Tag Archives: drm

Gave DRM talk at UANL

Today I gave a talk about DRM technologies and how they affect everyone that consumes products with them. It took place at the UANL physics and mathematics faculty.

It interests me very much the fact that its the second time they invite me to give this talk (and I hope to get invited many more) because typically at schools and universities, at least in general in Mexico, this topic never shows up on anyone’s radar. Probably software licensing, but not DRM technologies and issues.

I hope more universities follow this trend and call people to talk to them about current topics and not just stick to the education program and teach how to be code monkeys.

Maybe it has something to do with the mathematics (cryptography) on the DRM technologies and that’s why I got invited by the physics and mathematics faculty instead of the computer science faculty. I thought about that so I updated my talk and slides to explain a bit more on the cryptography side (very basic stuff) this time.

The talk went very well and got good response from the audience. I even gave out stickers!

I’m a lucky guy

Seeing this xkcd comic made me think about how lucky I am with my girlfriend. She listens to all my ramblings about free software and free culture and she even went to my anti drm talks I’ve given on several universities.

She puts up with it. I’m not sure if she buys it, but at least she doesn’t runs like the one in the comic.

DRM chat at Unitec: video and slides

A few weeks ago I posted about me giving a talk at Unitec Monterrey about DRM and mexican copyright law titled: “DRM: ¿derechos o restricciones?”. Basically is an introduction to what DRM and copyright is, according to mexican law.

I have finally transcoded and published it on Google Video. Slides are also available as PDF and Open Document ODP.

DRM chat at Unitec Monterrey

Last week I was invited to talk at the Unitec University in Monterrey about DRM and copyright, of course, applied to mexican law. Which is interesting since the mexican law allows for people to have a copy of a work for personal use only. This means P2P and basically all forms of file sharing are allowed.

This is the first time I talk about this topic. Even though I’m very passionate about it, I think I still need to learn a lot on how to deliver the right and complete message. Fortunately I recorded the whole chat on video (video coming soon) and will improve for next time. On the good side, everything got cleared up during the audience questions.

The public’s reaction was interesting. A lot of people there were surprised when I mentioned GNU/Linux and open source software. Others, for some strange and bizarre reason, insisted on me giving them advice on antivirus software and providing them with serial numbers for their software. No, I never mentioned or endorsed the use of unofficial (or cracked) serial numbers for their software. I don’t know where this guy got this idea from me.

But it keeps surprising me the fact that, every time I talk about software freedom, there’s a lot of people that didn’t have a clue that they have a choice.