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Longhorn to Require Monitor-Based DRM
Mr_Silver writes "Engadget has an interesting article regarding a new feature in Longhorn entitled PVP-OPM (Protected Video Path - Output Protection Management) which detects the capabilities of the display devices you are using and manages how (and if at all) content is sent to it. In short, this means that if Longhorn detects that your monitor is not "secure" enough, then your premium video content won't play on it until you buy one that is. Who gets to decide? The content providers of course." From the article: "So what will happen when you try to play premium content on your incompatible monitor? If you're "lucky", the content will go through a resolution constrictor. The purpose of this constrictor is to down-sample high-resolution content to below a certain number of pixels. The newly down-sampled content is then blown back up to match the resolution of your monitor. This is much like when you shrink a JPEG and then zoom into it. Much of the clarity is lost. The result is a picture far fuzzier than it need be."
As we live in a capitalistic society this of course means the end of Microsoft as an os providor as people generally don't want to buy crap (tm). I mean who would "want" to buy this?! I hope Linux is ready for the desktop (at least for Joe SP) when this rolls out because this is THE chance for linux to explode into the market.
"It's so convenient to have a system where everyone is a criminal" - A. Hitler
Microsoft is considering the acquisition of an ASCII art company.
This is just the feature I've been waiting for. I wouldn't dream of buying a monitor without this priceless capability.
Daniel
Carpe Diem
My Computer -> Computer
My Documents -> Documents
My Monitor -> Our Monitor!
Seriously, who didn't see this coming?
isn't this a case of indirect industrial price-fixing? by forcing you to buy a DRM-enabled monitor, they can easily collude and charge a, say, 20% premium, over a standard LCD.
Another reason why Tiger and Leopard makes Longhorn look long-in-the-tooth ^^
A Longhorn feature that everyone hopes is vaporware!
The problem is not things that *CAN* operate with a wide variety of DRM option. The abilty to support DRM isn't a problem at all.
:)
The solution, as always, is simple. Vote with your wallet for either (a) DRM solutions that make sense, or (b) for solutions that don't take advantage of the richly enabled DRM fabic available to content producers.
If I produce content, I should be able to decide what's done with it (for a reasonable time, anyway). If I want it to be one-peek-per-customer, that's my right, it's my content.
You...just shouldn't be stupid as to buy it
Well... the lock on your front door isn't to keep determined criminals out. It is there to keep the average Joe from just walking in on a whim and stealing your stuff. This is the same philosophy as a lot of security mechanisms, and I don't think DRM is much different.
I doubt they have monitors or video cards that can detect, say, a simple splitter or repeater. It's the sort of thing a third-year EE student can build (fourth year for digital signals).
It will stop some casual piracy, you know, the kind companies and congressmen say they don't care about. Mostly it will get Microsoft a piece of the monitor market without the need to develop useful features or compete on price.
"we're not gonna take it. da da da da da-da da. we're not gonna take it da da da da da-da da"
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
So, of the major features that were originally supposed to be the selling point in Longhorn...
WinFS pretty much seems indefinately stalled.
Avalon seems to be delayed until after release.
The new shell will not be available until the Server release.
But the crippling DRM feature that requires me to have an MPAA approved monitor to get "premium" video quality is right on schedule.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
But the "average Joe" wouldn't walk in and steal your stuff.
Keeping an honest person honest is like keeping a tall person tall. The DRM may as well not be on there in the first place. The "honest" folk will do with their content what they would anyway, just as the DRM would allow them to (i.e. not distribute it on a large scale) , and the determined users will crack the DRM and do whatever they want with the content.
This stuff is so basic, why invest time and money in an inherently flawed system when they could *gasp* be pushing the frontiers of technology and inventing some truly useful stuff for us users.
How long until we see something similar with audio? "Users without an appropriately DRM-equipped soundcard will hear down-sampled audio played back through the Windows PC Speaker driver"
From the article:
You don't think Apple is going to do this too? What will happen with Linux though? With Linux making inroads into set top boxes there will be some solution for Linux, though I don't think it will make its way to the desktop (legally).
When DRM requires the purchase of new hardware just for things to work like they used to, then thats when it is going to turn off even the clueless consumer who normally wouldn't care. When it starts biting into people's wallets they always stand up and take notice.
In my case, if my monitor is not "secure" enough, finding a replacement might not be so easy. My monitor is an older CRT that presents a very high quality picture. I use this because I dislike the ghosting and viewing angle issues that, while much improved from how they used to be, are still present in LCD monitors.
The problem is that it is hard to find a decently priced, truly good CRT anymore because most of the industry is switching over to flat panel production. They literally don't make them like they used to anymore.
I'm guessing that this technology is just geared towards people using video outs to TVs and Tivo like devices, but I really don't like the idea of being potentially forced to buy a new monitor just for an operating system. That is pretty rediculous.
You are who you are, let no one tell you different. But, never close your mind to a new point of view.
Do you honestly think it will be possible to purchase and watch content on a linux machine? Do you think the movie industry is going to give you something playable on your un-DRMed box? You might pirate it.
Of course, we all know that making bits not copyable is like making water not wet. But I think you underestimate the MPAA's lobbying capabilities. I fully expect it to be illegal to posses or discuss wet water any day now.
Right. Just like copyrighted broadcasts aren't shown on TV since someone could copy them. And copyrighted movies aren't released to the public on DVD. As it is, studios are just testing the waters to see how much control they can grasp from the user. If the courts consistently rule they have no right to require "broadcast flags" or whatever they are calling it now, they'll get over it and go back to doing what they've done for years: releasing content knowing that someone can copy it if they want. Some people will pirate stuff, but the content producers will keep making money because enough people will buy.
As far as Linux, expect that it won't work at all unless someone can manage to find a crack to unprotect content.
No, DRM is more like a padlock on a homeowner's breaker box or water heater, requiring the average, unskilled person to pay an employee of the manufacturer of the device to enable him to get electricity or hot water from his own property.
The problem is, people won't KNOW what it is
What this means is, WE HAVE TO TELL THEM.
People aren't going to refrain from buying Longhorn. People in a year or so literally won't have a choice; if you want a new computer you'll be buying Longhorn. However, we can make an impact on the secure monitors. It wouldn't be that hard to convince people (friends, family, neighbors, etc) that the new secure monitors and video cards are to blame (which they are, because if the secure monitors aren't picked up then the feature won't be used by content providers). Explain the feature enough that they'd understand it-- perhaps explain that the movie companies and microsoft want to stop you from doing certain things with your computer, and they can only do it if people buy these monitors-- them that and try to get them to pick some other brand.
Longhorn is unstoppable. Microsoft can and will do literally anything it wants. However a consumer backlash against the feature itself is possible as long as the hardware is targetted. Unfortunately I fear the American consumer is so weak right now no one will bother to try.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
This WHOLE thing is moot. We all know that DRM does't work and people go out of their way to avoid DRM content.
.wmv to secure online video, we use XviD. They region encoded DVDs, China starts pumping out millions upon millions of region free DVD players.
For instance, they made ATRAC as a secure format for digital music, we all still use mp3. They made
So who wants to bet that this DRM will die still born along with the rest of the attempts to restrict media?
Sometimes I wish I was a plumber, then I'd know how to deal with other people's shit.
Under this scheme, though, you are screwed by the time you get to see what services are out there. You buy Longhorn, you've just given control of your machine to more than content producers. You've handed control of your machine to a third party - be it Hi-Def content producers or Microsoft itself. You've given someone else the right to redefine *your* rights under copyright law and to control to which materials you even have access - now DRM becomes censorship.
This may not be how DRM starts out but it certainly is where it *can* lead.
What about my right to make a backup of digital content I've licensed for viewing? My DVD collection is a prime example - Jack Valenti once said something akin to "digital lasts forever" but the only reason that is even remotely true is because I can find a copy of every movie I own online and burn a copy if I chose. It certainly is not because DVDs last forever - a few scratches (and if you have young children in the house this is very easily done) and you are done.
This has been said before but I'll say it again because it is appropriate: content producers need to decide: are you licensing content or are you selling a product? If you are licensing content then you are telling me to what limits I can use your content - the medium upon which I place your content should not matter. If you are selling a product, then I can do whatever I want with the product as long as I do not violate the copyrights upon the content.
Remember, among your rights as a consumer are the rights to time- and space-shift the content you are entitled to possess (be it via explicit relationship defined by the exchange of money for goods and services or be it via the implied relationship defined by trading your time and eyeballs watching advertisements).
In general, as a software developer and an individual who would like to make a living as a writer someday, I understand the debate over intellectual property/copyright and DRM. I understand why content producers are concerned. However, you cannot have it both ways. DRM tries to let the content producers usurp or otherwise limit *your* rights in favor of their own and that is a very bad thing.
Unfortunately the choice the public will see is likely to be between:
- Buy Longhorn, and be able to view this premium video content.
- Run Linux/MacOS/BSD and not be able to view this content.
Sure, it may be possible for someone to crack the encrypted path, and distribute unrestricted versions online. But you can't exactly advertise that in your marketing campaign, whereas Microsoft can advertise this premium content as only being available on Longhorn.I think this can only hurt other OSes.
Wouldn't this just be done at video card or motherboard level or more likely software level? I'm assuming it will still have a standard output to any generic monitor, the average person wouldn't upgrade to a new monitor for a new OS.
Actually from the microsoft white paper:
>PVP-UAB provides the last internal link in the Longhorn content protection chain, to ensure that the premium video content reliably makes it from the Longhorn Protected Environment to being rendered on the card without a copy of the content being stolen.
So it's not a monitor thing, and the article writer appears to be a dumbass.
Actually, no. Only if you want to use the Secure Computing platform built in to Longhorn. This "feature" is part of Microsoft's Next-Generation Secure Computing Base. Essentially they are putting into place a framework that will provide a secure channel from keyboard to OS to monitor that runs in a protected bubble from the non-secure OS/apps/hardware. Longhorn will use a protected kernel "shell" in which DRM-enabled applications can run without interference (or being touched by) applications or non-DRM-enabled hardware running in the non-secure OS portion.
The videocard tech they are talking about here is ostensibly to prevent things like screen-scraping or intercepting video output. The goal is to provide a secure portion of OS that is inviolate from bootup and has secured pathways for data to travel. Think of it as Uber-root or a chroot'd OS partition that include hardware.
Using this secure channel is optional. You are not forced to use it. You can run all the aps you want, you can run it on your old hardware. However, the NGSCB is there should you need... and provided you have the hardware that supports it.
Now, certainly this feature has the *IIA's drooling. The theory is sound but the actual use and implementation can be (and probably will be) abused.
Do not taunt Happy-Fun Ball
What the planet really needs is more people throwing CRTs into the garbage. Way to go, Microsoft,
for making it happen!
If only we could charge them for the environmental damage they're going to cause. =/
25% Funny, 25% Insightful, 25% Informative, 25% Troll
First of all, it means they've failed to put their CrapWare(tm) in the computer's firmware. Less cruft in my motherboard is a Good Thing. Not that it would have killed Linux, anyway -- the Open Source community is pretty good at working around things like that. But still.
Second of all, this means that in order to access their movie content and so on, you'll have to have one of the "special" monitors, but the system will only work through Windows -- it's primarily a software solution which looks for the monitor feature, and fucks up the imagery if it doesn't find it. So, again, Linux remains unaffected.
Third, if we Linux guys decided to buy something like a future game console or set-top box (we wouldn't run a Windows computer per se, of course, because we're already wonderfully served by our Linux boxen) it would probably have this built-in, and we'd be able to do what we wanted with it.
I'd say it's not a bad idea overall.
Farewell! It's been a fine buncha years!
http://www.spatz-tech.de/spatz/dvi_magic.htm
Magic de-HDCPed DVI. Completely illegal in the USA thanks to the DMCA, but the rest of the world can enjoy our content at full resolution.
That's precisely the question, and we'll just have to see.
Generally, when one asks "Will it run ____?" the blank is filled in with some commercial piece of software, usually a game or a productivity app. And the answer will always be yes: Photoshop, MS Office, Half Life 83, etc. will all run beautifully on this. Probably even the old versions will, since they're not video players. The same will apply to all of the most common media players; in fact, Windows Media Player will run right there.
The most obvious question from the slightly more insightful user is, "Will it play my existing DVDs?", and that's the biggest question mark. If the answer turns out to be "No", if somebody upgrades their laptop and discovers the next time that they board an airplane that they have to read the in-flight magazine rather than watch Tomb Raider 9 3/4, then you're going to see some serious, serious backlash.
I'm going to assume that MS knows that, and so existing DVD formats will probably play exactly as they do now (which does have various protections anyway, though they're easily bypassed.)
Instead, I expect that this will apply primarily to new content (or rather, newly-coded content). For that, question would be "But will it run NFF (New Fangled Format)?" and the answer is "Yes". The flip side, "Will NFF run on my existing box" will be "No", but I think that user backlash on that is smaller than you might expect. They could take it as an opportunity to switch to Linux/OS X/PDP 11, but as long as they're buying a new computer, they could buy one with Longhorn, which will run NFF along with all of their old programs.
The user is kept on the upgrade treadmill because at each step the logical choice will be "forward" rather than "right" or "left". That's partly because they expect that a side-step will just put them on a different treadmill, which is a whole different debate.
So I don't expect this to cause a mass defection from Windows, at least not by itself. Other factors (cheaper Macs, improved Linux, the stunning revival of the Timex Sinclair) will make it hard to tease out whether I'm right or wrong, so maybe all this is moot, but, well, it's Slashdot and I get to shoot my mouth off anyway.
As soon as you need actual hardware to pirate the signal, copying movies becomes a restricted occupation again, just like selling free cable boxes.
No, copying movies the first time becomes a restricted occupation. Once a single unencrypted copy exists, then making a million more is no more difficult than it is today.
Whip out your favorite P2P client, and search for some copyrighted video. Do you see a hundred different rips made by each of the hundred different people sharing a copy? No, you see one or two of the best rips, each with hundreds of identical copies shared, in part because the swarming download protocols and hashing algorithms fundamentally encourage that behavior.
So what difference will in-monitor DRM make? Instead of having a few zealous groups using software to rip tons of movies that are then shared by millions of people, we'll have a few zealous groups using hardware to rip tons of movies that are then shared by hundreds of millions of people.
Wait - why will there be more people sharing these rips? Because most people will own some of the billions of non-DRM-capable monitors in existance, and the moron DRM-using publishers will have thus made it impossible for them to play a full-quality copy of these videos unless they have an illegal copy. Publishers couldn't do anything more stupid if they put a "Download free movies on P2P! It's the best!" advertisement at the start of every show!
It's not enough that the majority of installed PCs probably don't have the horsepower to run Longhorn, now M$ wants to force people to buy new peripherals. I hate to compare them to Apple, but I was using the old OS 9 on an old computer that wouldn't run OS X. So, I bought a used B&W G3, plugged in my ADB keyboard and a beige, Performa-era monitor, and installed OS X 10.3 which runs flawlessly. The OS was literally more expensive than the computer.
M$, on the other hand, would force me to buy a new monitor in addition to a faster computer to view content that I'VE ALREADY PAID FOR? Once again, I'm having difficulty seeing Windows as a value added product.
Make love, not reality television.
And then comes the warning: "Do not stare at blocked content with remaining good eye!"
Similar to the upcoming US election results
People almost all of you are part of the problem. Not just non-geeks. Why do go around calling people consumers?? You've already been brainwashed. You're citizens or people!
Who the hell cares if you can't see some dumbass movie or the listen to the latest manufactured pop star's video???
I'm gonna be labelled a troll for sure, but hell this mentality burns my butt. The problem isn't DRM the problem is that you all believe you *need* to see the lame things being offered up.
Come on. You got better things to *do* than just be a content "consumer". And for those that don't they deserve all the DRM and rights violations that are happening. Look at where you've been lead to think. If you don't think the content is worth the price they are asking for it then clearly the answer isn't to fight DRM.... the answer is just don't buy it.
That's what this is all about.
If Longhorn is a bloated mess and comes with utter sillyness such as "monitor DRM" that requires you to buy a new monitor (remember the MS keyboard? Keyboard manufacturers were crawling up MS' ass to be able to build and sell them) then the hardware vendors will hail Longhorn as the best OS ever. And be happy to sell you the great hardware you need to honor this OS.
That's what this is all about.
I hope they screw this one up.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca