That’s the word from Colorado, where Disney exec Preston Padden informed Paul and the rest of the audience at the Silicon Flatirons telecom conference that DRM is the secret to the company’s online success. Wonder if he’s discussed this with Disney’s largest shareholder, Steve “Abolish DRM” Jobs.
Forgot to add this — I did ask Padden about Jobs and DRM. His tongue-in-cheek reply: “Steve Jobs is a member of our board of directors, which sets my compensation. That’s all I have to say.”
Echoing a comment made on the original post, I must add that Jobs did not talk about video DRM, only music DRM. It’s easy to see why. Video is not as widely pirated because its filesizes are much larger and will be slower to go DRM-free because its production costs are much higher, unlike music where high-quality music production tools are now available to practically anybody at a pretty low price.