Slashdot Mirror
Kaleidescape CEO Speaks Out About CSS Lawsuit
An anonymous reader writes "Engadget has an interview with Michael Malcolm, the CEO of Kaleidescape, which you might remember as the high-end DVD jukebox manufacturer that was sued by the DVD Copy Control Association for violating its CSS license.
Despite the fact that anyone who can afford a $27,000+ DVD jukebox also usually ends up buying
hundreds of movies to load onto it, the DVD-CCA wants
them to redesign the Kaleidescape to require the presence of
the physical DVD disc in the drive during authentication and playback.
Besides defeating the whole purpose of having a jukebox in the first
place (none of their jukeboxes allow for copying, streaming, or sharing
DVDs), Malcolm says he can't find any clause in their CSS license which
would require them to implement this "feature" anyway and they're about
to file a counter-action against the DVD-CCA."
I think DVD-CCA is indeed afraid of two billionaires swapping 78 pounds Kaleidescapes on their 50-foot yachts in the open sea.
With the proposed protection feature, they'll have to bring out their DVDs for the exchange too.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
"I just loaded my DVD into my Jukebox... I don't need the DVD anymore, so I guess I'll go sell it on ebay or give it away..."
That's what they're afraid of, and they're probably right.
I don't get the benfit of a system costing $27-100k, when you can put something together for 5x less.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
It's nice to see companies standing up to the class bully...
One day everyone will realize that the bully just had a self-esteem problem. Let's hope that day comes soon.
Of course, this can be done at the client, by sticking a DVD in the playback client. The client, of course caches the keys extracted from that DVD, so this only has to be done once. For large numbers of DVDs on the jukebox that one wants to make accessable to a given client, just burn a CD (or DVD) with the whole set of keys that the client can cache, or explicitly push the keys to the known authenticated clients (or some desired subset thereof).
Sheesh, this isn't rocket science.
You could've hired me.
The fact that people buy it is how he figures it. Things are worth what people are willing to pay for them.
You will find yourself taking messures that in any other situations would be ridicoulous. This happends with copyright, it's an UNNATURAL law, and so, it's unenforceable. If you try to charge people for the air they breath, or for what they think about, you will find that this are basic freedoms of the human been, and that, because of their nature, it's allmost impossible to measure / control / quote them. But there is a HUGE bussines built arround copyright low, and the big boys making tons of money out of it won't just let it go, so, expecto more and more ridicolous ideas and restrictive methods in the future. They just won't stop.
ALMAFUERTE
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
umm did you RTFA? A 400 dvd carousel isnt going to power 8 diferent plasma screens and a huge projector all with different movies all in 1080i now is it. nor is it expandable and adaptible like this system is.
dont get me wrong i'm not going to buy one, but the is alot more to it.
Some people would rather buy a dedicated piece of store bought hardware than cobble together a righteous hack out of stone knives and bearskins, no matter how much duct tape they own. Go figure!
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
"a $27,000+ DVD jukebox"
Betcha cain't rest your beer on it and cry about yer lost love...
Gotta have Dolly parton onit...
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Their suit says that Kaleidescape must redesign its system to require the presence of the physical DVD disc in the drive during authentication and playback.
"I forgot my password. Can you reset it?"
"Sure, what's your password?"
// file: mice.h
#include "frickin_lasers.h"
People who buy the $27K setups have money to waste.
:)
Or they're getting older, and are willing to spend the money so they can husband the precious time they have left doing other things.
Futzing with hardware when you enjoy it is one thing. Futzing with hardware when you'd rather be doing something else is another. Besides, why complain? You should try selling your setup to some of these guys for the mere price of $20k
"Prior to playback, the data from the original DVD is decoded into memory and stored there for a period of time. In this instance, the memory is magnetic media rather than memory chips on the system board."
I don't see a violation especially as no method for extracting the decoded data exists to my understanding of this device. I think the DVD-CCA is being [surprisingly?] overzealous with their issues here. But who knows... something good could come of this if the DVDCCA loses as I suspect they will.
How is this different from the feature in Mac OS X which lets you drag copy a mounted DVD to your hard disc for playback later? You just need to have the physical DVD disc in the drive the first time Apple's DVD Player plays the hard disc version to prove that you own the physical DVD. I guess it must copy the DVD CSS key to your hard disc somewhere.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
The truth is, that someone that pays over $30,000 for a DVD system (the people that can afford the system are probably going to not settle for the bare minimum $27,000 configuration) are not interested in screwing over the MPAA. Many of these customers are probably music and movie stars anyhow. They buy it for the unique experience of the well-built UI and the convenience of the system. They don't care if a DVD costs $20 or $100.
Of course, the lawsuit is more about the long term possibilities... that someday this type of system will be available at lower prices, and then the studios will get ripped off. But still, the lawsuit is absurd. Especially since the complaint is that this device permits the "wholsale copying of DVDs, which CSS was designed to prevent." If that were true then any DVD-ROM drive would be in violation. I think CSS is not so much to prevent copying of DVDs, but to prevent unauthorized playback. I wish the DVD-CCA would stop abusing the purpose of their precious CSS.
The Kaleidescape is a great device, I would be very sad to see it get buried by people who see it as the threat that it isn't.
Basically all the movies you'd ever want. As quick as you can get them from your company of choice.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
Who gave DVD-CCA mod points?!?!
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
The newest ruling requires the whole cast and crew of a film to be present - living or deceased - in order to play a movie...
Though the requirement will be an adjustment for some, once viewers get used to handling shovels and arranging for flights and hotel stays, they should get back to just enjoying their films...
*cough*NetFlix*cough*
It isn't just storage. The one I messed around with had (I think) 3tb. It grabs and stores the cover art and some imdb-type info, and I think it suggests related selections. It is overpriced, and the size of a minifridge, but you aren't just paying for storage, I think you get a 200 disk changer and another unit that I think is for playback (as opposed to storage).
I'm sure OSS could whip up something similar, but if you are buying this you just want it to work and you want someone to yell at then you can't get the cover art for "Hope Floats"
I'd never thought about the legal aspects of it, because it seems to me like fair-use backup. The DVDs are stored encrypted, so there isn't anything amiss there.
Rich people don't know better.
Know better? They don't give a shit. When your house costs $10 million, and you've got $500,000 worth of custom-installed home theater gear, plasma screen TVs, multiroom audio and video, etc., an additional $27k or even $100k isn't that much to spend to ensure that you can watch any of your movies from any of your screens any time you want. It's a helluvalot more elegant and intuitive than some hack-it-together-yourself DVR or DVD caching box. Besides, you're going to be taking your family on a holiday to Barcelona or Shanghai or Aspen during the couple of weeks it takes to get that whole thing installed, configured, tested and debugged. And you probably will pay Kaleidescape the money to duplicate your entire DVD collection onto the hard drives so you don't have reload them yourself, or have your personal electrical engineer spend a week loading your DVDs onto the system.
Besides, if I'm some rich guy who's spent that much on his house and electronics, I'm showing off my latest "I'm cooler-than-you" gadgets to my other ultra-rich friends before we head off to cruise the Mediterranean in my private yacht. The people who buy this are the same people who buy the Ford GT (~$140k), the Mercedes SL65 AMG (~$140k), the Bentley Arnage T (~$250k), the Maybach 57 ($~$330k) or the Porsche Carrera GT (~$440k). The cost is irrelevant--it's all about the cool.
BTW: The CEO of the company I work for has recently bought both a Ford GT (~$140k) and a Mercedes SL65AMG (~$140k). That's to go along with the BMW 760Li (~$90k) he already owns, his $14 million Learjet, his $12 million house, etc.
Why sure, I'm going to buy a $27,000 machine to copy DVD's that I actually bought, because I can't afford them. That would be much smarter then using a $400 PC to get them off of Bittorrent.
Once the **AA's decide to embrace digital distribution instead of attempting to squash it, they'll make the same killing they have off every other technology they fought at first. Remember, radio and, later, the cassette tape were going to be the end of the music business. We're tired of hearing that the sky is falling. Start adapting your business model to technology, and quit telling us to adapt technology to your business model.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
I guess Lucas is guilty of pirating his own films . . . The concept of extreme protection of digital content is really getting out of hand when someone like Lucas can't legally "backup" his films onto another media. I don't really understand this when no one prosecutes the average Joe from copying a CD to tape or CD to MP3 player for convenience . . . Isn't this all that the Kaleidescope box does? Copies from one media to another for ease and convenience?
If you can do it with music, then why can't you do it with movies?
An innovative startup company is being sued by Random House and other publishers for a product which can hold the text and figures of up to 500 books. Their new product stores the words and pictures of of up to 500 novels, paperbacks, or coffee table books and allows any one of the thousands of words and pictures to be accessed in an instant. Called the "bookshelf", the new product goes on sale starting at $49.99. Publishers complain that there is nothing to prevent the owner of this data-storage system from making photocopies of the books, lending the books , or reading the books and then selling them at a discount to others. The publishers claim that if the technology is not regulated, it has the, potential to destroy the publishing industry, leaving thousands of editors starving on the streets of New York.
This quote is the one that made me laugh out loud, and shows that we (meaning the Linux/Slashdot/techie crowd) just aren't getting through to the proper people so that changes can be made. [Note: TT is "The Tech" and JV is "Jack Valenti"]
During all his time presiding over the MPAA, he didn't even realize the enormity of the problem. That sends the message that word justisn't getting out. This case, should Michael Malcolm be successful and gain some ground, may finally allow Linux users to legally play DVD's they bought with their own money.
People at all income levels can be thieves. I doubt you could find any correlation between income level and thievery. As one poster commented, why not just add every NetFlix rental to their jukebox?
signature pending slashdot approval
Listen folks, it's really fucking simple here.
YOU created this monster. Just like South Park's "Walmart" episode--who is number 1? YOU are.
The "threat" of DVD has been known for years. The DVDCCA came up with consumer-hostile garbage from day one: CSS, Region Encoding (aka RESTRAINT OF TRADE), and Macrovision in every pot (sorry, under every TV). YOU BOUGHT INTO IT. You just HAD to have your fucking "Matrix" DVD, didn't you? Nevermind all the problems with DVD--look at DIVX! HAH what fools! Right.
And now we have "big brother" DVD-CCA clubbing people over the head for violating their bullshit license for their bullshit "encryption" which has already been compromised 100 ways from Sunday. We STILL have region encoding despite the fact that it IS restraint of trade. And YOU allowed it. Every one of you that ran out to get a DVD player and filling your shelves with boxed-sets of whatever--you allowed this to happen.
So do NOT bitch about the DVDCCA. You fucking gave them the power. And you know what? Now that you let them stick their foot in the door JUST A LITTLE, they're going to try and see what ELSE they can get away with...the "broadcast" flag, the bending-over of TiVo...it's going to get worse because YOU, the drooling hordes, couldn't stop for ONE moment to say "hey, this is just a candy-coated fish hook!" Nope, GOTTA have that latest anime collection! Just GOTTA get that Matrix DVD Boxed Set!
Now go ahead--do your Slashdot duty...whine about the DVDCCA and how they "don't get it." Contradict me by saying "so? You can just get a hacked player!" (Yeah, and Apex is SUCH great quality too *snort*). Somehow tie Bittorrent into the conversation (it's just not slashdot if you're not blathering about how great bittorrent is). Mod me down to nothing. Continue preaching to the choir.
We need more legal precedents that show that time and space shifting recorded performances that we legally own is a legal practice. We have these rights, fair use of our copies that we own. But until its documented in legal precedent in the modern age, copyright owners will see a chance to intimidate and scam their way to suck up our rights to add margins to their bottom line at our expense.
--
make install -not war
They're outright liars.
I was one of the good number of people named in the DeCSS case. I was offering a mirror of DeCSS on my site, in the hopes that people would be inspired to build a Linux DVD player package around it (or, at a minimum, that they could have used the Windows binaries to rip DVDs and then play them under Linux).
They sent me an email saying that because I hadn't responded to their earlier email, they were taking me to court.
Only problem is... I grepped my entire mail spool forwards, backwards and sideways (I never delete mails to my home email box, except spam, and even then rarely; I like being able to search for anything I've received) and could not find any previous email.
I called them, emailed them, etc., trying to ask them why they are claiming that I received a previous email when I didn't. Naturally I got nowhere.
I ended up having to sign an agreement basically stating that I'll never license or sell CSS technology. Over a lie of theirs.
(Not like I would license or sell their shit, but a sufficiently slimy lawyer-- and they have plenty-- would be able to argue that selling a used DVD-ROM drive (or a used DVD!) on eBay violates the agreement I made with them...)
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
The motivation to take someone to court is almost always at least two-fold:
1) Settle the outstanding issue that needs be resolved.
2) Establish a precendent.
(2) is much more valuable than (1) in the long run. Though the actual DVD format may become passe, the issues addressed here will not, at least not as quickly.
Honestly, I am always pleased when something like this goes to court, since it is a demonstration that people are willing to put their money towards causes that benefit the consumer.
Sure, you can point out that "Hey, people could Netflix everything and then they'd get to watch the DVD whenever they want without buying it!". Two important points need to be made about this argument:
1) Netflix basically already does this, it is simply a matter of convenience - with Netflix, I can see *anything I want* I just have to wait for them to ship it to me. Where do you want to draw the line on convenience?
2) So what? So people *can* misuse the system. People can misuse a hammer too. Or a spray can. Or a car. For some reason, the public-at-large has bought into the idea that their fundamental fair use rights (not having to put in a DVD every time they want to watch a movie) are forgone since the RIAA and MPAA have trouble enforcing copyright law inside someone's home.
I always hated having to bring game CDs along with me when I travelled because of the cd check. I hated having to bring CDs, DVDs, and PS2 games as well. The sooner we move to a system where I can have the convenience I want, the sooner I will have more respect for the folks that supply to material.
The are lots of counter-arguments to this, but let's face it: we all know digital distribution is coming because it is cheaper and more convenient. The industry needs to stop fighting the tide and allow people to access entertainment in a convenient way, that is in touch with modern technology.