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DVD-Audio's CPPM Circumvented
Bodysurf writes "After DVD-Video's CSS encryption was broken in 1999, the music industry chose a much more secure copy-protection method for DVD-Audio called Copy Protection for PreRecorded Media (CPPM). This protection scheme has remained publicly uncracked, but it was circumvented recently, providing the ability to save the unencrypted digital audio data. CDFreaks has the details."
Probably nobody uses DVD-Audio. The effort spent cracking the copy protection will be proportional to the popularity of the medium. When the DVD Audio section at your local record store is as large as the CD section, we may see some more time being spent on such things.
Region coding on DVDs has caused enough headaches for people. The idea of having DVD audio disks that don't allow ripping to your computer is idiotic.
CSS for DVDs didn't stop ripped DVD movies being downloaded by millions. Why does the recording industry think that some new encryption scheme will stop music pirates? All such encryption does is make the lives of legitimate users hard.
So, rather than try to compromise the DVD-Audio's encryption itself, someone has succeeded in making a patch that uses WinDVD to perform the decryption and playback, but instead pipes the decrypted audio output to the hard drive instead of the sound card.
While certainly useful for WinDVD users who aren't able to do this natively (guessing that Windows can't do this redirection natively, hence the news story), this is really "circumvention" at its most basic level. Well, almost...one step up from sticking a tape recorder next to your speakers. Not quite the "fair use" that will "break open" the DVD-Audio market that many posters will no doubt clamor over, and nowhere near a true solution to the problem.
And to those familiar with this patch: Is the output even in a standard format capable of more than two channels?
But the reputation of the format here on /. is that it was created because they (the RIAA) wanted to prevent ripping. So which is it?
The problem with the "prevent ripping" choice is that, AFAIK, there are no releases on DVD-A that isn't also available on CD.
Plain and simple, the format allows the companies to disable your machine. Not only are they trying to control the music that you buy, but now they are wanting to control your machine.
Funny thing is, that kids today can control the industry as they are the main buyers of the music.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I'm not saying the effect will be huge, or even noticeable. For one, as mentioned, the industry can revoke the player's keys, which would prevent ripping new releases. (As well as screw anybody who owns WinDVD. Class action lawsuit anyone?) And as you say, they have only to take it off the market slowly, thus killing it while being able to say that piracy killed it (even if said piracy never occurs). But if there ever were a non-monopolized, non-overpowerful market, you would see a noticeable rise in sales.
Fair use would be fair, yes, but free use is free. Which would you rather be paying for?
Or do you hate our freedoms?
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
That's a silly thing to say. You have a program that will let you record sounds as they come out of the sound card. So what? It's not in DVD-A format (which, in case you didn't know, is a high resolution format, much higher than CD.). Plus, your recording is in real-time, which makes it inconvenient for users to do. One reason MP3 encoding has caught on is because it takes 10 minutes to rip and encode a CD. I doubt it would be as popular if everything was recorded in real-time.
I have a couple of Audio DVDs. When I play them, they only play through my SoundBlaster Audigy 2. I have a professional card that has far superior DACs and opamps, and thus far superior sound, but it won't play through it. Why? Well the pro card plays by my rules, it will route any input to any output, allow logging to disk, allow full resolution digital output, etc. Thus, the driver isn't certified. The Audigy 2 will accept encrypted input from the program, shut off digital outs, deny recording capability, etc.
So a program like this IS a restration of fair use. It has nothing to do with free music, I mean shit, DVD-A is 50MB/minute COMPRESSED, I don't really think there'll be a lot of intrest in trading that online. What it's about is the ability to listen to music the way I want, on teh hardware I want.
Back in the day, the content providers WERE the pirates. Especially Disney, which is interesting because now they are lobbying hard against the very activities which brought them their power. For more information regarding the history of this issue, Lawrence Lessig has an excellent book called "Free Culture" which addresses this usurping of our rights.
Why should businesses be allowed to "better control their marketing districts"? This seems very anti-competitive and non-free-market, why should we pass laws to encourage it? After all, if companies are free to outsource to places where prices are cheap, thus lowering wages here, why shouldn't consumers be allowed to do the same thing by buying items someplace where they have to price it cheaply? Why should they be able to have their cake and eat it too?