Need Some help on explaing parts of DRM Please

[gorehound]

Hello All And Thanks In Advance:

I have some questions about DRM used on DVD's and Digital Copies.I work in a video store owned by my good friend and now he is saving all the "Digital Copies" to try and build himself a library.He intends on someday in the future (10-20 years) to buy a boat and maybe live on it and travel.Our rental library now is getting a lot of these discs that include a digital copy so we rent the real DVD and he keeps the digital copy Disc.
He has a passport drive and puts his copies on there slowly building up his library.Now I have stayed away from DRM and I just rip DVD's and do much of what others do on this site so I am not aware of all the issues you will see when dealing with files that have DRM on them.I just keep reading of horror stories but now I have to help my good friend out and find the answers.

1.How will he be able to play these files in 10 or 20 years ?
2.In order to play DRM copies do you always have to be connected to the Internet
3.What does it mean when you say DRM Authorizing Server ? And does these servers stay up always to authorize your digital copy ???
4.Do these new Digital Copies only work for a certain amount of time and then die ?
5.Explain some more of what DRM Means.Can you only watch a digi copy on one computer ? Can you plug your external drive with DRM Videos into another computer and it works ? or do you have to authorize the movies every time you move to a new machine or drive ?

Help us out here as I can not advise him properly and I know there are some very smart techies on this great site.

Thanks a lot
gorehound

[MOVIEGEEK]

Toss those digital copies in the trash because they will be worthless.

[jman98]

1.How will he be able to play these files in 10 or 20 years ?
2.In order to play DRM copies do you always have to be connected to the Internet
3.What does it mean when you say DRM Authorizing Server ? And does these servers stay up always to authorize your digital copy ???
4.Do these new Digital Copies only work for a certain amount of time and then die ?
5.Explain some more of what DRM Means.Can you only watch a digi copy on one computer ? Can you plug your external drive with DRM Videos into another computer and it works ? or do you have to authorize the movies every time you move to a new machine or drive ?

MOVIEGEEK's answer is correct, but brevity does nothing to answer your reasonable questions.

1. He may not be able to play them in 1 year! Some "digital copies" expire as soon as 6 months after you first watch them.
2. Unless someone has come up with something I don't know, the answer to this is "yes". A scheme that doesn't require you to be connected would probably be easy to crack.
3. A server that says you are OK to play the copy. HELL NO! This is one of the gigantic problems of DRM. A lot of people have bought DRMed music and the services are now out of business. Care to guess if the files are still playable? (Hint - the answer is NOT "yes")
4. YES!
5. Depends on the DRM. Maybe, maybe not. Yes.

That is why the digital copies are worthless.

[gorehound]

I found this on the Internet so maybe some can help and coment more.

So I have a couple of movies that came with a digital copy. Great right? Wrong. I jumped through the hoops to get the digital copy on my laptop. They worked fine. The instructions tell you to be sure to back up the file so I did this too. Well then my laptop decides to die on me. No big deal right? Everything is backed up so no real loss. Unfortunately, the digital copies of the movies wont work. They want to be registered but since the registration code has been used, they can no longer be registerd. What a worthless "feature". I've tried emailing the tech support for these different movies a few times and they assure that a response will be sent within two business days. Its a week later and I'm still waiting. Once again, the people that want to use thing legally are the ones taking it in the gut...

So I think You can only use a digital copy once even though you payed extra for it or am I wrong ???

[jimdagys]

I just learned about "Digital Copy" yesterday. There is a lot of info here:
http://blogs.computerworld.com/digital_copy_a_feature_thats_no_feature
I think it is like this: You're not too smart, but you've got money. You want transportation. You buy a Hummer for $120,000. The Hummer includes a Huffy bicycle which is more practical and so that is what you use. People that bought the Hummer supported this nonsense. Likewise, people that bought Hollywood DVDs supported "Digital Copy" nonsense. Me, I get my movies a practical way.
From the above blog, I can see that Hollywood is starting to piss off mainstream movie watchers. Big mistake.

[gorehound]

Thanks for that link.I read the article.It is sounding more and more like a useless feature that will only anger paying folks rather than make them happy.The DRM seems really evil on this type of media.I found out that you usually have to use it by a certain period and then you use it on only one computer.
The whole world seems like it is going digital and that is looking a lot like a bad thing.Films,Music,Books all with this DRM STuff is not a cool thing at all.It is a scary thing to me anyways.