Slashdot Mirror
Preparing for the Broadcast Flag?
Couch Potato asks: "I'm worried that, come next July, the FCC mandated broadcast flag will soon take away all sorts of fair use rights I have long enjoyed. Given that there are only a few months left to make purchasing decisions, how best can one prepare for the advent of the broadcast flag?"
"I'm somewhat aware of projects like Myth TV, but it's not all that I want. Specifically, I want to make sure that I can record DVDs or similar files of any program I want off of cable, sattelite or broadcast TV, flag or not and without any other encumbering restrictions (such as the Macrovision DRM for DVDs) and without worry that someday they'll change something so that my old drivers and hardware are suddenly obsolete and useless when faced with updates to the formats. Note that this makes closed-source-only drivers an issue, because assuming the hardware can still be adapted to whatever they change on us, open-sources drivers can be modified and closed-source ones probably won't be, whether for legal or practical considerations. So then, what can someone with a modest budget do to make sure that their constitutional fair use rights don't succumb to planned obsolecense, like the VCR has?"
I am using an AMD 1700+ CPU with 1 GB memory, an nVidia GeForce FX 5700 128MB board. I only have 80+GB space on the system right now (enough for around 5 hrs recording time ) but I will probably upgrade it later this year.
I bought this card because it does not have the broadcast bit and since it was made before July it will not be encumbered with all those restrictions.
I do not, however, plan on abusing that flexibility by sharing my recordings and thus ripping off the content owners. It is the thieves that feel it is thier right to steal from people just because they can that have brought this onerrous situation upon us.
Just buy an ATI TV tuner card before its too late.
link from Ars Technica
Unfortunately they're fighting it on a technicality - that Congress did not give the FCC explicit power to create the broadcast flag, and thusly they have no authority themselves to create it.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
The DC Circuit Court isn't so sure the FCC has the right to make that rule.
I have no idea what you can do to try to sway the judicial system, as it's only 2 of 3 so far.
I guess you could contribute to the folks trying to take the FCC to court over this.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
I found myself asking this same question, too. So I put the question to the makers of the EyeTV 500. This is their response:
"EyeTV 500 does not support the broadcast flag. Units bought before July 2005 will never support the broadcast flag. We will not update EyeTV 500 units bought before then to support the flag.
Thus, your EyeTV 500 will never support the broadcast flag. It will ignore flags, and not use DRM for any content. That means you'll have the maximum freedom possible with its recordings."
It's a little pricey, but it does the compression on the box. I don't have digital cable yet, but I may buy this come May/June just for the fuck of it since pre-July box prices will probably go up dramatically come July 2 (on the black market, of course, since the law bans all inter-state trade of these devices).
The IRS is the one organization that you don't want to fuck with. Remember, these are the guys who took down Al Capone.
yes, a card bought that IGNORES the flag, will continue to do so.
Hope it never shorts out, and they never update the driver or software.... and you don't need your todays AGP card to work in tommorows PCI-E mobo.....
p.s. buy two
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
That's only on all digital systems. The "rabbit ears" remark was valid. The broadcast flag has no effect on analog transmissions that can be recorded with analog equipment.
I believe the hardware itself is going to honor the bit. May not be much one can do from software...
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
Knowing a number of close friends that have worked in congressmen/senators' offices, I can tell you that writing/calling your congressmen will do.....NOTHING. They get ridiculous numbers of emails/calls a day (in addition to the normal spam and telemarketing no doubt), and just end up feeding it off on some intern who sends out cookie-cutter replies. No one in Washington or the state capitol wants to listen to you.
The broadcast flag is simply a flag that indicates that people are not entitled to do what people don't do anyway - Make multi-generational copies of broadcast media.
Not exactly... the broadcast flag will allow the control of recording, including the possibility of *not* being recordable at all. It's a possibility that you won't be able to timeshift some shows, and some won't be DVD writeable (which is how I store some shows for long term storage).
Better to buy from Korea, they also use 8VSB for DTV transmission over the air.
Avoid any COFDM devices as that is the European standard and would not work here in the states unless it also did 8VSB.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
Intro to HD PVRs
Broadcast flag info and list of HDTV cards
And BTW, the Elgato eyetv 500 is the answer to your question.
I am concerned about any program, any piece of hardware, any treaty, any law that treats me as a consumer, not a citizen
...all of the Broadcast Flag plans were in motion up long before Bush became president, during Clinton's presidency. Clinton appointed Michael Powell to the FCC [when he became Chairman, he didn't get any more votes], Clinton signed the DMCA into law, and Fritz Hollings (D) (along with four other Democratic senators) is the sponsor of the CBDTPA (née SSSCA or "DMCA 2").
I'm not saying the parent is speaking to this specifically, but this is just a point of information for others who will no doubt ignorantly vomit out the opposite in this thread.
As did i the amount of time that was added to my life has alowed me to post slightly more often on slashdot, learn multivariable calculus, do work on a computer animated movie, and most interestingly I feel less compelled to buy shit at the mall.
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
A number of groups like the EFF, American Library Association, etc. are all challenging the broadcast flag in court. With a bit of luck it's implementation will be delayed or even stopped.
That's a nice lie you used to prove your point. Too bad the truth proves the opposite.
As I understand it- and I'd LOVE to be courteously corrected, the law only applies to products moved across state lines (or into the country) so a product manufactured, marketed and sold in the same US state, is actually still a possibility.
I doubt it (IANAL). Since the case that broke the interstate commerce clause involved a farmer growing grain on his farm which happened to extend across state lines. The farmer was feeding said grain to his animals in part of his farm that was in the other state. It was argued that since he was growing the corn instead of purchasing corn, he was affecting commerce. Since corn could potentially be brought in from another state and sold to said farmer, he was affecting sales in the interstate grain trade. Thus, his actions were subject to Federal jurisdiction. From that point on, anything which "exerts a substantial economic effect on interstate commerce" has fallen under the aegis of the Commerce Clause. I think the same would apply if I built PVR's and sold them. TiVo's sales would be affected, (people who bought my system wouldn't likely buy the TiVo system), and I would thus be required to abide by the Federal Laws.
For more info see this article
pcHDTV 3000 from here
Air2PC from here or here
2. When you're ready, build a computer for MythTV. Use this guide, look here for HDTV tips, and ask questions on this mailing list. You can also search for answers on the mailing list archive.
3. You say that Myth isn't all you want. I think you're wrong. Here's what it can do:
It can record analog content from cable, satellite, and over-the-air broadcasts.
It can record digital content from over-the-air broadcasts, including HDTV.
It can record unencrypted digital content over firewire from some digital cable boxes.
Using free tools that come with MythTV, you can cut commercials and export any recording from MythTV to a number of different formats, including Divx, Xvid, VCD, SVCD, and DVD.
4. Here's what it can't do:
Myth can't record encrypted digital content from digital cable or digital satellite. Keep in mind that no PC-based solution can do this. The only possible ways to do record content from these sources in digital format are to use a black-box solution (usually) provided by the cable or satellite company or to put on your black hacker hat and crack the encryption. If you choose the former, odds are slim and none that you will be able to export the recordings.
I am concerned about any program, any piece of hardware, any treaty, any law that treats me as a consumer, not a citizen
It's being heard in court today.
6 35 .html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20050221-4
JON
Ahhh... but grasshoppah... that toothead boozehound pot smoker G. W. Bush IS in office. ;P
No worries mate!
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
That's illegal, according to these guys. DMCA and all that. Defeating their encryption scheme is against the law.
Need a Linux consultant in New Orleans?
Your concept of a bit flipper is a little more... complicated than you think.
Now to write up this explanation for a third time in less than a year... maybe I should save it.
A digital television transport stream is a stream of binary data divided up into 188 byte packets (the ATSC standard at least). Each packet has a PID stamped on it, and the broadcast flag is carried on a packet with a specific PID (sorry, but I don't have time to drag out the ATSC specs (A/65B in this case I believe)... it would be possible to detect an Redistribution Control Descriptor (RC)(the official name) and restamp the PID of the packet carrying it to be a null packet (0x1FFF).
The problem with this approach is that it is not easy. For over the air signals (or cable for that matter), you would need a tuner and demodulator which turns the RF signals into usable binary data, which in turn would be fed into some sort of processor (FPGA's are good for this) which does the detection and restamping work, and then spits out the altered stream to a modulator which would turn the binary data back into RF signals.
Complicated eh? Worse yet, you could only do it for one channel at a time without spending a fortune on multiple tuners and multiplexers. You could in theory have such a device tied into your receiver box, and start it out at the same channel as your receiver and pick up on the channel change requests from your remote in order to keep it restamping the channel you are looking at... not that this is much simpler.
Such a hack (the simple version) would run around $75-$100 a piece for parts alone. You are far better to attempt to beat it in software, which depending on the API's provided by the card maker, you could do this on your own... in theory.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
"The CTEA [Copyright Term Extension Act]extended the term of protection by 20 years for works copyrighted after January 1, 1923. Works copyrighted by individuals since 1978 got "life plus 70" rather than the existing "life plus 50". Works made by or for corporations (referred to as "works made for hire") got 95 years. Works copyrighted before 1978 were shielded for 95 years, regardless of how they were produced."
And thus, the reason why I cannot sell my bootleg Mickey shirts for another few decades. :)
--Teechur007