EFF Begins Digital Television Liberation Project

Dozix007 writes "One year from today, on July 1, 2005, an FCC regulation known as the Broadcast Flag will lock up your digital television signals. But EFF's "DTV Liberation Project" aims to help the public keep over-the-air programming free. The Broadcast Flag, which places copy controls on DTV signals, attempts to stop people from making digitally-perfect copies of television shows and redistributing them. It also stops people from making perfectly legitimate personal copies of broadcasts. More disturbing, the Broadcast Flag will outlaw the import and manufacture of a whole host of personal video recorders (PVRs), TiVo-like devices that send DTV signals into a computer for backup, editing and playback. After the Broadcast Flag regulations go into effect, all PVR technologies must be Flag-compliant and 'robust' against user modification -- and that means, once again, that the entertainment industry is trying to tell you what you can do with your own machines."

Comments

Call to arms

[Plaeroma]

It's about time for everybody to stand up to those fuckheads at the FCC. They will push and push and push until they get pushed back. They know that people are generally lazy, apathetic, and stupid, and they are going to take advantage of it as much as they can. It is our responsibility to do something about it. Whether it be in spreading information about the FCC's ridiculous plans or volunteering with EFF. The time for action is now.

This kind of restriction seems pointless

[eamacnaghten]

This kind of restriction seems pointless to me. The casual user who wants to copy a show/film for a friend to see will use VCR type recording anyway. The only people who will want to redistribute the digital signal will be criminals who - not being well known as maintainers of laws - are likely to have outlawed equipment.

All in all the only people this will harm are the legitimate paying customers. How long can a business model last that pisses of the people who pay the wages?

Re:Is piracy really that much of a problem?

[Lumpy]

It's gone further...

last thursday I went to watch the Detroit Tigers play a glood game. the gatekeeper checking my ticket started harassing me about my fancy digital camera... "That doesnt record video does it?" "recording video is stealing"

These SOB's have everyone including the average joe that works the ticket booth at a ballpark that recording is stealing and is as bad or worse than trying to smuggle in a machine gun or bomb.

it will not change until you have a major and almost violent public backlash. having a riot at a ballpark over a stupid policy and having the place burned to the ground or severly damaged MIGHT get the message through to the morons in the executive suite...

but it will not happen, the people that live in this country like to walk in line and say BAAAAAH.

Re:I still don't really see what hte big deal is..

[bmw]

Unless you bought it with the implicit agreement that you wouldn't do X, Y, or Z with it. And you did agree to that, by buying content that has the flag bit.

You're right. Unfortunately this is the direction that we're headed in. Pretty soon all content will be licensed to you. You won't own anything and what you can and can't do with that content will be strictly controlled. Ugh... What a great future we have to look forward to.

Boycott

[carcosa30]

My answer to this is, and has always been, "Screw 'em."

I will not pay money to companies that behave in this manner. Many Slashdot readers are vociferous opponents of Microsoft, but they continue to pay money to the media establishment for such things as Spiderman II and cable television.

Perhaps it's time to find ways of entertaining ourselves other than media worship which enriches these gigantic conglomerates.

Is television all that good anyway? I personally have not watched broadcast or cable television with any regularity for 15 years. From 93-01 I did not even own a TV set-- I grudgingly got one to pacify friends who called me deprived because I did not have one, and for a while I actually tried to force myself to sit down and watch the thing, but I couldn't stomach it-- nothing on cable that appealed to me even remotely.

So, if they're going to behave this way, let them behave this way, and leverage all the technology we have at our disposal to support independent media groups. If you have to have Star Trek Voyager, there's always BT.

old hardware

[Dance_Dance_Karnov]

seems like a good time to stock up on old hardware. make a killing selling them back to folks who wanna tape the latest version of {reality show x}

Keep rubbing it in...

[Kjella]

...this "everyone is a pirate" mentality. I think most people's thinking is "Well, if you're already treating me like one, why not fucking be one?" P2P networks are developing at an enormous pace. Easier, faster, better all around. Anonymity in numbers. Anonymity by design. Trust-based networks. Decentralized networks. Scalable networks.

If there's something similar to "TCO" that is "Total Value of Acquisition", including rights, limitations, legality etc. I'd say bought content is getting lower, while pirated content is getting higher. That can't be good for the RIAA/MPAA...

Kjella

Do it without hardware

[seanmcgrath]

http://www.gnu.org/software/gnuradio/hdtv-samples. html

Re:Is piracy really that much of a problem?

[blincoln]

Seems to me that they are spending more money developing all these technologies than they stand to gain by knocking out piracy.

I would like to think that you're right, but I think they are just extrapolating from the losses in markets like gaming, where the easy ability to bootleg games basically killed the Dreamcast, and caused publishers to drop support for the Playstation earlier than they would have otherwise.

I'm as big a fan of fair use rights as anyone - I make mix CD-Rs from my legally purchased albums, I've ripped the music from a DVD to make a soundtrack CD when one wasn't available, and one of my hobbies is hacking the Legacy of Kain series of games. None of those things would be possible in a 100% copyright-enforcement society.

On the other hand, I see thousands of people pirating movies, music, and games of all types on a regular basis and wonder how small of a minority I represent. Most of them don't even have the shakey "I can't afford it" alibi - they do it because they *can*, and don't care that they are ripping off the producers and making it less likely for legitimate fair use rights to survive.

Look at something like the HDLoader for the PS2 - it's a pretty cool idea, a product that lets you install your PS2 games to the add-on hard drive to make them load faster and play more smoothly. Only a tiny percentage of gamers are going to use it for that capability though, with the vast majority seeing it as a way to get free games from their friends and the rental store.

Re:I still don't really see what hte big deal is..

[rpozz]

Unfortunately, this appears like the one of the only sensible solutions to piracy. Current technology allows the user to make perfect, redistributable copies. This is quite a major problem considering that media costs money to create.

This is a serious problem that needs to be resolved, without restricting the user's use of their computer/tivo/etc. Basically, someone needs to come up with a fair solution to the rampant piracy that is so common today.

Re:Right? What right?

[epcraig]

Heretofore, I have had the Right, under the First Amendment, to copy anything I please. My right to distribute what I copy is constrained by copyright, but I do retain the right to copy (albeit only for my own use).

Now, without repealing the First Amendment, I am no longer permitted ownership of the work I have purchased, not even the copying of that work, not even the ability to copy for my own archives, for fear that I might distribute my archive without permission.

This, I think, means I am no longer permitted to own certain sorts of Presses. Henceforth, I will do as I'm told, and only as I'm told, by officially approved authority, as defined in the officially approved Press. So much for the First Amendment.