EFF employee/activist and science-fiction author Cory Doctorow gave a talk at Microsoft Research about why he thinks Bill & Co. should quit building digital rights management into their software. He manages to tie together cryptography, the invention of radio, e-books, Flowbees, the way AT&T used to own every phone in the country, player pianos, Apple iTunes, Ringo, the Luther Bible, DVD region encoding, and cellphone ringtones as he explains why DRM will never work and can only inhibit innovation and incredible business opportunities.

If you’ve rolled your eyes at me during my DVD region encoding rant (or my iPods-are-evil rant), GO READ THIS DAMMIT. It’s also required reading for geeks and artists of all flavors.

(By the way, on the subject of ringtones, if you’ve chosen a cellphone that requires you to pay for ringtones, you’re on crack. One of the greatest things about my Treo 600 pda/phone is that any old MIDI file can be a ringtone. Didja know that the Web harbors free MIDI versions of just about any tune you can think of? My phone alerts me to the end of a meditation sitting with a sparkly little rendition of “Within You, Without You.” A nice little shot of George that always does me right.)