The deals that Microsoft has struck with the content providers in terms of how Vista exerts its Digital Rights Management (DRM) could be the smartest thing Microsoft has ever done in the short term, but eventually its efforts will fail according to Bob Cringelyis weekly column posted Friday.
Mr. Cringely described the glee of the Hollywood and music studios as customers were all forced to give up their VCRs and cassette players and buy new media and equipment in the 1990s. Just to play content theyid already paid for once. The new DRM mechanisms in Vista will force customers to do it all over again according to Mr. Cringely: "Intel and AMD love it. ATI and nVidia love it. Thomson and Philips and Sony and Matsushita and Samsung and LG love it. Every movie studio, TV network, and record company loves it. The only people who donit love it are consumers, and neither industry nor government really cared much about them, ever."
However, the noted analyst predicted that, in time, Microsoft wonit be able to maintain the tight controls. Vista just isnit up to the task. And the next generation of customers and user-generated video has no use for Microsoft.