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Philips Says Compact Discs Can't be Copyprotected
Tomcat666 writes "tecChannel has a story about Philips, the holder of the most CD digital audio (CD-DA) patents. Apparently, they don't like the audio CD copy protection many record companies want to enforce in the future. They break the CD-DA standard and therefore are not allowed to use the logo. As a conclusion, Philips' next audio CD copier will be able to detect and probably circumvent the copy protection of audio CDs."
This article is Auf Deutsch but the fish does a tolerable job of
making it sane for those who can't remember the proper gender of all
their nouns.
Since Hemos is the only one that realizes that the fish isn't the only translator...
Google now has language tools, translates pages, AND will let you link to the translated page (that link is to the article in question). And, actually, google's translators are really good. Maybe even better than altavistas...
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
NewScientist.com is carrying the same story in english
According to the article, Philips is not going to try to get offending companies to remove the logo since the patents are running out in 2003/2004.
There's an enlish-language article on the subject at New Scientist:9 91783
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns999 91783
Honestly, Philips only has there self interest at stake here. I'm sure it's just posturing to get there own CD copy protection scheme in place. Hopefully they will do as bad a job as the DVD people did. The one thing we can all be sure of is that they don't care about you, me or the CD consumer -- these are the same people who try to sell "audio" CD-R's for $20!
I recall someone who worked at Philips telling me -- "How was copper wire invented? Philips management squeezing a penny".
I am not a number! I am a man! And don't you
I'm happy to see that Slashdot changes is rhetorics from "copyright protection" to the somewhat preferable "copy protection." However, that term is still completely inaccurate. "Copy protection" does not protect copies. It does not protect your right to make a copy. It does, in fact, not protect anything at all (except the greed of the media industry).
Some of the more accurate terms that you might prefer to use are "copy prevention" (that's what those technologies actually try to do) or "usage control" (that's the effect of copy prevention, e.g. your choice of playback devices is limited). To describe a media that is crippled by usage control technology, you can use something like "restricted use media."
If you think these terms are too political, think about how political the terminology used by the media industry is. The only reason why "copyright protection" doesn't sound completely laughable to you is that you've heard it so often.
Sig (appended to the end of comments I post, 54 chars)
It's *Philips* NOT Phillips, the poster got it right, but almost without exception everyone else is using the superfluous 'l' in the name...
I know it's anal, but there's a big difference between Philips and Phillips... or Phillips for that matter...
No man is an island, but Gary is a city in Indiana.
Readily available mail-order (do a search) and probably at your local china-town as well. The ones in china town where I live are from several different manufacturers and offer karaoke support as well. Sure most of these are 'moded' players, but some are available with upgradeable BIOSes that you just slap in a CD-ROM and it writes the new instructions into the DVD players BIOS.
People are just too lazy to look for items like this if they aren't on the shelf at their local best-buy, radio shack or wal mart, but the products are readily available.
Philips says copy-protected CDs have no future at New Scientist. As an aside, I find New Scientist to be one of the best all-around sources for sci/tech news.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
(From the parent post): Unfortuneatly according to the article, Philip's patent runs out in 2002/3 (hitting that 20yr mark).
(From the article): They break the CD-DA standard and therefore are not allowed to use the logo. (emphasis mine)
I'm not an IP lawyer (IANAIL..?), but I'm guessing that if the logo is *trademarked* by Phillips, then they will still get to decide who can put the logo on their disc regardless of whether or not they continue to maintain exclusive rights to the patent.
If it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.
You're correct, pro equipment generally lets you set it however you want regardless of the source, which is actually fairly appropriate. After all, there's not a huge market for things like $1000 standalone 1x cd burners, or $1500 DAT drives. People who own these things tend to actually have a legitimate need to have control over those bits.
Though you're also correct that you can buy relatively inexpensive format convertors ($250 or so), that also offer SMCS management, which could be used to defeat the copy protection... or to fix the bits on the demo tape you made, to allow people to distribute it freely.
Sorry to contradict, but you won't see Sony doing that any time soon. They're a major force in the RIAA through their record label.
-Perrin.
Now I want you to go in that bag and find my lightsaber. It's the one that says bad mother-fscker on it.
Since Slashdot rejected this story, I will post it here.
There is a related item reported in the LA Times about a bill being introduced to amend the DMCA - which will allow for consumers to copy digital works without running afoul of the law.
LA Times Story
No. You are wrong. Fair use, backup copies, etc. are all spelled out in the US Code. Most of the /. crowed doesn't want to know about it however, because it kills most of their arguments.
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
US Code: TITLE 17, CHAPTER 1, Sec. 107.
Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
Sec. 108 covers copies made by libraries and archives.
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/108.html
Si vis pacem, para bellum
The only thing more annoying than a Libertarian is an (un|mis)informed Libertarian
Phillips is merely protecting their intellectual property (ie the CD standard) RIAA member companies were unlawfully violating their licenses of CD-DA technology by labeling non-compliant discs with the Compact Disc logo.
You know, I keep seeing this arugument over and over, but as far as I know, NONE of the "copy-protected" CD's DO display the logo. I know for certain that the "Fast & Furious" and "Charley Pride" CD's do not. And I have never heard anyone confirm that they have ever seen one that actually does. Not that I am supporting them, but they do at least seem to know that they are violating the standard, and aren't trying to pretend otherwise.
PK: 09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
The logo is a trademark indicating certain specifications and recognition. The patent is different from the logo.
Fight Spammers!
Uh, more like CD Rom drives seem to have a rather low Mean Time Between Failure. Thanks for playing though.
In turn, Philips attempts to dictate how the record labels may use their CD format: It's our standard, so you can only use it the way we want you to.
I would start with The Antitrust Terrible 10: Why the Most Reviled "Anti-competitive" Business Practices Can Benefit Consumers in the New Economy and The Government's War on Mergers: The Fatal Conceit of Antitrust Policy, because it is a common misconception that antitrust is even needed. More analysis is found here, here, and these two links. In short, antitrust and monopoly-busting tactics do more damage than good.
"All mankind is at the mercy of a handful of neurotics". - Norman Douglas
For those of you who don't know, Philips is a huge multinational electronics corporation. They sell most of their wares here in the US under the Magnavox brand name.
Philips, by the way, was the main creator of the compact disc and as such holds the majority of patents on it.
Can't patents be renewed
Patents last three and a half years after being granted but can renewed to 7 1/2 after grant, 11 1/2 after grant, and 20 after filing by paying maintenance fees.
Copyrights last 95 years unless you're a freelancer creating works on or after 1 Jan 1978, in which case they last life plus 70. (To renew a copyright for 20 years, simply stuff millions of dollars into the pockets of both parties in the United States and all major parties in the European Union.) Either way, they last additionally until December 31.
A registered trademark lasts five years. After that, the owner files an affidavit of continued use, which buys another five years; then the trademark can be renewed for ten years at a time until a court decides that the trademark has become too generic to maintain.
Will I retire or break 10K?
S/PDIF is also capable of carring datastreams containing multichannel sound in MPEG2, AC3 and DTS formats. S/PDIF has a bit which indicates whether the payload is digital audio, or something else. This is how your receiver knows not to try to play back that audio feed from your DVD player without decoding it.
There actually is a S/PDIF format which is identical to AES/EBU other than the media, but this is not what is included with consumer equipment.
Additionally, the professional format of AES/EBU and S/PDIF does not carry track marks, which consumer S/PDIF does.
Not many people realize that this is actually a Phillips, not Sony who has invented CD-DA. Sony did come up with a number of substantial enhancements. If I remember correctly, the whole error-correction scheme belongs to Sony. Yet the main inventor is Phillips. Now Sony's position regarding the whole issue is completely schizoid. Parts of Sony which are involved in music business fight the parts of Sony involved in A/V equipment. A good example is Minidisc vs MP3. In case you are not familiar with technology, Minidisc is heavily copy-protected, extremely unflexible, this is its major limitation as a coding scheme, yet Sony doesn't want to open it up. For instance, you cannot digitally copy one MD to another - unless you have a high-end expensive professional MD mastering equipment. From what I've head there was a big conflict inside Sony between those who wanted to release Sony CD/MP3 player, and those against MP3 (for obvious reasons). (the 'good guys' won, btw)
Well, apparently Phillips doesn't have such type of mentality and this is nice. I'm not sure if they are involved into recording business (I vaguelly remember seeing LPs with 'Phillips' label, but that was many years ago). Probably it is mostly company specializing on A/V equipment
Now this is what I've been saying all along. So-called 'copy-protected' CDs are nothing else but the violation of Red Book standard. I'm glad to hear it from Phillips.
Incidently, there is a good article on copyrighted CDs by Steve Rochlin, at http://www.enjoythemusic.com. It also contains some good URLs.
As far as I can remember (it's been a few years),
"silberscheiben with music drauf" = silver discs with music on them
-Erik
I think the point was that the name was spelled wrong..
I know they have/had a line of classical CDs, and used to owned a share of Polygram (and by extension, Decca and Deutsche Gramophon, I think).
Are they now out of recording biz, which allows them to come out so solidly _against_ CD copy prot? Anybody know?
>Just because the head-in-the-sand US market has never been very enthusiastic about them doesn't mean they have failed.
No, the US market simply decided not to waste money on a half-baked idea like MiniDisc. Now that there is a solution which does everything that Minidisc can do, except 10-50x faster, and with over 50% market penetration; America has decided the time is right for a portable solution. They just let you be the guinea pigs with MiniDisc.
So what is the solution that bests MiniDisc in every single way known?
8 cm Re-Writeable CDs and MP3 encoders/players designed for these. Expect this open format to become HOT as more people realize MiniCD lets them put multiple albums on a disc of similar size to MD, of similar quality to MD, and allows them to play it in well over half the locations they might travel. And don't forget the ace-in-the-hole of most any format over MD, ease of copying. Not to mention the full data compatibility of the disc, allowing people to store interesting tidbits like music videos, album art, and other things MiniDisc either wasn't designed to handle, or which Sony forced format incompatibility with. Let me repeat the most important point: Philips, a very large investor in the CD format, actually wants you to be able to use these CDs to copy as much music as you like, unlike Sony and their proprietary MiniDisc format.
If you ask me, MD needs to rest with Sony's many other stillborn consumer formats, such as Beta and MemoryStick.
>They are extremely popular in Asia,
That's great, but virtually no music that appeals to the American market is produced in Asia. This makes the format further unappealing to us.
What's good for Asia isn't always good for us. If MiniDisc has worked out for them, good for them. It didn't here simply because people here want easy to use, unemcumbered music formats.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC