#IDAD, International Day Against DRM

Today we are celebrating the International Day Against DRM.

DRM, or Digital Rights Management, is a set of access control technologies for restricting the use of proprietary hardware and copyrighted works, by controlling the use, modification, and distribution of copyrighted works. Instead of educating users, companies prefer to restrict them from exercising their legal rights under the copyright law, such as backing up copies of CDs or DVDs, lending materials out through a library, accessing works in the public domain, or using copyrighted materials for research and education under the fair use doctrine.

DRM is an epidemic spreading across the Web, infiltrating homes, classrooms, workplaces, and just about everywhere else users can go. Tools, technologies, books, games, movies, and music are coming to us locked down with DRM, whether they are streaming or claim to be locally hosted.

DRM can be associated to document lock in by means of pseudo-standards. They are both hidden to users and reduce their freedom as they make sharing contents – even when fully legitimate – completely or partially impossible.

The Document Foundation supports the International Day Against DRM as part of its daily fight to make content sharing available to all individuals, and to educate them to adopt open standards to foster innovation.