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Microsoft Licenses Analog Anti-rip Technology
photojournaliste writes "CD copy-protection specialist Macrovision is to work with Microsoft to ensure their respective DRM and anti-rip technologies are interoperable, the two companies said this week. Sounds straightforward enough, but the deal runs deeper. Microsoft agreed to license a number of Macrovision's patents, in particular those relating to analogue copy protection technology and more recent extensions to that system that cover video-on-demand, pay-per-view content and support for the US 'broadcast flag', which determines whether consumers will be able to record digital TV broadcasts."
I hope Microsoft take over Macrovision, then we can have Microsoft and Macrosoft. Microsoft can deal with insecure software and Macrosoft can deal with securing copyrights, what a world it will be then!
I'm sorry but that song you can't get out of your head is in violation of copyright laws. We are going to install a little chip now to ensure we are compensated.
What is this television thing anyway? Does it involve moving away from my computer?
The master of the eye-killer blinking videotapes gets in bed with my unfair lady of blue screens of death.
If there have any offsprings, shoot'em.
You know, I just realized why, in TNG, they never listened to anything but classical music and never watched anything other than plays.
Copyrights and analog locks trapped all modern culture in outdated media that ended up being lost to the ages.
And people say that series lacked foresight.
All I needed to know about digital rights, I learned from Star Trek.
No ..... the ultimate rights-management solution is PharmaGard (TM). Unlike conventional scrambling and encryption technologies, which work by unscrambling the picture and taking a leap of faith that nothing can intercept it on its way to the screen, with PharmaGard (TM) there is never a recoverable, unencrypted signal: the final decryption takes place in the viewer's brain.
The secret of PharmaGard (TM) is a special pill, containing a phenylethylamine-type {= ecstasy-like} drug that you have to take before you watch the film. The first few minutes of the film are neurolinguistic programming -- basically, reprogramming your mind so that, under the perception-distorting influence of the drug, it unscrambles the picture -- embedded into an advertisement sequence. There is no possible way for the viewer not to see this sequence if they are going to see the film, so this advertising space would be worth a fortune. As long as the drug's effect lasts, the film appears unscrambled through your altered perception. When it wears off, your eyes go back to normal.
Anyone can copy a film protected with PharmaGard (TM). But only people who have taken the special drug can watch it. If viewers invite friends to watch with them, their friends will have to take some too. A stash of pills are provided with the movie; if you want to watch it again, you have to buy more of them from your local retailer.
PharmaGard (TM) also provides built-in age-restriction. The pills for different-certificate movies are formulated slightly differently. The pills provided with an "18" film will contain an additional substance which reacts with Human Growth Hormone at the levels found in under-18-year-olds to induce undesirable side-effects e.g. nausea, breathing difficulty, loss of balance &c. There will be less of this substance in a "15" film pill to account for the fact that a 15-year old's body will contain a higher level of growth hormone; but the "15" pill will not be a powerful enough psychedelic to allow the consumer's brain to unscramble an "18" film.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!