OneAndOneIs2

Since its inception, the GPL3/DMCA has become notorious in the IT world. Its purpose is to make it illegal to do something that is otherwise both legal and technically simple: Make hardware that will only run digitally-signed Free Software/Bypass technical measures that prevent users from excercising their Fair Use rights.

The authors justify this on moral grounds: It is necessary to prevent Tivoization/piracy, something the authors are dead-set on combating. Although there are acknowledged reasons why an end-user might wish to restrict a computer to digitally signed binaries/make copies of copyrighted works that are both completely legal and perfectly ethical, the authors of the GPL3/DMCA are of the opinion that these uses must be sacrificed for what they consider to be "the greater good". They are more than willing to sacrifice your freedom to do something to support their crusade.

But what makes it a truly bad concept is not what it prevents you from doing, but the sheer, fundamental uselessness of it: The one thing it was created to prevent, it fails utterly to stop.

Anybody wishing to Tivoize/pirate a body of work can do so very easily by use of simple alternatives: By using the GPL2 version or BSD equivalent/downloading the cracked versions, anybody can easily and simply bypass the unwanted restrictions and use that work as they see fit - GPL3/DRM notwithstanding. The quality of a work gained in such a fashion might not be quite as good as the "real thing" but the slight loss in quality is more than made up for by the lack of GPL3/DRM restrictions.

Even the people it claims to have been created to protect are often not in agreement with its existence: Many open source developers/artists have gone on-record as being against GPL v3./DRM and the DMCA because it has no other purpose than preventing the spread of their work, which only harms them in the long run: The fewer people that are exposed to their work, the fewer will be inclined to contribute patches and support/buy the records and attend the concerts - by focussing on the short-term loss, the GPL 3/DRM wipes out far greater long-term gains.

But in truth, the GPL3/DMCA isn't about those people. It's about its authors: People who are more concerned with their own crusades than about what the actual end results are. Their minds are made up: Tivos/Downloadable music is a bad thing that must be stamped out at any costs. Never mind how the Moxi/iTunes have shown how embedded devices/MP3 players can result in a net benefit to the creators of a GPL'd/copyrighted work. These are aberrations or irrelevances to what the authors of the GPL3/DMCA know without doubt: That the best way to make software/music popular is to limit the ways it can be used.