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Build Your Own TV Without Broadcast Flags
doom writes "An account of an event sponsored by the EFF, a "roll your own television" build-in. The San Francisco Bay Guardian has coverage in an article entitled Build Your TV!". From the article: "According to the FCC, the flag is going to ease the nation's transition from today's analog televisions to tomorrow's high-definition televisions. What exactly does it mean for a government agency to "ease" the transition from one kind of TV signal to another? In this case, it seems to mean making the entertainment industry feel very warm and fuzzy inside." The EFF's efforts against the flag have been covered before on Slashdot.
Bush is a great president and he will not let this broadcast flag happen under his watch. I know liberal /. probably doesn't get this, but the Republicans are all about SMALLER gov't, people.
This is going no where as long as Republicans are leading this great nation.
I thought that judges told the broadcast regulator that the flag was unlawful? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4290315.stm
Hence rolling your own tv would be entirely redundant?
But I'm not too terribly worried. There'll always be ways around that dumb flag.
I think it`s a good ideea to make your own tv, but it has some bad parts two, you cand blame anybody else :)
Think like a hacker, act like a hacker, but never become a hacker !
It means we're going to transition from a time when we have a constitutional right to record shows to a time when we don't.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I thought the courts slowed/stopped the fcc from mandating anything like this? References in reverse chronological order
/. Story One: Broadcast Flag in Trouble /. Story 2: Court Says FCC Out-of-Bounds With Digital TV
Like here
Or Here
So why are we worried?
Wang33
PAGERANK++ Robsell.com
Seems to me that this could be the begining of a Kit TV era. Kits that would include a broadcast flag 'chip' that could be mistakenly left out by the user. At least that would be one way to skirt the system - albiet legal ramifications would likely exist with this model - I'm sure others will be fourthcomming.
This flag is going to be like any copy protection that we've seen to date. Those who want to steal will just get around it, and those who don't steal will be extremely inconvenienced.
"... very warm and fuzzy..." just like the picture on your homebuilt TV.
If things keep going the way they did on that last court opinion, we may not have to deal with this sillyness.
Seriously though, I predict broadcastless recievers will become as common as regionless DVD players, and that it'd be another enormous flop.
I'm not gonna to take it anymore. I'm gonna toss the damned boob tube out the window.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
... if we can buy non-BF ready TVs in .ca after they become illegal in the US? It's ~10% the size of the US market but it'd be nice to have HTDV for watching DVDs etc.
Trolling is a art,
"According to the FCC, the flag is going to ease the nation's transition from today's analog televisions to tomorrow's high-definition televisions."
Funny the only thing the broadcast flag is meant to ease is the minds of the media fatcats.
Just like software patents in Europe, the forces behind this (well-funded forces) will not give up until they succeed in implementing the lockdown of all media. A court ruling is just a minor speedbump in the process.
In Europe, even after near-unanamous votes against software patents, they are still about to become reality.
The court merely ruled that the FCC did not have the implicit authority to order the flag. All that is needed is a lay giving the FCC the explicit authority. That kind of law is easy to purchase.
There is not nearly enough love in the world, but there is far too much trust.
'ALL I WANT is to make a high-definition copy of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, save it on a DVD, and loan it to my friend," says Sarah Brydon, looking up from a long table covered with half-built computers.
Err... what's wrong with this picture? Women don't look up from tables covered with half-built computers... do they?!
...an earlier story on the media
Screw you all! I'm off to the pub
Because the Reuters article says that while the judges felt the FCC overstepped its authority, they may not rule against them.
"But it was unclear whether the judges would strike down the FCC's 2003 rule, since doubts were also raised about whether the American Library Association and other opponents had legal standing to challenge the rule in court."
The judges may rule that these groups don't have legal standing to bring the suit, so it will take consumers to sue and most likely that won't be able to happen until AFTER July 1 when consumers can reasonably say that they have been harmed by the flag. No one can say they have been harmed by the flag until it goes into effect.
So when do we start seeing mod chips for TVs?
Can someone explain the FCC's comment that the broadcast flag will ease transition to HDTV?
How can the FCC beleive that a technology designed only to prevent useability will be a benefit to end users in any way?
Surely the 'ease the transition' bit is like the regional coding for DVDs. If you remember the entertainment industry was so paranoid it insisted on this before launching.
Then a short time afterwards it was bypassed and everyone lived happily ever after.
That's exactly what will happen with the broadcast flag. Let them have it. If the entertainment industry thinks this will achieve their objectives then let them have their illusions - it won't make a damned bit of difference at the end of the day.
Disappointment ensued...
Just another slashdot legal article in tech's clothing...
The broadcast flag is a part of a LARGER system to keep us from recording ALL programing.
i ne er/f-MO-Earth_to_congress.shtml
The way broadcast flags are mentioned its all about stopping HDTV programing from getting on the net. It makes it sound like we'll still be able to record our analog shows.
However, analog outputs will be soon be illegal on all television devices. Thus, this is about locking down ALL content.
http://www.tvtechnology.com/features/Masked-Eng
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Where exactly in the constitution does it give you the right to record shows?
p.s. The constitution does not grant rights to individuals. Instead it limits the rights of the government.
Electroshock machine
Lobotomy apparatus
Automated Librium making apparatus
Hell, if you want to make sure that your brain never gets to do anything without some sort of institutionalized coercion, why stop at making a TV?
I hear you cry: "TV is good for me, and you are just a humorless crank for criticizing it!"
To which I reply: Alcohol and Heroin addicts say much the same thing about their brain-restraints of choice.
If the thought of someone criticizing your TV watching makes you angry or defensive, you need to get help.
Building my own TV without the broadcast flag may be fun, but the real point of this exercise is building a recording device without the broadcast flag.
They have a pc with an off-the-shelf capture card stuck in it running MythTV. All the talk in the article about computer "guts" spread all over the room got me thinking they were actually doing something new and cutting edge. I'm not sure what this article achieves, beyond lamenting the broadcast flag throughout.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
I stopped watching TV years ago, and with a few rare exceptions, I do not miss it at all.
Of course, they canceled one the exceptions ( farscape ), further reinforcing my decision.
That's the only way things will change: Vote with your cash, or in this case, your unwillingness to deal with their crap. You may think you *need* your TV, but you don't.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
While I applaud this as a demonstration and hope it will have some effect in educating the public, the mere fact that hobbyists can evade a technical protection measure is not, in itself, of much social importance.
During Prohibition, Californian vineyards openly marketed bricks of compressed, dried Zinfandel grapes, together with a strongly worded warning to the consumer explaining that they should not any circumstances mix the grapes to five gallons of water, five pounds of sugar, and yeast.
If the **AA's can create a climate of fear and create the impression that legitimate fair use is illegal, they win--even if devices that circumvent the broadcast flag become as available as marijuana.
One of the examples given is about having a copy of a TV show to watch on a trip overseas. Given the size of the screen you're probably using, you won't be able to tell the difference between a high quality hdtv recording and a lower quality (like the current analog) one.
The last time I checked, the cable operators weren't excited about the greater quality of hdtv, they were excited about the ability of a digital signal to squeeze more channels onto the co-ax. The quality would still be poor.
Anyway, there are few movies where I find the inconvenience of going to a theater worthwhile. (The theater gives me much better quality than my 22" tv of course.) Based on that, I don't care if I can only record analog quality signals. They're 'good enough'.
With hdtv, I and many others would be over-served consumers. As long as we can record low quality, we don't care.
I wasn't around at the time, but I've heard that under prohibitions "wine" blocks were sold including instructions along the line of:
Warning: Do not combine this product with 1 gallon warm water, mix thoroughly and let steep in a warm place 3 hours or an illegal beverage may result.
How long before the broadcast flag is used to avoid recording news? This government seems more than a little bit inclined to consider images of, say, Guantanamo bay or prisioner torture sensitive information...
I only hope this idea doesn't catch.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
Check out the 9th Amendment in your French copy, JeanBaptiste.
To be economical, HDTVs must shoot for massive integration on chip. Digital TV means exactly that.
Unless you have access to xray machine, the ability to open a chip and identify and inspect traces, and just generally reverse engineer the chipset, and then reprogram it, it is a sealed component and will be very difficult to circumvent.
Not saying it couldn't be done, but a frontal assault would be extremely difficult, so as always, a backdoor located would be the approach.
But they know that.
it's the average citizen that would do well to have a large supply of petroleum jelly on hand..
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
First off, It's not the TV that needs to be "built from kit", it's the tuner. Why try to build a projection device when it's likely much less expensive and simpler to just tune and strip broadcast flag from a signal?
That said-
Grill me if I'm wrong, but my understanding of the Broadcast Flag is that it exists to prevent copyrighted material from being "ripped" to something such as a PC's hard drive.
I have an HDTV, and an HDTiVo. Both obey the broadcast flag and encryption (HDCP) via its digital interface- HDMI. When the FCC/whoever decides to "broadcast-flagamaphone" a show, I will see it just as it's intended, in all of its HD glory.
If however I were using the Component/Analog outputs from my tuner (TiVo), the broadcast flag will force the TiVo to downres it to 480p on the analog connections, but it may remain in 720p/1080i/1080p on its digital path.
Yes, very early HD adoptors with analog-only inputs will have to get new sets- but all sets prior to about 2 years ago didnt support 720P as n input or display format, so they're likely going to do this anyhow.
So who's hurt here and what are we whining about?
--falz
In this age of technology, the broadcast flag should be implemented to prevent copying, but, also to block according to content. Parents should be able to block anything they deem as unfit for their children, and the people who object to various deptictions of lifestyles/cultures should be able to use this flag as well. I want the flag to automatically block 'crappy shows' from wasting bandwidth on my set. Will any senator sponsor that provision?
Oh wait - we already have this 'content' flag, its the green button on the remote that says "OFF". What if we all started using it? Nevermind the goofy grass roots "Just turn it off" stuff, but, what if enough people just get turned off by the bullshit that comes through the tube: PayPerView, InfoMercials, Commercials, crappy content sitcoms, and now: the no-copy flag with the requirement of a digital TV set.
The broadcast media players are betting heavily that you and I will ingore the "minor inconvience" of upgrading the TV set, not be concerned with the video-taping prohibitions... What if they're wrong? What will happen if there's not enough viewer base to support high-cost productions like today - will TV switch to an all-channel-pay-per-view model? Will some networks fail, or just crumble into perpetual crap like today's FM radio? Will TV commercials goto a higher ratio of commercial vs. show time? Or will competitive economics drive it the other way - bringing back more show time?
The TV wasteland may just get more devoid of meaningful content, and it will be shown brilliantly in HDTV on $3000 sets, with $150/mo subscriptions. Ah the future looks so bright!
The only PT Boat Journal on the web: http://www.PT171.org
In fact, forget the TV ...
And the blackjack.
I know, the grandparent was a troll, but at least it brought out someone with a grasp of the real facts.
If people can't record their shows and do what they want with their recording, less people will watch TV. Due to the internet, video games and arguably terrible shows, many of the younger generation, specifically young men, are watching significantly less TV.
USA Today has a fairly old article here.
Excerpt from the article: "They're watching television when they want to watch television," says ABC Entertainment president Susan Lyne.
I'm curious about something regarding the pcHDTV card. Obviously it will soon be illegal to sell the cards, but is there anything stopping them from selling [or even better, giving away] the plans and schematics and perhaps even the parts to build one yourself?
I'd LOVE to get one, but I don't know if I'll be able to come up with the money by the time they're illegal, so if I can't, will plans be available to me to build my own?
Of course, the best option would be for the court to tell the FCC to shove the broadcast flag up their collective @sses, but I'm not holding my breath.
ender -
Nothing to see here
From ATI:
Regarding Broadcast Flag:
There will only be one version of the card produced and after the date of the
Broadcast Flag institution the cards manufactured after this date will support the feature.
I do not know if Canadian broadcasts will have a similar limitation.
Regards,
Rick Carman
Customer Care
ATI Technologies, Inc.
http://www.ati.com
...but couldn't we just find the chip on the circuit, find out which digital output pin says *you can record this*, and just patch in that signal perminantly to whatever is recieving it?
You call it excessive, I call it ambitious.
I'm hurt here. I use MythTV to record HDTV, much like you use your HDTiVo. However, because MythTV is open source, it is impossible to have it encrypt the outgoing signal using HDCP, even if I'm using a DVI connection to my HDTV.
Further, I have a CRT-based HDTV, and when using the DVI input, it has far too much overscan. If I use component output, then I can adjust the overscan, but I can't with DVI, so going digital isn't the best option.
And even further, my TV has only one DVI input, so if I have multiple HD sources, then I have to recable my TV to change sources (like, say, a HDTiVo, satellite receiver, and broadcast ATSC tuner).
What are we going to download now?
If you have no idea what that is, please do not say so, because that will just make me feel really old.
Could someone corner the market by selling a TeeVee that just happens to be hackable to remove the flag. And a memo on precisely how to do this easy hack just happens to leak out of the company and onto the Internet.
Which also means that the devices people are using at today's Build-In will be illegal in four months.
I am not a lawyer, but isn't illagality of Ex Post Facto part of the constituition? The point is they are building it before a law (might) go into effect. They can't be persucuted for building something before a law exists, after it's taken into effect.
click me
Yes, very early HD adoptors with analog-only inputs will have to get new sets- but all sets prior to about 2 years ago didnt support 720P as n input or display format, so they're likely going to do this anyhow.
So who's hurt here and what are we whining about?
People with a limited supply of cash?
Do note the fact that most LCDs on the market do not support HDCP. Nor do they support HDMI..
I beg to differ...
As far as I can see, in the past decade or so, the Republicans have been MUCH more effective in doing whatever they want to do. The Democrats at least have the kindness and consideration to squabble themselves into a large degree of ineffectiveness.
Most (though not all) of the time ineffectiveness is GOOD in Government.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Is it possible that the end users in the US might be pushed to get high definition recordings from countries that don't have the broadcast flag?
Certainly there's going to be a demand and the timeframe allows a couple of years for the whole environment to change so in 2008/9 you get..
a) Very high bandwidth (so it's quick)
b) Anonymity as the RIAA and MPAA are "promoting" the development of faster, simpler and more anonymous file transfer. (So it's "safe")
c) Instant access (So it's easy to use)
d) Low cost (It's cheap or even free!)
d) I CAN lend it to my friends (Better usability)
e) No ads/infomercials/garbage! (More friendly)
I wonder whether the advertisers will fight this or whether they'll realise that it's cheaper and easier to jump on the bandwagon, bypass the Networks and start selling the shows directly?
I built a Myth system last year, so you can be sure that this issue has concerned me greatly. But I am still optimistic that we're going to see the system actually work for a change.
I don't know if the flag was Michael Powell's idea or not, but he was appointed by Clinton. Funny ways of regulating whole industries, as well as coziness with Big Hollywood, are much more Democratic traits than Republican.
Anyway, Powell's out, the broadcast flag has been successfully challenged (at least the first step), and this is an issue that can get people excited.
I am betting the Republicans gang up and squash the broadcast flag before it comes into effect, mostly because it can make them look very good to their constituents. For one thing, they can do something very loudly to protect consumers from Big Bad Government. For another, they can twist Hollywood's nose (the GOP is no friend of big movie studios, believe me). And the kicker is that they can somehow blame it all on Clinton.
All you need is someone like John McCain to start making noise about this -- he's gone after cable companies before and is pushing cable a la carte -- and people will line up to back him.
It's very easy to speak persuasively about letting Joe Sixpack (or Jane Sixfigure) keep a DVD archive of Masterpiece Theater (or Pimp My Ride). It's much harder to explain how being able to take your shows with you is a mortal threat to God, Mom, and The American Way(TM).
The Republicans in Congress will be able to colonize C-Span with catchy populist rhetoric, while anyone defending the flag -- it would have to be a Democrat, maybe Sen Feinstein (D-CA, who wrote a bill to throw people in jail for sharing screeners) -- would have a hard time not looking like a shill.
For some perspective, there was a very good op-ed piece in the Seattle Times on March 1 about retooling the FCC after the Powell era.
I am no Republican, but it's clear that they have the most to gain from scuttling the broadcast flag, and very little to lose. I wouldn't trust Democrats give up a chance at regulation, or to piss off Hollywood.
Weather or not this is held up by the courts isn't the issue. Weather or not the whole idea is viable isn't the issue. Can you think of one thing along these lines that hasn't been hacked? The issue to the consumer is that this is costing you money. Developing the technology, implementing it, all of that goes into the price of the TV. What you end up with is a TV that won't do things that your old TV did, but it will cost more.
What does this button do...
I'm a chief engineer of a large station and I never heard of such a flag. We broadcast HD material all the time. I know for a fact, I don't or have the equipment to put a broadcast flag on HD or SD content.
I suspect that the broadcasters would be reasonably content, at least for a while, to let you go ahead and tape the analog output. It's fuzzier than the digital signal. It's also harder to control: in order to tape Jeopardy at 7:30 and then Law and Order on a different channel at 9, you'd have to have some way to control both the tuner and the analog recorder, which would be separate boxes.
I'm sure somebody would eventually come up with a hack around it, like those VCR+ remote controls that you left pointed at the tuner box and the VCR. (I don't know if they make those any more.)
You, slashdot hacker, will be perfectly capable of cobbling something together and feel all proud of watching Battlestar Galactica at 5:37 the following afternoon, gleefully fast-forwarding over the commercials. Most people won't do it.
Perhaps I'm wrong on that score. The broadcasters seem kinda pissed about low-res fuzzy episodes of South Park posted on FTP servers all over the world. For me, it's easier to wait until they come out on DVD.
They may eventually try to require digital signals and content control all the way to the CRT, but such transitions take a long time. Look how long it's taking to get HDTV accepted. I hope by then we've found better ways aroud it, like ignoring the crap the broadcasters are spewing in the first place.
If TV gets this inconvenient, I might just have to go buy me one of them "books" I keep hearin' 'bout and watch it instead. Ain't heard nothin' 'bout any flags on those yet.
Why is it that everyone who doesn't watch TV has to brag about it?
"I don't watch TV, and I'm a better person."
No, you're just a different person.
I knew quite a few kids who grew up without TV. They hated having to go to someone else's home just to watch a movie or a ballgame. I'll tell ya, they couldn't wait to move out so they could watch some TV, even if it was just broadcast.
Where in TFA does it mention actually building a TV?
How about a headline of "Record HDTV streams with your computer"?
I was hoping for something along the lines of Heathkit. I'd build a kit tv.
No, I'm serious. Wouldn't the dissemination of information like this fall under the DMCA and get the EFF sued?
It may be the right thing to do, but doesn't mean the courts will agree.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
guess we'll have to do what is done in theatres, actually record the tv show with an external video recorder. Sure quality will suck, but hey, how else can we provide all our friends with the newest inane "friends clone" that will further stifle their intelligence?
tv is all about big money, multinational media conglomerates striving to dumb down the masses with their inane and numbing propaganda.
It's legal today to sell a kit at gun shows to convert certain semi-automatic weapons into automatic weapons. Do we really think that the broadcast flag is the end of TV recording? It's only a delay until some enterprising youth starts selling a kit to modify your VCR, PVR, etc. from a semi-recorder into a fully functioning recording device. I'm not saying the delay's not gonna suck - but I'll stick with what I have and wait them out.
sounds of trumpets playing God Save America .. God save the rest of us from them..
Chaps, the TV is like heroin.
Television is a phosphorus screen that presents a ever changing pattern of light onto your eyes.
Heroin is a biochemical that blocks active extreme pain in the brain. When there is no pain, heroin makes the same brain receptors feel great relief and well-being, regardless of the external conditions.
Please be more precise with your metaphors.
Continous use of heroin results in a biochemical change of the brain receptors that it acts on. The receptors begin to require heroin to function normally. Not replenishing them with heroin results in pain and convultions in the user to the point where they will engage in high crimes and other anti-social behavoirs in order to obtain more of this illegal chemical.
Absence of television will induce extreme boredom in people who have been spending long periods of time watching it.
There is a major difference between extreme pain with convultions and boredom.
...could walk the dog and make waffles. Too bad they took those features out before DVD players actually came to market.
From the article: "But when HD becomes the standard, MythTV's development may face stagnation. As analog becomes an obsolete format, MythTV will also become obsolete. People can build their own analog TVs, but they won't be able to build their own HDTVs."
I have to disagree. MythTV won't become obsolete. People will either just use HDTV cards that were manufactured before Broadcast Flag support was required (which is perfectly legal), they will just deal with the lower quality recordings for flagged shows, or people will find ways around the broadcast flag. The thought that the Broadcast flag will make MythTV obsolete sounds a little far-fetched to me.
Hopefully, the FCC won't have their way and the Broadcast Flag idea, if anything, will be what becomes obsolete.
Assume that they (the media corporations) are successful at preventing copying of new shows in HDTV, and new music on copy-protected audio CDs.
The old content which is not copy-protected becomes more valuable and more in demand among the people who won't be 'consuming' new product because of the effective copy restrictions.
Old content is more profitable for the corporations because the cost of creating it has already be amortized. Any revenue from its sale is pure profit, even if the numbers of sales are much lower than new product. Plus there is no expense developing artists and audience interest in new shows when marketing old product. Why spend a million dollars for publicity on Boobies & Shoes or Two-Penny PsychoNigga when you can just release another Greatest Hits of some Classic Rock One-Hit-Wonder Band?
As with most articles I have read about the broadcast flag, this one sacrifices substance for hype.
TNT-HD does not use the broadcast flag, nor does any cable channel. If TNT wishes to restrict copying, then Comcast/Directv/Whoever will trigger that using the proprietary conditional access that cable has been using for years.
Remember, the broadcast flag is some bits that an ATSC (digital off air) station can set to indicate that the receiving device should not allow the content to proliferate beyond the home network.
What exactly does it mean for a government agency to "ease" the transition from one kind of TV signal to another?
The FCC wants to get broadcast TV off of it's current portion of the broadcast spectrum so that they can start selling licenses for telecomm use of those same frequencies.
They know that Hollywood will put more effort behind a system that "protects" the digital transmissions so that they don't wind up on the internet. With the backing of the big film studios, the FCC believes that it will be a shorter time until current analog TV is obviated and they can start selling those licenses.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Well, they can always do what they did with Abu Ghirab: send in Janet Jackson's nipple before the story breaks and scare the networks with "decency standards" scandals to get them to not broadcast the images at all.
...Although, compared to Janet Jackson's right nipple, I'd prefer the broadcast flags.
...thank god I don't live in the states.
You can either complain, or do nothing. You don't get both.
The mention of "the previous generation of activists" was particularly touching...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
when its your movie you are free to do with it what you will. hell give it away. start a torrent. whatever. if its not your movie, dont watch it. dont bitch. its not yours.
Well, the most popular movies on file share seem still to take forever to get no matter how many goodies I have to share with the people I need parts from. But DVDXCopy? Downloaded the entire disc image file before Law and Order was three quarters finished. Just about everyone on the network seems to have one copy of it or another.
Remember people, we're dealing with people who have completely failed to notice that the advent of the VCR caused the end of endless crappy films going straight to the movie house with no way of really knowing if it was worth bothering with and staying until some exec who never saw it decided otherwise.
With the VCR we got "straight to video" and a higher bar was set for the production of films in the first place and for the method of distribution in the second. Yet they still think 8-tracks, cassettes, VCRs, etc. were all bad ideas. Funny how they don't notice that all those ultimately made them wealthier than they've ever been. While piracy ain't exactly right, they are certainly doing every possible thing they can to encourage it.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
As a photographer for the Bay Guardian. (You can only see my lovely portrait of Helen Seltzer if you pick up the dead tree edition of the paper.)
There were three women there. They were taking apart computers. I saw it and (even) photographed it.
I am currently working in a Top-Secret underground lab. We are currently designing a wetware package that creates a decryption algorithm inside the brain. When the encrypted movie/song hits the eyes/ears it is auto-magically decrypted and the listener/viewer can enjoy their show.
Actually, I really shouldn't be telling you this as I might get into trouble.
What was that noise???
Urk...
End of Transmission
The transition from analog to digital tv transmission has NOTHING to do with the transition from standard to HiDef. The only possible connection is that the media moguls dont want to transmit in either hi def, or digital, if they dont have a way to control copying.
Please read that twice if it is at all confusing.
Wether a tv signal is broadcast digitally has absolutely nothing to do with wether its hi def or not. You can broadast a hidef signal over current analog transmitters, and you can broadcast a low-def signal over a digital system.
If you buy into all the HDTV hype why not buy into the BF hype?
You probably don't even use Linux.
I see no reason to waste my time with you.
In our family, we just flat gave up on TV. I am not trying to troll or be flamebate here, but, high definition crapola or digital crapola is still crapola. Nothing worth watching, for the most part. 90+ channels of clear, sharp, digital dung... and certainly nothing worth paying $40+ on a monthly basis, as far as we were concerned. Just my .02. I wonder if others feel the same about the amount of good content most of the time.
Cheers.
"According to the FCC, the flag is going to ease the nation's transition from today's analog televisions to tomorrow's high-definition televisions."
We're from the government. We're here to help you...
If you disagree with me on social issues, then it's pretty clear that you are a narrow-minded bigot.
Universal City Studios Wins!
Midnight, a fat moon looks down on a group of shady looking men.
In thier hands the new drug, the unlocked TV. Handbuilt and fetching a premium TV addict will fight for them and it's getting worse.
"This sort of activity leads on from lesser crimes such as drugs and is often involved with Terrorist activity. This is why we need to have the power to detain without trial. And this is why we have detained all fishermen." - said an establishment clone doing as told the other day
I'd pay extra for an unlocked TV. The black market awaits.
A blog I run for the wealth
Oh, you think you jest, but you don't.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Republicans - People = Humans who can think for them sleves
Except when we need to be protected from tits on TV (ha! on-topic!). Except when we need to have government approval of our sexuality to get married. Except when we need the federal government to overrule the states' right to legalize marijuana within their borders.
Yeah, I can just smell the independence vibe coming off the Republican party.
You actually believe your own propaganda, don't you. Here's a hint: the Republicans in power ain't conservatives. Running up horrific debt in foreign policy adventures isn't a conservative act. Especially now that, since the WMD tack failed to pan out, we're there to spread freedom and democracy.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
$20 to unflag your box. good. I love the black market.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
move to Israel
Israel isn't really a theocracy. The Likud party in charge is a secular one. More than half of the country considers itself "secular", and only fifteen percent considers itself "religious".
If you're going to talk about the dual citizenship bit for Jews, that's based on Jews as an ethnic group, not as a religion.
Muslims and Christians live there alongside Jews and enjoy the same rights of citizenship that they do; they vote and hold office.
What makes Israel a theocracy?
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
My APEX DVD player has been one of the most flexible, useful, reliable pieces of entertainment hardware I've ever owned. It played all the VCDs and SVCDs I threw at it, whereas brand-name players costing twice as much refused to play them. Aside from that, I never found a difference between the cheap foreign players and the expensive American ones.
Oh, and you could flash the APEX's firmware so it would display a different background image. That was kinda nifty.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Ah, the Phantom Tenth Amendment. Ever since Congress started slapping everything with the Interstate Commerce Clause, it's gone out of vogue. Face it, the United States are no longer plural, and haven't been for a very long time. It's one nation under a strong central government.
Go try to apply the Tenth Amendment to that case in which Californians grew pot in accordance with state law, entirely in-state, to be controlled and used entirely in-state. Whoops, it could conceivably be used for interstate commerce, so send in the feds.
Federalism ain't what it used to be.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
How hard are you willing to work to see Survivor? For the last 3 years the only people who have known that you won't be able to record HDTV are us techies. Do you really believe that the average American won't throw a fit when they discover that their new $7,000 home entertainment system won't let them watch American Idol when they want too? TV ratings are falling like a rock. If TV gets to hard to watch the networks and cable systems stand to loose big time. They will probably use the flag to protect pay-per-view, but I doubt that the vast majority of programming will ever turn it on. HDTV is the most hyped and overrated bunch of crap I have ever seen. The picture on broadcast just isn't that much better, hell it's still interlaced. Eventually I will buy an HDTV, but not until the price for a set gets down to $5 per inch. Don't get me wrong, I definitely don't like the BF because its a backdoor attempt to prevent electronic innovation in the guise of 'copy-right protection'. Hopefully the courts will smack it down. But frankly, TV suck and there are plenty of other electronic entertainments these days, if it gets too expensive or too inconvienent it will die.
I saw that nice bumper sticker "Shoot your TV". After some thought, I realized that this was meant entirely seriously. I do not have a TV (never had, never will), and I keep hearing people say "Yes, but I only watch nature documentaries and the news...".
Chaps, the TV is like heroin. You get drawn into it. You can't help it. It's like a TV in a bar. Even if you hate it, your eyes find it again and again.
I've got and watch a tv, but for the last few years I've mostly used it to watch CNN and movies on tape and dvd. I don't recall exactly when the last tyme I watched another channel but so far this year I haven't had the tv on any station other than CNN.
Previously though I was a regular watcher of some tv series, I credit two series, "Touched By An Angle" and "Dr Quin, Medicine Woman" with my still being alive, and "relatively sane" after I had an accident several years ago, other than CNN and movies I'm not into watching tv much.
FalconShould there be a Law?
"Problem" Definition: HDTV getting on the net.
Reality Check: Most people are not techno savvy enough to get around the flag... most. Those that are savvy will find a way around it and then put even more content on the P2P networks. One reason will be just to give The Man the finger. But also there will be an even bigger demand for the content now that Joe Schmoe can't record it from the privacy of his living room for his personal use.
To the media fatcats - the genie is out of the friggin bottle and we *will* get our wishes...
Regards
That's certainly one way of looking at it, though I'd point out that the early Americans did what you describe to a land that they'd never been to before, and America isn't a theocracy.
The Jews didn't flood in all at once after the Holocaust, either. True, there was a wave of immigration after World War II, but Jews had been moving to what is now Israel since the turn of the century and earlier.
In the early years of Israel's formation, it was proposed as a two-state deal, sort of like what the current "Road Map" is pointing towards, but with more land for the Arabs. The Jews accepted the two-state idea, the Arabs denied it, the Jews declared a state, the Arabs attacked and the hostilities began. After which, the Jews were booted from the surrounding Arab countries, and the Palestinians from Israel itself.
As of today, Muslims and Christians live in Israel, as citizens equal to any other. The Palestinians aren't citizens there; they've been camping on the borders for more than fifty years. Note that the Jews in the surrounding nations didn't see fit to do this.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca