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I still have a question... so DRM is not 100% secure (ok,nothing is) and sites that use DRM have to lower their membership so that people don't get pissed off, but in the end members are still pissed since they can't have anything saved on their computers even after they cancel membership, and content owners are still pissed off because it DRM doesn't guarantee their files won't be shared and they have bunch load of pissed members...
God... so DRM yes, or DRM no?
Me..personally...NO!Quote:
Originally Posted by dalimili
Most all of the problems people mention about DRM in this thread can be overcome by the manner in which DRM is implemented. It is highly customizable and can be implemented and set to various specifications.
For example you can make a license last an hour or you can make it indefinite.
And as for the authentication server going down, that's a problem much like any other hosting issue. Get a reliable set up and it's no more a problem than any other aspect of running a site (which is to say, your regular host can go down and take your entire site down for a day but that prospect doesn't make us all unwilling to run websites, does it? It's something we do our best to avoid but always a possibility nonetheless).
for me, no drm. i like happy customers and quicktime videos.
Quote:
Originally Posted by dalimili
So... what do you do to protect yourself from customers who only buy trial stuff and go inside with some software download all and don't come back until some other major update?
Do you think Limiting daily download goes well with customers? I mean, not limiting it to 10 MB ofcourse, but for instance 200 MB?
ANy other alternatives?
why not DRM the files based on usage? Say sharing between 5 PCs max and let the members keep it. Sort of what Apple's DRM is like, not sure if it can be done with video files.
I'm also interested in DRM protection, but I read it's possible remove DRM protection from .wmv files.
search in google: remove DRM protection
you can find some info about this.
you can either stop selling trials, limit each trial's downloads or offer trials with limited content unless they upgrade to monthly (this is what naughtyamerica does).
basschick is absolutely right! I can not say this enough... just don't sell trials! I hate them!!! They almost never convert to full memberships... they are a waste of the affiliate's traffic and the paysite's content.Quote:
Originally Posted by dalimili
Quote:
Originally Posted by Xstr8guy
For the site I'm currently working on I tought at first not to give trial option at all, but then I tought "what the heck" so I came out with rather high trial options of $19.95 for 7 days.
Since site is suppose to be updated daily, even if they download everything for that week, next week there will be 1200 more pix inside and 7 new videos..so either they'll keep buying 7 day trials or keep the monthly membership...
I don't know...
dalimili - what is the monthly price of your site?
and btw, reps at both paycom and ccbill told me that the high priced trials get a LOT of chargebacks.
$29.95... I didn't even think that lot of people would buy weekky trials at that high price , but that's exactly what I want, because there's only 10$ difference, so I tought they would then rather buy monthly membership...Quote:
Originally Posted by basschick
I'm not really keen on giving trials, as my tour will be exact reflection of members pages, I figure they will know what they're buying and they won't need that trial... or am I wrong?
there's no point in a $19.95 trial. most people who will spend $19.95 will probably spend $29.95, but some people might resent having spend $19.95 for so short a time and charge back...
basschick, glad you liked my reply :)
dalimili, I think DRM has its place, if you offer top quality exclusive content its a fantastic alternative to only providing video streams. As long as the member keeps his membership active he can play any videos he downloaded from his own computer.
I would highly recommend dropping any trial periods. More and more site owners are doing this, when we dropped trials we had a very small decrease in the number of signups, however, we also had a huge increase in the number of surfers that rebilled too. It was like when they stuck around for the month and saw the site was good they decided to keep their membership for longer.
webnet, its not impossible to remove (or maybe the right term is defeat) DRM protection. Just for fun I did google "remove DRM protection" and the 2nd site that came up was "*** WINDOWS MEDIA COPY PROTECTION CRACKED ***" LOL!!!
cheers,
Luke
We did trials for a while, but people would join on the $8 trial, download all the content, and not renew, so now we don't offer trials any more. Actually, it significantly increased our income... we have a few less members, but a lot more cash, since all join at the one month level or higher.
As for DRM, it is *not* limited to WMV, it's just that at this moment, the most advanced DRM toolkits are the ones written based on the Windows Media DRM technology. There are several people offering DRM options for Quicktime, just none that are as sophisticated or mature as WMV; give it some time, and it will mature. Another option is Flash Video. Much harder to download the files, but requires a Macromedia streaming server to implement in volume.
As for arguments that customers don't like DRM... well, phooey. It depends on implementation, as others have said. What many sites are doing is allowing a license that can be unlocked for play on a single computer for an unlimited period. So anyone that joins can get any video and view it as long as they want, as long as they don't change computers. If they change computers, they re-join for a month, and reactivate all the videos they have (without downloading again). Most sensible people consider that reasonable.
There will never be an uncrackable DRM, but using a good DRM toolkit will certainly make it more difficult to trade rights-protected videos, and I think that's what matters.