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No DRM for Apple in Intel-based Macs
JWeinraub writes "OfB is reporting that, contrary to widely-published and discussed rumors, Apple is not including the controversial Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip in its Intel-based Macs. An anonymous registered Apple developer claims that the Apple x86 test boxes do not have DRM or TCPA components." From the article: "As to why those with access to the kits have been quiet concerning the claims, our source said, 'you can rest assured that Apple is keeping very close tabs on those of us who have them.' The kits are only available to those who accept a non-disclosure agreement."
Even though the article says these are "test boxes" apple should see that wIthout DRM they would have the perfect weapon to gain market share. The difference between heavily restricted wintel boxes and non DRM Apples will be apparent even down to the level of J6P. Would this leave Apple as the only "General computer" left? A more accross the board move to Apple could even be a boon to linux as more people accept the fact that there are options to wintel (or at least options to Microsoft). Americans generally only get upset at the loss of Freedom when those it is the kind of abrupt in your face taking that DRM represents.
"It's so convenient to have a system where everyone is a criminal" - A. Hitler
So we have some people saying that there are DRM chips in the x86 macs, and some people saying that there aren't DRM chips in the x86 macs... did it ever occur to anybody that Apple might be shipping different configurations to different people? It makes sense that they'd try a few different things out before release.
First they move to a *nix based OS, then switch to Intel processors, then they add a mouse with multi-buttons and scroll, and now no spooky DRM at the hardware level.
I'm finding it harder every day to resist... Now if they'd only do something about the price.
StrategyTalk.com, PC Game Forums
It is actually working for them since almost every single rumor out there is wrong. About what the kits come with, what they don't come with, et cetera. This goes to show that most of the people that do have the devkits are keeping their mouth shuts.
The rumors out there are likely "Well, I heard from this one guy... that attended WWDC on a Student Scholarship that the dev kits..."
$499 gets you a mac mini that has basically the same specs as my 15 month old powerbook. 512MB, 1.25 GHz G4. No, Apple doesn't compete with whitebox selling-out-of-my-trunk "vendors" on pricewatch.
Anonymous Coward time...
How on earth can that person say that the chip isn't there...I'm LOOKING AT IT IN THE COMPUTER ON MY DESK!
Mod the parent up for having the nuts to take a pic. I'm convinced that everyone's motherboard has markings on it so they can tell who is letting the cat out of the bag.
Just because a computer is based around a particular processor, does not necessarily mean it is going to be software- and hardware-compatible with other machines based around the same processor. For instance, the BBC model B, the Commodore PET and the Atari 400/800 were all based around the 6502 processor. The Sinclair Spectrum and the Amstrad PCW8256 were based around the Z80A processor. Both the Acorn Atom and the Dragon 32 used the 6847 video chip. And both the Oric-1 and the Amstrad CPC464 used the Yamaha AY-3-8910 sound/PIO chip. Anyone who was reading computer magazines in the 1980s will tell you that even when it was possible, it was a devil of a job to translate type-in listings meant for one machine so they could be run on another. It wasn't made any easier by the almost total lack of abstraction in many systems -- you would often have to use PEEK and POKE statements {and IN and OUT on Z80 machines with their separate memory and I/O buses} to manipulate memory and peripherals directly.
All Apple would need to do to prevent their OS from being run on generic hardware, would be to use a totally different addressing schema than that used by generic DOS/Windows/Linux PCs. Of course, it will still be possible to compile Linux and BSD for Apple hardware {the absolute minimum you need to port any OS written in a compiled language to a new architecture is an interpreter, written in assembler, and just capable enough to understand the compiler compiling itself}. But OS XI would not run on generic hardware because the memory map would be all wrong and the I/O devices would be in the wrong places. And as long as Apple did not release the source code, nobody would be able to recompile OS XI for generic hardware.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Lets see - anonymous developer says "test boxes do not have DRM or TCPA components", then your answer to the evidence of the chip on the board is..?
No, no, no. People keep on saying this, but it is not true. Name one EC case in which post-sale restrictions on use have been upheld by the EC courts. Name one EC case in which the provisions of a EULA forbidding installation on a particular type of machine, or restricting how one copy is installed out of the box, have been upheld. You will not find it possible as a seller to penalise a buyer for using the product in a different way from the way you would like or with other products you do not like. There is no legally enforceable way to stop anyone from making and promoting hardware to run X. In the same way, there is no legally enforceable way to stop them running MS Office on Linux under Wine. And Sony could not enforce a CD/DVD EULA which forbad people to play its music or films on players made by anyone else. And Wolf could not enforce post sale contractual provisions which forbid you to use its garden tool attachments with other people's handles - though it might be able to patent the attachment method, and stop others making compatible tools or handles. People need to think straight about this. This is the same.
There are only two reasons why there may not be non-Apple hardware. One might be it will be technically feasible, but not make business sense, perhaps because the niche is too small and the hardware too specialised. Not very plausible. The second might be it is technically impossible or inconvenient to run X on non-Apple machines. Much more likely. EULA provisions forbidding it are, and are well known to be, unenforceable. At least in Europe.
First of all, I will say that I am as against Trusted Computing as the next guy on Slashdot. I think it is a terrible thing.
Unfortunately, I don't think Apple is going to have a choice in this matter. When the big media companies have seen TC and its "benefits" on the Wintel Vista boxes, they will demand it on Apple boxes. Since Apple doesn't currently have the *COMPUTER* marketshare to stand up to the MPAA/RIAA, on the COMPUTER (where video content will come), they will be unable to get any of the content that media companies will be comfortable releasing to a Trusted Vista box. Since Apple only has 5% market share, it won't hurt much to leave them out.
So why does Apple NEED that content? Simple. In recent years, Steve Jobs is taking steps to reinvent Apple as a media company. Not a media PRODUCTION company, but a company that makes media-centric equipment. The iPod now contributes far more than its fair share of profits to Apple's bottom line. Jobs has visions of Apple computers being the "hub" of a home media system. How can any of this POSSIBLY happen when the companies that control the content will not release it to non-DRMed Apples?
Jobs is a good negotiator -- that is clear from his dealings with music companies with iTunes. But there is NOTHING that the MPAA/RIAA is more afraid of than rampant piracy. They see it as bad now, but potentially MUCH worse when all those computers are connected to home TVs and stereos. The sad reality (for me, especially, as I would certainly get a non-TPMed Apple if it was the only "free" (as in speech) choice) is that it WILL happen sooner or later, because it would be a major stumbling block to Apple's foreseeable future as a media-delivery company.
Why would he want to run Windows? ... :-)
Ok, so you may not have heared about that obscure OS called Linux
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
And you know that those pictures are of actual Mac devkits because...?
If I don't put anything here, will anyone recognize me anymore?
I don't understand what all of the excitement surrounding these rumors of Apple including DRM technology on the Macintels is about.
It's about access to networks that use Trusted Network Connect. It's about continued access to the Internet once major ISPs require Trusted Network Connect by 2015.
The fit hits the shan in less than a year when Microsoft releases their new OS in summer 2006. By then yes, the systems will be coming with the required certificates and it is a DRM system and worse. Apple's new hardware switchover is what, a year after that in 2007? If it too includes a TPM (which appears likely despite the conflicting claims and reports) then the TPM will be a DRM enforcement device there too.
That is completely wrong. Read what Seth Schoen of the EFF wrote two weeks ago about Microsoft's plans for the TPM in Windows Vista. Seth is one of the most knowledgeable Trusted Computing opponents on the net, author of the so-called User Override concept which would eviscerate the most useful features of TC. He wrote:
"The most important message at the 2005 WinHEC about Microsoft's trusted computing effort, now known as Next Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB), is that it is late and will not be included in Windows Longhorn.
"In fact, Microsoft is not implementing support in Longhorn for the controversial remote attestation features of trusted computing hardware. That means that publishers and service providers will not have a hardware-based means of forcing people to use particular programs for interoperability, nor of stopping people from reverse engineering or altering software on their own computers."
In short, you are wrong that Vista in 2006 will use TPMs with certs for DRM purposes. This will not happen. There will be no remote attestation, hence no certs, hence no utility of the TPM for DRM, not in that time frame. Maybe never, depending on the politics of the issue.