CONTEXTS

Applied ResearchLiza Pottsmake better decisions going forward, onesthat match our mission. (Bezos, 2009).While clearly these user experiences are broken,it is unclear how Amazon hopes to balance userexpectations with content-licensing issues. As oneposter to a technology blog noted, “This is why DRMis bad, kids” (Anonymous, 2009). The communityhopes that such moves would include ensuring thatany content sold through Amazon was licensedcontent (Sunny Lady, 2009). While Amazon’s businessrule might be to sell only content that has secured theappropriate license, it certainly was not the businesspractice in this case. Another point made was theneed to close the Whispernet backdoor that allowsAmazon to delete content (Frauenfelder, 2009). Asone researcher has stated, “Policies that are subject tomany exemptions or based on conditions that may beindeterminate or external are difficult or impossible toautomate with DRM” (Erickson, 2003, p. 36).A post made on the group blog Boing-Boing, arespected technology blog, noted that such moves byAmazon “will encourage readers to visit Web sites incountries where the copyright has expired on Orwell’sbooks so they can get free un-stealable electronic copies”(Frauenfelder, 2009). Clearly, this is not a positive reviewof Amazon’s DRM implementation on the Kindle, andthe company and policy makers will need to continueto look toward improvements to ensure that userexperiences and content licensers can coexist to matchBezos’s concept of Amazon’s “mission.”The Orwell incident is already having a globaleffect. In January 2010, leading French book retailersasked their government to create an eBook hub forpublishers and retailers to sell their products (Laurent,2010). They cited incidents such as the Kindle’s. InGermany, a similar system, named Libreka, is already inplace. It is unclear whether location-based systems runby governments are the better alternative, although itis clearly an option being explored in Europe. Furtherresearch into the evolution of these systems will benecessary to help shape user experiences.In this case, mapping would have alerted technicalcommunicators to the users for whom they shouldbe advocating, the technologies as they exist, theorganizations affected, the context in which this eventoccurred, and the strength of relationships betweenthese actors. While it is doubtful that Amazon intendedto alienate, upset, or anger its user base, it is clear thatit did not have a strong understanding of how brickand-mortarretailers would have handled this situation.It also seems clear that Amazon did not make theconnection between Orwell, his text, and the situationit created by allowing the purchase of this unlicensedversion. Mapping the actors and relationships withintheir context can illuminate such issues so that technicalcommunicators can advocate for their audiences, writebetter content, and help influence policy.Mapping Experiences of Viewing Television andFilm OnlineFrom DVDs and network television to YouTube andsubscription-based content, today’s television viewersare no longer restricted to any one system for viewingthese materials. As content has migrated from VHS toDVD to the Web, consumers have a host of optionsfrom which to access this content. There are manymethods of accessing content legally, but there are alsoa plethora of illegal access points. As one researcherstated, “With the advent of load sharing peer-to-peernetworks like BitTorrent, it is now virtually impossibleto stop distribution of digital data on the Internet orto isolate all the sources of reproduction” (Arnab &Hutchinson, 2005, p. 1). In this case study, reasonswhy these illegal access issues may be occurring areexamined through the lens of user experience.In tracing issues of experience, DVDs present theobvious issue of fragility. A simple Google search for“scratched DVD” returns more than 911,000 results.Consider the use case of a Disney DVD, a DVD player,and a 5-year-old. Scratches happen, and with Disneyreleasing its content library piecemeal, you have a recipefor every parent’s worst nightmare: a scratched SleepingBeauty. In its defense, Disney is trying to bridge thisexperience by offering digital media copies along with itsphysical DVD copies. Describing this new technology,Disney (2009) states, “DisneyFile Digital Copy is theDisney-branded Digital Copy experience, which enablesbuyers of DVD and Blu-ray to receive the standarddefinition digital version of the movie in their choice ofiTunes or Windows Media formats.”Volume 57, Number 3, August 2010 l Technical Communication 311