One DRM to rule them all
Now voices are raising after everyone awakes with a headache that this move from Apple to Intel processors was about more then just processor speed. Its Intel that has been pushing Palladium or Trusted Computing or whatever you want to call it since the last years and its Intel that already announced that all their processors/mobos will have a hardware side DRM system in the very short future. Now Apple was widely seen as not implementing the Trusted Computing Platform mostly because they didnīt use Intel processors and it was widely believed that IBM would not join the DRM crazyness (even thought they are a member of the Trusted Computing Group). Now if you would have asked me before the iPod if Apple would ever implement DRM on the hardware side I would have said clearly "no". Now I am not sure anymore. That must be a dream come true for all the movie and record industry executives. In less then a year they will have a homogenic hardware enabled DRM scheme on all consumer computer copy machines. Linux comes to rescue you think? Linux is also on Intel/AMD hardware (amd is also a member of the TCP forum) and the Linux community can feel lucky if they even get open access to the DRM functions to run the OS. Environments without diversity can not be a good thing - not for Apple users not for PC users not for Windows Users not for Linux Users - it leaves doors wide open for monopoly power abuse and misuse - at least you can look ahead to rent your video online in less then two years through a DRM enabled trusted computing environment.