One of the most shocking elements of the Sony-BMG rootkit disaster, has been the inches of press written about the Draconian EULA that have been forced onto users.

The Electronic Frontier Association has a great high level interpretation that is a must read. The full text of that EULA, is here.

Basically, Sony is trying to say the following:

You can only play the music on their preferred players (so no Winamp).
You can only transfer the music to their preferred portable players (so no iPod).
You are obliged to keep the software (the rootkit) up to date with patches. If you don’t your “license” to play the music is revoked and you have to remove them.
If you lose your CD, you no longer have a “license” to play your music, and you have to remove them.
If your system is damaged because of the rootkit, you have no right to sue Sony-BMG.
You have no right to sell this CD. Ever.

Clearly, Sony have turned into a load of facists who really really believe they can control how we play our music down to such a finite degree.

What went wrong? How did it come to such extremes? How did we have CD’s one day that we could copy, share, sell, lose, and re-buy; then suddenly wake up with this, for lack of a better term, facist EULA that has come out of nowhere?

I think the problem is, there probably was a EULA like this, back in the day, but they were never enforced. What publicised ‘piracy’ there was, was always restricted to my good friend Igor, everyone’s favorite Russian mobster-cum CD Pirate. The average Joe, made mixed tapes, had stacks of CD’s thanks to Columbia House (but never paid), and generally did whatever the hell he/she pleased.

I think we always had a consumer EULA, it was assumed. We never felt the need to flex our consumer muscles, because the music was ours to do with as we needed. If a friend had the new Duran Duran, we’d glady trade our Adam Ant album for a week or so. What harm did it do? Nothing. I, I mean Average Joe, didn’t have the money at the time. The mixed tap was a stop gap, until Joe got paid.

But now, its like this plastic albatross across our neck. We can’t play it wherever we want, it might break when we do play it on our CD, it won’t work on your iPod, and if you lose it yout stuffed.

Enough I say.

What I would like to propose is that we as consumers, excercise our own EULA. This EULA is our minimum requirements for purchasing music. If a company, like Sony-BMG, is unwilling to agree to our terms, they can simply go into the corner and not get sold, EVER. I’m not proposing a BAN on Sony mind you, all I’m saying is that we should DESERVE the respect that has been sadly missing of late.

Consumer EULA

1. We should be able to play our music in any player that we chose.
2. We should be able to make as many backups as we wish, as long as those backups are not traded/used simultaneously.
3. We should be able to rip into ANY format that we chose, in ANY bitrate that we chose.
4. We should not have to accept ANY software install, unless it is for extra features or games that WE deem acceptable.
5. We should be able to store digital copies on any personal or business PC that we deem acceptable.
6. If we go bankrupt, we still have rights to retain our digital copies.
7. If our CD is stolen/lost/broken, we still have rights to keep our digital copies.
8. If #6 or #7 applies, AND our digitial copies are lost, we SHOULD be able to download equivilants from your site for a nominal fee.
9. Our license will allow us to loan the CD out to whoever we chose. That person, however, will not have rights to create digital copies.
10. Our license will allow us to sell the CD to whoever we chose.

Will the music industry agree to this Bill of Rights? Well, they have the freedom to either accept it, or deal with the backlash from frustrated, fed up, and pissed off consumers NOT buying their product.

The revolution will not be televised. It’ll stream from every corner of the earth.