Posted by
emmett
on from the i-got-yer-serial-digital-interface-right-here-pal dept.
pgrote writes "The New Scientist is reporting about a pretty cool device you can add to your DVD for digital output to a Serial Digital Interface. As someone who didn't know the ins and outs of DVD signals and how restricted they were, this article opened my eyes."
If you have a normal DVD player, go out and rent the movie "The Sixth Sense". Slap it in the player. Watch as previews for other movies come up on the screen. Reach for your remote and push the "DVD Menu" button. Watch as your DVD player says "no".
That's what the MPAA wants the DVDCCA to protect: the "right" for them to control how you use the intellectual property they've sold you; or, as they'd have it, the intellectual property that they've given you precisely constrained access to. That's why DVD player manufacturers have to sign away their souls, and that's the real threat of DeCSS: if it's an open-source project, then somebody will port it to a mainstream platform like Windows, and then Mom and Dad can play DVD's without any manufacturer controls.
Imagine a world where Lawn Boy figured out a way to control a lawnmower engine so that it'd only mow a particular type of grass. Got St. Augustine in the front yard and Bermuda out back? Fine, just buy the St. Augustine lawnmower for the front yard and the Bermuda mower for the back. Lawn Boy would of course license the technology to every other lawn mower manufacturer, all of whom would be ecstatic to have such a sales-boosting technology at their disposal. Then, of course, they'd all get together and tell the government that people who tinker with their lawnmowers to disable the "Grass Security System" are just doing it because they want to kidnap children and use the modified mowers for terrorist acts and drug-related murders. As a society, we must stand up to the criminal element and outlaw illegal mower mutilation.
Nobody would willingly put up with a world like that except the people who'd stand to reap windfall profits. But that's really exactly what the MPAA wants.
Problem With Digital Interface
by
LaNMaN2000
·
· Score: 5
The problem with the digital interface that they are using is that it is only found on *very* high-end home theater equiptment. Most HDTVs (even high end ones) use the standard Firewire input to receive data from an external decoder or other digital video source. As a result, the DVD players that will ultimately come with this output will be priced to compete only in the high-end market (for the near future).
In addition, most people do not even have HDTVs yet. As a result, their TVs cannot receive a digital input. Even if standard TV manufacturers built D/A converters into their sets, the signal wouuld have to undergo the same D/A conversion that currently takes place within the player, anyway.
Since their is nothing preventing somebody from developing a device that will let this digital output connect to a firewire device, that should be the next product offering. As a result, people could ultimately get the firewire outputs, which the MPAA tried to eliminate, on their DVD players despite the manufacturers contractual agreement!
*Sigh* It's just sad to see how corporations today cripple technological advancement just for the sake of their bottom-lines...
But Hollywood studio bosses are worried. They see the new system as a pirate's charter, and have been fighting to keep the pristine digital signal out of consumers' hands for fear that people will make broadcast-quality copies.
The technology is already there (ie. the high quality data). But they have to cripple the output in the name of "avoiding piracy"??? What kind of greedy, profit-hogging attitude is this? I am disgusted. If you don't want your consumers to get at the "pristine digital signal" then why put it there in the first place??? Perhaps Hollywood should go back to using VHS for movies. If they want the technology, what's the point of deliberately crippling it? It's like buying a Formula 10 car with all the engine power in there, but with an additional device that restricts the horsepower that can be output, in the name of "driving safety". I mean, why do you sell an engine with that much horsepower if it's never intended to be used anyway?!
This whole thing just stinks of greed and power lust (in terms of controlling what your consumers can do). What use is advanced technology if nobody can use it? (OTOH, of course, they are just asking for trouble by doing this. Surely they'd have learned by now that deliberately crippling something that's already there is a sure incentive for pirates and crackers.)
Slashdot Mirror
If you have a normal DVD player, go out and rent the movie "The Sixth Sense". Slap it in the player. Watch as previews for other movies come up on the screen. Reach for your remote and push the "DVD Menu" button. Watch as your DVD player says "no".
That's what the MPAA wants the DVDCCA to protect: the "right" for them to control how you use the intellectual property they've sold you; or, as they'd have it, the intellectual property that they've given you precisely constrained access to. That's why DVD player manufacturers have to sign away their souls, and that's the real threat of DeCSS: if it's an open-source project, then somebody will port it to a mainstream platform like Windows, and then Mom and Dad can play DVD's without any manufacturer controls.
Imagine a world where Lawn Boy figured out a way to control a lawnmower engine so that it'd only mow a particular type of grass. Got St. Augustine in the front yard and Bermuda out back? Fine, just buy the St. Augustine lawnmower for the front yard and the Bermuda mower for the back. Lawn Boy would of course license the technology to every other lawn mower manufacturer, all of whom would be ecstatic to have such a sales-boosting technology at their disposal. Then, of course, they'd all get together and tell the government that people who tinker with their lawnmowers to disable the "Grass Security System" are just doing it because they want to kidnap children and use the modified mowers for terrorist acts and drug-related murders. As a society, we must stand up to the criminal element and outlaw illegal mower mutilation.
Nobody would willingly put up with a world like that except the people who'd stand to reap windfall profits. But that's really exactly what the MPAA wants.
The problem with the digital interface that they are using is that it is only found on *very* high-end home theater equiptment. Most HDTVs (even high end ones) use the standard Firewire input to receive data from an external decoder or other digital video source. As a result, the DVD players that will ultimately come with this output will be priced to compete only in the high-end market (for the near future).
In addition, most people do not even have HDTVs yet. As a result, their TVs cannot receive a digital input. Even if standard TV manufacturers built D/A converters into their sets, the signal wouuld have to undergo the same D/A conversion that currently takes place within the player, anyway.
Since their is nothing preventing somebody from developing a device that will let this digital output connect to a firewire device, that should be the next product offering. As a result, people could ultimately get the firewire outputs, which the MPAA tried to eliminate, on their DVD players despite the manufacturers contractual agreement!
ByteMyCode.com: A Web 2.0 code sharing community.
*Sigh* It's just sad to see how corporations today cripple technological advancement just for the sake of their bottom-lines...
The technology is already there (ie. the high quality data). But they have to cripple the output in the name of "avoiding piracy"??? What kind of greedy, profit-hogging attitude is this? I am disgusted. If you don't want your consumers to get at the "pristine digital signal" then why put it there in the first place??? Perhaps Hollywood should go back to using VHS for movies. If they want the technology, what's the point of deliberately crippling it? It's like buying a Formula 10 car with all the engine power in there, but with an additional device that restricts the horsepower that can be output, in the name of "driving safety". I mean, why do you sell an engine with that much horsepower if it's never intended to be used anyway?!
This whole thing just stinks of greed and power lust (in terms of controlling what your consumers can do). What use is advanced technology if nobody can use it? (OTOH, of course, they are just asking for trouble by doing this. Surely they'd have learned by now that deliberately crippling something that's already there is a sure incentive for pirates and crackers.)
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mikre he sophia he tou Mikrosophou.