It was just 2 weeks ago that we got the hot tip from Engadget that Microsoft's PlaysForSure DRM had been mugged like a little old lady in Central Park after sundown. FairUse4WM made headlines everywhere and Microsoft, in an effort to save it's digital music distribution street cred, was amazingly quick to offer up a patch.

Then the counterstrike came. According to Engadget, "The new release -- version 1.2 -- knocks out DRMv1 files you've ripped yourself with protection, breaks down individualized WM9 files and has a workaround for WM11beta2".

And thus was born a new digital arms race. It could be argued that Microsoft needs this like a lame foot, with the launch of Zune approaching in something closer to weeks than months.

Bruce Schneier of Wired News, who it should be pointed out is a security geek rather than a music geek, has written a scathing article that calls Microsoft out like a drunk in a barfight over the relative quickness in which the Redmond kids have been able to release a patch. Schneier, a man keenly aware of Microsoft's attention to real security vulnerabilities, thinks there's some inequity a foot. When it's your problem, such as when your machine is vulnerable to actual cracker attack, Microsoft doesn't seem to have the same motivation to issue a fix. When it's a problem that might cost Redmond money, or market share, they're right on it.

Unfortunately for users of the world's most popular OS, Schneier remains skeptical we'll ever see an end to the one sided nature of the beast, "If Microsoft abandoned this Sisyphean effort and put the same development effort into building a fast and reliable patching system, the entire internet would benefit. But simple economics says it probably never will."

Schneier is right, and that's one more reason why DRM should end. As I've said before, DRM doesn't protect copyrighted content from piracy, it protects the business models of a few dominant companies. Digital Market Manipulation?

(Thanks Monoto!)