ACTLab > Disruptive Technologies > Spring 2008
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Welcome to Cecy Correa's Disruptive Technologies course page.

Project 2

For this project, I wanted to explore the interplay between DRM, the DMCA and illegal downloading. The industry views illegal downloading as a crime, and I wanted to contrast that with the worst possible crime of all: murder. Ripping a DVD or CD is a violation of the DMCA, yet in the documentary This Film Is Not Yet Rated, which deals with the MPAA and the ratings system, the MPAA illegally ripped and made copies of the director's film for review--which is a violation of the director's copyright (the DMCA states any copy whatsoever of a copyrighted work is copyright infingement). In my project, I wanted to point out several things:

  • Because of the restrictive nature of DRM, everyone, at one point or another, will come at odds with it (as exemplified in the This Film is Not Yet Rated example).
  • The business model the movie and music industry is based on is a dying model
  • In order to complete this project, I had to rip several DVDs. Although this project falls under the laws of fair use for several reasons (non-commercial use, parody, free speech), the DMCA has deemed it illegal by the sole reason of the breaking of the DRM in the DVDs. You can download a fair use checklist here.

Click here to watch the video.