DRM denial

TotalVid has a nice collection of skate/snowboard videos available for download at about $3.99 each. Sounds good, so I was ready to pay and download Wee Man and Laban Pheidas' American Misfits, when I found out that the store uses Windows Media DRM to protect the files, so you can only play them on Windows with Media Player 7.1 or above - "This is done to prevent file sharing".

Disappointed, I headed to Suprnova, found the torrent file, downloaded it overnight (well done with preventing file sharing there, DRM enthusiasts) and watched it today. It's pretty good. The dilemma now is: do I do the seemingly honourable thing and pay TotalVid the $4 fee, without actually downloading the video, or would that only encourage them to keep their pointless DRM system even longer?

If I choose the second option, this becomes an ironic quote from thePlatform's site: "TotalVid is a great example of how Windows Media DRM can help make full-length feature download ‘rentals’ a viable business,” said Jason Reindorp, Group Manager, Windows Digital Media Division at Microsoft Corp.