Key aspects of an effective DRM system include:
DRM has a number of advantages:
Most DRM solutions build upon the same chain of production, transaction
and consuming of the content. The creator - an author, musician, artist - makes the content. The creator or the publisher converts the content in an electronic accessible format (for example in HTML, XML, MP3). The next
step is encryption so that the content can only be read by people who are able
to decrypt (by means of a software key for example). The encrypted content is
placed on a server. The server recognises and manages the different kinds of
licences and payment and decrypts the content or gives keys with which people
can decrypt the content.
Next to that, the design of the DRM solution has to take into account a few demands to
security, privacy and capacity.
There has been much turbulence in the market for DRM products. An initial boom in the number of producers of DRM
systems was followed by consolidation. Although the need for DRM
solutions for publishers seems obvious and the offered products look promising,
there is reason to doubt the success in future for DRM products.
First, although DRM offers protection to the digital content, not one
system can be seen as 100% piracy-proof. There will always remain ways of
circumventing the protection measures. The software and publishing industries
therefore stress that besides sophisticated DRM-systems, protection by law of
the copyrights is necessary. A more serious threat to the DRM market is that
DRM system vendors have targeted to sell their products to the e-publishing
industry. And particularly the market for paid e-books stays far behind the
initial expectations.
The availability of digital texts is a major breakthrough in the access to
information for people with a reading impairment. Without the mediation of special
services high quality e-books are becoming available on the market. With their
screenreaders and adaptive devices or software the reading impaired can theoretically
read every e-book, but on the other hand DRM also can be a major threat for
access to information by people with a reading impairment. (George
Kerscher, Jim Fruchterman. The soundproof book).
For example, the options to copy a text are blocked by DRM. This prevent illegal
distribution of the book, but it also prohibits the screen reader providing
access with synthetic text to speech (TTS) or braille. The result is that people
with a reading impairment are denied access to the e-book, because the screen
reader cannot work. A solution can be the availability of access directly into
the user interface. This is exactly what has been done by Adobe in 2000 and
Microsoft in 2001. Both companies released e-book readers which use TTS to present
textual information in to speech. Although this seems to be a very positive
development, accessibility is now threatened by the issue of the audio rights
on the e-book.
In most industrialised countries there are services to provide people with reading impairments with reading materials in alternative format. Where the largest amounts of these formats are on audiocassette and braille, the number of organisations providing accessible content in digital formats is growing. Of course, depending on the copyright laws and contracts with publishers, those organisations have to protect these publications in alternative format.