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Microsoft Preps 'Janus' Music Copy-Prevention Scheme
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft is expected to unveil copy-protection software this summer that will for the first time give portable digital music players access to rented tunes from all-you-can-eat subscription services -- a development that some industry executives believe will shake up the online music business." Janus is the Roman god of doorways, gates, passages, preventing people from copying music, etc.
Happy Trails!
Erick
http://www.busyweather.com/
Pay for time limited, rental media? Has Circuit City's DIVX fiasco taught them nothing?
If there were a demand for such an item I can see them working on it but the media companies try these silly schemes that have no consumer interest. Naturally they'll end up somehow blaming P2P for this system's inevitable failure.
Trolling is a art,
Didn't we already learn that people don't want subscriptions, they want the actual media to keep for posterity?
"Nobody owns the fucking words man." - James Dean
Lest we forget, Janus is also two-faced.
Anonymous Luddite: "What do you think of the dehumanizing effects of the Internet?"
Andy Grove: "Not Much."
So to start with, you'll have to get a different player that supports this "secure clock". Then you have these issues:
Music service executives said they were still in negotiations with record labels over how to treat the new technology. Allowing people to bring thousands of songs at a time to portable players may wind up costing more than the $10 a month that most subscription services charge today, the executives said.
Well that's certainly going to help - keep up the level of confusuin with different rate plans based on what you might want to do.
Nevertheless, some music services are eager to drive more consumers to subscription plans, since per-song download stores have tiny or even nonexistent profit margins.
Because what always excites the consumer is helping a company make more money.
I would think artists would not be too fond of subscription services - they must get quite a bit less (if anything?) from such services. As someone who wants to help out an artist why would I want to support a subscription services? Seems like just another refined means of ripping off people who make the music.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Has Apple iTunes been hacked yet? As in giving people un-encrypted, un-watermarked AAC files?
Can you "disable it" by holding the shift key while inserting the cd?
I recently tried out the Wal-Mart 99c per song download and found it pretty cool, DRM and all. I was able to download to my work computer and then copy to my home computer (with the license). So both are viable in both locations.
The only downer is the fact that if you lose the licenses you're screwed.
Also worked on my MP3-player so I can take the song running.
The interesting note is I charged the song. So it ended up being 99c. This was the only charge for the month on my credit card. However, my balance for the month was zero! Wal-Mart had given me a 'Small Balance Credit' which I assume is that it's probably less of a loss (99c) then some transaction fee (several dollors) from the credit card company.
So I guess you get twelve free songs a year if you handle this correctly!
I don't want to rent...I want to OWN.
"This isn't a study in computer science, its a study in human behavior"
Society of Janus is a San Francisco based BDSM education/support group...
know what it is exactly you're consenting to when you click accept on EULA.
My days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle...
Sounds more like a name of some diabolical, secret plot to rule the world.
...Maybe I've had too much caffeine recently.
"Launch project Janus!"
"You'll never get away with this!"
"I already have, Bond! Within minutes, the world will have no choice but to bow to my demands... or face the consequences."
"You fiend!"
A two-faced god that claims to stand between the primitive and civilization, but is in fact just a product of the primitive superstition of a decrepit culture.
Perfect.
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
It should be really interesting to see how quickly this gets adopted. Like you say the model is really similar to DIVX and people in general just do not like rentals.
TV subscriptions are one thing because most shows are transient, and you can record forever the ones you like. But a music subscription offers no similar benefits, only an ongoing cost and limitations on use (can you burn real CD's with a subscription service?)
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
"Janus head is a popular phrase for deception, that is, when action does not match speech."
..or perhaps a very appropriate one?
So says Wikipedia
hacker-resistant : hacker-proof :: water-resistant : water-proof
=)
I read the article this morning, and sent to some friends. I have multiple problems with it.
..."
1) I don't want to "rent" my music. I want to buy.
2) I don't want my music in crappy WMA format.
3) The tinfoil hat wearer in me sees this as a way for the music/software industries to indoctrinate the next generation of consumers with the idea that you don't "own" anything.
As the sidebar in the article says "If fans of iPod-like devices can be convinced to drop the idea of owning song files, they could shift to paying a subscription fee for ongoing access
Pass.
www.robot-invasion.com smart-assed political news, humor, and commentary
Before MP3s were Satan, I had a stereo system (hi-fi for us old folks) that could easily "rip" CDs, records, or tapes to cheap portable media (blank tapes). It didn't seem to be an issue then...
I would actually be very interested in an all-you-can-eat music subscription, provided it gave me files in the MP3 format. I have an MP3 player in my house, office, car, and person, but I don't have a Janus player anywhere!
Stop spending all your money trying to stop me from sharing stuff, just sell me stuff I want.
:wq
Everytime I hear someone use the phrase "hacker-proof". I think of the Titanic's designers calling it "unsinkable"
My days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle...
Unless they've already developed a new, proprietary headphone, a high quality 1/8" to RCA cord already circumvents this. Or -hello- get it from the CD. This 'prevention' will only matter if they can actually get exclusive content that people want, and anything that can be listened to can be copied.
File this under "Too little; too late". If this was here 10 years ago it would have ruled the market, even 2 years ago before iPod/iTunes made legitimate music buying easy* it would have had a chance. Now it's just another unwanted product; at best a footnote in a future history book.
* I'm thinking specifically of when the iTunes Music Store came to Windows. To head off the 'no ogg/Linux support, so no business from me!' posts, that most assuredly applies to this new product as well and is pointless in a comparison.
R: That voice. Where have I heard that voice before? B: In about 365 other episodes. But I don't know who it is either.
Step 1) Rent song.
Step 2) Put rented song on mp3 player.
Step 3) Go to Radio $hack, buy an adapter cable to connected mp3 output back into PC.
Step 4) Record song from Sound Card's 'Line In' using a high-quality program like Goldwave.
Step 5) Enjoy all the choonz you want for $10 / month.
Given that the system relies on a "secure clock" - it must be some kind of chip set with a time and then sealed with a battery. Otherwise, how can it continue to keep time independant of that player loosing battery power or knowledge of time?
So then - what happens when the power for this embedded secure-clock runs out? Your player needs to go in for repair, as I doubt the "secure clock" is user-servicable.
Or, perahps the chip just counts up as long as it has power. So if you only use it now and then you might be able to keep the song-embers alive for years as you slow time to the device.
I guess it won't matter since the system will be cracked before it becomes an issue, but it's kind of like buying a car with a pre-wired explosive charge under the hood set to go off in severeal years. "Not to worry!" the salesman says, "You'll have a different car in seven years anyway!".
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Janus, the two faced god. They claim to help the users and then stab them in the back for the sake of the corporations.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
I would never get a subscription to view TV.. err... Ok i would never get a subscription to listen to satellite radio.. ummmmm
...its all around them.... i doubt they will balk about this..
.. but the general public is used to not being able to own anything anymore, to them its just one more monthly fee to 'get stuff'......
well id never get a subscription to drive my errr ummm car.... or live in my apartment..
The general public is used to subscriptions
*we* may refuse
---- Booth was a patriot ----
OddManIn: A Game of guns and game theory.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world > > Those who understand binary and those who don't
I'm surprised no one is mentioned that 100% uncrackable DRM: refusal to release.
If more record companies would simply *NOT RELEASE* music, there would be nothing to crack. In fact, I'd urge record companies to examine this carefully. Take Janet Jackson, for example. If they *refused to release* 'Damita Jo' -- or, better yet, refused to record it -- there would be nothing to crack, nothing to leak, and no filesharing problem.
The fact that record companies have recorded Damita Jo and actually released it indicates (to me, at least) that the record companies are as complicit in the problem as anyone else.
My two cents.
You raise an interesting point. DRM is always going to be hackable, so let's look at the incentives.
"Unlimited burns + no expiration + multiple devices + multiple computers = Not worth the trouble"
As you say, not much incentive to hack if you can do what you want with the downloads. Notice that this supports the theory that hacking DRM has nothing to do with "stealing" music; the real motivation is to defeat the crippling restrictions on usage.
Microsoft + expiration date + music drm = another hacker victory