Well, of course it isn\'t strictly immoral to sell i.e. the right to only use the music three times, only on weekends, between 3 and 5 am, but when it becomes immoral is when it is the only option made available. This is possible with music, since obviously there is no option to get a competitor\'s product. Also, looking at the omnipresence of just very few big labels, chanches of consumers would be next to zero to get anything besides the DRM\'d stuff. Just look at copy-protected CDs (better called \"usage-impaired CDs\" ). You simply can\'t get any that are usable. And you pay the same price for less functionality. Even if there would be non-DRM alternatives for the same content offered by these labels, it surely would be at an unreasonable price (because they give you soooo much more freedom *yawn*).
And let\'s face it, it does not stop any halfway intelligent pirate, does it? I mean, they\'re doing illegal things anyway, will they really care about the new laws? Also, they have exceptionally good and extensive equipment and technical know-how, so is there even the chance of DRM stopping one single pirate?
The only ones that are (maybe) stopped are the consumers who want to have fair use and copy the stuff for their friends, just like they always did (tapes, anyone?).
While one can of course argue about the legal and moral questions of fair use, one should be very careful to criminalise a common behaviour and therefore have 70% of any nation\'s population branded as criminals, especially if it\'s done to cater to some unflexible corporations who don\'t feel like adjusting their strategies (failing the most important directive in a capitalistic economy).
It may, therefore, be morally OK to sell the right to use the content 3 times only, but if the sale is done at the exact same (or higher, or only slightly lower) price than the unlimited usage right used to be, and / or if there are no alternatives, then it becomes morally wrong.
As long as I have the choice (and at a price I see as appropriate, not as artificially inflated), I will only buy unrestricted things. I want these rights regardless of what the music industry tells me I want / need.
If you start selling limited rights, then you\'re going to sell a computer that I may only use for certain things? Like running only Microsoft software? I don\'t think buying restricted rights is a good idea.
