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Australian Commission Rejects Crippled-CD Complaints

Posted by timothy on from the lotsa-luck dept.

rooinlondon writes "The Age newspaper reports that a recent complaint to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission regarding copy-protected audio CDs has been rejected. Has anyone else complained to local authorities regarding this issue ? Has anyone had any more luck with their action ?"

33 of 43 comments (clear)

  1. Once again the government screws the consumer by wallet72 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I sent a few emails to the state government department in charge of consumer protection. Their answer was simple - "record labels must be able to protect their products, and if a few consumers have issues with that, it's unfortunate but there is nothing to be done about it.'
    I asked what a person was supposed to do after they'd spent money on a CD and it wouldn't play, and they said 'that's unfortunate, maybe you should test the CD before paying for it'
    I then pointed out I wouldn't be carrying my entertainment system into a shop to buy the CD, and was told that if I chose not to test the CD first then it was my problem.
    As for the copy protected CDs not being standard, yet still displaying a standard marker, I was told 'well they play on some things so they can't be non standard'

    So what's next? What can be done?

    1. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by DiSKiLLeR · · Score: 1

      I thought the ACCC was about protecting consumer rights, but obviously not. Seems they don't give a fuck :(

      --
      You can tell how powerful someone is by the magnitude of the crime they can commit and be able to get away with.
    2. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by slittle · · Score: 5, Informative
      The ACCC aren't the be-all end-all of consumer protection.

      Quoth the Office of Fair Trading:
      When do you have a right to a refund?

      Simply, a refund would be in order if the goods:

      * have a fault that you could not have known about when you purchased them
      * do not do the job that you were led to believe they would do
      * do not match a sample you were shown
      * are not as they were described.

      They may not be able to stop the sale of the products like the ACCC can, but they allow you to return the product if it doesn't do what a reasonable person would have expected.

      And another thing:
      Don't believe everything you read

      "No refunds" signs are illegal. If you buy a faulty product and you weren't aware of the fault at the time of the sale, you can usually return it to the store and expect either:

      * a repair
      * a replacement or
      * a refund.

      Of course, if you deliberately go out to buy crippled CDs so you can return them as a protest, you're fucked if they call you on it.
      --
      Opportunity knocks. Karma hunts you down.
    3. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by ralphclark · · Score: 1

      Isn't it obvious - industry representatives must have had a quiet word with the head of this body. Very likely this "quiet word" involved sending them on an expensive holiday or presenting them with a gift of a new set of golf clubs or something like that. Or just a plain bribe perhaps.

      The head of the ACCC has no business representing the interests of a multinational organization against the interests of consumers. That is the exact opposite of what he is there for.

      I suggest that all concerned Australians should give up attempting to persuade him and instead campaign loudly for his removal. I'm sure his successor would get the message.

    4. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by macdaddy357 · · Score: 1

      From now on, I suspect many Australians will buy the four dollar pirated disks sold on street corners. They will play in any player. Since the Government doesn't care about EMI ripping consumers off, consumers need to put EMI out of business themselves. Dontbuycds.org predicted that the labels would just drive everyone to the counterfeiters in an article called, What is piracy?

      --
      How ya like dat?
    5. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by wallet72 · · Score: 1

      Nah, even been down this path.
      The issue is the CD is not faulty (according to the record label and the department of consumer employment and protection), it must be the hardware you are using.

      It's just a load of crap, that needs a good legal challenge to get it sorted.

    6. Re:Once again the government screws the consumer by wallet72 · · Score: 1

      Guess what? In Australia at least, you own the CD but if you download the music becauuse you can't play it then you have still broken the law.

      Hell, we don't even have a fair use clause anymore - every CD (that I own) that I copy to my minidisc player is another infringement.

  2. There's only one thing you can really do by Xenkar · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Don't buy CDs.

    A business must sell goods or services to survive. After they sue every file sharer on the internet, they'll give in and start selling non-crippled media. I don't really understand why anyone would really want to listen to a music disc with one or two decent songs and ten to fifteen filler songs.

    1. Re:There's only one thing you can really do by wzm · · Score: 1

      People make the "filler" argument, but it simply isn't true. I buy a lot of music, typically from independant labels, or from "indie" bands that are on majors, such as Wilco, or Built To Spill. The filler argument doesn't work for me, just listening to singles sucks. There may be only a couple songs on an album that are upbeat, and poppy enough for radio, but that hardly means the rest are filler (unless you only like upbeat pop). On a decent album, you usually only find a couple bad songs, not the other way around. Have you thought about changing what you listen to? Maybe your just not listening to good bands.

      Please don't bring out the "CD's cost 15-20$" argument either. Most albums can be found for 8-14$, depending on who you go to. I like going to interpunk.com, or straight to the labels themselves, most of them have their own web sites. The 15-20$ albums usually are double lengths.

      Those two arguments have been pissing me off lately, because I personally find them to be incorrect.

    2. Re:There's only one thing you can really do by squiggleslash · · Score: 2, Insightful
      I will buy CDs.

      What I will not do is buy flat, shiny, discs that look like CDs and that can be read by some CD players, that are not CDs.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    3. Re:There's only one thing you can really do by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      Maybe you should come out of your little world once in a while and see what things are like for everyone else.

      These two arguments don't apply to you because you're not buying RIAA music, which everyone else is. When people talk about "filler", they're talking about all the music that's currently popular, not some indie band that 4 people have heard of. And CDs sold by RIAA labels, at typical music stores where MOST people shop, cost $15-20 (usually closer to 20 these days).

      Personally, I haven't bought a CD in a really long time, so neither of the arguments really apply to me either, but you don't see me going around bitching, saying "this 'CD's cost $15-20' argument is crap! They don't cost me anything at all!".

  3. How about a different law? by narratorDan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Skip the laws covering what is on the CD, how about laws covering basic product usability. If you bought a TV in AU that used NTSC (Used in USA) rather than the PAL standard that is used in AU, could you return it as defective?

    True, it works, but not in AU!


    NarratorDan
    --
    "If you're not confused by quantum mechanics, you really don't understand it." - Niels Bohr
  4. phillips and protection by doug · · Score: 5, Informative

    Didn't Phillips say that the various protection extensions were different from "real" CDs and thus were not allowed to use the CD logo? If so, check to see if that icon is on your disk and/or case. If it is there then the manufacturer is guilty of false advertising. If not, well, I guess your just outta luck unless you feel like being a long term pain in someone's backside.

    - doug

    1. Re:phillips and protection by wallet72 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Tried that argument, myself and got a friend who is a music retailer to ring them about it. Their very glib answer was simple... 'it's an audio CD because it plays on some equipment, therefore it must be standard. If it doesn't play on other equipment then maybe you need to look at that equipment.' When told that non protected CDs played fine, it was only the 'protected' CDs, their response... 'that may be the case, but I've already answered that issue.' (these are direct quotes by the way)

    2. Re:phillips and protection by Loosewire · · Score: 1

      Ive seen only a few copy protected cd's and they didnt have the CD DA logo on :-( Cd's as you know usually have the logo in the inside around the edge of the plate of plastic which holds the cd. On these cd's (one of them was Robby Williams - Escapology) there was the indient rectangle where the logo should have been but no logo :-(

      --
      Slashdot - The one stop shop for procrastination
    3. Re:phillips and protection by Channard · · Score: 1

      Trouble is, that argument runs aground because you can get those oddly shaped CDs that play on stereos and PCs or even mini CDs, and those aren't standard. I think the best way to go would to be to print out a set of the CD standards if you can find them, take them to your local store and point out how what you've bought isn't in fact a CD. Without abusing the staff, that is.

    4. Re:phillips and protection by Danse · · Score: 1

      'it's an audio CD because it plays on some equipment, therefore it must be standard. If it doesn't play on other equipment then maybe you need to look at that equipment.'

      This is so logically flawed that it's not even funny. I would have called him on this statement in a heartbeat.

      --
      It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
    5. Re:phillips and protection by eric76 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I got an argument like that once when buying a CD drive.

      At the time, CD's in computers were really just starting to gain ground. We were starting to see computers that even came with CD drives installed!

      So I went to Best Buy to buy a CD drive and picked out one made by Sony. I was talking to a manager and told him that since I didn't see the OS I was using listed on the box, I'd bring it back if it didn't work. He said that if it worked on any computer with any operating system, it was not broken and I couldn't return it.

      I hadn't been back to Best Buy since then.

      I drove over to another store, bought the exact same model, took it home, and it worked fine for the next six years or so.

  5. A long time ago... by mikiN · · Score: 5, Interesting
    in a galaxy far away two companies called Philips and Sony wrote the Red Book on CD-DA (Compact Disc-Digital Audio) and that was that. All CD players in existence could happily play CD's mastered to that standard. To prevent copying there existed the CP (Copy Prohibit) flag hidden away in the subcodes. To allow people to make a personal backup copy there was added an SCMS (Serial Copy Management System) control bit to count the number of copies made, up to 1, obviously.

    The fact that CD-ROM/CD-R manufacturers later ignored SCMS completely by allowing any audio-CD to be copied regardless of CP/SCMS bit values doesn't mean that the recording industry should level their wrath on us poor consumers by bombarding us with unplayable CD's.

    It's the drive manufacturers who chose to circumvent the SCMS policy in the first place. In a way, it can even be said that they are assisting in circumventing a copy protection scheme and as such are violating the DMCA

    Anyway, these so-called 'copy-protected' CD's do not conform to the standard so should not be sold pretending that they do.

    --
    The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
    1. Re:A long time ago... by ASkGNet · · Score: 3, Interesting

      And today copy protected cd's do a bit more than set a hidden subchannel code flag. Today, there are cases of a particular copy protection killing macintosh cd drives (jamming them), so they can only be opened by a service technician, a copy protection (which supposedly never saw the light) that would crash the OS/hard drive of the PC that its CDROM drive was used to playback the CD, now we have copy protections that simply destroy the media (DVD in this case) after a set period of time.

      Sometimes greed tops every other emotion and feeling. Recording companies have this syndrome for a long time already.

    2. Re:A long time ago... by DarkVein · · Score: 1
      in a galaxy far away two companies called Philips and Sony wrote the Red Book on CD-DA (Compact Disc-Digital Audio) and that was that. All CD players in existence could happily play CD's mastered to that standard.

      Amusingly enough, the RIAA was formed for this very purpose, for records. Now, they're an instrument in the destruction of standards, and the industry surrounding them.

      --

      I'm as mimsy as the next borogove but your mome raths are completely outgrabe.

    3. Re:A long time ago... by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      It's the drive manufacturers who chose to circumvent the SCMS policy in the first place. In a way, it can even be said that they are assisting in circumventing a copy protection scheme and as such are violating the DMCA

      Cool! Maybe one of the big record companies, like Sony, could sue one of the big drive manufacturers, like Sony. I wonder who'd win.

  6. I guess you could.. by jotaeleemeese · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ... if you were not warned in advence.

    And warned does not mean small text in a lose paper inside the box in which the TV is packaged. Warned should be a big label in red letters with "WARNING" in capital letters in the top of the box and the legal responsibitlity of the seller explaining this.

    --
    IANAL but write like a drunk one.
  7. I got screwed by EMI by EricKoh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    A little off topic, but I feel the need to warn consumers of the potential pitfalls of buying these crippled CDs. I just bought 2 CDs today using EMIs 'Copy Protection CD' technology. Both CDs wouldnt play properly on my portable cd player (iRiver IMP550). Each track would start skipping after a few seconds of play. I suspect it has something to do the electronic shock protection present on the player. (Unfortunately I cannot turn it the ESP feature off) The CDs would play on the PC (windows media player etc), but there would be clicks every now and then. The clicks are not present and the CD plays properly on windows if I install their software player. Any solutions to this problem?

    1. Re:I got screwed by EMI by PurpleFloyd · · Score: 4, Informative
      I hate to say this, but the only solution is to take the CDs back. The problem is that the "CD"s have deliberate inconsistiences in the data and the error correction: the theory is that audio-only CD players will just throw away the error correction data, while CD-ROM drives will read it, attempt to correct it, and fail. Unfortunately, since your CD player is also designed to read ISO-9660 CDs (standard CD-ROM format) for MP3 playback, it probably checks the error correction data no matter what. Thus, since you have an MP3 device and are probably an evil pirate (after all, who but evil pirates use MP3s?), you are basically screwed.

      As for the software player, it's reading off a second session of the CD, which contains valid error correction data (it's designed to be read by a computer). This contains the player installation files and some heavily compressed, DRM-laden audio files. It's probably impossible to get the audio into a format your CD player can read reliably without breaking the DMCA (at least if you're in the US; still, breaking the encryption on the files may be a rather daunting task).

      Perhaps you should write a letter to the artist; tell them that you tried to buy one of their CDs but, due to EMI's copy protection, you could not play it. I would imagine the artist would be rather troubled after recieving a few of these letters; that is, if the record company lets them see the letters. As it is, you're stuck with a CD that basically comes from the factory with defects equivalent to a nasty spiral scratch along the entire length of the CD (one side effect of the copy protection technology is that CDs become very vulnerable to scratches; there's no error-correcting data that can be used to recover from bad data).

      When you take the CD back, make sure to bring in your portable and play the CD for the store manager. If they offer you a replacement, be sure to play it before you leave the store. If they try to tell you your player is defective, tell them that Windows Media Player clicks and you don't want to install their player. Good luck; it's a tough battle, but one you should be able to win.

      --

      That's it. I'm no longer part of Team Sanity.
  8. I've said it before.. by MImeKillEr · · Score: 1

    ..and I'll say it again: I've not run across a CD yet that Exact Audio Copy has not been able to copy. It copies the track to .WAV, then uses your copy of the LAME encoder to convert it to .MP3.

    What makes the deal even better: It's free.

    I rip my CDs to CDR and pack away the originals using it all the time.

    --
    Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
  9. Contract of Sale by aaaurgh · · Score: 1

    IANAL. However, I do know (from personal experience) that in both the U.K. and Oz the law relating to the commercial sale of an item are essentially encompassed by the following. The item must be all of these:

    1. Fit for the purpose for which it was sold.
    2. Of merchantable quality.
    3. As described.

    How these are interpreted by the various parties involved is obviously variable but I have always found that stating these tenets as part of the "Consumer Protection Act" with sufficient confidence and presence (DON'T get angry) has yet to fail in achieving a refund / replacement / whatever.

    Finally, don't be fobbed off to a third party - your contract of sale under law is with the party from whom you purchased the said item, unless specifically stated and agreed to as an agent of another party, and even that's not too rigid and intractible.

    --

    Go permanent? In your dreams and my worst nightmares.
  10. And they want me to BUY music? by portnux · · Score: 1

    So the choice is to either buy cd's that may be crippled and have absolutely no recourse, or to download music. Pay and have something that MAY work, or get it for free and easily copy it to my mp3 player or play it on an Amiga. This is freekin' me out. I'm way more used to getting free limited use demo's and then paying to get the version that has all the features. :/

  11. Forget that nonsense by ILLRoyalty · · Score: 1

    it does not matter. If my ears can hear it, i can record it and pirate it... not saying that i DO That sort of stuff... In the meantime check out these ill rhymes i wrote: Im only there to diss you, my words are a set of missiles this cats got beef, more like some skeletal gristle you havnt seen, the wrath of a gentleman damage king you got more issuses than original Mad magazine and i got more magazines than Mad, blastin queens and fags stabbin knees and backs leavin ya spine barely in-tact When i spit the shit, i know its rediculous cat couldnt crush bones, if he used all his strenght to grip a dick i got proof look at his writ material this kids inferior rip his two piece off and expose his bitch exterior

  12. The answer is simple by Mr_Tulip · · Score: 2, Funny
    Do exactly what a good citizen should do...

    Throw away all your DRM-unaware HiFi equipment and replace it with shiny, new non-copyright-infringing gear.

    Or download the songs in mp3 format from some anonymous ftp, and listen to it on your PC.

    It's your call.

  13. Still waiting by poptones · · Score: 1
    I'm still waiting for those "self destruct" DVDs to show up. I live an hour from the nearest DVD rental shop and would love nothing more than to plunk down five bucks for a DVD of a movie that I could take home, rip to my hard drive, and then throw away.

    It's not like DVDs aren't already self destructable. This new technology (that I still haven't seen) has just sped up the process slightly. If the price is right, it's a better bargain than a rental.

  14. How to win (the sure way) by poptones · · Score: 1
    Don't buy their shit in the first place and you'll be sure to "win." Or, if you want to protest, buy the CD, use EAC to rip it, post it to usenet, and return the fucking CD. The other poor schmucks who don't have the skills to rip it themselves will benefit, the artist's fans will benefit, and the record company will take *yet another) hit due to their own stupid greed.

    One thing is sure: nobody wins so long as you keep giving them money.

  15. Re:tricky call, I took my cd back to Sanity by wallet72 · · Score: 1

    just one point, Australian law was changed about 8 or 9 years ago to remove the 'backup' clause - you no longer have the right to make any copy at all, although I dare them to try and enforce that law.