Nikon makes great cameras, but they’re pretty bad with customer issues. When the D70 came out, there were some issues with moire and backfocus, which they never admitted to, but seem to have fixed silently (my D70, which I got about a half-year after initial release, doesn’t have those problems). Now, they’ve decided to encrypt some information in their NEF RAW format produced by D2X and D2Hs cameras (and probably some future models too). (/., DPReview followup, /. followup) The only reason for doing this is to prevent third-party software from using the NEF files without using Nikon’s software, with the threat of being sued under the DMCA for those who try to decode their format.
To Nikon: if I take a picture with my camera, I have a right to do with that picture anything I want. You have no right to prevent me from accessing my data. Until you reverse this decision and provide unrestricted files from your cameras, I will no longer be able to recommend Nikon cameras.
To Adobe, who are making the most noise about this: don’t think we’ve forgotten about Dmitry Sklyarov. You used the DMCA yourselves to try to suppress software for reading your own “encrypted” format (if ROT-13 can be considered encrypted). Don’t expect much sympathy in this case.
Many thanks to people like David Coffin and Bibble Labs for working hard on letting users access their own data. Let’s hope that Nikon decides not to sue these people.
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