Info on Intel's Viiv DRM

An anonymous reader writes "CNET went to Intel's Viiv launch in Australia and scored some interesting info about Viiv's DRM scheme. From the article: '[Don] MacDonald also told CNET.com.au that Viiv won't be testing to see if the content being played is pirated from networks such as BitTorrent. He believes that it's not Intel's job to be policing downloads and that it's wrong to assume that all consumers are criminals. As such, Viiv won't test for watermarks or other red flags that reveal pirated content, allowing any type of media to be played.' Another choice quote from the article: 'MacDonald is confident that piracy won't be a significant issue for Viiv, as Intel promises to make content easier to buy than it is to pirate.'"

Comments

Power to the content providers

[js_sebastian]

From TFA (emphasis mine):

Intel's stance surrounding Digital Rights Management (DRM) is that consumers should be able to do whatever they like with legally purchased content
(...)
Intel is encouraging Viiv content providers to allow users to pass their media to other devices

So whatever they say about their intentions it will be up to the content providers to decide what you can or cannot do with legally purchased content.. Guess how nice they're going to be about this. and this is from version 1, not some distant imagined future..

DRM is treating consumers as criminals, hypocrite!

[babbling]

It's funny that he thinks it's wrong to treat consumers as criminals, yet endorses DRM.

The entire idea of DRM seems to be that you prevent people from passing the file to someone else. This idea is flawed, because the "someone else" will always be able to get the file from elsewhere, illegitimately, and the "original customer" will probably end up doing the same because DRM is an inferior product when compared with illegitimate versions of the same thing.

This idea assumes that the original customer is a criminal. All DRM treats the customer (the person who has decided to pay for the file) as a criminal.

Re:What this really means...

[necro2607]

Well, idunno if I'd call Apple's DRM "really restrictive"..

Consumers should buy DRM-free hardware

[UseFree.org]

Intel is pushing a technology called Treacherous Computing, which will prevent unsigned code from running on their hardware. So even if you have the source code, if you try to remove the DRM restrictions, the hardware will refuse to run the modified binary.

The Free Software Foundation admits that the anti-DRM provisions in the GPLv3 will not be enough on their own to prevent the nightmare scenario where users can't trust their own computers.

People who understand the dangers of Digital Restrictions Management at a technical level (ie.Free and Open Source software developers) should warn the general public to avoid buying DRM-crippled hardware. Consumers should know about the great variety of DRM-free computers and accessories built specifically to work with Linux, the KDE desktop, and other Free and Open Source applications.

On the music side, there are plenty of websites that legally sell DRM-free, RIAA-free music by independent artists. Consumers can use a cross-platform, iTunes-like application called Songbird to easily download songs from these sites.

As for movies, building a Linux media center works just as well as the DRM-crippled offering from M$FT. Just download MythTV and run it on a computer equipped with the pcHDTV HD-3000 card and the PVR-350 card -- these will capture both standard definition (NTSC) and Digital/Hi-Definition (ATSC/HDTV) signals.

Re:Consumers should buy DRM-free hardware

[dr.badass]

Consumers can use a cross-platform, iTunes-like application called Songbird to easily download songs from these sites.

Songbird is not cross-platform. It is currently Windows-only. It also sucks really hard.

Re:Consumers should buy DRM-free hardware

[Wesley Felter]

Intel is pushing a technology called Treacherous Computing, which will prevent unsigned code from running on their hardware. So even if you have the source code, if you try to remove the DRM restrictions, the hardware will refuse to run the modified binary.

This actually isn't correct. You'll be able to run whatever you want, but if you run unapproved binaries you won't be able to download certain stuff (e.g. legal music/movie downloads) and may not be able to play certain online games. This is trickier than just banning unsigned code, because such a computer running free software will appear to work fine, but over time it may be gradually locked out of more and more Web sites/services. (How do you boil a user?)

Trusted computing is bad, but you should attack it based on what it is.

Re:What about AMD?

[dr.badass]

Now throw DRM into the mix and what am I going to buy? A DRM enabled chip that costs more, or a chip that is DRM-Free, costs less, and performs better?

If you're looking for "DRM-free" you're not going to find it from AMD. AMD is a founding member of the Trusted Computing Group, along with Intel, and is building the exact same functionality into their processors.

Re:What this really means...

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

When have they done this? Cite an example.

example cited.