this lying. But then, I guess that temporarilysublicensemusic.com isn't quite as catchy. Of course, you might remember buymusic.com as the download service that put out national television ads that clearly ripped off Apple's iTunes Store commercials. Here's the Slate article about buymusic.com's rip-off unacknowledged sublicensing of Apple's commercials (not to mention service).

Lest this entire entry seem negative, there's a nice set of resources courtesy of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which includes some smart remarks about the problems with DRM. Those problems include some fundamental conflicts with the concept of "fair use," which is crucial for those of us in education.