After a month or so of heated debate, including France's Trade
Minister telling Apple: "I don't want the
crap," France's
DRM-killa legislation has lost most of its teeth in committee, after being passed by the National
Assembly. The new draft of the legislation switches out phrases like "copy in an open standard" for
"protected copy," puts restrictions on getting access to information needed for interoperability, and says
that DRM publishers don't have to publish source code if they can prove it harms that DRM's security. It sounds
basically like a whole bunch of wins for team Apple, a lot of lost ground for Mr. "I don't want the crap,"
and a possible overall loss for consumer rights in France. Turns out the bill has been hijacked by Universal/Vivendi
and they're having their way with it, but nothing has been passed into law yet, so we'll just have to wait and see how
this sorts out.[Via Ars Technica]