The Little DVD Driver That Could Change Movies

AnnaBlack writes "DVDSynth is a (currently prerelease) low-level driver tool that can sit between your physical DVD drive and any software that accesses it. So far so what, but the extremely clever thing about this is that it can filter the DVD data on the fly. The example applications included currently allow new subtitle sets to be provided for existing films (which could spawn a whole new activity for movie buffs!) but also a very neat little filter that will remove region codes on the fly from any DVD you play. Supplied with full sourcecode and programmers documentation." Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS.

Comments

Region codes?

[Piquan]

I thought the region codes were handled by the DVD drive, not by the software or drivers. That's why the the regionset tool for Linux exists, no?

Re:Region codes?

[homer_ca]

Region codes are enforced both by the drive firmware and the player software. You'll still need a region-free DVD drive. They're hard to find, but still out there. See here.

Re:Region codes?

[Jucius Maximus]

"Region codes are enforced both by the drive firmware and the player software. You'll still need a region-free DVD drive. They're hard to find, but still out there."

The linked site in the article is slashdotted, so I am going to assume that this is software for PC, as opposed to a firmware flash for home theatre DVD players.

You can just get an easily obtainable pioneer 106s slot-loading drive which can be found for less than $70CAD these days and plays damn-well near every type of CD/CD-R/CD-Rw/DVD/etc and is relatively quiet and then flash the firware with an anti-RPC firmware.

You can get hacked firmware for many, MANY PC dvd drives out there to make them region free or allow an infinite number of region change switches.

Re:Region codes?

[pioneerdvd]

The region settings are indeed handled by the DVD drive.

When you play a DVD, the first thing the software player does is to ask the DVD drive to return the DVD disc's title key. This key is needed to decrypt a CSS-encrypted movie.

On a Region Protected drive (or RPC-2 drive) before acknowledging this query, the drive first checks that the region of the inserted disc matches the drive's own region.
If they don't match, the drive will simply not return the Title Key. Hence a Region 1 DVD will not play in a Region 2 drive, etc.

Until now, the only way to defeat this scheme was to act upon the drive itself, by flashing a "patched" firmware.
In this firmware, the region check would have been disabled (with other things) so that the Title Key would always be returned, regardless of the disc's region.

Because this region checking was hardware based, it seemed for a long time that no software only solution would ever defeat it, and that the only solution to make your system region free would be to flash your DVD drive.
However, people using DVD-Rippers (DeCSS, etc.)soon noticed that they were able to rip the content of a disc on a region protected drive, regardless of whether the disc region was matching the drive's one or not.

This gave the idea to a few people (this is the 3rd product I know of that makes use of this feature actually) to create "virtual" DVD drives, i.e., fake drives that would rip from the actual DVD drive on one side, and appear like a standard DVD device to the software player on the other side, while feeding it the ripped data.
Of course, as such a software offers complete control on both the (virtual) device and the (unscrambled) data that flows through it, getting rid off all the annoyances like region checks, FBI warnings or Jar Jar Binks characters becomes child's play.

This little tool looks really cool though...

Re:Region codes?

[testadicazzo]

I have a dual boot system (win XP and redhat) I work almost exclusively in Linux, but boot to windows to watch DVD's. Why?

Well, I live in Europe, but I'm american, so region free dvd'ing is a big issue for me. At first I noticed that yes, I can rip some other-region dvd's to my hd. But not all. It depended on the encryption. For example, I could not rip the region 2 DVD of Buffy the Vampire slayer (which I own. I just wanted to rip it so I could watch it on my computer, since it some episodes don't play correctly on my PS2).

When I flashed my DVD's bios to make it region free, I no longer had this problem. I can rip anything. I can also play any DVD under windows. Unfortunately, I can no longer watch encrypted DVD's under linux. I know I had the software setup correctly because prior to the flashing I could watch any dvd of the appropriate region. Now even dvd's which previously played, no longer do so.

So I'm wondering if some of the information in your posting are entirely accurate. Specifically, my experience says one cannot always rip the content of a disc, regardless of region. It seems to be possible only when the dvd is not encrypted.

I don't know the root cause of this, but based on that experience, I'd guess flashing of the bios will still be necessary for encrypted cd's.

that said, I'm thinking my problem is I don't have a tool like DVD genie for linux, that software sets a region code when scanning the dvd to play it. Anyone know of a solution to this problem?

Re:Region codes?

[Sique]

So I'm wondering if some of the information in your posting are entirely accurate.

In fact there is a glitch. After region free players were beginning to become common things at least in the Region 2 countries, the DVD consortium did something called Advanced Regio Coding. This is in fact some piece of software on the DVD itself, which causes the DVD to not play if the Regio code is zero.

Embedded in the DVD standard is the possibility to execute small programs. This feature is used to check the actual regio setting while running the DVD and thus the ARC can block the "execution" of the DVD program.

Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal...

[krinsh]

They just aren't $40-at-Wally World cheap. That's the real clincher: if you aren't paying tariffs and exorbitant fees for your international media; then The Powers That Be get pissed off. Maybe, just maybe we should start considering the regulations that make it difficult for us (in any country) to access foreign-produced media; and then the technology itself won't matter quite as much anymore.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal...

[catwh0re]

In Australia we have a sort-of niche middle-upper store called David Jones, here you can purchase multiregion DVD players, however the sales staff aren't allowed to advertise them so, or lead information that suggests it's region free (it could be clearly stated on the box). The reason is some legal technicality so some stores rather just absolve themselves from the whole issue.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal...

[Temsi]

They just aren't $40-at-Wally World cheap.
Almost true...
The Apex line of players (I have the AD-1500) is easily modified (a freely downloadable .iso is used to flash the player's bios) to not only open all regions, but turn off Macrovision as well.
That player is currently available for as little as $50. Plays every available video disc format, including (s)vcd,dvd-r(w),dvd+r(w)... even plays mp3 cd's and photo-vcd's.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal...

[krinsh]

You're right and I am interested in getting an Apex because I have heard good things about 'em... but they aren't multisystem or 'region free' off the shelf

Cool

[Henry V .009]

For changing subtitles, I use DVDsubber. The region code thing is great, though. Couldn't everything be done better in hardware though?

Re:Cool

[Simon (S2)]

if you think about performance you're maybe right, but who cares about performance with the computers out there right now.
and hardware would cost you money. software not.

Re:Cool

[Archfeld]

my hardware (firmware ?) has a limited number of region switches..this helps there...

Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[irritating environme]

Isn't this and example of the achilles heel of any CD-encryption/protection technology? The hardware reader has to decrypt it at some point, and then a program can just capture the unencrypted bits and reroute them as desired, for example to an unencrypted image.

If it's dedicated hardware, you just have to make friends with an Electical Engineer.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

"If it's dedicated hardware, you just have to make friends with an Electical Engineer."

Why? 99% of those priests of exam-cramming have never touched electronics in their lives. They just want a piece of paper to climb the career ladder.

Why not make friends with the guy who has a lab in his house?

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[AvitarX]

Enter pallidium. They are well aware of the inherent roblems with software playback. When the homebrew app that captures these bits is not signed, oh well for you.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Archfeld]

ONLY if you want external access....Palladium is going to drive a NEW wave of NAT. Instead of just the IP, new NAT is gonna have to mask a Trusted Computer Bit as well. Then I can have just ONE Judas box and the rest of my network can be safe :)

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Salsaman]

That won't help you if the data coming down the pipe can only be decrypted by "Judas's" (I like that BTW) Fritz chip/Palladium OS, whatever. Even capturing the encrypted stream for later playback likely won't work, because Judas will issue challenge/response signals which will not be recognised.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

Electrical Engineer != TV Repair Guy

See that computer you're using? An EE designed that. Not a guy with a lot of spare parts in his garage that he calls a lab.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, moron, *an* EE designed *maybe* the power switch. Thousands of people in hundreds of unrelated domains made it possible to have that computer.
Open your eyes.
And just because the cult has its tentacles everywhere, doesn't mean it's the only way things can be done.
Read your history. There's a difference between regurgitating what one "learns" at church, and the creative, often persecuted, often ignored, types who make new ideas possible.
Wasn't it an EE that once said that the world market for computers is 5?
And guess what? It's a fucking good thing your 'TV repair guy' isn't an EE, otherwise the repair would take 5 years, 2500 meetings, performance reviews, and 3 managers.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

the creative, often persecuted, often ignored, types who make new ideas possible.

Like these:
http://abc.net.au/news/indepth/featureitem s/s66487 8.htm

Oh, he's not an engineer and his garage is full of spare parts!

Let's kill him before the word gets out you don't need 10 years of university to do something!

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep, and all those people who worked on the Athlon and Pentium4 are TV repairmen.

Your [sic] an idiot.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[MoneyT]

As a current electrical/computer engineer, who has touched many bits an pieces of equipment and electronics, and has read through service manuals on electronics for fun, I resent your statement. You may not need a college dgree to be smart, but they sure as hell aren't hiring highschool grads. IBM et al work very closely with many colleges to provide work experience before you graduate.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[MoneyT]

Any ecryption that has to be decrypted to human readable format is breakable and copyable. While you cannot understand data on a CD or in bits and bytes on your computer, and you cannot understand the digital pulses that comminicate to your computer and TV and speakers what to do. However, the light that travles from your screen to your eyes and the sound that moves from the speaker to your ears are readable by any human, and therefore can be copied and duplicated. Maybe the technology does not yet exist to make these copies great, but if a demand arises, then they will be made.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[baldass_newbie]

Judas box

I've been wondering what to call it...

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Zeinfeld]

Enter pallidium. They are well aware of the inherent roblems with software playback. When the homebrew app that captures these bits is not signed, oh well for you.

I very much doubt that Palladium could possibly support region codes or anything close. In the first place it is quite likely that the EU will have found them to be an illegal device to suport differential pricing by the time Palladium launches.

But even without that, laptops are an international comodity as are motherboards.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Grishnakh]

Yep, and all those people who worked on the Athlon and Pentium4 are TV repairmen.

I work at the company that makes one of the above chips, and I'm a EE, and I'm happy to inform you that very few of the EE's who designed those chips would have the first clue about how to even replace a fuse in their TV.

Most of the EE's I've met (mainly the young ones) know only what their company has been training them to do since they started there out of college. They know VHDL, and how to design maybe a DMA unit. Or they know how to design some bitcells in a memory array. Or they know how to do validation on a part of the design, and debug a problem just enough to figure out which part of the design the error lies in (and thus which person in Design to call up). Their knowledge of electrical engineering is anything but broad; it's so narrowly focussed that they're completely useless at any different EE job, and they don't remember enough of their college classes to be useful at something different.

When a previous posted said only EE's from the 60's can do the hardware hacking stuff brought up here, he was mostly right. There are a few of us young guys (and no, not women; of the very few female EE's I've met, none were in it out of interest in electronics) who do have a broad background and interest in many aspects of the EE field, and actually can take apart a piece of consumer electronics and know what we're looking at (and also care enough to do so rather than just buy something new or hire someone else to fix it). But we're really really rare. Here's a clue though: if you know a EE who also fixes his own car, or builds electronics stuff at home, you've probably found one of the rare hardware hacker types.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Grishnakh]

I'm a current electrical engineer too, and I don't resent his remark at all. I'm the only EE I know who works on electronics projects at home, and I work at the world's largest processor maker. Do any of the EEs you know do stuff like that, or do they just learn what they need to for their job?

Most EEs these days are just in it because it's an ok-paying job and can get them into management. They don't give a rat's ass about service manuals.

Just because you don't fit a stereotype doesn't mean it's not valid for the other 99.9% of the group.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Thomas the Rhymer]

beware of software engineers with screwdrivers

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Cruciform]

Woohoo! and we can say we were there at the birth of new geek terminology :)

I was pretty pissed when I missed out on the invention of the smiley.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[Archfeld]

Could the signal be highjacked AFTER decryption but before presentation, similar to the analog capture of a digital signal ? then it could be passed to internal UN trusted hosts, the re-assembled again and passed out ? Obviously this is high level but it seems feasible.

Re:Generalized solution to CD-encryption?

[zonker]

hell, i guess i gotta join the club then and stake my ground next to the coiner of the term. :)

Subtitles aside..

[sweet 'n sour]

Being able to bypass the region code stuff has been avail for a while now. http://www.elby.ch/download/SetupRegKill.exe Also, this still won't help with the dvd drives that have the region checking stuff built into the hardware.

Re:Subtitles aside..

[Simon (S2)]

you can patch the firmware of your dvd. check on dvdgenies homepage.

Re:Subtitles aside..

[Luminous Coward]

Also, this still won't help with the DVD drives that have the region checking stuff built into the hardware.

You could always flash new firmware to your DVD drive.

Ripping on the fly? Where's the catch?

[justsomebody]

I wonder what difference does it make. To write to a video stream instead of video (with a DVD payer). All problems come when compression takes place. So there would be a need for hardware that makes possible to compress on the fly.

Intercepting video or playing video ta a stream, there's no difference.

"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

[Dr. Spork]

I think it would be lots of fun to rip on some of the "great" movies in the style of MST3K or Rocky Horror. Sure, doing it through subtitles is not ideal, but it could still be a lot of fun! It would sure make the recent Star Wars releases 5000X more watchable.

Re:"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

[SuiteSisterMary]

Do a search for 'DVD Subber' and you'll find that it exists already, with timed scripts for all sorts of things.

Re:"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

[EvanED]

Also, enter DVD Tracks.

Re:"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

[guttentag]

"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

Funny, I always thought subtitles sounded like silent movies. I only get sound out of my audio tracks. Maybe I should have my hearing checked.

Do you get to hear that jerk in the theater who has already seen the movie twelve times and is ruining the whole thing?

"Watch this... the goat's entrails are going to land on top of the SUV and scare the shit out of everyone in the theater."

Only you can't throw your popcorn at the subtitles.

Re:"Fan comments" subtitles sound great!

[Robotech_Master]

Have you seen the Buckaroo Banzai DVD? It's great fun, because writer Earl Mac Rauch, through the character of Pinky Carruthers, does just that. There's a subtitle track of "obscure trivia" which includes a few jabs here and there at various characters.

Damn, server is /. ed

[Merls]

Damn, I was interested in that, my new laptop is region fixed, and I am really looking for a solution so that I can play my import dvds. Hmmm, looks like I am getting the page, but not the zip file. Anyone grab a mirror?

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[k98sven]

Well.. you could try writing down the model number of your DVD drive and go right over to the firmware page and see if you can find some region-free firmware for it.

It's worked for me on 2 different occasions.

Hardware hackers.. god love 'em..

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[PFAK]

I had a chance to mirror the index.html & the source code and binarys before the site went down..

You can pick them up here. It should be a high enough bandwidth site not to go down.

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[Anonymous Coward]

And another mirror here at http://mongfish.com/mirrors/dvdsynth/. Haven't got all the files yet though, but should have them in a while. The original site is not quite dead yet, but very slow!

P.S. Your site seems to just redirect to the web1000 main page at the moment.

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[Anonymous Coward]

sorry that web1000 page is down too ;( do you have another mirror ?

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[Anonymous Coward]

This was announced two or three days ago on Doom9. I mirrored the site then. You didn't provide an email address so I can't send you the file. I'm NOT going to open up my system for all Slashdotters to kill. Send a note to gorgonautNO@SPAMhotmail.com (uh...clean that up) and I'll send you the file. I need to know which flavor of Windows you have. Also, this is a pre-release, not a finished project. Keep that in mind.

Re:Damn, server is /. ed

[PFAK]

it works now.

PC DVD region coding?

[Covener]

Is this a mix of software and hardware? Are some DVD-ROM drives just un-regioned? Does it somehow rely on the software to participate?

I'm curious because I paid no mind to region when I got my bare DVD drive -- I can play region 1 and 2 discs from linux (mplayer) but haven't ever tried commercial dvd software.

Can someone lay out the steps a PC takes when verifying that it's the proper region?

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[VertigoAce]

I think it's mainly software based. I know my DVD software (for Windows) allowed you to set the region when you installed it, and then you could only change it a certain number of times. Which is really stupid, because you can just use free software which won't check the region.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[Covener]

I thought that too for a while. But if you check out all the 'region unlocking' sites, they all seem to be indexed by drive instead of players.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[adb]

There is a chunk of flash in the drive electronics that can only be rewritten a certain number of times, and the region is stored in that.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[91degrees]

2 types of DVD ROM drive.

The early sort would play any data. Hollywood relied on the software to preserve the region coding. And the were surprised to find that patches to circumvent region coding were released in no time at all.

The DVD licencing was changed so that the hardware has to be region locked. The rules allow the region to be reset and then changed a number of times, then the region code locks.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[Anonymous Coward]

The DVD-region is both in software and in hardware. The hardware code can be hacked by writing a new firmware to it. The software region MUST be there in order to let you play a disk. A disk can have multiple regions and in order to play the right track the region must be set.

The software region is however easy to fix.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[Jucius Maximus]

"Is this a mix of software and hardware? Are some DVD-ROM drives just un-regioned? Does it somehow rely on the software to participate?"

There are two schemes:

RPC-1 (the old one) - The drive itself physically has no region protection and relys on the software to check the region of the disc and act appropriately. Your average windows DVD playing software has these protections. This is very easy to bypass and usually involves some easily obtainable freeware program. Linux dvd players usually ignore regions to begin with, so an RPC1 drive + linux player = 100% region free. Judging from your comments, this is what you have.

RPC-2 (new age, ubuiquitous today) - The drive itself has region checking so first you have to bypass the hardware protection via firmware patch (often but not always available) and THEN bypass the software protection in whatever DVD playing software you use. So, an RPC-2 drive + correct firmware patch + linux player = 100% region free.

Even if you are using VideoLAN or Ogle for linux which ignore region control, your RPC-2 drive will shut you down unless its firmware is patched.

If you are buying a DVD drive for your PC, you might want to go look around for firmware patches and then make your purchase depending on what's available.

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[Anonymous Coward]

RPC-2 drive + correct firmware patch + linux player = 100% region free

Is there a way to flash the firmware on Linux?

Re:PC DVD region coding?

[Jucius Maximus]

" RPC-2 drive + correct firmware patch + linux player = 100% region free

Is there a way to flash the firmware on Linux?"

Usually the flash programs are for DOS so I suggest you look into getting FreeDOS or downloading a win98 bootdisk from www.bootdisk.com.

Re:Ripping on the fly... Correction

[justsomebody]

(with a DVD player)

I wanna say, this is the only tool that will came out with this. Either that or pirated DVDs.

Phsaww, why bother with this

[jandrese]

When you can change the region code on your DVD-ROM with a simple firmware flash. I havn't run across a DVD-ROM drive that can't be flashed yet. Although this could be a nice tool for fansubbers. They could avoid some legal trouble by releasing only the translations and making the people buy the actual offical DVDs themselves.

Re:Phsaww, why bother with this

[Dahan]

I havn't run across a DVD-ROM drive that can't be flashed yet.

Okay, where can I find a region-free firmware for either of the Plextor PlexCombo drives (combination DVD-ROM and CD-RW drives)? firmware.fr.st says there isn't one yet.

Re:Phsaww, why bother with this

[AvitarX]

why risk flashing your drive (there has to be some risk, right?) when you don't nead too. I mean, if I can be 100% sure there won't be a problem with my new drive I just baught why go with the 99.9% sure way of flashing?

Re:Phsaww, why bother with this

[drasfr]

Well... I came accross a DVD-writer that did not supported the flash update, Panasonic, LF-D311 DVD-R/RAM writer (Matsushita drive). Trying to Flash my bios killed the drive :( And as far as I know in my researchs, they can't be made zone free, Matsushita put some built in 'features' like checksum, and outside of flash stuff to protect against that kind of stuff... It sucks. Buy a Pionner if you want a DVD-writer, at least you can make them easely zone free...

Re:Phsaww, why bother with this

[MrWorf]

Ahem, the drawback of this conclusion would be that everyone would have to watch the DVD on his/hers computer instead on the bigscreen (in my case, 29" TV). So, no, I'll keep downloading anime fansubs until I can buy it on R1 with english subs and watch it the "proper" way.

Sorry :-) /MrWorf

Re:Phsaww, why bother with this

[Anonymous Coward]

Changing region code and adding subtitles aren't the only things this can do. The feature on it that I find most useful is the ability to remove restrictions on fastforward/chapterskip/etc so you can do things like skipping the FBI warnings and misc logos that appear at the beginning of some DVDs.

I thought this already existed

[ModernGeek]

I thought that these already existed, I forgot where, but I saw it a couple months back.

slashdotted already

[zemote]

Mirror, Mirror on the wall, tell me who has the most bandwidth of them all?

Zemote,
Mysql is like masturbation

Re:slashdotted already

[Anonymous Coward]

Mirror here at http://mongfish.com/mirrors/dvdsynth/. Haven't got all the files yet though, but should have them in a while. The original site is not quite dead yet, but very slow!

"legal" dynamic edits

[wfmcwalter]

Perhaps (IANAL, naturally) this would enable one to perform edits to a movie legally, as no altered copy of the original work is ever instanciated.

One could distribute the edits alone online, and someone else could play their DVD filtered through that editset.

So everyone can remove the "dirty bits" of DVDs. For the right-wingers, that's kissing, nipples, evolution. For the test of us - Jar Jar.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Cally]

Perhaps (IANAL, naturally) this would enable one to perform edits to a movie legally, as no altered copy of the original work is ever instanciated.

One could distribute the edits alone online, and someone else could play their DVD filtered through that editset.

And how will you do that when the tool itself is illegal, hmmm? It's already in breach of the DMCA, and the MPAA have shown no reluctance to pursue DMCA-infractions outside the US as if they were domestic - as I know to my cost, being prosecuted in California for my deCSS mirror in the UK - and the forthcoming EUCD legislation in the UK mandates DMCA-type provisions, without those pesky exceptions for reverse engineering, interop, et al.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Anonymous Coward]

It's already in breach of the DMCA

How's that? It's not a device primarily designed to circumvent protection, that's just a side effect of its "edited viewing" capabilities.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[limekiller4]

Perhaps spawn a new DIY MST3k sub-genre?

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[purp]

If it gets past the DMCA, I'm sure the "clean" movies crowd (CleanCut Cinemas and MyCleanFlicks to name a few) will love this. There was an excellent article in the New York Times Online (free subscription required, blah-de-blah) last Thursday discussing such things.

Like all cool things, really scary too.

--j

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.clearplay.com already offers a pay service/product that allows to put your existing dvd's into your computer and watch an edited version. Of course, they must have made an edit of the DVD, so there's limited selection, at least initally. And it's only available for Windows.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[glitch23]

So everyone can remove the "dirty bits" of DVDs. For the right-wingers, that's kissing, nipples, evolution. For the test[sic] of us - Jar Jar

And for left-wingers, that pretty much means that The Ten Commandments, if ever put on DVD, will be 2-3 hours of blackness on your screen.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[jbolden]

I've always said that if life is discovered on Mars California courts will rush to claim jurisdiction there. Seriously though how does the state of California argue that your actions took place in their state?

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Cally]

>>It's already in breach of the DMCA

> How's that? It's not a device primarily designed to
> circumvent protection, that's just a side effect of
> its "edited viewing" capabilities.

Tell that to the judge. deCSS's alleged "infringing" use is just a side-effect of someone trying to watch DVDs using Free software. That hasn't prevented people losing their jobs, getting into very expensive (and risky) legal cases, having their websites silently pulled, and so on.

FWIW my mirror's at http://www.zpok.demon.co.uk/deCSS/ . The last time I posted that URL here I got a nastygram from
my ISP (who are now playing nice, to be fair.)

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Cally]

> Seriously though how does the state of California
> argue that your actions took place in their state?

I have no idea (I'm a British citizen residing in the UK and the mirror's physically located here too.) I won't dignify their pathetic actions by bothering to pay any particular attention to the case. I'm a "John Doe" id'd only by the URL of my mirror. Perhaps the lawyers were too stupid to realise what ".co.uk" signified?

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[Kjella]

Californian law claims that any crime directed at California is prosecutable under californian law (I.e. if you stand at the state border and throw a grenade into California, you can be prosecuted in California even though you never was in that jurisdiction.) Since the MPAA is located in California, they argue that it's an attack on MPAA and thus prosecutable under californian law. They also wanted to prosecute DVD-Jon from Norway under the same reasoning.

Personally I feel it makes no sense whatsoever, as it would institute californian law and global law, even if the reverse engineering was legal where it occured* (*trial not settled yet about DVD-Jon in Norway, but I'm 99% certain he will be acquitted).

Kjella

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[jbolden]

But the MPAA is a national / international agency. I could see an attack against the MPAA physical offices being under CA jurisdiction but copyright is at the very least national so I still see how CA has any claim. In many ways even if the mirror were in California it would be hard to argue this shouldn't be in federal court.

Re:"legal" dynamic edits

[guacamolefoo]

> So everyone can remove the "dirty bits" of
> DVDs. For the right-wingers, that's kissing,
> nipples, evolution. For the test of us - Jar
> Jar.

After watching the almost completely unwatchable "Attack of the Clones" I decided that Jar Jar, while annoying, was not nearly as annoying as the awful, truly bejeezusly awful, Anakin/Amidala love subplot. The dialogue is laugh out loud awful and that acting either flat (Amidala) or just teen-angst bad (Anakin).

My edit goes to that. Jar Jar is, in comparison, a minor annoyance, on a level with the cackling rat thing in Jabba's throne room in RotJ.

guac-foo

not long at all.

[Em Emalb]

"Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS."

Based on the way things are going, I'd say not long at all. It seems once something hits /., the big guys pick up on it and [Emeril voice]BAM![/Emeril voice] Down it goes, in a fiery ball of death.

Folks, the powers that be won't sit idly by while new means of circumventing their devices gets published. the only way to defeat them is to beat them at their own game. Politics, politics, politics.

Re:not long at all.

[kaxman]

Can't we just bash them in the nuts with the mighty gavel of justice?

Dammit, it would feel so GOOD.

Re:not long at all.

[nmarshall]

wait, so they have a ton of cash, and we are suppost to defeat them in a game that can be bought...

why not do what we do best make excellent code? remember that in the end it is the engineers and scientists that design the world that the power brokers and politicians fight over.

you can't win a crooked game.

here's the google cache

[Anonymous Coward]

http://216.239.39.100/search?sourceid=navclient&q= cache:http://www.roundelay.net/dvdsynth/prerelease .html

dead link

[io333]

well since that link is /.

here are some cached links

Re:dead link

[Anonymous Coward]

And a more complete mirror here at http://mongfish.com/mirrors/dvdsynth/. Some of the links aren't there yet but should have them in soon.

One use for this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a thought. VMWare 3.x doesn't support FreeBSD, but that's where DVD support was added. I'd like to be able to use the DVD-ROM features on my discs, but they're always Win only or Win/Mac.

If this can make virtual devices on the Win box inside VMWare, maybe I can use it to watch 'em. Rip the disk to a bitstream, scp it inside the VMWare box, set up a new device with this driver that's linked to the bits on disk instead of a real drive, and go to town.

Re:One use for this...

[Piquan]

That makes a lot less sense without adding that FreeBSD supports VMWare 2.x, but not DVDs.

Re:One use for this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not just the DVD directly inside VMware?

VMWare 3.x supports DVDs,but not CSS-ed DVDs.
Mount, run vobcopy, see DVD be decrypted in VMware.
Simple.

Nice hack.

[Soko]

Google Cache here. Poor little server.

Anyway, seeing as this little guy can effectively extract all data coming from a copy protected device, I guess Palladium type systems are already in-effective. Contraband code? So what - it's already out there.

I would guess that this is a method for creating what is effectively a wrapper for the DVD driver, perhaps more correctly a shim. This means that it appears to be a DVD drive to the OS, and a DVD player program to the drive. This method can be employed to any hardware device - even embedded DRM methods. It may take a while, but it can be done. If hardware needs software to run, that hardware can be emulated with software, period.

The proponents of DRM might eventually come to realise this - if it's an idea, it's hard to keep it in a can. Good ideas are impossible to keep under wraps. To them I say:

The Genie is out of the bottle boys, but it grants wishes to anyone, not just you. Deal with it.

Soko

Re:Nice hack.

[ncc74656]

I would guess that this is a method for creating what is effectively a wrapper for the DVD driver, perhaps more correctly a shim. This means that it appears to be a DVD drive to the OS, and a DVD player program to the drive. This method can be employed to any hardware device - even embedded DRM methods.

Now that you've put it that way, it's not even really a new idea (except for applying it to a DVD-ROM drive). Total Recorder has done basically the same thing with soundcards for a long time. It lets you save the audio from crippleware such as RealPlayer and Windows Media Player.

Nice, but ...

[JohnyDog]

how long it will last before it'll be stolen^H^H^H^H^H^Hadopted by MS for their newest DRM model ?

Hack 'em all

[Anonymous Coward]

Destroy the fat pigs with code!!! Fight the power !

Players..

[gmuslera]

Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS.

Wonder how long before this will be included in mplayer and other open source players

Re:Players..

[Piquan]

What's the point? mplayer already supports changing subtitles, I don't think it honors region codes (and DVDSynth probably won't help with h/w region checks), and the SCSI protocol spy doesn't belong there under the Unix device model.

Used for evil?

[3Suns]

I think the more pertainent question is how long it'll take Microsoft to shanghai this code (embrace, extend, whatever) for their signed DRM drivers. If it can filter DVD content before it gets sent to applications, it could potentially be used to block copyrighted data from being recorded, or displayed by non-endorsed, non-liscensed software. This sounds alot like the driver tricks considered for sound cards, that would refuse to send unencrypted sound to the computer.

But what about RPC2?

[gleffler]

Since the link is /.ed, I can't tell if it addresses this or not, but if it just strips out the region coding from the playback, how does it deal with RPC2 disks (that query the drive for what region it's currently running under, and if it gives the wrong answer, bye bye movie)? If it can't handle RPC2 DVDs (most new ones are like this - if you try to play an RPC2 disc on a player that has been modified and it tells the disc the wrong region, you see the annoying map screen), it's not much use to be honest.

Re:But what about RPC2?

[Rogerborg]

• how does it deal with RPC2 disks

RPC2 (aka RCE) is a software solution that relies on the menu system on the player being run before the tracks are played. Part of the DVD-video standard specifies that players must respect unskippable track flags. Disney abused that to force long previews, the Feds use it to show the "Federal Offence" copyright bluster, RCE uses it to force the menu.

However, players can ignore the flags. This utility lets you skip the menus completely and just play the tracks. Similarly, some dedicated players ignore the standard and allow you to simply select tracks to play, bypassing the RCE menu completely.

Jar-Jar?

[codexus]

So that means that we'll finally get the Episode I without Jar-Jar Binks?

filter that will remove region codes

[Alsee]

Damn terrorists.

-

Re:filter that will remove region codes

[Anonymous Coward]

"If you remove the region coding from DVDs, the terrorists have already won"

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[terminal.dk]

In Denmark, all the cheapest DVD players are region free.

Region protection an Macrovision costs money, so that crap is saved.

Hahah.

[Xacid]

"Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS." Until it gets onto the front page of slashdot...oh wait..

Im not so sure of its controvrsy

[huhmz]

Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS.

Non-region coded dvdplayers are almost defacto now, im not so sure this will cause a stir. It seems to me the big media providers have more or less given up on the whole region thing.

it's very ironic..

[Anonymous Coward]

that with his books containing the content that they do, Stephen King manages to die every single day here on slashdot. hmm, i wonder if he gets all of his ideas from doing this.

Re:it's very ironic..

[matrix29]

that with his books containing the content that they do, Stephen King manages to die every single day here on slashdot. hmm, i wonder if he gets all of his ideas from doing this.

Well, Bill Gates was shot on December 2, 1999.
http://www.billgatesisdead.com/

So I guess Stephen King felt left out (or is doing a bit of self-advertising to keep his name in heavy circulation).

Yes, it's Free

[ptbrown]

The source code is licensed under the GPL, which isn't mentioned anywhere on the page.

Also from the README...

All DVDSynth components should build with VC++ 6.0. Most components also build with MinGW, except for dvdproxy.mpd, dvdproxy.sys, and MirrorDrive95.kll (and those only because I haven't ported them yet). Be careful about this last, because if you build MirrorDrive95.dll without MirrorDrive95.kll and try to run the result, you will probably get a nasty crash. The MinGW Makefile is kinda broken; in particular it doesn't know anything about the header files. You will also need NASM (a free assembler) to build the one ASM file that's currently in the distribution. You should not need the Windows DDK or any Windows header files beyond what come with VC++ and MinGW.

Which is kinda nice for those of us who don't have $600+ to blow on visual studio. (Or are a student at a uni with the $5 per license deal.)

(sorry, I didn't bother to grab any other files)

Re:Yes, it's Free

[Chris Carollo]

Which is kinda nice for those of us who don't have $600+ to blow on visual studio.

I believe you can get Visual C++ Standard Edition for $90, which while lacking the optimizing portion of the compiler, should do the job.

Re:Yes, it's Free

[knodi]

Actually, I'm a student at a Uni, and I know about that deal you're talking about. It's not $5 a license; it's $5 a CD. And we can only buy one copy each of one version of vis studio (and one os (xp), one office (xp)).

Visual Studio .NET (as it comes to us) is 6 CDs. And there's a mandatory $20 student fee called the "Software Licensing Fee". With our 44,000 students, Micro$oft makes $750,000 without selling a single discount CD.

I WISH it was just $5 a license. Then I could say screw the CDs and legally download pirate versions (which are readily available on our campus network.)

Re:Sad day ... Stephen King dead at 55

[Anonymous Coward]

you should probably start listening to another radio station. do they have any other programming? or just talk about how Stephen King dies every day?

short and t-shirts

[skydude_20]

Wonder how long before this is contraband code like DeCSS
so long as they can get it written in only a few lines of perl and printed on shirts we can all buy

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[Elledan]

Few countries outside the US do much about regio-encoding.

In Europe just about any DVD-player you can buy is region-free, and it doesn't appear that this will change any time soon.

Not so fast.

[Dan Crash]

I think you're missing something here.

In the future, a Palladium-enabled DRM aware OS could stop you from installing this driver. Or even researching enough to write a similar one. With a DRM OS, Microsoft could specify that only cryptographically signed drivers from approved developers will be allowed on your system. The DRM future is one where you don't control your box. Everything you want to do will have to be approved and accepted. This is not your father's copy protection, and you treat it lightly at your peril.

Re:Not so fast.

[MAXOMENOS]

Well put, which is why I will never use Windows XP, or any other Microsoft OS, on any system I develop. I can only hope that the hardware manufacturers aren't intimidated into making their hardware compatible only with DRM-aware OSes.

Re:Not so fast.

[mark-t]

Which basically means that your home computer is about as programmable as your toaster oven. It may have software in it supplied from the manufacturer, but you sure as heck won't be able to write your own software for it.

I suppose if people want to turn the word "computer" into meaning something along the lines of "useful household appliance for watching movies , listening to music, and web surfing" rather than a "programmable computing machine", there's not a heck of a lot that can be done about that...

A machine that we can't control is not, by any definition of the word we use today, a programmable computing device. I see no reason that something like DRM will change that.

A fundamental premise of computing is the abillity to move *any* bitstream. Violate that, and you throw away over half a century of research in the field of computer science.

Re:Not so fast.

[macrohard0]

This would also mean that I cannot test a programming school assignment on my system. I somehow doubt this is going to happen.

Re:Not so fast.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't you take some time to read the faq on palladium. It isn't MS that will be chosing what can be installed or run, it's the user.

Re:Not so fast.

[Proneax]

Microsoft can say anything they want NOW, but what is stopping them from embedding code that they can switch on at a later date to add these kind of restrictions? That's the danger of this new security platform. Although, look at passport. Maybe Palladium will be too buggy to be effective.

Re:Not so fast.

[cerberusti]

The fact that corporate america relies heavily upon internal software development, which this would hinder. So they will not do it or, they will either have a way to sign them easily (which will be quickly distributed) or a version that does not enforce this for corporate use (which would also be quickly distributed). There is no way they would risk only allowing signed items to run with no exceptions.

Re:Not so fast.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, I choose to install an app that lets me copy that Palladium protected datastream as plain old unencrypted data. Ooops... what do you mean I can't do that? You said I could install any app I like... you fucking lied to me!

Re:Not so fast.

[Anonymous Coward]

So nobody will probably see this, but I'll post anyways.

This ignores the growth of virtual machines. Very few corporate programs require direct access to the hardware, Microsoft could (in the name of trustworthy computing) add restrictions to code running directly on the processor without restricting the use of code that runs on top of .NET (where these low level hacks wouldn't work).

Re:Not so fast.

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw it AC, and I think the same: VMs would be mighty popular in cases like that.

Perfect Example of Need for Palladium

[Sean Clifford]

You see, Senator? This is a perfect example of why we need Trustworthy Computing(TM) protection like Palladium(TM). Protection at the hardware level is absolutely essential to stop the rampant piracy of intellectual property that threatens to destroy the entertainment industry.

Imagine, if you will, the billions of dollars in lost revenue, the thousands of lost jobs, the dozens of dollars of lost tax revenue (for those of us who don't shelter our money overseas) if this behavior is allowed.

This is more damning that the threat of VCRs and audio tapes that nearly destroyed our industry in the 1980's. Then consumers could watch television whenever they wanted and fast-forward over commercials. They could watch these shows again and again without new revenue being generated with each play. They could make mix tapes of their favorite music to listen whenever they wanted as often as they wanted, without paying more money, and without being forced to listen to the new music and messages we're selling.

See how much money we lost in the 1980's a direct result of the evil Socialist conspiracy? This is why we need perpetual copyright and why we must control every aspect of the consumer experience. We must be rid of choice; it threatens our very existence. And yours. Imagine what would happen if voters had real free choice of who they wanted in office.

</sarcasm>

Re:Perfect Example of Need for Palladium

[0x0d0a]

Imagine what would happen if voters had real free choice of who they wanted in office.

You don't have a Sen right because there are *other interested parties* like your next door neighbor.

You *do* live in a country that at least has indirection elections that are fairly free from corruption.

Re:Perfect Example of Need for Palladium

[plaa]

This is more damning that the threat of VCRs and audio tapes that nearly destroyed our industry in the 1980's. Then consumers could watch television whenever they wanted and fast-forward over commercials. They could watch these shows again and again without new revenue being generated with each play.

I think this comparison (very common though it is) misses two points which distinguish copying in the '80s from the copying of today:

1. With tapes and VCRs, you need a physical medium to copy the music/video, hence cost for copying (not to mention the tape-tax). Nowadays you can copy content on the 'Net for free (or at maximum for what the ISP charges you).
   
2. There is no loss of quality when copying digital content. In the '80s you could copy infinitely, but the quality was very soon too poor to be the least bit satisfactory (at least with common consumer devices).
   

As much as I hate DRM schemes, I think this comparison is very unfair. Does anybody have any better comparisions to suggest?

Re:Perfect Example of Need for Palladium

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no loss of quality when copying digital content

I take it you have never seen a compressed movie, then? The quality really, really sucks...

Re:Perfect Example of Need for Palladium

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey buddy, take a look at what I can do. I can take these movies, and these videos, and these computer programs, and without paying the companies which produced them, I can give it away for cheap. Isn't that cool!

It's just information, and information was meant to be free. :) I mean, I know that it costs millions of dollars to produce this stuff, and that the people who make it are famous (and I am deluded into thinking that they make a killing). But those attempts to protect the content are pathetic and I enjoy breaking them.

Any tricks they can do to protect their rights to ensure that people compensate them for their time can be overcome by my hacking. Wow. Look at that, another $300 product stolen here. There, we have $100 in music I didn't buy. This is way fun.

When I grow up, I am going to be a professional thief! Steal from the people who work 24/7/365 to make a difference in the world. I sure hope I don't ever get caught. Heh what they have to try and stop me is evil, and will never work. I just love freeloading off of the system.

Re:Sad day ... Stephen King dead at 55

[Anonymous Coward]

How come the "Stephen King dead" troll is getting more bites all of a sudden? It used to be that it would get modded down and people would ignore it. Recently though, it seems like more people are responding; several yesterday, 3 on this one.

Slashdotters must be getting more stupid.

IP status of subtitles

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that's an interesting question. A studio-provided set on a released disc is obviously the property of the studio, not to be passed back and forth. A verbatim copy of dialogue would also qualify for protection. But an independently translated version of copyrighted dialogue? How about a paraphrased version in the original language?

This is gonna be interesting to watch. Studios don't take kindly to any unathorized editing of their stuff, as we have seen.

Re:IP status of subtitles

[Thomas the Rhymer]

There is already case law on copyright from one language to another under Bern convention. The USA is a Bern signatory. It is an obvious issue here in Europe where all EU states have two or more languages. Any published translation falls under the original copyright. The original owner can choose what terms the translator works under. This applies to TV programs, movies and books etc etc. Notably it applies to pop songs as well. So it goes.

contraband code like DeCSS

[dirvish]

Somebody should condense it into about 30 lines of perl code and print it on t-shirts...

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[drinkypoo]

Region protection doesn't cost anything, it's done in software. I don't know if macrovision is added in software of if they use a circuit to do it.

Is Slashdot scooped by EVERYONE?!?!

[philovivero]

I read this story on Friday morning. NTK Now covered it. The submission seems almost a word-for-word copy/paste of NTK Now's coverage. Hell, why not? I'll copy/paste NTK Now's coverage:

TRACKING: sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering

DVDSYNC is a low-level Windows filter that can sit between a DVD player and your DVD player software, and mess with data streams and controller commands on the fly. There's not much there yet but what there is demonstrates the great promise of the design. Already You can create your own subtitles (there are already some improved English subs for Gauche the Cellist, and a couple of other anime tracks). In the future, we imagine, you'll be able to perfectly sync-up extra audio tracks or even skin your own DVD menus. There's also, ahem, a filter to take out any DVD zoning information before it gets to the DVD playing software. In other words, a really useful utility for DVD watchers - and anyone who likes improving on the creativity of others - which will have the military- industrial-entertainment complex spitting blood. This is what TCPA, EUCD, DMCA and any anagrams thereof were cynically designed to smack down. Get it while you can. http://www.roundelay.net/dvdsynth/prerelease.html - despoiling our DVDs with homemade content? Who could want such a thing? http://www.yil.com/columns/column.asp?columnist=eb ert&date=020201&page=01 - Ah. And wasn't killing Siskel enough of a warning?

Now, don't you feel better?

Re:Is Slashdot scooped by EVERYONE?!?!

[AnnaBlack]

The submission seems almost a word-for-word copy/paste
Well, I think that's a tad unfair - yeah, I saw it linked from NTK, followed the link and thought "that's worth checking to see if SlashDot has it". It didn't, so I submitted it with my own words. Jeez, if you appreciated the story fine, but leave the poor submitter alone!

Anyway, aren't nearly all SlashDot stories submitted by people who have seen them linked somewhere else (or are the originators of the story hoping for attention)? And isn't this an inevitable and even beneficial part of the whole web-zine thing? What do you want, roving reporters already?

Anna

Video Jukebox anyone? Cd Server?

[ReadAholic]

From the Summary:

--------------
DVDSynth is an open platform for developing various "virtual devices," particularly virtual CD/DVD-ROM drives and virtual discs to put in them.
--------------

If you can make a virtual device AND a virtual disk, you can copy an installation disk to your hard drive ( ISO ), and do software installs from there. Some games, and anything else that look for the cd to verify before runing, could look to a virtual CD.

You could do the same for DVD's and have video parties without the worry of some doofus ( or 2 year old ) scratching a new DVD.

I believe there is something already released that does something similar under windows , but it is not open source.

Re:Video Jukebox anyone? Cd Server?

[Anonymous Coward]

In windows there is a Daemon tools for mounting ISOs. In Linux just use "mount -o loop0 image.iso /mnt/some_directory".

future features

[Lazarus_Bitmap]

An excellent start, to be sure, but her are a few more features I'd like to see: -Automatic coherent plot insertion. To finally add a compelling story line to those lame new Star Wars movies. -Friends cast declothinator with male/female preference settings. -De-Teshinator. To overwrite awful soundtracks. -Anti-Green mode, to remove annoying bit characters like Tom Green or (as mentioned) Jar Jar Binks. -Anti-Bruckheimer mode, to remove intense close up and schaltzy slow mo scenes backed with Aerosmith songs. So many possibilities....

Pretty foolish to put this on /. so soon...

[Wolfrider]

Does anyone else think it's BLOODY STUPID to put this on /. before it's even finished? This gives the PTB plenty of lead time to shut the project down!!!
.

Sounds like it could be usefull

[I_am_Rambi]

According to my universities handbook, "Guidelines for DVDs on campus are that any media which contains inappropriate language, nudity, gratuitous violence, etc. may not be viewed or possessed (including video tapes) in the residence halls or on campus.." Will this driver filter out all on wanted bad language. There are movies that I like to watch, Star Wars for example, but am unable to because it contains one or two swear words.

If this driver can do that, I wonder if we would be able to watch upto certain rated movies.

This would also be nice for families. If a parent doesn't want a child to view/hear certain parts of the DVD, this sounds like it will be able to bleep that part out. Sounds like this program may take off nicely.

Re:Sounds like it could be usefull

[Clock Nova]

Good God, man! What kind of university do you attend that can, in such a sweeping move, infringe upon your civil and legal rights? Bob Jones University?

Re:Sounds like it could be usefull

[Zeinfeld]

Good God, man! What kind of university do you attend that can, in such a sweeping move, infringe upon your civil and legal rights? Bob Jones University?

Hey, could be worse, it could be Jim Jones university...

Just in case, I'd lay off any soft drinks on offer

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[Anonymous Coward]

"You can get hacked firmware for many, MANY PC dvd drives out there to make them region free or allow an infinite number of region change switches."

True however one must be very careful in flashing one's firmware. Any problems (wrong version,defective code,improper or incomplete flashing) can cause you to end up with a paperweight. An easy way to lose $70. Besides most discs come out in region one, so people in the northern hemisphere don't even have to bother.

corruption free elections

[Sean Clifford]

You *do* live in a country that at least has indirection elections that are fairly free from corruption.

Really? How about the Florida elections of 2000 and 2002? Those sure the hell weren't free of corruption. Bush was "elected" due to rampant voter fraud. And now his brother will be re-elected in Florida - again due to vote fraud.

Re:corruption free elections

[0x0d0a]

There also was all sorts of problems with the election that the media dug up, but there were on both sides, and not that severe. The Bush elections aren't anything like killing off political opponents or simply openly buying votes, or throwing out the results of an election because they went against you.

Re:corruption free elections

[the eric conspiracy]

There also was all sorts of problems with the election that the media dug up, but there were on both sides, and not that severe.

Not to mention that the independent reviews concluded that Bush actually did win the plurality of the votes.

Re:corruption free elections

[BlueUnderwear]

Not to mention that the independent reviews concluded that Bush actually did win the plurality of the votes.

But with a margin that was so small that the result would have changed if Palm Beach voters had voted the way they intended to vote.

Even a million recounts could not fix the Palm Beach problem, because people did actually vote for Buchanan, and no recount can show that the really intended to vote for Gore.

Re:corruption free elections

[Clock Nova]

That was utter rubbish. No matter how "independent" they may claim to be, everything they supposedly researched had already been tainted by that son of a bitch and his party.

Let's go to war so we can all forget about what a lousy job I'm doing here. He's just like his father, except not as smart.

In case you're wondering- yes, I'm trolling, but I really mean this, so I'm not just saying it to illicit a response.

Re:corruption free elections

[jbolden]

Bush was "elected" due to rampant voter fraud.

Balony there was less vote fraud in 2000 then in 1996 then in 1992.... Florida is a pretty clean state in terms of fraud and given the microscopic level of detail there is very little evidence of fraud. If there was known rampant votor fraud who has been indicted for it?

Re:corruption free elections

[jbolden]

So what?! You ever seen a California ballot? They are much more complicated then what was used in Palm Beach, I'm a pretty bright guy and I prepare my ballot in advance using the sample ballot because of the compexity. We have no idea who would have won the election if the American electorate were intellegent votors who paid attention. It would have been a different election most likely with neither Gore or Bush as candidates.

Re:corruption free elections

[Lectrik]

Quoth the post-it:

But with a margin that was so small that the result would have changed if Palm Beach voters had voted the way they intended to vote.

Even a million recounts could not fix the Palm Beach problem, because people did actually vote for Buchanan, and no recount can show that the really intended to vote for Gore.

speaking as someone who has been living in Florida for 99% of his life I have to point out that Florida contains 74% of the nations DUH. When people get confused by the ballots because they can't read or if they actually wanted to vote Buchanan there is something wrong, we need to have ballots with the pictures next to the names so the twits who screwed up can stop making us look like a state of complete farking idiots

On another note: National DUH distribution
74% in Florida
17% in Holywood
5% in Washington DC
3% remainder of the USA
1% Dubya

Re:corruption free elections

[matrix29]

Balony there was less vote fraud in 2000 then in 1996 then in 1992.... Florida is a pretty clean state in terms of fraud and given the microscopic level of detail there is very little evidence of fraud. If there was known rampant votor fraud who has been indicted for it?

Why certainly, and of course we can blissfully ignore Katherine Harris (the hideous clown-woman) hiring CHOICEPOINT to illegally disqualify 8000 legitimate voters (even going so far as to claim people were felons arrested in 2007)with a 95% error rate (which is in itself shameless fraud which CHOICEPOINT should be prosecuted and shut down for).

And if we blissfully ignore that the "spoiled ballots" were double-punched by a IBM card puncher (remember the LONG DELAYS on the "machine recount") to punch a certain amount of each independant candidate on valid GORE ballots while optical scan ballots very rarely were spoiled.

http://www.geocities.com/redflagsinflorida/irreg ul arities.htm

Should I also remind people of the double absentee ballots sent overseas and James Baker claiming the absentee Israel voters would tilt the election to Gore so Baker claimed we should intially reject the overseas votes until the ballot fix was in.

http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/11/09/d uplicate/
Florida sent duplicate ballots overseas
Defense Department employee alleges that some co-workers on an air base in
England voted twice.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Carina Chocano

Nov. 9, 2000 | At least five Florida residents serving at a U.S. Air Force base in England received two absentee ballots for this year's hotly contested presidential race, a civilian Department of Defense employee told Salon. Elaine Gatley, 48, a civil service executive secretary stationed at RAF Mildenhall in southeastern England, said Thursday that she and four fellow Floridians who work in her office received two ballots in the mail from the state of Florida.

"At first I thought it was just a fluke," Gatley said. "But when I went to work the next day, I talked to my friends and they said, 'Yeah, I received two also.'"

Gatley, a registered Democrat, completed and returned only one of the ballots she received. But she said that at least three of her fellow Floridians, all of whom are registered Republican, told her that they filled out and returned the second ballots as well.

"These people thought there was something wrong with the original ballot," said Gatley, who is married to an Air Force serviceman. "They just sent the second ballot in, thinking maybe something was wrong."

The duplicate ballots were mailed from election offices in at least three Florida counties -- Santa Rosa, Osceola and Hillsborough -- according to Gatley. The multiple ballots were sent to registered Democrats, as well as Republicans, she said.

"But the majority of overseas military people are Republicans," added Gatley. "It's usually the spouses, you know, the civilians, who are Democrats."

One of Gatley's Republican co-workers at the Air Force base confirmed to Salon that she had received two ballots from Florida. She requested that her name not be used.

According to Gatley, the majority of the base's staff comes from Florida. Gatley was formerly employed at Eglin Air Force Base near Navarre, Fla.

No one from other states with whom she spoke at Milden received more than one absentee ballot, said Gatley.

According to a Florida Elections Board official, it's common for counties to send out sample ballots before mailing the official absentee ballot. The sample should be clearly labeled, said the official, who requested anonymity.

The official also said that if someone sends in two ballots, election officials simply void one of them, not both.

But told of this comment, Gatley said she could discern no difference between the two ballots she received, nor could her co-workers. She said neither ballot was clearly marked as a sample.

Absentee ballots are still being counted in the controversial Florida race. Officials say the final absentee tally might not be completed for another eight or nine days. With George W. Bush clinging to a razor-thin lead in the Florida recount, the absentee-ballot tabulation has taken on critical importance.

http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/11/13 /d uval/index.html

Nov. 13, 2000 | While the nation focuses on several southeast Florida counties where election officials are struggling to come up with an accurate vote count from last Tuesday's presidential election, another brush fire is burning upstate in solidly Republican Duval County. There, an extraordinary number of discarded ballots are also at issue, and Democrats are crying foul.

Of the 292,000 votes cast in Duval County, nearly 9 percent, or 27,000, were nullified. "Overvoting," punching holes for more than one candidate, caused 22,000 votes to be tossed, while 5,000 were voided because voters didn't choose anyone, known as "undervoting." Machines tabulating the vote automatically spit those out.

Over the weekend, several prominent Republicans, such as GOP chairman Jim Nicholson and Rep. Tillie Fowler, R-Fla., pointed to the 22,000 nullified votes in Duval County as proof that the practice is common. They suggested that even though Bush would have benefited if there had been a hand recount in the county, which he won 152,000-107,000, they were not complaining about the process. "These things happen in elections," stressed Nicholson on CNN.

Truth is, Democrats are the ones outraged about Duval. They're angry because close to half the voided ballots -- nearly 12,000 votes -- came from just four of Duval County's 14 city districts. The four districts cover predominantly African-American areas of Jacksonville, where Vice President Al Gore won handily.

Duval County did not use the controversial "butterfly ballot," yet the number of voters apparently confused skyrocketed this year. In 1992, a combined 6,000 over- and undervotes were discarded in Duval County, and 7,500 were thrown out during the '96 presidential election, according to local officials. This year's jump to 27,000 represented 8.9 percent of all votes cast in the county, compared with 2 and 3 percent in the previous presidential tallies in Duval. Nationally, the percentage of presidential ballots discarded for under- and overvoting runs between 1.0 and 1.8 percent, according to Curtis Gans, director of the Committee for Study of the American Electorate.

What's so unusual, according to election experts such as Bob Naegele, who certifies voting machines for the Federal Election Commission, is that the normal rate of overvoting when punch-card ballots are used is roughly 0.1 percent. In Duval County last Tuesday, the rate ballooned to 7.5 percent. Even in Palm Beach County, where some residents say confusion reigned on Election Day and 29,000 ballots were dismissed, the overvote rate climbed to only 4.1 percent.

http://www.yorkdispatch.com/elec2000/001128b.htm l

Though the ballot applications already had been rejected and placed in a warehouse, Goard's staff members fetched the Republican postcards out of storage and placed them in a separate box for the GOP representatives. More than 4,500 ballot applications were corrected and ballots were sent to those Republican voters. It is unclear how many of those absentee ballots were returned as votes.

Some Democratic ballot applications also apparently arrived without some of the required information, but they were thrown out and Democrats were not provided the same opportunity to make them comply, Democratic attorneys say.

Re:corruption free elections

[Clock Nova]

If I could mod you up, I'd send your karma throught the roof.

Re:corruption free elections

[ncc74656]

But with a margin that was so small that the result would have changed if Palm Beach voters had voted the way they intended to vote.

Your intent to vote is indicated by what you marked. If the voters of Pea Brain County are so mentally deficient that they can't figure out the difference between "Buchanan" and "Gore" on their ballots (designed by a Democrat, design signed off on by more Democrats), then they really have no business voting. (Given that these are the same people who can somehow keep track of 50 bingo cards at a time, though, I'm somewhat suspicious of their claims of confusion WRT a single ballot.)

What I found more disturbing about the 2000 election was Gore's attempt to throw out the military vote. There was indeed an attempt to steal the 2000 election...what the left-wing media (ABC/CBS/NBC/CNN/etc.) refuses to acknowledge is that it was Gore who tried to steal the election. Thankfully, he failed in his attempt.

Quality DVD under Linux

[turtlendogrmusd.net]

Has anyone had high quality results with DVD players under Linux? I've tried Xine and VideoLan and both are choppy on an AMD1600+ with a Samsung SD-616F. I've been looking for drivers for this drive with no luck. Presumably, the decription is taking place on my processor and bogging my system enough to cause the poor video quality? Any ideas? Oh yea, DVD works great under that POS other OS using WinDVD but who wants to boot the M$ partition?

Re:Quality DVD under Linux

[mrscorpio]

Try an mpeg decoder card, they're pretty cheap and very effective.

Chris

Re:Quality DVD under Linux

[winne too]

the xine faq contains information on improving performance, here's an exerpt:

"5.1.1 I have a lot of dropped frames - what can I do?
Your hardware might be too slow for xine. Make sure you turn on all speed optimizing options."

unlikely, since i'm using it for fluid playback with an athlon 700.

"A few things you should check:
- first of all, run the xine-check script included in xine-ui package (probably already installed in your system)."

i suggest you give it a try, the following output should be the most useful information:

"checking MTRR support
[ good ] you have MTRR support and there are some ranges set.
[ good ] DMA is enabled for your DVD drive"

plus xv information.

you should also use hdparm to check your device, that's what made a huge difference for me.

Re:Quality DVD under Linux

[m0RpHeus]

Try buying a video card with a built-in hardware video scaling. It can make a big difference. I once had a Pentium-II 300 that has a Nvidia TNT2 video card before and I could still play DVDs at full screen (1024x768) without the video being choppy, because the TNT2 does all the video scaling. Also use the XV driver for Xine to be able to use the hardware video scaler

I tried on a cheap S3 Trio3d card when my TNT broke down (I already updraded my motherboard and CPU to an Athlon 1.2 GHz a year ago) and it's really slow and takes up upto 95% of CPU load because the CPU does the video scaling to play it at full-screen. It is extremely choppy. But when I use a TNt or GeForce as my video card, CPU utilization is under 5%, and video plays smoothly.

I am not a PC specialist...

[aepervius]

... but even with palladium, what stop you from using a palladium processor on a CORRECT dvd, and then having a driver non signed in background which takes the bits direct from the screen memory or what is sent to output ? What indeed ? As long as palladium authorise non signed application to run on the same PC as signed application, then there will always be a way. (yeah I know, in the future they will surely try to forbid any non signed app).

Re:I am not a PC specialist...

[AvitarX]

What is the point of palladium if it allows non signed apps? I mean what trust do they gain at all of it being in the prossessor, if the prossessor will wantonly run anything anyway?

Re:I am not a PC specialist...

[memfrob]

...and then having a driver non signed in background which takes the bits direct from the screen memory or what is sent to output...

The video card, for one. The monitor, too. In the Palladium world, hollywood can trust the video card to not allow its memory to be accessed unless the application sends the correct decryption key. The monitor will only display "signed" data, prenegotiated over your new 18-pin cable. Remember, in the world of Trusted Computing, you can't trust any part of your hardware to cooperate.

(of course, nothing prevents you from just videotaping the screen itself, then signing that as a "personal, shareable" video... until image watermarking progresses quite a bit further than currently possible. Your quality, however, will suffer - probably unacceptably.)

Re:I am not a PC specialist...

[Anonymous Coward]

Chain of trust, dude. The screen memory will not be accessible to unsigned drivers - it will be encrypted.

Re:I am not a PC specialist...

[jbolden]

When the system is running in trusting mode unsigned apps will have to run in a sandbox. They won't have access to screen memory.... Those apps that need this kind of access and are unsigned will only be bootable in untrusted mode in which case you won't have access to the encryption key for the data.

Re:I am not a PC specialist...

[The_Guv'na]

Your quality, however, will suffer - probably unacceptably.

Hmmm... *strokes chin*... At 1280 x 1024 on my monitor I can still clearly pick out single pixels. Someone could tap the monitor circuit [albeit VERY FSCKING CAREFULLY!!] to grab the rgb+v/h/sync signals, feed them into a normal VGA to TV converter, then into an encoder card or VCR. Maybe? I'm no tech expert.

Ah, watermarking... A little curcuit trickery after the tapped monitor should/could sort that out I imagine.

Can anyone with electronic expertise comment on this?

Ali

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[Anonymous Coward]

region 1 != the northern hemisphere

donut

WOOOHOO!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the best thing since sliced bread. I have a ton of region 3 dvds I wanna watch on my laptop, but until now I had to rip everything to divx... thank you to the author for allowing me to use my dvd drive again!!!

Btw, the install is alot simpler then I expected and works flawlessly on win xp for me. Thanks a million!

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[neur0maniak]

Europe is Region 2. I believe that's also in the northern hemisphere. I own a collection of both region 1 and region 2.

DVD Firmware isn't like BIOS Firmware. If it fails, it's possible to re-flash as it doesn't prevent booting up.

I have had troubles with DVD Firmware flashing. It made my drive terrible at reading even the perfect discs. Later on I found another update for the firmware, which improved on it.

First thought...

[rjamestaylor]

Use this to provide an alternate sound track for Wizard of Oz: Pink Floyd's Darkside of the Moon. trippin'...

Re:First thought...

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember - You want the "new" DSOTM (anniversary edition remaster, solid prism) for the DVD edition of Wizard of Oz. (The difference is a different amount of silence before Money - if you want to correct and don't mind cheating, line up the first bass note of Money with the entrance to the colour world.) Sync right after the third lion's roar/fadeout, line up with song transition for director credit.

For those who have no idea what this is on about, do a Google for The Dark Side of the Rainbow, one of the weirdest, synchronistically trippy things you can do with one of the greatest albums of all time, grab a copy of the DVD from somewhere, dig out your copy of DSOTM, fill the bong and/or eat a small, specially prepared piece of paper (if, that is, in such a state of mind you can _cope_ with Oz, which might just weird you out) and enjoy.

First saw it at a party. Weirded me out then. Still does.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[BitterOak]

Macrovision costs money to implement due to patent issues.

Mormon college?

[Anonymous Coward]

That description covers about 95% of what's on TV.

Is that a university or daycare?
Let me guess..youre in Utah?

"Quick, quick, turn off PBS, they're showing some nekkid roman sculptures."

Oh wait...silly me. Didnt that Ashcroft twit have a scaffolding made so that the statue with a breast showing is kept under wraps during his propaganda time?
When I read about that, I had to double check that I wasnt on the Onion site by accident.

So considering your puritanical leaders, maybe we shouldnt be offended.

trey

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[blincoln]

Region protection doesn't cost anything, it's done in software.

It costs money to have people program the routines, or license them. Even if it's only a small amount, what it amounts to is consumers paying for a "feature" that allows major studios to scam them for more money and have unnecessary control over what the consumer is watching.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[phiwum]

In Europe just about any DVD-player you can buy is region-free, and it doesn't appear that this will change any time soon.

This is not my recent experience. When I was shopping for a DVD player in the Netherlands, there were a few region free models available, but most were not region free.

In the end, I ordered my player online, because none of the region free players in the stores here support both PAL and NTSC. Curiously, there was a PAL/NTSC compatible player that supported region encoding.

No, Gore won the election

[Sean Clifford]

No, Gore won the election.

Independent reviews show that Al Gore should be sitting in the White House right now. Instead of mandating a state-wide recount, the Supreme Court ended recount and handed the election to George Bush. He was selected, not elected President. Ironically, the Supreme Court action was unconstitutional. In a disputed tied election, such a decision goes to the House of Representatives - not the Supreme Court.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[bnenning]

Instead of mandating a state-wide recount, the Supreme Court ended recount

Yes, in accordance with Florida law, which the Florida Supreme Court ignored. SCOTUS did not "hand the election" to Bush, they simply prevented SCOFLA from rewriting Florida election law after the fact.
Under the law as it existed at the time of the election, Bush won.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[Clock Nova]

Actually, you're wrong on this, too. The Supreme Court could have mandated a statewide recount, and have been perfectly within the bounds of law. What they, in fact, did was to tell them to come up with a fair way to recount, then gave them two hours in which to do it- by all accounts merely a token gesture as two hours was not anywhere near the time it would have taken.

The bitter irony, here, for the citizens of America, is that gore himself may be to blame for not demanding a statewide recount in the first place. Had he done so early enough, there would have been time for it. Of course, he can hardly be blamed for this. There was no precedent at the time for a situation like this. I'm sure he though he was doing the best thing at the time.

Unfortunately, he also had to deal with the pressures the the Bush-partisans were placing on himself, Florida voters, and the media, to admit defeat and "do the honorable thing." Funny, isn't it, how honor is always brought into the equation by the party who stands to benefit the most from it? All of that insipid name-calling, the "Sore Loserman" thing, was just a way for the Bush camp to deflect attention away from the facts, much in the same way he is wagging the dog today by insisting on launching a first strike against Iraq to deflect attention from domestic problems (sound familiar?). All of this in direct defiance of America's long-standing policy of not striking the first blow. It's amazing how much power war can give a president. If he can keep a war going until the 2004 elections, he actually stands a chance of getting re-elected.

I guess that would make each and every Bush supporter out there a war-monger, too. Because that's the only realistic chance he's got. But cheer up, it looks like Bush may actually succeed where so many dictators before him have failed. Then you can look forward to four more years of your favorite brand of chocolatey, Republican-flavored oppression.

So, no matter which way you look at it, your Republican golden-boy was selected, not elected. And history will ultimately mark him thus (if the world survives this war-monger's selectidency.)

Re:No, Gore won the election

[Clock Nova]

One thing I forgot to say:

Even if the Supreme court acted within the constitution by denying a Florida recount, you and all of your fellow Republicans will have to live with the fact that your "compassionate-conservative" messiah was sent to the white house with fewer votes than his opponent and against the wishes of the American people and the spirit of the constitution. This applies both to the popular vote and to the electoral vote, since it has been established that gore did recieve more votes in Florida.

He lost, get it?

His precidency is and always will be illegitimate, no matter how many third-world countries he bombs into oblivion.

This is so off the original topic, it hurts.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[Anonymous Coward]

Re-Elect Gore in 2004!

Re:No, Gore won the election

[jbolden]

This along with every other election in US history went to the house of representatives. The house votes whether to accept or overturn the judgement of the electors and they may do so on a state by state basis. If they had disagreed with the Florida ruling they had many options.

They voted in 2000 to accept the electors from all 50 states.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[jbolden]

There have been 3 presidents who have lost the popular vote, Bush is not the first.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[Anonymous Coward]

"There have been 3 presidents who have lost the popular vote, Bush is not the first."

True, but Bush is the first to also lose the electoral vote.

Re:No, Gore won the election

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure he [Gore] thought he was doing the best thing at the time.

Only if you mean the best thing he could think of to do to distort the vote and get elected. Certainly not the best thing for the honesty of the vote nor for his personal integrity.

It's really sad that the media didn't comment on how slimey his ajenda was in Florida. While continuing to spew retoric about counting every vote, he tried to get only those districts "recounted" (using a more lax ballot acceptance standard) that were shown to be voting Democrat. Choosing his districts carefuly and relaxing the ballot-acceptance standard could have no other effect than to increase the number of Democrat votes compared to Republican votes in those districts (becuase the ratios in the rejected votes are usually the same as in the accepted votes). This was one of the most conniving things I have ever witnessed in an election, and you know that if the parties had been reversed that the media would have been all over this fact instead of silently ignoring it.

If Gore had actually wanted to see what the will of the people was, he would have been pressing for a state-wide recount, not a Democrat-skewed recount. The fact that he mentioned a state-wide recount only once (and was glad when no one took him up on the idea) shows that he was trying to win the election by any means necessary, and he thought he had figured out a good way to skew the votes in his favor.

Certainly what the Republicans were doing was also self-serving, but the media was all over the Republicans for such things (even going so far as to find bias in any action that didn't favor the Democrats, even if it was the proper, lawful thing to do), so don't think that I find what the Republicans did to be without blame. I just hate that people don't treat both parties with equal distrust.

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.geocities.com/progressramsoftnet/DVD/fi rmwares.htm

"Flashing wrong type of firmware, will cause malfunctions! Beware what type of firmware you download and use!!!

Make sure about the state of your drive after flashing, with running Drive info program after firmware update !!!! You win, when get an "This drive has NO region protection" message. It means your drive become RPC1!

Don't forget! With new official released firmware flashed in your drive, the drive will be return in original RPC2 state, and you risk no possibilities to return to earlier RPC1 regionless state !!!!

Any power failures, hangs up, or restarts occoured when flashing, your drive maybe dead, and irreversible damaged. Please dont use this upgrades when you don't have smooth running PC. Use of an Uninterruptible Power Supply is recomended!"

Not absolutely authoritative, but you do give up any "official" updates that could correct a problem. You have the possability of "damaging" your hardware permanently.

http://perso.club-internet.fr/farzeno/firmware/d vd /dvdfi.htm

"These pages are only for advanced users.
Bad flashing could destroy your drive definitively."

Now who's ready to risk $70?

About the hardware stuff....

[dasunt]

There are already ways to flash the BIOS of DVD drives to make them region free...

People are dedicated. Especially geeks. It seems to be a rather trivial problem, due to the wide number of DVD-flash upgrades out there, and most geeks I know aren't hip on the idea 'Its supposed to not read all DVDs'.

Last I heard...

[SomeOtherGuy]

thats why IBM is spending billions on Linux. To finally marry Tux with a "boxen" that has the cycles to watch a DVD on Linux. (I don't own a DVD for my computer -- but was plenty pink in the face upon blindly bragging to a Linux/Win fence sitter than Linux was finally "there" enough for him to get his lips off Bill's backside and play his shiny new DVD's on his trusty new AMD 1800+. Well -- I ate some crow (and bought some rounds) over that one. He is back to being convinced that Linux is still only good for routing packets and mail.

Re:Last I heard...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh no, it's the inevitable 'sorry but...' message! :-)

Sorry to tell you this, but my 300mhz pc seems to be quite happy to play dvds under Linux. Full screen, even. Of course, part of it is that you need a reasonably well supported graphics card, but hey, even if your lovely new wonderbeast(TM) doesn't have an xv extension, there's a lot of stuff out there fast enough to play dvds for under 20 dollars (say matrox 200 series or so). Heck, even my laptop plays DVDs perfectly... though I will admit that it took more than one hack to get it there. So, take courage in the fact that you were basically telling your friend the truth - and feel just a little silly :-)

For the moment, your average default install doesn't do it, though - you really have to know what you're doing, and understand a little bit about the way X works, and be very aware of exactly how and with what drivers your X is currently functioning (not to mention, on PCs, little things like enabling DMA can make all the difference in the world to the system's performance). I agree that Windows does it more automatically, and on a larger range of hardware, but that's monopoly pressure for you...

Finally, an important thing to do - try Xine AND mplayer. Every time. One of them frequently works where the other one turns up its little toes and dies. If all else fails, I recommend googling for information - somebody has nearly always solved the problem, and on an AMD 1800+, if one can't get reasonable video output (even using the (pathetically ineffective) framebuffer), then one is very probably missing something important. Oh, and check out which version of libdecss you're using - the later versions were, for a time, horribly slow.

The other thing that comes to mind is Linux's general handling of DVDs, but I'm sure you weren't stuck on that - modern distros probably modprobe the important bits automagically these days.

scratched disks

[cosyne]

So does this mean it could buffer a few minutes ahead on the hard drive, and go download short sections of movies off the internet (assuming they were available) when there's a read error (such as when my roommate borrowed my DVDs without asking and scratched some...), all transparent to the player app?

(You could be required to submit a hash of the 10 minutes before (or after) the minute you want to download in order to prove that you actually have the DVD version of the movie, or an indistinguishable copy).

I'm sure glad that micrsoft, hollywood, and washington are working so hard to protect me from evil software like this....

Everyone missed the best feature of this

[Aexia]

People here keep going "Well, you can flash the ROM and sidestep region-coding that way."

That's just one of the things it can do.

Unrestrict DVD: This filter removes various usage restrictions from a DVD, including region lockout, APS (Macrovision), and disabled fast-forwarding, menu call, angle change, and so forth.

The ability to remove those stupid control lockouts is what's really great. That it gets rid of region-lockouts is simply a bonus.

rpc-2 can be broken without firmware

[David Jao]

Even if you are using VideoLAN or Ogle for linux which ignore region control, your RPC-2 drive will shut you down unless its firmware is patched.

NOT TRUE. I have rpc-2 DVD drives with original shipping firmware (two of them, in fact), and I can tell you from firsthand experience that while rpc-2 does make life more difficult, it is not by any means a roadblock to region-free playing

VideoLAN and ogle both use libdvdcss for CSS authentication and decryption. What saves you in the case of rpc-2 drives is that libdvdcss implements not one, but three different CSS access mechanisms. Two of them (called "key" and "disc") use the drive for authentication and require the drive region and disc region to match. However, the third method (called "title") attacks the algorithm cryptographically, and in most cases works even if the regions don't match.

In fact, the "title" method can even be used in the case where you have an encrypted .vob file on the hard disk and neither the dvd disc nor the dvd drive is available at hand.

See the libdvdcss documentation for more details.

The inner workings of the cryptographic attack on css are actually quite interesting. As I recall, the attack relies on the fact that blank black mpeg video encodes in a very predictable fashion. Most movies which start with blank black video are thus vulnerable to a known-plaintext attack and the movie's CSS key can be guessed in this manner.

Re:rpc-2 can be broken without firmware

[Jucius Maximus]

"VideoLAN and ogle both use libdvdcss for CSS authentication and decryption. What saves you in the case of rpc-2 drives is that libdvdcss implements not one, but three different CSS access mechanisms. Two of them (called "key" and "disc") use the drive for authentication and require the drive region and disc region to match. However, the third method (called "title") attacks the algorithm cryptographically, and in most cases works even if the regions don't match."

Thank you, I did not know this!

There's a cost associated with digital too

[Sean Clifford]

There is a cost associated with going digital too. The last time I checked, hard drives and mp3 players weren't free. You need a place to store your movies and music, hence the analogy holds.

Digital TV musings

[anarkhos]

A similar tool for Digital TV to enable recordings would be cool.

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[mindstrm]

Not necessarily.
Depending on the design, it's quite possible you could lobotomize your dvd player with bad firmware.
It all depends on if the loader routines are in firmware or in separate rom, and what measures the engineers took to ensure a clean upgrade.

Re:Sad day ... Stephen King dead at 55

[Anonymous Coward]

Today is Mr. King's birthday.

Fan Subs for Anime on real DVD!!

[RockyJSquirel]

The official subtitles are often not as well translated as "fan subs"

Cool if we can get better translations on our movies..

Rocky J. Squirrel

Gore won Florida, actually

[Anonymous Coward]

" Not to mention that the independent reviews concluded that Bush actually did win the plurality of the votes."

Just the opposite, actually. If you go back and read the news stories about the recounts, buried deep within the stories was the interesting news that Gore actually won the recount. Oh, not when they recounted only those counties Gore had asked to be recounted -- he still lost then, and that is what got trumpted by the news media in their headlines. But if you kept reading, you would have learned that when they recounted all the counties in Florida, Gore won. Period.

Now as to why this wasn't highlighted more in the media, and thus why you remain ignorant of this fact to this day, is an exercise for the independent thinker.

Download it now

[MoneyT]

while you still can. If it's downloaded everywhere and thousands upon thousands of us have the code, even if it goes the way of DeCSS it couldn't be stopped. Print the source code on T-Shirts, mousepads and mugs. Distribute the binaries via email and AIM and Kazza. They won't stop this one

Subtitles

[Earlybird]

As I'm sure other have pointed out, this tool isn't necessary to play/replace subtitles.

For Windows there is already the DirectVobSub codec/program which overlays, in real time, subtitles on any kind of video stream. If the stream has embedded subtitles, DirectVobSub will provide those as an option; if a file exists alongside the stream file named .language.ssi or .language.sub (eg., Signs.English.sub), it let you use that. It's most easily available through the Nimo Codec Pack.

Even Still

[spudwiser]

despite the hooha about the hardware region controlling, now that /. has said something about this, the powers that be are going to hear about it, and it's probably going to get slapped hard with a lawsuit or a c&d order. get it before the MPAA opens up again on monday!

Do you know what this means!!!

[Lelon]

Some fan could make decent english subtitles for the complete Cowboy Bebop dvd set I bought on ebay!!!

Sounds like...

[gabec]

Sounds like the next expansion-market for Gator if you ask me.

Re:Multiple region DVD players aren't illegal

[krinsh]

On the OTHER HAND, it doesn't matter whether the software or firmware on the DVD player costs; what is likely costing is the import/export- or tariff-related fees. It's something that I'm kind of getting myself motivated to start researching.

MOD PARENT UP!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's da troof!

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[Hast]

What, you've never reflashed your BIOS? That's a lot worse than just flashing DVD firmware.

Don't even think about it.

[cornicefire]

You must sit on the couch. Do not move. Do not go to the bathroom. Watch what the box shows you. The box owns you now.

Make DVD drive region free

[jopet]

The simplest way is to buy an ASUS DVD drive: just remove the "test" jumper and it is region free. See drawing

MST3K returns

[doublem]

YES!!!!

Now I can build patches for movies to put them thrugh a Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatement.

MWHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

This is fantastic.

MST3K fan sites will have a whole new outlet.

I can now taunt and mock all the movies I hate.

The next epic geek challenge: A Joel and the bots level treatement of Titanic.

Re:Region codes?-Flash n' trash.

[fyonn]

region 2 encompasses europe, japan and south africa iirc, so not just the northern hemisphere.. or even just pal/secam (japan being ntsc)

dave

Wrong -- can you say "derivative work"

[serutan]

Even a third-rate lawyer could easily chew up anybody who tried to assert that "on-the-fly" mods are not copyright infringement. Output to the end consumer is just as controlled as copying. For example, it's illegal to use copyrighted music in a live stage play without permission, even if you never record the final output.

It's called The Phantom Edit

[philam3nt]

THIS HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE!
It's called The Phantom Edit.

I honestly don't know much about it (having never seen it), but it's an amateur edit of The Phantom Menace, circulated mostly through the internet, but there are also VHS tapes and DVDs floating around.

• 
  Here's a message board with information:
  
• http://forum.onecenter.com/phantomedit/
  
  A very explanatory Salon Article:
  
• http://dir.salon.com/ent/movies/feature/2001/11/05 /phantom_edit/index.html
  

I once saw some semi-official website but now I can't find it...anyway most of the rumors are that it's worth watching, decide for yourself.

1280x1024 CCD camera?

[Xenophon Fenderson,]

Since we're in the realm of theory, why not build a CCD camera the size of a computer screen? Proper alignment would be a bitch (or not, with modern flat-panel displays), not to mention recompressing the old video, artifacts and all, but it would be a bit-for-bit reconstruction of the original image.

Another alternative would be to use one of the many TEMPEST-like screen reconstruction techniques, e.g. Van Eck phreaking or sampling the flashes made by the electron gun.

Oops, I guess I just described several circumvision devices. Guess that's illegal, currently...

Only software engineers?

[Andy Dodd]

I think you're being a little unfair there... ANY engineer with a screwdriver should be considered armed and dangerous to any electronics nearby.

Myself included. :)

Last Post!

[alpg]

I suggest you locate your hot tub outside your house, so it won't do too
much damage if it catches fire or explodes. First you decide which
direction your hot tub should face for maximum solar energy. After much
trial and error, I have found that the best direction for a hot tub to face
is up.
-- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw"

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