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Restricted CDs Quietly Distributed
fantazem writes: "I was just browsing news.com and found this rather interesting article just posted. The article basically explains that Macrovision along with unnamed labels have released thousands of CD's with a new form of copy protection." This is a follow-up to this article. Whitfield Diffie noted that the identity of the restricted CDs can be ascertained by polling a large enough sample of CD-buyers; a good way to avoid these defective products. Anybody bought one yet?
It isn't worked around by Vorbis, but it is handled correctly by Monty's other software: CDparanoia. It appears that this 'protection' only provides protection along with certian popular windows ripping applications which have sold out their users in order to prevent being sued. CDparanoia does not have this problem.
Use Free Software and don't worry about it.
Some [expletive deleted] broke into my car last fall and made off with about $600 worth of stereo equipment and about $600 worth of CDs (don't believe it when they tell you a detachable faceplate is protection against theft). Every single one of my favorite albums was stolen (and I stil haven't replaced most of them). The morning I discovered this, I swore I'd never keep an original CD in the car again.
BUT WAIT!! If the theif makes off with a copy of a legally-purchased CD, YOU are now responsible for illegal distribution! Horrors! The record company lost out on another sale because YOU made a copy!
Who cares that the theif wouldn't have bought it... it's a COPY and it's DENYING the recording agency the RIGHT to PROFIT! Somebody PLEASE think of the children!
What in the world are they doing modding up posts that say "I have one" and don't have any supporting data (like even a album title!?!?)
/. article from totally degrading to a "me too!" fest and a panicked shouting match of fears that big brother is coming: Don't post "me too"'s without at least putting the title of the disc so someone else can confirm it.
Here's a suggestion to keep this
And don't let all the unconfirmed "me too"'s stir the coals even more.
I'm glad I don't listen to any mainstream music.
I was discussing this with a colleague yesterday, and an interesting question came up: are these new discs actually marked as CDs? Do they have the little Phillips' Compact Disc logo on them? If they are just relying on people assuming that the 5-inch silver disc is a 'real' compact disc, then what you should expect from this CD-like disc is your problem, at least to a greater degree.
Not that I am in favour of the 'protection', especially at the expense of the error correction - I too rip all my CDs straight after purchase.
--
the telephone rings / problem between screen and chair / thoughts of homocide
"don't fall into the fallacy of believing that Perl can solve social problems. Maybe Perl 6 can, but that's a ways off"
How long till cdparanoia will be declared an illegal circumvention device that breaks protection on copyrighted works and has the author jailed?
It just happened. It can happen again...
No. THe AHRA of 1992 says that copying music for noncommercial use using *the devices covered by the act* is not actionable. Computers are not covered by the act. The AHRA also says that digital devices must follow the SCMS (serial copy management system).
I'm not saying it's illegal to copy music, just that the AHRA does *not* give de-facto permission for people to copy music, even it it appears to at first glance.
There is a difference between something being 'not illegal' and being 'a right'.
ALl the act says is that you cannot be prosecuted for using a compliant device to copy some music; it does not say you have a non-infringable right to copy the music. Nothing in the act prevents them from making it technically difficult for you to copy music.
is it illegal for me to make copies (or partial copies) of CD's that i own for my own personal use?
No, according to the Home Recording Act of 1992, it's perfectly legal for you to make personal copies of CDs you own.
However, that same Act does NOT say that the record companies can't try to stop you from making such copies (through content control mechanisms) -- just that they can't sue you if you suceed. Of course, if you try to bypass these content control mechanisms, you're most likely in violation of the DMCA.
All of this may be moot as far as using your computer as a jukebox, however, since the courts still haven't decided whether or not a computer should be classified as a digital recording device (if it were ruled not to be so, it wouldn't be covered under the Home Recording Act).
There are no real difficulties in writing code to read over a ripped CD image, and do the interpolation in software.
I just hope that solutions to this come out soon (and, in particular, for Windows and not just linux), so that the record companies realise how pointless the scheme is and stop writing trash all over our fairly purchased music!
--indecision
If:
I can't download the (legally obtained) songs to my MP3 player
I can't make a backup copy in case my (legally obtained) CD gets that aluminum eating virus we read about
I can't listen to the CD at work on my laptop
I'll take it back to the place of purchase.
If enough individuals do this, the stores will be forced to spend their resources (time and money) with the returns (which take 2-3 times longer than a purchase).
If it happens enough, the stores will in turn be forced to work with the record labels to stem the flow of returns.
Why don't record lablels just ROT13 all the lyrics? Can't really hurt today's pop songs...
------------------------
Co-founder of GerbilMechs
Is this a portable player (or can you reproduce the results on a portable player)? If so:
/.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
What astounds me is the method they seem to be using to check if it affects the sound quality. There are no increase in returns therefore they seem to be inferring that the change is inaudable. It would be great if the drug companies tried this, "This drug is 100% safe, not one person who disn't know they were taking it, told us they died". Have they considered that maybe the sound quality is reduced, but the effect of this is to make people assume its just the way the band should sound, and resolve never to buy the next release (and tell their frends, etc)
>Macrovision has had copy protection that inserts
> noise and monkeys with your picture
This sounds like the best protection system ever. It turns everything into the last fifteen minutes of 'Congo'.
It sounds like a good test for the record industry, "let's distribute a protected cd for free to see if anyone complains, and they can't return it because it's free".
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
Couldn't someone sue them for this, since it's being done so discreetly? I know when I buy a cd I assume it conforms to the redbook standard(or whatever) and will allow me to rip it. I don't even listen to CDs anymore except in mp3 format--too much hassle compared to the incredible ease of making playlists on the computer, or 700 minutes of mp3s to a cd and listening to them in my mp3-cd player.
So, find out what CDs these are, and lets start a class action lawsuit. I bet you could get half of Slashdot in on it...
I bought a copy protected CD audio once. There wasn't anything special mentioned on the case or even on the CD itself. It played fine on my computer, but when trying to copy it with normal software (I tried with easy cd creator & cdrwin for windows and cdrdao for linux) the copy was full of pops and scratches (even in 1x) and didn't work in some cd players. And I know my cdrom drive & cd burner are not faulty because it's the first and only time I had troubles copying an audio cd.
However, I eventually managed to copy the cd by extracting all the tracks with cdparanoia under linux (with all the possible jitter correction options turned on), and then burning the wav files on a cdaudio.
Your mileage may vary, it worked for me but I'm not sure it will work for every kind of copy protection system on the market.
!
^_^
Agreed.
The technology takes advantadge of the error correcting technology built into every audio CD. This technology is what allows the CD to play well even with hundreds of minor scratches. I think that the error correction will try to compensate for loss of data up to a tenth of a second or something like that. What they do is they put hundreds of minor glitches that are able to be corrected for by the technology. The error correction technology works really well, and is no way even close to being similar to a wave file.
If I recall correctly, compact discs use a version called cross-interleaved Reed-Solomon code, or CIRC. The basic level of error correction provided for Audio CD is one uncorrectable bit out of every 10^9. CD-ROM provides additional protection for data (ECC/EDC ) reducing the error rate to one bit in 10^13 For those interested, there is this detailed description, along with this basic introduction.
The coding system is based on groups of bits--such as bytes--rather than individual 0s and 1s. That feature makes Reed-Solomon codes particularly good at dealing with "bursts" of errors: Six consecutive bit errors, for example, can affect at most two bytes. Thus, even a double-error-correction version of a Reed-Solomon code can provide a comfortable safety factor. Current implementations of Reed-Solomon codes in CD technology are able to cope with error bursts as long as 4000 consecutive bits.
Thus it is possible to put in a couple hundred bytes of junk data every second or that would be the basis of the copy protection, all without compromising audio quality.
That said, I can record any sound playing through my computer with the software I have. The Audio Quality will be very good, then I can burn direct to CD, or convert to MP3, or whatever. Of course, all that I use this for are the music tapes I have from when I used to record certain local bands in clubs professionally.
Check out the Vinny the Vampire comic strip
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
The point remains that this is a pain in the ass.
And one more thing, correct me if I'm wrong, if those CDs have the Compact Disk Digital Audio (or whatever) logo on them yet they don't conform to the redbook standards (as they don't) we can sue the labels.
""The Audio Home Recording Act, a law passed in 1992, says that copyright holders can't sue people who are making personal home copies of music. But lawyers note that the act does not require copyright holders to make this power available to consumers. ""
Essentially they are now nitpicking the fight because they know they would lose. The question is, by their actions to make it harder to exercise our rights are they actually violating the right?
This has got to be one of the most anti-consumer actions I have seen. This is the actions of a true monopolistic entity. This is the type of activity that the Justice department should be jumping up and down about.
I don't know, but if I find out which labels use this process I know who I damn well won't buy a CD from.
and they wonder why people pirate music, sheesh
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The trick is you don't want to be worth the hassel. No store gives a crap about a yuppie food pellet ($20). They rake in a few million a year taking a 25% cut. But more importantly who wants to spend $75 on the wages of 3 or more employees to ruin the day of everyone involved and end up with a customer who hates them even more than they did when they felt they got ripped off? I think I can safely say no one in the US.
I suppose the best thing would be for every US living slashdot reader to write a letter to the FTC about this group of companies using their undue market influence to deny their 'customers' choice in the market place. Of course the other side is will this make downloading music more or less popular?
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
The human soul is the greatest anti-piracy measure in the known world, but no major company will use it.
If your customers like you, they will never steal from you, even if they're criminal men by nature. Anybody heard of the priest who walks around East L.A., wading in and out of gang shoot-outs, but nobody will touch him?
The problem of course, is that in order to be liked, YOU FIRST have to be honest. These greedy futhermuckers can't hide in sheeps' clothing anymore; the world has become too cynical.
My prediction? The bigger and badder the fatcats get, the sharper and nastier will come the replies! The truth is, even my own sainted mother can't convince herself that these assholes don't deserve everything they get.
--S.T.
Karmic Ocean -- Beware Sharks
Can I make illegal digital copies with this cd?
-No.
Can I make illegal analog copies with this cd?
-Yes
So, I CAN make digital copies with this cd?
-Yes
Can I make legal digital copies (to my own MP3 player)?
-No
Can I bypass this stupidity by adding a DA-AD conversion to my digital copying?
-Most probably, yes.
Wont this give me MP3 files with lesser quality?
-Most probably, no. Not if you do it right.
Sooo... What we have is an encoding method that will only bring inconvenience to the law abiding consumer doing his private copying?
-Yes
The real pirates will work around it, and the music will eventually end up on Gnutella or wherever anyway.
-Yes
Doesnt this smell awfully lot like the Win XP Product Activation stupidity?
-Definitely, yes
...um...like...a sig...
That said, I find it interesting, but not unusual for CDs and other media to be released, without mentioning that they're copy-protected. I suspect the reason is that most copy-protection schemes are temporal at best. They're sort of like locks on our doors and cars, they keep the honest man honest.
I found some interesting articles along this same topic:
- Copy-protected CD hacked--or is it?
- How to Create a Copy Protected CD
- BMG's New Copy-Protected Audio CDs
None of which come right out and state the obvious. With enough time, all copy protection schemes get hacked.healyourchurchwebsite.com - WWJB?