Joel Brinkley

I live in Washington, DC, and as the old adage goes, the Union is most secure when the Congress is not in session. Well, Congress has been in session more or less continuously for the last few weeks, and, as usual, little good has come of it, even in the home-theater arena. But I've been in Washington long enough to have coined my own truism about life in the nation's capital: Beware any trade group that says it is performing a public service. Usually it is serving only itself.

I was in Beijing for work a few weeks ago, and one free morning I wandered down the street toward the Forbidden City to do a little shopping. As usual, a virtual army of street hawkers greeted me with pirated DVDs by the handful. In previous trips I paid no attention, but this time I decided to have a look. After all, they cost just $1 each. So out of curiosity I decided to buy a few as a journalism experiment, since I write about issues like this.

Welcome to another month in the copy-protection wars.

Washington is chomping at the bit to shut down analog broadcasting; has the time finally come to let go of the past?