Slashdot Mirror
Real Networks to Linux - DRM or Die
Baronvaile writes "ArsTechnica is running a story about RealNetworks VP Jeff Ayars at LinuxWorld Boston discussing the future of Linux for the consumer, if it does not support DRM." From the article: "Ayers has a few supporters in this issue from the Linux camp, as Novell, Linspire, and Red Hat spokespeople reportedly said they would be happy to add DRM to their distributions, but with some caveats. Novell, for example, is "currently in discussions with vendors who control proprietary formats" with the goal of supporting these formats in SuSE Linux. One can only surmise exactly which formats that would be, but recent rumblings from Redmond make it likely that Microsoft DRM solutions such as PlaysForSure could be among them."
If they have to make the source available under the GPL, then it's child's play to unhook the DRM, yes?
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
Ditch DRM or die.
seen waving his hand, saying, "you don't need to see the source code."
Obviously real networks arent looking at this from a consumer point of view. Plus, drm would kill the whole opensource thing (at least real's implementation would).
good luck convincing linux users of that. it's going to be a tough sale.
Sorry for being offtopic and troll and everything. I just had to say it.
Swedish plasma phys. PhD student; MSc EE; knows maths, programming, electronics; finance interest; seeks opportunities
...another distro!
As long as I am the one in control of my own computer and what it does (or does not do) instead of a mega corporation, then DRM is fine and dandy.
Digital is, by definition, imperfect. Analog is the way to go.
Yeah.
CfkRAp1041vYQVbFY1aIwA== RV/hBCLKKcSTP5UFK3kqsg==
Seriously, no one likes your product. You left a bad taste in our mouths with your nagware/adware supported POS software back in the day. Your format and codec suck, and there's really no point in your continued existence. FALL INTO A FIRE AND DIE.
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------
Ask not for the future of Linux without DRM, but for the future of DRM without Linux (or other free OSes, for that matter).
If DRM becomes as oppressive as the big media players seem to want it to be, then it will drive people away from platforms requiring it and towards platforms that circumvent it. Moreover, there are enough such people that attempting to legislate such platforms out of existence is unlikely to meet with success, at least not for very long.
History furnishes few examples of big business successfully forcing the people to accept something not in their interests for extended periods. Once the public get wise to something, it will stop.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I guess it's like a visiting dignitary - if you want so-n-so to visit your country, you have to help provide him/her police protection. In The Future® if you want pop star so-n-so to appear on your computer in audio or video, you'll need DRM to protect the material from getting around without permission.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
But I hope that it doesn't support DRM! With Vista going to DRM, I may be heading to Linux full-time.
On a side note, when was the last time anyone used RealPlayer? I just haven't found a practical use for it since around '99, but it still seems to get on other users machines.
Real who?
Go fuck yourself
If it's a fight between Linux and Real, please GOD let Linux win!
You can't take the sky from me...
I'm sorry, but when was the last time this joker was relevant? 1996?
110100 1101000 1101000 1100110 0 1101111 1101000 1100011 1
Wouldn't a DRM solution also include a closed source kernel driver? Even if you couldn't remove the DRM from the player, it still has to talk to the audio card. As far as I know all audio boards aren't encrypted, so you could modify the open source audio driver to capture the digital signal.
-Matt
Content provider supports DRM! News at 11!
"DRM or die!"?
What is that? Famous last words?
Seems more like "support what your users want or die!" to me.
Is this guy proposing to kill linux? And how exactly would he do that? go find all those volunteers and break their knuckles? Come on. People don't want DRM. Some people want linux. You can't stop that.
man, I feel like mold.
I am not going to pay money for software that tells me "no."
I will abandon SuSe and use a different, DRM-free distro instead, if this is what they start doing.
Anybody else of the opinion that RealNetworks isn't in a position to be giving advice to anyone? They totally squandered the brand recognition they once enjoyed, though IMHO that has more to do with poor marketing decisions than technological weaknesses.
I won't use software that implements it, and I won't watch or listen to media that uses it. It is a direct attack on my freedom, and I don't take kindly to that at all.
If the Linux community had any backbone, he would've been booed off the stage after he finished speaking. If it's DRM or die, I'd rather the latter.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
So, tell me *AA, what benefit does your DRM supposedly have to me, your customer? What would make me decide that your crippleware is actually something I'd want? Go ahead: we're listening.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
n/t
Seriously, is there any real research that actually shows DRM to improve sales, customer relations, the economy, or anything save corporate egos? Contrast this to the numerous studies you can find via a simple google search that show "piracy", if anything, increases overall sales; those who pirate more, buy more than they would otherwise. Also, take Stardock's recent example in the videogame industry. Galactic Civilizations II is a number one seller, and it has no DRM at all. You don't even need a CD in the computer to play the game. It seems that DRM is largely ineffective or, if effective, violates fair use and pisses people off. I don't know about the other people on slashdot, but basically everyone I know that has ever pirated understand they have to buy good products. Afterall, if you don't then you aren't likely to see similar products in the future, and people understand this. Sure, you get some freeloaders with piracy, but in my (admittedly anecdotal) experience they are rare and research seems to support this. So, is there any real point to DRM? It seems far more harmful than good; it risks making products of today innaccessible in the future; it angers customers; it makes it much harder to transfer your information from an old computer to a new; it usually gets circumvented by crackers sooner or later anyhow; and all implementations seem to give an almost scary amount of control to content providers/makers. It just looks like a bad way to go. I think (and hope) this whole forray into DRM is a temporary insanity.
Unlikely, there's always bittorrent, freenet, etc to float everything without the DRM. And thats not likely to go away that easily. Infact i would hazard to say that DRMing would push more users towards Linux.
Poor word choice, sounds legally iffy to me.
How about we just say "supports non-DRM" formats, or some such?
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Ayers said: "Linux would be further relegated to use in servers and business computers, since it would not be providing the multimedia technologies demanded by consumers."
I am a consumer and I am _NOT_ demanding DRM.
DRM is E-fascisme.
And if the major Linux players go ahead and support DRM? Then other Linux distributors will come along with their DRM-less versions and scoop up market sahre, and users will see the movies and listen to the music they want to anyway using pirated versions of stuff. Let's not forget, what a coder creates, another coder can hack. No amount of DRM is going to keep enterprising coders from breaking it and freeing the content. The DRM camp is, as usual, kidding themselves.
And we've had unprotected media around us for years, like FM radio or good old cable TV, and all we need in order to make unauthorized copies of those broadcasts are cassette radios or VCRs. Just because content has gone digital shouldn't mean that we all are going to turn into the dirty, rotten pirates in need of heavy restraints that DRM proponents seem to assume that we are.There will always be freely available content, if you know where to look. Let's not forget: many radio stations stream their audio already, and how hard is it to record that stream? A user will always be able to pick up the content they want given the effort, the RIAA and all its cronies be damned. It doesn't make us criminals, but consumers forced to extraordinary lenghts to get the things we want without having to be beholden big media over and over again.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Yeah. Isn't Real Networks dead already?
On the other hand, lots of people pirate their software to run "radio stations."
As usual, an open standard/system/format can solve the problem: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/03/14 20214&from=rss
On a computer or under a hood.
I expect in the near future, after you buy a CD, you will need to connect to an internet site, and pay a fee, each and every time you want to listen to a song on that CD. No more play as often as you want after buying the CD. Fees will be higher if you have better equipment. Audible static will be added to make it harder to pirate. And if more than one persion *might* be listening, you will need to pay a higher fee (i.e. if you don't use headphones). You will also need to pay to be able to listen to the radio. "Free" music will not be playable on any new hardware. And it will all be done retroactivally.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Hilariously, their very greed is still the thing that holds them back. Each company jealously cautious about "licensing" its proprietary format, everyone in "talks", the whole PS3 fiasco...
I'm not even worrying about this any more. Hopefully they will continue to try to compete technologically with FOSS, because so far, it's worked out great.
So says the VP of a dying company.
We will be unable to see some media stuff, because the only legal available codec will be DRM.
:(.. .BUT WILL BE SAD!, not a killing problem, but some attrition.
No drm mean we will suffer the lost of some media stuff. Anyway we will route this with reverse engineering, and media piracy
There is an old saying....
If you want success: grow
If you want spectacular success: grow and use leverage
My point is that I don't see any reason in the world why we shouldn't be trying to use Linux as leverage against people who are trying to impose DRM. Market forces are clearly pushing Linux in spite of them anyhow. What do people who controll content really have to offer us that we somehow can't manage without? The truth is that the future is not about extracting revenue from content, but instead extracting revenue from content related services.
IMHO, just as the plantation system tried to deal with the industrial revolution by fencing off the south and breaking off from the Union, the media system today is trying to deal with the information age by using DRM to fence off all content. Both are doomed stratigies, and the sooner we kill copyright and tools used to impose them, the sooner we will be doing ourselves and the information age a big favor.
Just die, dammit.
Looks like RMS is right (again) and Linus is wrong (again).
If companies like Red Hat are seriously considering encumbering their Linux Distro with Digital Restrictions Management, then this makes a very strong case to have Linux covered by GPL V3.
To make demands of a community that made its start "fighting the man."
These are the same people who continued to work on a fledgling OS in the early 90's because they believed in it, despite the Microsoft behemoth.
Through the cries of "Linux will never make it" to "Linux will never make it into real business server rooms" to the current "Linux will never make it onto the desktop."
This is a community of people who thrive on problem solving.
DRM is not a solution. It is a problem waiting to be solved.
Linux. Adapt and survive.
He who confuses his religion with his science knows neither.
I find the timing of this article to be highly relevent. I've been a windows user since I was a kid in the 1990's until a couple of weeks ago when ms announced a massive code re-write for vista. The most likely reason for the rewrite? Fixing holes in their DRM implementation. On that news, I installed linux. I failed miserably trying to install GENTOO, and ended up with UBUNTU, which I am very pleased with. I suspect DRM will be a major driver for growth in the linux userbase as long as they continue providing an alternative for people attempting to avoid DRM.
My only regret... is that I have... bonitis..
The Linux vendors need to simply reject DRM. Not only does DRM not generally work against anyone interested in defeating it, but it leads to general abuse of the consumer.
The fact remains that most consumers are honest enough to buy what they use. Make it more simple to buy and use, and more of these consumers will buy and use more often. Make it less simple and more difficult to use and fewer consumers will want to buy and use it.
The whole idea of DRM, unfortunately, will have to be PROVEN as a failure before it can be washed from the minds of these people interested in implementing it. What really needs to be realized is that information is NOT property in the physical sense and they should stop trying to treat it that way.
We could call it, I don't know, Real Alternative....
Seriously though, I realise its not about the player here, but to echo many of the previous comments, and no doubt many of the comments to come, the Real codec hasn't been relevant for 5 years, I don't have it installed on any of my boxes because I never come across the opportunity to download media in that format
If they add DRM to linux, does that mean I can download episodes of BSG from an online store and play them?
If so, I'm all for it.
If you let me code and install my own output drivers, you will not prevent me from obtaining an unencumbered signal.
ZZ
In spite of the fact that I know I should know better, I find myself continually surprised by these execs just...not...getting it. The companies are hanging onto an obsolete business model. Consumers want our digital rights protected, not the company's.
My hope is that one day they screw up and lock things down so tightly and inconveniently that Joe 'Average' Sixpack sits up and takes notice. The Sony rootkit fiasco was a start. That's who we need to convince, because if we get the mass market aware of and against DRM, the companies will face a tougher challenge in restricting our rights.
They want to close the analog hole. Yes every analog to digital convert will have to have the ability to detect a water mark and then refuse to record the data! No I am not making it up that is what some groups want!
Yes it is sickening. I don't download music or video but I do want the option to use it on my PC in a fair manner!
I also want to have the option of buying AD chips that don't cost a bloody fortune and work.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
When was the last time clueless real networks bashing earned you karma? It still works I think.
Get rid of karma whoring and check http://www.realnetworks.com/ to have a clue what they talk about, why it matters and what they warn the Linux against.
It's a lot easier to say "Real Networks free" right here, and right now.i ve.htm
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Real_Alternat
Slashdot.. where people join together in deliberate ignorance.
Earth to Jeff Ayars: Linux is not an OS or "consumer platform" but a kernel which powers many OS's ("consumer platforms") and is hugely popular among those who value personal liberty.
OTOH Real Networks is basically a parasitic media company of the Old Showbiz school, i.e. middleman adding zero value to content.
What's the benefit we'll miss without your Heretical DRM Blessing? Honestly, I haven't looked at any RealMedia in years, because your player and your format really bite. It is more hassle than it's worth to me, especially as content is now everywhere online.
And yes, I have tried it in OS X, XP, Debian, and FreeBSD. I'll give you this, RP is very portable and the bugginess is fabulouslly well represented on all platforms.
Oh and hey Jeff, Bill Gates called -- he wants his schtick back.
I imagine that this was part of the plan behind the DRM restrictions of the new GPL from the very beginning. It should be interesting to see how it finally turns out.
In any event, while I don't really totally agree with the anti-DRM provisions in the proposed GPLv3 (don't get me wrong -- I hate DRM, but telling people that they can't use your software if they use DRM -- isn't that a sort of DRM right there, just done in legalize rather than software and hardware?), I do think that given the choice between 1) continuing to use existing software pakcages that migrate to GPLv3 and new packages that use GPLv3, or 2) giving up the ability to use anything that uses GPLv3 and so restricting ourselves to the older versions (that were GPLv2 licensed) so that we can include DRM into a Linux distribution so we can play Real media ... I think it's pretty obvious what the answer will be.
Linux to Real ... die. (No `ditch DRM or die', just `die'. You had your chance to be relevant, and you blew it, and all you're doing now is reminding us that you blew it.)
Granted, even without Real, I don't see DRM going away any time soon, but it's just not something that I think that Linux (or, more specifically, Linux distrubtions) absolutely has to support, and the GPLv3 will probably just make that decision (not to support it) a bit easier.
Real could release a version of it's player that has DRM support, but they're fully aware that the OS isn't going to do too much to keep their content safe from things that record directly from the screen and audio hardware (and I don't see this changing), and so I predict that Real will just decline to make an updated Linux version of their player and point to this as the reason. Of course, the real reason will be that they just don't think that Linux is worth worrying about, and they'll probably be right.
The content industry sees DRM as its saviour from the pirates. In fact, it will be their doom. Let's take a look at what DRM will do, and to whom.
For this we'll be looking at four groups of people:
1. The joe average sixpack crowd, who buy some music, copy some more from his friends and generally think DRM is the new acronym for the thingie to plug into your car to make it faster. He's getting some music online, doesn't make heavy use of torrent and is still plugged into Kazaa, but complains he doesn't find much anymore.
2. The people who use suck the net dry, whether they need it or not. It's there, it's free, it's on my HD. They don't know jack about the inner workings of the DeCSS, don't know who broke it, but they use it to rip it, with the neat and foolproof tools provided.
3. The people who know what DRM means to their privacy and who fear, hate and fight it. Not necessarily in that order. Out of principle, not because they want to pirate what's available. But it's a privacy thing.
4. The people with The Clue to actually break DRM.
Group 1 will suddenly notice that their movies don't work anymore, or that they can't play the movie in the player they want. They bought a $3000+ HDTV set and they now got the same crappy rez because some part isn't to the DRM's liking, so they get the low-rez instead of the promised HD quality. They're understandably pissed, sink another 2k into the system to get better resolution and then find out that, again, some things will work while others don't, they suddenly can't borrow movies from their friends anymore. They do buy most of their movies, but they're PISSED because more often than not the DRM locks them out of their (bought) movies, following the creed of "better prohibit too much than allow too much".
Group 2 will notice that they can't play the ripped movies anymore. They won't do anything about it but google the web up and down 'til Group 4 provides them with the tools to rip again. They won't buy a single movie. They're not in for the movie, they're in for the "wanna have".
Group 3 will talk to Group 1 and blame whatever irks them on DRM. Until Group 1 starts listening to it and starts digging up information about DRM. And they get MORE pissed. Group 3 doesn't buy movies either. They're not in for the movies, they're in for the privacy issues.
And finally Group 4 will spend its time tinkering with the DRM, they'll burn a few of the DRM crates 'til they figure out how to break it, release it and then we are right where we are now.
With a few differences.
Group 2-4 don't change their behaviour at all. They didn't buy before, they won't buy after. Group 1, though, is not PISSED at the industry for making it all so "complicated" and they will think and ask twice before ever buying any new equipment. They will no longer be on the spearhead of adaption, they will wait 'til one of their clued friends tells them that it's ok to get one of those babies.
Who loses? Right. The content industry.
Who wins? Nobody.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Adapt or die."
.rm format.
I took me a few seconds to remember this forgettable Internet start-up (that should have burst along with the bubble). Yeah, I remember now, "Buffering...". That Real Networks. The one which gradually stuffed their flagship consumer product with so much garbage, that people ditched it out of frustration. The one that lost almost all its marketshare to players that can do WMV and Quicktime formats. You can always tell when a webpage was made before 1999, because it'll have content in
Yup, I'm surprised I nearly forgot who these people were. Yeah, I remember their ram-in-down-your-throat DRM in the first release of RealOne Player. I have this one guy I work with who is quite the musician. So he goes and rips all *his own* tracks from CDs he's recorded and put's them on his PC to listen to as background music. He made the mistake of using realplayer. So we upgrade his computer, RealOne loses all its "licenses", and refuses to play the guy's own tracks.
No, Real Networks no longer has an credibility. While this pinhead is running around crying that he can't grow his business until 'x' happens, I'm buying content streams online, paying monthly fees, and getting what I want, DRM-free. Only a moron who knows nothing about economics would think a one-sided "trade" could be the foundation for a solid business model.
Ayers said. "Linux would be further relegated to use in servers and business computers, since it would not be providing the multimedia technologies demanded by consumers."
People want music and movies not some greedy pig's Digital Restrictions Management. The absolute failure of "Plays for Sure" to gain any market share is because the DRM sucks. No one wants dissapearing music and convoluted subscription plans. You can, right now, get movies and music outside of such restrictions and that's where people are going to go.
That's just the beginning.
These are the new winners. Their work is excellent and they are the kind of people I want to spend my money on. Do you think for an instant that I'm going to corrupt my computer with crap that will lock them out? I'm not alone. People are already outraged by DRM'd CDs and the only people less trusted than Sony is Microsoft. When whole collections vanish they will really howl. The winners will sit pretty on their nice media and wonder what all the fuss is about. Their market share is going to go up and up.
I'm keeping my set top box for the old losers but it's going away. You can get them for $40 at the walmart and they do a nice slide show if you feed them a CD of your jpegs. I'll give the MPAA four bucks here and there to watch their little movies. That's all it takes to not feel like I live in a cave. As more content becomes available elsewhere, I'll spend less of my time and money on that set top box. I've already dropped cable TV and don't miss it.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I feel sorry for those idiots, considering Shoutcast is a free download...
I thought the whole point of DRM was to lock people in to the manufacturer's platform - Windows for Windows Media and IPod for Apple. Given this I'd be really surprised if Microsoft allow a Linux distributer to ship Linux with WMA DRM capabilities.
Given the statement in the article "If linux doesn't support DRM then media playback will be left to appliances and Windows PCs" - I thought that was the whole point. What's more I thought the whole point was that those devices were going to be running some form of embedded Windows. Surely that's what Microsoft would want and it would take something like an antitrust court to change it.
DRM is one thing that can really differentiate linux from MS for desktop users. If linux would *get there* for gaming, and continue to be DRM free (and especially would allow me to use the media I purchased to its full capacities) whereas I couldn't without DRM on Windows, that would be a compelling reason to switch.
I have not bought or played Half-life 2 precisely because of the phone-home technology that it uses to verify that the single-player title *I would've bought and paid for* was legitimately mine. In my opinion, the linux community should use the DRM front as a differentiating point.
I currently have no clever signature witicism to add here.
"After all, what candy-bar maker is going to ship candy bars to a 7-11, when any client can come in and just put one in his pocket? It's impossible to make money in such an environment. It's just... Un-American!"
says Hugh Bluehose, CEO of Safe Candy Bars.
"7-11 had better get their act together. We're working with our friends in Congress, who we've helped to really understand this whole industry, to ensure that Americans are protected from the scourge of illegal dealing in plastic-wrapped, un-protected candy bars. We're committed to putting companies based on criminal candy-bar infringement strategies out of business, and behind bars."
Later, when chatting with Bat Fridwig, technical lead of Microsofts EatsForSure project, we were informed that:
"There is just no market for un-protected candy-bars. It's not possible for any company to make money selling such unsafe candy-bars, long term. Why would anyone buy a candy bar, when they can just go swipe one? I mean, really..."
-- -pjk Perry Kundert perry@kundert.ca http://kundert.2y.net
This is absolutely ridiculous. It is *not* the responsibility of the FOSS community to support DRM. I doubt that there are many OSS advocates who would even *want* to support it by running applications that support these proprietary technologies, but I disgress...
Honestly, if proprietary software companies want their DRM to work on FOSS, they should get up off their asses and do it themselves. Don't tell the FOSS community that it's their responsibility -- it isn't.
DRM must die, and consumers supporting it is just like throwing more wood onto the flame.
There already is an attempt to get PlayForSure protocol on Linux. It's called libMTP. This stems from Creative's decision to make all their new players only work with PlayForSure and hence preventing any OS without WMP 9 from working with their players.
Anyone see the connection between this artical and the one after?
What saddens me is that I forsee the time, maybe in 10 years when the Powers that Be will promote the new innovation : the file format that allows you to do what you want with it! the XML of multimedia! Simple, usable everywhere, you can copy it, transfer it, transform it, slice it ! It's easy! Thanks to the new WMP3 ! Praise Redmond's engineers for bringing your media in 2010!
They will do it, you know this.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
Buffering .... 5% ... 30% ... 15% ... 88%
Buffering
Buffering
Buffering
No.
There's a big difference between downloading a song, and buying a song. Someone may download a song if they like it, but would not have necessarily bought it. Not even for $0.99, or even $0.10. Has the artist lost money? Or have they gained exposure? Sure, the big stars have it in their best interest to have DRM protecting their "investment", but the lower 95% will gain much more exposure without it. The caveat is that if a previously unkown artist reaches stardom via this exposure, then they fall in the former category...
... but we feel compelled to do so. We like you. We think you're ok, kid. One of these days you just may make it. If you would just take our advice, you too could take over the world.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
If DRM becomes as oppressive as the big media players seem to want it to be, then it will drive people away from platforms requiring it and towards platforms that circumvent it.
There is a very arrogant assumption that consumers will continue to buy or use the product, regardless of the hassle, scrutiny, and freedom they're given by so-called content owners. I'm still waiting for the day when people en masse wise up and say, "Keep your stuff- I'm not interested," and find other material (they can either buy or legally download).
The argument to make MPlayer "work" under Linux? MPlayer is a Linux app you jackass.
More over, it had nothing to do with viewing fucking Microsoft content. At the time, there was no decent video player in Linux, _at all_. Ever try to play an mpeg1 file in Linux on a Pentium 2 before MPlayer? Video in Linux was a nightmare before MPlayer came along, period.
True enough, I would not have bought it in a store if I knew I'd be required to go through that kind of BS.
But then, I bought it online like everybody else.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Sun's DReaM seems like a good candidate for Linux, it makes both sides somewhat happy.
Re: telling people that they can't use your software if they use DRM -- isn't that a sort of DRM right there, just done in legalize rather than software and hardware
Nobody is saying this. You'll be perfectly OK using GPLv3'd packages with DRM. What you won't be able to do is publish anything that uses both, because that would restrict the rights of others.
Reduce, reuse, cycle
mplayer doesn't tell me "action not allowed" or that I must go through the menu. I put in the DVD and tell it to play Title 1. That's it.
In Windows, (or on a "real" DVD player), it's watch a few ads, look at the FBI warning, wait for the damn animation to finish, push Play, wait for another damn animation....
Why? You cant easily DRM Linux. Why , well imho its because Linux is community driven not profit driven. While some people make a profit off Linux it is not its end all be all. There is no central company to buy off to put DRM in. Communities design it to be free and open. Any project that decides to become DRM infested will lose community support. Without a community behind it the project is as good as dead. When one distro dies 4 more take its place. It isn't hard to do. Its easy to do with Linux, its called a fork! Using the last available code that wasn't DRM infected. But the biggest fear of the DRM crowd is that Linux is a DRM free alternative. mThey fear more people will find Linux is open, and easier than they thought. I know I did, no trusted computing OS for me! I see this as the biggest fear from people like Real. Will linux have DRM in the future? Maybe. It could be mandated by law, or some other dirty trick. But it all comes down to trust. Do I trust the Linux community or or closed sorce companies not to take away more than is abaslutly necessary? For me , its a no brainer.
I trust Microsoft as far as I could comfortably spit a dead rat
Technically, his comment makes no sense; the only way to achieve reliable DRM is through hardware--something like a TPM. That's true even on Windows, although the lack of source code makes it slightly harder working around DRM in the kernel.
What this really tells us is that RealNetworks doesn't have a f*cking clue. But, then, we knew that already. Fortunately, I think they'll probably go out of business pretty soon.
Real once again pays some attention to Linux and the same people who whine and cry about big software companies ignoring Linux are throwing a fit.
Also no surprise at the amount "I don't want DRM on my machine" posts. Like it's DRM they're worried about.
And of course, the people who used the RP last decade are still making the same buffering jokes, that never gets old.
Look, is there another music service that works on Linux? Rhapsody does. And on Mac. Does iTunes work on Linux? Any other music service? (Mandriva Linux is building a desktop with built in music service through eMusic, but is tied to their OS)
I dunno, look. I use Linux. I use Mac. I use Windows. On all three, I can listen to music from Rhapsody. I don't have DRM on my machine, I don't deal with buffering, I don't care that it's streaming and Real is the ONLY company who has a product I can do that with.
If I decide I want to watch movies on my Linux box without stealing them or ripping them from my own DVDs, or buy and download music I have two choices. 1- Use Windows or 2- Use Linux and not do either.
Meh.
R(k)
The purpose of Copyrights and Patents was to allow a _temporary_ monopoly on some writing/invention, in order to encourage art and science.
DRM is an attempt of some to overstep copyright and patent laws, and write their own.
Existing unbounded DRM, has no expiration, so in essense is attempting to impose an infinite copyright. Infinite copy restrictions are against current law and the original intent of copyright law. Unbounded DRM is illegal, and can only hinder art and science.
Sorry, Billosaur, I'm not picking on you in particular, but your post was the last one before I decided to say something about it.
Whatever happened to the word "Patrons"? or "Customers"? Did anybody notice that?
People are not consumers. Bacteria are consumers. Mindless consuming machines. The word itself is demeaning.
I think it's high time that business started remembering the slogans: "The Customer is always right", and "Thank you for patronizing us". I think the shift to the demeaning and inhuman word, "Consumer", has a lot to do with the loss of respect for the "Customer" that's been developing in recent years.
Words have power. Use the correct ones.
realnetworks is dying
RealNetworks - it's like that dandelion on your front lawn that just won't go away and keeps coming back, year after year. Note that I couldn't care one way or another about DRM.
The heat from below can burn your eyes out
If we called it McCoy, it could imply that it is the "Real McCoy". Without even using the word Real(TM). Which we all know is intellectual property of the Real(TM) company.
Linux is open software. I want to be able to play DRM content, as well as non-DRM content. Why should my "more open" platform be more closed to some formats? Let proprietary systems, like Windows and RealNetworks' servers, suffer from less content because they support only DRM content. Support all the formats, make content creation cheap and easy without DRM, and let people choose what we want to produce and consume. The open, easy to share stuff will win. Along the way it might even bring low the high & mighty Hollywood brand franchises and the DRM-mongers who love them.
--
make install -not war
DRM will never work.
Why?
Because you will always have access to an analog output at some point in the signal chain.
Sure, it might take a soldering iron and a few resistors to get to it, but you will be able to get to it. There's simply no way around that simple fact.
Moreover, since the Digital-to-analog conversion will require that everything required to decode the digital signal be present in the system, the raw digital signal sans DRM will be either present or capable of being reconstructed. Again, you might have to solder something to your board, but it will be doable.
Geeks with EE degrees aren't going to cease being interested in tinkering just because the USA makes it illegal to do so.
To have a Linux (or free BSD, or Hurd, or...) desktop, one must support not only the free, open standards, but one must support DRM'ed foramts and common, closed formats such as DVD, MPEG4, MSN networking, DOC, Excel, etc. To be useful in an office scenario, especially to meet government standards like HIPAA, corporations must protect their clients data and often do it (right or wrong) via DRM-like solutions. I, for one, like to play DVDs on Linux and must do using sometimes hard to install, 3rd-party software despite having a legally purchased DVD drive for which the vendor paid the DVD tax and having at least one (or more) DVD programs that came with the drive, but which are limited or restricted to one very narrow range of platforms (DOS-NO, Win98-NO, FreeBSD-NO, Linux-NO, Hurd-NO, you get the picture).
We can scream all day that DRM is bad, DRM is evil, but in the end, it is here and we must operate with it or we can't compete in the problem space. Usually, this means the desktop
The reality of the situation is that for Linux to be accepted in many markets (mostly desktop-related), it must support some flavors of DRM to allow access to selected DRM'ed content. This is where you must be pragmatic and accept reality. You must lobby for change and hopefully the DRM will be like betamax and open VHS will win.
The true solution is to demand free and open standards, especially where Governments are concerned.
Note: I tried to start a public debate about open standards in 1999, but got nowhere (it wasn't popular at the time, I guess). I didn't get any support (but did register a domain name: openstandards.org). I have tried to push open standards in my problem space, but have been quite limited (job restrictions hence posting as AC).
Everybody else to Real Networks - Stop Buffering or Die
Nah, the rest of us non-Windows lusers will just use the pirated versions of content, since it'll be easier. Fuck the recording companies with a sharp, pointy, broken-glass-studded 12" long motorized 6666 rpm dildo. This will encourage *more* piracy, not less. And artists/bands will still make money by having concerts - if you like a band these days, you'll go to one of their concerts to get the full experience anyway. Free music will just give them more exposure - I downloaded music that I'd never even *heard* before from my college's network in the 90s, and I ended up liking quite a few of those bands, and going to their concerts or buying CDs. I think that the more piracy will also encourage artists to innovate or starve, since they won't be able to make money selling recordings of their music from 25 years ago.
-b.
Anybody using linux is not going to have too much of a problem circumventing copyright, even if they are just burning DVDs of content. DRM solutions are not being bought by anybody and the only people that give a shit are the content providers.
The bigger question is how does Real compete for server share for their burdensome, trash service? If MS is giving away WMP server software for free (i.e. Real's antitrust case in Europe), I think the only way Real can compete with MS is to use an inexpensive server solution. Why are thy biting the hand? Screw Real for bitching - let MS kill them and the linux people will continue to do what they want.
"The consequences of Linux not supporting DRM FUD would be that fixed-purpose consumer electronics and Windows PCs FUD would be the sole entertainment FUD FUD platforms available," Ayers FUD said. "Linux would be further relegated FUD to use in servers FUD and business FUD computers FUD, since it would not FUD FUD FUD be providing the multimedia technologies demanded FUD by consumers."
Hmmm..., I love it! I'll have FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD baked beans and FUD...
>A RealNetworks vice president voiced a few inflammatory opinions during
>LinuxWorld Boston last Tuesday. The RealNetworks rep in question, Jeff Ayars,
>said that Linux as a consumer platform would be dead unless DRM capabilities
>are built into the OS itself.
What arrogance! In fact, his real concern he probably that Linux could become the PREFERRED consumer platform if it ISN'T burdened down with DRM!
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Real Networks to Linux: DRM or Die!
Linux to Real Network: Oh shut the hell up, retard. Damn it, one of those days, one of those days...
Parent makes a very good summary of DRM. It's the essense of DRM.
I do know what DRM is but I have yet run across a file that uses it. I simply stay away from crap like iTunes. I download through bit torrent, yes its illegal but I honestly don't care. The music industry has been ripping people off for years now its thier turn.
WTF?
Real Netowrks will stop to support Linux!!!
:-P
Noooooo!
Then I'll have to use players like MPlayer (ouh good NO GUI), xine and vlc!!
I have a transcript of the speech right here:
"Hello, my name is Jeff Ayars, VP of Real Networks. Today I would like to talk to you about Buffering.... Buffering.... Buffering"
Wether its BluRay and HD-DVD, or Live TV HD Broadcast/On Demand (IPTV, Cable and Satellite)
If you dont care about HD then DRM wont bother you.
But if you want HD, you are going to have to deal with DRM.
1) Take donations to put up ads (ad-word or banner, whatever) to encourage up-and-coming musicians to ONLY sign up with independent DRM-free music labels (like www.magnatune.com).
2) Start a pledge form (hosted at OSDL or similar) which open source contributors or fans can sign. The pledge is basically, "I pledge to never support, condone or ignore DRM in any software development endeavor or in my music purchases". Link to the pledge form in the aforementioned ads.
3) Send the signed pledge list to the agents who represent the mainstream artists to encourage them to get their artists to switch when their contracts are up.
4) BUY music (whether from iTunes or MagnaTune). Piracy is shameful, dishonest and counterproductive. "Musician" isn't a philosophical pursuit, it's an occupation, and it deserves to be compensated. Anyone capable of writing good music has enough brains to want to avoid poverty (it sucks, remember?).
We can create a sustainable, DRM-free indie music business, but it will crumble without a conscientious effort to avoid piracy at all costs. If we can do that, the mainstream music business will follow (especially when their bottom line starts to be affected)...
If you look at the big picture, it might be good for Real not to go away. The more incompatible proprietary DRM formats there are carving up the market, the more complicated it is for those who want to try and control everyone and everything. This is a desirable alternative to one single monolithic DRM infrastructure imposed end-to-end.
If the DRMers are divided, it is better for the human beings.
Because I am in the same boat. Any Linux distro that will be supporting DRM is not one that I will be supporting or telling anybody else to support.
Meh.
We don't need your crappy spyware-infested applications and codecs.
--Chag
Article 1, Section 8
."
"Congress shall have power . . . to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for LIMITED times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries . .
> Keep in mind, that the Constitution restricts government behavior, not private behavior
By passing laws like DMCA, which protect and enforce infinite DRM, the government is violating this clause.
While I didn't exactly like all the things that J. Ayers was saying, he was right about most of it.
I was in the room for his talk (which all of about 20 people showed up for). When he said that the big companies will leave Linux out of the picture for future media, he knew what he was talking about. He wasn't just talking about Real. This is how Sony and Disney, RIAA, MPAA all feel. If those companies are unable to control what you do with their content, they won't let you do anything.
Now, myself and a few other like-minded people made it clearly known that we as consumers and avid computer users didn't like that idea, to which J. Ayers sounded sympathetic, his points still stood. Media companies are pushing DRM from the medium (cd, dvd, hd) to the output (video, audio). The major point he was making was that the control was over quality. If you don't have top to bottem DRM, you could still get the content, only it would be degraded. That degradation would have to be respected in the HARDWARE and SOFTWARE.
That means (which someone pointed out to him) that user don't control their system anymore. DRM took the control and gave it to the media. Users only have priviledges, not rights. If you update your kernel, or use an OSS video driver, you are not allowed to get the full content.
This assumes we trust the media company not to shutoff your whole system when it detects that you are not in total DRM compliance. There would be NOTHING to stop them from doing THAT.
Sig
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars
Hmm, let's see, the MPAA banked on DRM on DVDs. That worked real well. For an encore they're going to do what? Come on, anyone who's been in the software industry knows that software companies have tried protecting their software since the days of the Atari. But go on eMule and you'll see cracked this and cracked that. You simply cannot stop piracy. Not doable. You can't even put a dent in it because once a single copy gets out, it's out. And as with CSS, once it's cracked, your entire library is available.
I remember in the old Atari days, the used to protect software on floppy discs by writing a few bad sectors in specific places to the disc. It wasn't long before people figured out you could write to that sector over and over while, using a screwdriver, you adjusted a pot that changed the drive speed, thus reproducing the bad sectors. Then someone got even smarter and released a chip that would copy discs, bad sectors and all.
There are the hardware keys you used to put in the serial or parallel ports, but all you had to do was hack the code to not check for it anymore which, was pretty doable, because a lot of stuff got cracked that way.
Every attempt to prevent piracy of products that people wanted bad enough, has been broken. If history is any indication, and I have absolutely no reason to think that it isn't, this will continue to be the case for a long time to come. There's always going to be someone(s) out there who's more clever than the people that design the protection. That's simply a fact. The sooner these industries face that fact and move on with their business, the better off we'll all be.
More to the point. I'm suprised they havn't been bought out by MS for the sole purpose of patent acquisition.
Life is not for the lazy.
If you sell a pry-bar, you say, "pulls nails easier", or "speeds remodeling projects", not "jimmies back doors great!". The former sells more tools, the later gets your product criminalized.
DRM won't work and only systems and artists who avoid it will profit and grow. Go visit the links I provided and tell me what content you are still lacking.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
"As always the biggest victims in these DRM schemes are the people who just want to do something a little unusual (but completely legal) that the media company didn't expect. It's just innovation stifling. The worst part is that for the media companies, innovation is often bad. They're in a precarious position already and one more disruptive technology could put them out to pasture for good."*
Maybe, but that's more an implimentation issue than being a mark against DRM. Think of it this way. Companies can ditch all the other broken ways (starforce), and have a simple DRM were the customer doesn't even see it. For example one could buy a game and install it. The hardware/software transparently does what it needs to do, and all the customer sees is an installation that went smoothly. No more entering serial numbers, or XP style activation. And this could be cross-platform as well. The only flaw I could see is the selling of the product to someone else (make certain you don't retain a copy).
*Like iTunes. Look as long as they're "content creators", then all the wishful "disruptive" shipping technology will be meaningless. Now come up with some "disruptive" anyone with talent technology, and you may have a point, but that's not what you ment.
People are buying BILLIONS of dollars of DRM protected content TODAY. So, it works well enough for most people (even though many complain about it).
Ah, then this is where our expectations differ. I can see DRM becoming so annoying that there is a massive consumer backlash.
Macrovision is mostly irrelevant, because few people try to back up their stuff anyway. OTOH, the average lifespan for a home computer is probably under five years, and I'm guessing most portable MP3 players and the like don't last that long before breaking. In a couple of years, the generation that bought lots of legal downloads recently will want to transfer them to a new toy. If they're told, "Sorry, you can't, your whole music collection is going to die with your iPod," then there are going to be a lot of very upset people around.
Likewise, if people who just spent four-figure sums on big, flashy HDTVs a couple of years ago go and buy new HD-DVD or Blu-Ray discs and then find that they're stuck with upsampled low-res displays because they don't have HDCP, there are going to be a lot of very upset people around.
The difference between this sort of thing and the crude "copy protection" technologies that have gone before is that the new generation of DRM will actively get in the way of things that typical users really want to do. Worse, it will do it only to users who are good customers, buying content from legal sources, while it will do jack to people who rip it - and someone, somewhere will always rip anything that's any good, and that rip will always be playable on systems that don't play ball with media megacorp DRM initiatives.
If this isn't a recipe for a serious consumer backlash, then I don't know what is, and I reckon this one will probably be accompanied by plenty of antitrust suits in the US, deceptive marketing claims in Europe, etc. It's just a matter of how long it takes before DRM stops inconveniencing a fairly small and mostly silent minority (Macrovision) and goes mainstream (HDCP, legal music downloads, etc.).
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
If they DRM Linux, then I just switch to Hurd. I will be dead before it gets a DRM.
What was the last amount Real paid Ilgaz for astroturfing? Not much, I guess, since this pro-DRM provider of buggy software keen on spyware and shady EULAs do not matter anymore.
Prescriptive grammar:linguistics
I paid them in fact, for yearly broadband "radiopass". :) I bet that should be unusual to hear for pirates who thinks DRM is only about their precious mp3s.
After Microsoft said to us, OS X users "use third party plugin to view our media" (flip4mac) , I had to switch completely to Realplayer 10 for OS X and Quicktime for live net radio.
As a side note, I remember Kevin Foreman, Helix Community CTO has a slashdot account and was once naive enough to submit a story to Slashdot about some open source progress I can't remember.
Yes, the same site you read these comments on.
Next time you blame me for getting paid to post comments, either contact Slashdot.org admin (they care about that, no kidding) or have a lawyer handy since I will sue you.
Has anyone ever wondered this. They aren't that popular anymore. I mean really. Macromedia flash is really taking over in this arena. Their software is problimatic, buggy and I can't remember the last time they updated there Linux version. Most people I know just use mplayer. So how does this guy stay in business.
Maybe its the movie industry paying him. hmmm... food for thought. Isn't the real player chopped full of security issues anyways and we really shouldn't run it on our linux machines? In any case he is the last person I would take advice from. DRM is useless. It will be easy to circumvent. However I don't like the idea of the big computer companies saying I can't re-flash my bios if I want to install linuxBIOS.
The man who trades freedom for Real Media does not deserve either. Oh wait, nobody deserves Real Media.
Spine World
Yeah, good luck suing a guy in Brazil.
What an idiot.
Linux Penguine to Real Networks: "Buffer this, biatch!"
... what did you expect, something profound?
If DRM must be built into the kernel then it will be in open source format or
it WON'T be there. Most people agree that the GPL will prohibit binary kernel
modules and I think Linus feels this way too. So if RealNutworks wants DRM in
the kernel, fine post the source to Linus as a patch and we'll consider it!
Of course having the source code for a Linux DRM kernel module out there on the net ISN'T what these guys want! So I think the red guy holding the pitchfork will
be freezing his brass balls off before Linux gets DRM built into the kernel.
Aahh, that is the other side of DRM. It ensures that the media companies can continue to make you re-buy all your content due to forced obsolesence. This is the reason the electronics companies are behind it as well -- to sell more goods. Many people think that CDs and DVDs are good enough, and the gravy train of rebuying media is starting to run out. DRM limits your ability to move the media to a format of your choice, giving you no alternative but to keep rebuying.
Repeat after me:
DRM ultimately benefits no one. It does not benefit consumers, directly or indirectly, in any way. It does not significantly hinder pirates from getting copyrighted content for free. It only hinders legitimate purchasers of copyrighted content. And it does not ultimately benefit copyright holders, either, because DRM will never, ever increase sales -- only diminish them, by irritating legitimate users into not buying the content.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
The Beauty of the whole argument is its ultimate fallibility. All forms of media have to exist in an analogue format in order for the human to understand, perceive, and enjoy it. Period. I dare someone to read a digital book that's not represented in an analogue format. Same with Music, same with Art, same with anything.
We are an Analogue species. Everything has to be represented in an analogue format at some point in the process. Analogue can be copied without issue, and has been copied for YEARS with the simplest of equipment. You can imbed watermarks all you want, but it can only affect technology point forward. Fortunately there's enough pre-existing technology available that it'd take 100's of years before DRM could force people into it's own standard.
I know that I'll never have to accept and abide by the DRM if I don't want to. Then again I'm knowledgeable enough about technology that I can build my own recording devices if needed.
-Duff
P.S. As posted prior, I also believe in the Public Library and purchaseing Albums in whole. This is just my choice to make though, and I don't wish to force that on anyone. Still, If I own the CD, I can rip the CD, and enjoy the digital info as I see fit. Worst case I can record the analogue, convert it to digital, and do the same. You don't need a masters degree to do this folks.
Come on, just stop pirating and all of this would be a non-issue.
From an acquaintance of mine who actually creates entertainment for a living:
"I've also got too many friends dedicating their lives to creating art, struggling to get stay afloat, so Im gonna take this a little personally."
Real have been obnoxious in one way or another ever since I can remember. These days, good luck finding a link on their site to the downloadable player in amongst all the ads for the paid stuff. On top of that, when you do find it, in order to get a download link, they want you to fill out a form detailing everything about yourself, almost up to and including how often you have a bowel movement in a given 24 hour period.
Also, for some reason they feel a need to install a memory resident (thus, additionally memory consuming) tray loader. Why the double click association for RA/RAM files isn't good enough for them is beyond me.
I've generally given them a wide berth since the mid 90s, since that was when the last halfway sane version of the player was released. 5, I think it was, and from memory it's on oldversion.com, for those who want minimal real playability without all the other crap.
For them to issue moronic statements such as this however, on top of all their other annoyances, is just one more reason to stay well away from them in my book. Most media streams I come across are either Windows Media or ogg anywayz, so real aren't even really necessary.
Who is this 'Real Networks' and why is anyone listening to them?
I'm pretty sure the 3rd sign of the Apocalypse is when the irrelevant start speaking relevance. I'm pretty sure this isn't an instance of that, but even if it is, the world's ending, so who cares?
But I don't really see why you'd need kernel support here.
Kernel support is what can prevent users from creating "write to a file" audio/video drivers, "save a copy of movie data" X servers, "pretend every binary is signed" executable loaders, or even just "freeze this program and hunt for DRM keys in RAM" debuggers.
Publishers are finally starting to understand that if you give someone both an encrypted file and the key to decrypt it, no amount of obfuscation can forever prevent him from doing so in a way you didn't expect. So, they're taking it to the next level, where the keys to decrypt DRM content are distributed in hardware, and where the only software that ever gets to touch those keys are programs that have been signed by the DRM cartel.
This will never prevent movies and music from being pirated, of course (we'd have to ban cameras and microphones first), but it's at least a higher grade of snake oil than the MPAA and RIAA are used to paying for. To the big software companies it's fantastic - not only can they force upgrades and prevent software piracy by locking the programs they sell to a single computer, but they can freeze out upstart competitors by making it too hard to get your OS or your audio/video/ebook player signed. Even the big hardware companies will want to get in on the game - the harder it is to get a video driver or audio chipset driver signed, the harder it becomes for new companies to start competing with the existing vendors.
DRM is Copy Protection.
Copy Protection failed back when it was just a laser burn on a floppy. It inconvenienced the best customers; the rest of those who were interested in the product just bypassed it. (Ob.Disclaimer: a decade or two later, and I'm *still* pissed at the defective-floppy-lockout on my copy of ThinkTank. Generalization: expect pissed-off customers to have *long* memories.)
DRM will fail for the same reasons, taking with it those who rely on it to prop up their business. It's damage, and us pissed-off ex-customers are, with practice, getting real good at routing around that.
For Real.
A true hardware DRM solution would not have anything to do with the OS or BIOS. It would even be fully cross platform capable. To accomplish that, all you need to do is get rid of the people that are trying to design DRM to force everyone to use their product and no other. Then it can be a clean solution (despite the great dislike for DRM by myself and almost everyone else).
See my original comment on how DRM in hardware could be made to work.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm not eager to be sold into digital slavery at the behest of the content industry, nor am I about to hand final authority over what my computer may and may not do to some third party.
Maybe Slashdot should do a poll as to which finger is most properly used to respond to this DRM?
o Index
o Ring
o Pinkie
* Middle
There are already binary kernel modules. But that's really not relevant. It will get cracked, anyway. Of course they'd rather not let out the source, because that means the crack would be only hours away. With binary, it will be weeks.
If the DRM people really wanted a strong DRM system that is nearly impossible to crack, they would be it in hardware ... all of it. Software's role would then be just providing communication with the hardware, user interface, storage of the encrypted content and ... now get this ... legal trading. See my original comment on how that is possible.
And there's no need to insult BSD :-)
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
I have seen that line too, but with other apps. It is probably due to some change in Pango between Pango versions, or due to the GTK version.
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
Just write the DRM software and port it to Linux. Make a closed source, legal, libdvdcss and put it up for download. Put it on the DVD's you sell.
You want DRM so we can't copy content, well then give the softwareplayers. They won't be GPL, but they will be able to run on Linux.
Companies have DRM content to sell. The buyers are willing to buy. Give them the possability to buy and use it. This means making Linux software.
But you know, Jeff Ayers, that this is not about selling content. This is about selling DRM. Make a freely dristributable DRM player and SUSE will have it in its (boxed) distribution. Unfortunatly then you don't have anything to sell anymore.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
DRM isn't about stopping piracy. Piracy is nothing compared to the potential market of forcing the rest of the population that doesn't do pirating (about 85% right now, though that will decline as they push this) to have to pay extra just to play the music or watch the videos they already have. The content industry sees riches in everyone having to buy yet another copy for each different device, and even having to buy replacements for worn out copies (something they tried back when music was on 12 inch vinyl disks by going to a cheap product that would wear out in 10 to 20 plays). Getting the revenues from piracy is about a 15% gain. Getting the revenues from DRM forced re-buys could double or even triple their sales.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
What does it matter to us whether others use Linux or not? If it would make a difference as to whether the content industry would release DRM-free content or not, then that might make it important. But then, having DRM in Linux defeats that.
I've found plenty of DRM-free music online. Some is even free to download and play. Others you do have to pay for to have legally, but they don't put DRM in it, so you can fully use what you buy. There will be even more of this as the big content providers move to more DRM. That would then move more people over to the DRM-free providers who will grow, and a DRM-free Linux, which will grow.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Does anybody actually know someone who's using the Helix player?
If you follow the mailing lists, you'll see that Real is making their latest formats proprietary, and only work with their own player. That is, they're trying to use Helix to drive adoption of their codec.
Unfortunately for them, it doesn't work that way. GStreamer has support for pretty much every format, so any GStreamer-based media player can handle pretty much anything. Real doesn't like this, because it means nobody will want to use their player (they don't publish GStreamer plugins).
I guess it's neat that Real is trying to do open-source, but only because it's another company with a big name that's doing open-source, and that's good publicity. They're not being successful at open-source. It's more like when you see your cat trying to climb a houseplant that obviously won't support its weight -- "oh, isn't that cute? Real is trying to do open-source! aww..." *crunch*.
Real's most popular product Real Player is the biggest piece of bloatware I've encountered in a while. With it's constant phoning home and hiding in your background it's almost spyware in my book. Since when does Real deserve to have any influence? Oh wait, with the exception of whining about Windows Media Player, which is a superior piece of software anyway.
Grad
If the video/motion picture industry wants to fuck itself out of existence and kill tens of thousands of union and non union jobs, let them go RIGHT AHEAD.
Movies and special effects have done pretty much TWO major things:
- dazzle the hell out of unimaginative people
- ruin the experience of READING
Movie forces often tend to undermine or rewrite the original content: the script, the book, or the comic, and force it into a bullshit 90-minutes to 112 minutes format. IFFFF I'm going to watch adapted (and in a lot of cases, original AND YET SURPRISINGLY interesting) content, I'd rather a miniseries or a well-thought out series. But, since I killed (sold) my TVs in 2002 and haven't bought one since, I either buy DVDs or READ a LOT. No, let's restate that...to say:
"But, since I killed (sold) my TVs in 2002 and haven't bought one since, I either READ a LOT or buy import DVDs."
I'm just nonplussed by much of the crap spewing out of the US domestic scene. And, I'm tired of local distributors emblazoning 6 or 7 layers of "we got it", "we own it", "we discovered THEM" bullshit in the opening credits. What ever happened to "FILM", instead of (what I disparagingly denigrate as) "movies". To me, "film" should be used to describe something artsy, or original, or thought-provoking, "or novel", or "non-bullshit masses-entrapping glitzy fx-laden waste of film."
Fortunately, DRM hasn't got a grip on PAPER. Unfortunately, when everything paper is 80% converted to digital, the libraries might be too packed. I fear that SOMEday, the DRM and film and content industry will try to buy up -- piece by piece -- the paperback and paper books resells channels JUST to constrict the flow and availability of paper, JUST to force people to accept digital content.
The day I get around to finishing MY books/fiction attempts, I will release it WITHOUT DRM. There will be NO DRM fingerprints on my works. That may doom me from EVER getting a large backer to making anything more than a paper product out of it, but I'm willing to live with that. It' means I have ONE LESS BULLSHIT layer between the readers and myself -- other than the illegal duplicators who aren't going away anyway.
People, go get a book. Find an author who controls his or her distribution and reward the author who is less into rewarding those who rig up so many channels that the author is screwed or manipulated just as are many musicians. Reward independents who have more independence.
Maybe DRME should be co opted and turned into "D*ckhead Revenue Model Eraser"... Or, something along those lines...
In the end, people buying well-thought out films would choke off the production of money-moving/money-laundering pieces of shit. But, since people are buying the stuff, I suppose it'll take a more enlightened populace.
Instead of DRM/content moguls trying to RESTRICT access to films and movies, they should be ENFORCING QUALITY CREATION and PRODUCTION. I am still angry that I bought a VHS a few years ago. On the artwork, they showed an F-16, an M-1 Abrams tank, and some soldiers in NEW gear. The movie was about an out-of-control tank. Once I watched it, though, I found myself looking at the inside of a tank that was as roomy as the interior of a half-sized garage, virtually nothing but a chair and a joystick on it and it looked like a wooden stage. If this were MY planet, I'd round up those involved and...
Well, since I'd opened and played it and it wasn't defective, I couldn't get my money back. The movie was so shitty I wanted to commit seppuku. Or so I felt.
If the hollywierd types want to EARN money, they'd BETTER fucking start enforcing the concept of quality. That is, I hope smarter younger generations refuse to spend a dime on bullshit and demand more creativity, originality, and less blatant escapism. Oh, wait, these are HUMANS I'm talking about...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
We don't need no steenking DRM because... ...we don't need your steenking content!
:j
It's all garbage anyway. Mass produced vapid pop music and Hollywood movies?
No thanks.
There will be plenty of QUALITY content producers who know that they
don't need DRM to get fairly compensated. Their numbers are growing
just like the numbers of content consumers who absolutely reject
DRM are growing.
dear Jeff Ayars,
it's vice-versa - if real networks (and other firms like them) don't stop producing DRMs, YOU're going to die very fast and if Novell, Linspire, and Red Hat really start supporting this sh** they're dead, too.
DO YOU REALLY THINK people will just install your stupid DRM bu**sh**? how stupid do you think everyone is? how stupid do you have to be to beleive this!? do you really think they'll just let you controll their PCs? remember the sony rootkit...
How about this - Jeff Ayars, can you prove that you have never murdered anyone? no? then happy grillin on the electric chair!
THIS is why we refuse totallitary systems - YOU have NO FU**ING RIGHT to infiltrate our privacy, just because you want to see if we have anything illegal on our PCs - thats exactly what the gestapo did in the nazi regime!
The MAFIAA is a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes
Hey there,
I just spent 9 months developing a music store for independant artists. We allow you to burn to cd, copy to flash disk, other hard disks, anything you want apart from giving it to other people. We don't use DRM either, since we're pretty sure that once one copy gets out there, any DRM serves from that point forward to exclusively be a bane to customers, so that not only is the pirate product cheaper, but also technically superior.
Why isn't somone doing a story about http://store.pulserated.com/ instead. Ugh
Thats what we get for not being a mainstream music flogging, drm-whoring conglomorate. Go figure.
Doing DRM in hardware the right way would eliminate the need for software to have any major special capabilities, or licensing. The hardware would do the decrypting if it hard the right keys and authorization. All this could be provided by the software in a clear manner. DRM would only need to trust the hardware. It would not only be platform portable, but also even allow legal content file trading. More details are in my original comment. Of course, Microsoft's perspective is that DRM in software, exclusive to them, gives them leverage over Linux. And Linux being DRM-free gives it leverage over Windows.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
^ I'm sorry, it had to be said.
So I think the red guy holding the pitchfork will be freezing his brass balls off before Linux gets DRM built into the kernel.
:-)
And there's no need to insult BSD
Wasn't my intention. I meant that it would be VERY cold in you know where
before Linux gets DRM. (I actually like that little red guy with the pitchfork.
NOT SO his big brother.....)
Don't hold your breath ... if the content industry were to ever get a clue. Of course that's not likely. But if they were to do something like I previously described, they could have a DRM that worked in Linux w/o any trusted software being needed because the software would only be touching encrypted content and encrypted authorization keys.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Your friend is a much a victim of the greedy content industry as his patrons are. Sure, there is some piracy around. Sure, it has grown with the internet. But piracy is still way less than half of all uses of music and even less for video. DRM really isn't there to stop piracy. It doesn't even do things that stop piracy. Instead, it is there to (try to) force people to pay more and more for the same content. This will include things like forcing the use of the original media (which wears out, forcing a re-buy) by prohibiting the use of hard drive juke boxes, unless an "upgrade" is purchased. It's all about dunning the listener of music and the viewer of video for more and more revenues, which can way exceed the revenues lost to piracy. To the content industry, piracy is a godsend that allowed them to ask for laws against defeating DRM so they could deploy it to shake down the majority of consumers. Piracy will never go away, and the content industry would just as well have it stay around, lest someone try to get rid of the anti-DRM laws that can bring in huge profits.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Due to various problems with the library's web site it took her a few hours to download the books. Amusingly (for me), the library DRM turned out to be Microsoft's PlayForSure which doesn't play on iPod, for sure. I was able to witness firsthand what DRM does to Jane user: At first she was confused. Then she was annoyed. Then she asked me what was going on. Then she was furious.
Moral of the story: My wife will NEVER accept DRM ever again. She'd rather pick up a good old book at the library than waste any money on **AA's broken products, be it music or video.
I think the **AA industry overestimates its own importance. DRMed entertainment is not a necessity of life. Once time and space shiftable media such as CDs and DVDs disappear, we'll likely cease to consume any **AA media altogether. We've already cancelled our cable subscription due to the poor programming and amazingly annoying ads. There are better things to do.
You think that would work? The issue is the drivers for things like audio and video. Since the kernel is open source, as are virtually all drivers, it's easy for someone to code up an intercept within the kernel and replicate a perfect copy of the playing content out through another logical device where some other process is collecting a pristine copy.
In Windows, you won't be able to do that. And it will rat out any non-authorized driver you try to install, so the content won't play.
There is a way to do this without the software needing to be trusted. Of course Bill will be mad and Steve will throw another chair because Linux will be able to run open source programs that can play audio and video. The way is to do all the work in hardware (not in the application, or the OS, or even in BIOS). More details are in my original comment on this. One interesting thing is that this method even allows for legal content trading.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
They are not buying WMAs, so that's not good enough. DVDs don't really sell as well as they could because of DRM. I don't buy them because I know my set top box won't last forever and that will be the end of them. The problems with other, better built systems like IPod come later. We will see if publishers survive the waves of betrayal they are generating. In the mean time, other publishers are going to jump right in and steal their market share.
Will your kids be able to share and enjoy your music? I was able to convert my mom's 45s, had a great time doing it and will be able to share that with my daughter. I'll be able to move and convert those files around as I please. That's what people expect from things they buy and they really won't accept less.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I got the same roadblock at the BBC online store. But Amazon UK (amazon.co.uk) was happy to ship them to the states.
I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve. BB
Oh my GOD are you a useless troll.
'Have a lawyer handy since I will sue you'?
1) Get a life
2) Lose the legal threats, and
3) maybe come up with a sensical argument at some point.
I've been reading your posts; if you're NOT getting paid, I humbly suggest you're getting ripped off.
110100 1101000 1101000 1100110 0 1101111 1101000 1100011 1
On what grounds? We can't defame you anymore than you have already.
Need i say more?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I am not prepared to give up my freedom where the computer is concerned.
I can live without movies and music on my computer. In fact if you don't drop the anti-consumer "Rights Management" crap, I can and will do without movies and mainstream music completely.
Unfortunately I am very much the minority, and big media will probably still do quite well without me. Sometimes I feel like it's just me and RMS against the rest of the world.
455fe10422ca29c4933f95052b792ab2
It should read "Linux to Real Networks - drop DRM or Die." Any bets on who will be around longer?
"I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity but they've always worked for me" - HST
But don't hold your breath.
Disney finds an audience in every generation. Harry Potter made J.K. Rowling richer than the Queen and the Harry Potter franchise alone is worth a billion dollars to Time-Warner.
If DRM becomes as oppressive as the big media players seem to want it to be, then it will drive people away from platforms requiring it
More likely, I think, is that almost everyone will simply load a disk. watch the movie and that will be the end of it. Their first and last enounter with DRM.
They will care if they have to jump through hoops to get the same out-of-the-box experience every time they boot into Linux.
Managed copy protection for backups, home media servers, low-res downloads to portable devices, etc., etc. may be a little more complicated.
But probably not much worse than if the content was unprotected.
Who needs Real?
-------- In Soviet Russia, "Soviet Russia" sigs hate Slashdot.
I know how geeky this is going to sound... no wait! this is slashdot... You know, there is a manga with the name of Dream or Die, are the submiters fans of the manga?
But... the future refused to change.
I haven't used a Real product since before the year 2000. That's forever in the life of a software product. I certainly won't be using any Real products in the future having heard this statement.
I encourage Linux vendors to not support DRM. If you support DRM, other than in converting it to a non-DRM format, I will not use your products. I've already made it a practice to avoid products that have DRM, that hasn't yet been broken, in them and I'll continue doing the same. As it is I'm already planning to not buy any HD-DVD/Blueray movies, or players, that contain DRM (again, until the DRM is broken).
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Come on, just stop pirating and all of this would be a non-issue.
From an acquaintance of mine who actually creates entertainment for a living:
"I've also got too many friends dedicating their lives to creating art, struggling to get stay afloat, so Im gonna take this a little personally."
I actually create content (I'm in a blues band writing and performing original music) and we don't expect to make money from our recordings, as that buisiness model for primary revenue from content has been obsoleted by advances in technology.
Maybe your acquaintance and his friends should rethink their buisiness model? We produce CDs for promotional purposes and provide high-quality free downloads, but our revenue is mainly generated from performances and merchandise sales at our shows.
We encourage sharing of our music and performance videos, as that increases our fanbase and allows us more leverage in negotiating compensation for our shows, as the venues know attendance/ticket sales will be high.
Trying to mandate buggy-whip sales in the age of automobiles by trying to force people to have a buggy-whip inserted as a dongle before the car will start makes about as much sense as DRM.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Come on, just stop pirating and all of this would be a non-issue.
Counterexample A: DVD region codes.
How to solve most of our problems: 1.Lots of nuclear plants. 2.Cure aging.
Computer Users to Real Networks: .rm files? ROFL!! .rm?
Real who?
Oh the
Won't let us play
BWAHAHAAHAHAHA aaaaaa that's a good one.
Those kids!!
"In Windows, (or on a "real" DVD player), it's watch a few ads, look at the FBI warning, wait for the damn animation to finish, push Play, wait for another damn animation...."
You know what? I don't know if you people are making that up, or just don't know. But a lot of players can skip all the "ads". The only thing difficult to skip is the FBI warning and that's only about a minute. And yes I dual-boot Windows and Linux and I don't have the problems all you GEEKS seem to be constantly struggling mightly over.
Bufferrring .... Bufferrring .... Bufferrring .... who's dying first??
Crap is stinky and hard to mold into a usable form. So is RealPlayer. It's unintuitive and obtuse. We have a superpowered dual Xeon in the girl's room. We use it nigh exlusively to play lullaby music at bedtime. I cringe when the girl asks for "the Sheep music," because that freaking visualisation is the only time I have to run their PoS software.
Foff, Real. We don't need no stinking sheep.
#19845
"we don't expect to make money from our recordings"
.. lebowski on ice
so you are basically arguing for a model where all pre-recorded music (or any media for that matter) merely exists for the promotion of the live event?
I downloaded my free copy of the big lebowski, and I loved it so much I'm going to go watch
And I'm the buggy-whip person here?
incidently, I don't imagine that you actually are in a blue band for a living, so just because you "create content" doesn't mean your view has as much weight and authority here.
My experience is that artists who *rely* on their art to have food and rainment, don't live in the same lame hippy, commune that you do.
This DRM business is kind of like the discussion about putting alcohol locks in cars.
Imagine you buy a car, using your hard-earned money.
Imagine you can't start that car, because the car knows you're drunk.
Do you know what most people say right about now?
They say, "Well, that's good, it's safe! We'll have less accidents!"
"We should implement it, make it law!"
What they're missing is to think one step further.
That one step will bring you this:
You bought a car, with YOUR money, and you aren't allowed to drive it.
That's the big POINT, hurling itself into the faces of everyone hearing the discussion.
If you aren't allowed to drive your car, or if the car companies think you'll drive drunk ANYHOW, they shouldn't sell you the car in the first place.
It's the same thing with the DRM.
People will see the Dauntless, Ravishing, Magnificence called DRM.
"It makes our computers safe! We won't have to worry about viruses as much now!
I mean, we aren't pirates!"
"We should implement it, make it law!"
And what they'll miss, is the same things as they'll miss if the alcohol locks are implemented in cars.
But, oh, I would say it would be a tad too late to whine about it AFTERWARDS, when it's already a standard.
So, like, what are the smart costumers going to do when all those masses of consumers buy before they think?
Before we, the little minority, get our voices heard, it's too late. And we'll have to resort to hacking, etc, and we'll probably be regarded as pirates anyhow.
If not criminals, depending on how fast they'll implement this great thing into our nice books of law.
I mean, everyone since Stalin and waaay before knows that "the masses don't think, and those who do are too few," or something like that.
Why should it, in the end, be different with the binary world?
I've been playing guitar for 34 years, and I *do* make my total living from playing, although that wasn't always true. I have no day job etc. I'm not rich, but I'm far from starving.
:-P) and buy you a beer after the show. I'll be the good-looking guy playing a cherry-burst G&L Legacy through a Seymour-Duncan 84-40 1-12" tube combo amp, and a black leather fedora. ;)
During the winter season, my band plays mostly bars and clubs for anywhere from $60-$75 per man per night upwards, 2-5 nights/week. Summers we do mostly bluesfests, fairs, and other larger, mostly outdoor venues which tend to pay much better. We've released 1 CD, with another CD we plan to cut this summer. We ask for a donation, but don't require it for downloads and charge $4 for a physical CD to cover media and artwork costs. We say right on the CD and the liner, "Copy-Friendly!..You May Copy This Music and Share It."
You would be surprised..only about %15 of downloads are with no donation, and most happily donate $10-$20.
As far as whether you believe me or not, that's on you, and there's not much I can do about it. If you had looked at my comment history, you'd see that I've previously said I won't post the bands' website URL or name my band, as I don't feel that would be appropriate.
However, if you're in Kalamazoo MI this coming April 21st, come to the State Theatre that evening, (no, we're not the headliner) you can listen for yourself, and I'll even give you a CD (if there are any left
Cheers!
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
So, there is software for linux that exists which will let you buypass PUOPs?
You seem to ignore there are apps for windows that will do the same - including mplayer... And even better - there are a few apps that will "strip" out those PUOPs along with the region coding, macrovision, CSS and other nasties - and even have other options like "jump to movie start automatically" (bypassing boring/confusing/annoying/bothersome menus) and what not. And there are LOTs of great DVD playing apps (WinDVD, PowerDVD, Theatertek, ZoomPlayer, etc - dozens and dozens more). And it's pretty simple to get wicked quality decoding too (best mpeg2 decoder - currently nvidia's which is windows only - along with ffdshow for raw post-processing i.e. sharpening, scaling and what not, with VMR renderer; that IS quite better than linux from what I've seen)
Under linux, it's a freaking nightmare to get my sb live to output to spdif to the home theather amp (and ac3 passthru), which is totally trivial in windows (4 mouse clicks). And under linux you have to know how to add dvd/mp3 support (something that's a non-issue under windows), even if not overly complicated.
But this is slashdot, so people get modded up for being linux apologists or misinformed posts in linux's favor and such... (and no, I surely won't be modded up either, this is "pro-M$", oh noes! I must be some evil M$ astroturfer! BSOD OMG LOLZ!!oneelevenwhatever)
Other countries will not enforce some weird Hollywood protectionist legislation (which is really the core of DRM) unless it is forced upon them as part of a trade deal. The hardware with DRM will cost more to manufacture than that without - so it may just end up being a drag on US manufacturers who will be facing competition form cheaper imports without it. How much does Hollywood add to the revenue base for it to merit special protectionist laws that hurt larger portions of the economy - don't most large movies make a loss on paper to avoid tax?
Fast forward...
Recent events show that it won't matter too much where you might live.
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
And this really is interesting because there are countries with laws that state if you buy something, it's yours and hence you should receive such things as master keys. Sort of analogous to sim-locking on phones. If I have purchased and paid (a fair price) for my phone, they must unlock my phone and give me pin,pin2, puk and puk2 codes. Perhaps some jurisprudence on this level will prove helpful in countries with proper consumer protection laws. For those who are stuck in evil-land I can only assume you shoudl vote with you wallet and write to your representative...
-if at first you don't succeed, stay the heck away from paragliding.
Redhat going to include DRM software?? Great one more command for the post install scripts:
% yum remove *DRM*
Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so. - Douglas Adams
"You expect me to use DRM, Realfinger?"
"No Mr Linux, I expect you to..." BUFFERING... BUFFERING... "God dammit..." BUFFERING... BUFFERING...
If DRM is also introduced as legislation inside a extended DMCA act by the Government, in effect outlawing older Digital Media and its equipment, we are suddenly Locked in the BOX.
Then again, if one can only watch FOX NEWS using a DRM enabled TV-set, I already know what will happen: THEY themselves are getting Locked in the BOX.
Robert
Inside "Report from IRON MOUNTAIN ON THE POSSIBILITY AND DESIRABILITY OF PEACE" the world as we know it is divided up into 10 separate regions, see pictures of that here : 10-regions-1.png and 10-regions-2.png The world maps are from the COR, Club of Rome, and introduced in 1973. So this dividing up of the world is a Global Governance thing carried out by the CFR (Council on Foreign Relations), TC (Trilateral Commission), Bilderberg, Committee of 300 you name it. In a recent update of this map, Mexico was moved from region 6 to region 1. I really wonder now if DVD's officialy purchased in Mexico have their region codes moved from 6 to 1 also.
If you want to know more see :
Iron Mountain 1
Iron Mountain 2
Iron Mountain 3
Allthough all OFFICIAL media outlets and payed for stooges declare(d) "Iron Mountain" to be a Hoax, go find out for yourselves if its true. After seeing the Global Agenda being laid out for us day by day, I say its NOT a Hoax.
Robert M. Stockmann
Big Media - standard non-DRM'd formats or Die.
The sound card drivers in Linux are GPL'd, as are the video drivers. The kernel is GPL'd. This will not change. So I say bring on the DRM enabled players. If the audio plays on linux, a soundcard driver that saves the raw digital audio can be made (if it isnt as simple as temporarily replacing the /dev/dsp device node with a regular file). And while more complex, the same thing can be done for video.
When I worked at the university, they had a cluster of HP/UX machines. Each machine would claim it had a "2 user license". This confused me for a while: each machine would typically have someone working at the console, and 2-3 people working at an X terminal nearby.
I asked the sysadmin about that, and he explained that HP/UX in fact counts "classes" of users. These classes would be console, network and serial port. You could have any number of logins in a certain class, but only 2 classes could be active.
In practice, this meant there was no limit: we only had network users (from the X terminals) and a console. Except on one machine: it had a dial-in connection. If someone was logged in over the phone, it would only allow a person on the console, or X terminal sessions, but not both.
WWTTD?
Do you know you are listed in the "top comments" section twice?
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
The stuff you quote are weird, none of all the media I play have any DRM, it has already been cracked for me.
"Their only alternative will be to not buy the films, shows, and music they want, and I don't see DRM becoming so restrictive that people will go to that extreme."
;)
Or copy it
What happened to consumers telling corporations what they want? Ehe, why would I care anyway? It doesn't matter to me what Real has to say, their formats suck anyway.
People still actually use RealPlayer?! It's horrible - I only use it to play MP3s @ the moment 'til I get Xamp up and running...MPlayer is where it's at - plays anything I throw at it!
http://nathanlindsell.blogspot.com/