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Microsoft Acknowledges NBC's Wish is Its Command
theodp writes "Responding to questions about why some users of Windows Vista Media Center were prevented from recording the NBC Universal TV shows 'American Gladiator' and 'Medium,' Microsoft has acknowledged that Windows Media Centers will block users from recording TV shows at the request of a broadcaster. 'Microsoft included technologies in Windows based on rules set forth by the (Federal Communications Commission),' wrote a Microsoft spokeswoman, apparently referring to an FCC proposal that the courts struck down in 2005. 'Microsoft has put the requirements of broadcasters above what consumers want,' said the EFF's Danny O'Brien. 'They've imposed restrictions way beyond what the law requires. Customers need to know who Microsoft is listening to and how that affects their equipment. Right now, the only way customers know what Microsoft has agreed to is when the technology they've bought suddenly stops working. Microsoft needs to come clean and tell its customers what deals it has made.'"
Yes, this is the place where those of us who loathe Vista as a bloated, DRM-ridden piece of crap that just can't wait to rat on its owners come for an apology from all those people who accused us of spreading FUD about it.
But don't expect them to come with apologies. Astroturfing Microsoft shills never apologise. They'l call this story FUD, too. It's how they've always done business.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Why is everyone blaming Microsoft? While the broadcast flag is certainly not a required thing to honor, it is something the content providers wanted and something that doesn't really negatively affect consumers unless the content provider wishes so.
The fact of the matter is: It's not up to Microsoft to decide for you NOR the content provider. Microsoft can't tell the content provider "screw you" because you want to skip by some commercials on TV.
Microsoft isn't a champion of consumers, nor is any other company. They are out to get your money. That's their primary goal, that's why they exist.
Without support for DRM in Windows, we wouldn't have the ability to watch things such as blu-ray. This will become more important as the drives become cheaper and people start loading them up in their HTPC setups.
What do you want? To just not watch blu-ray movies?
You could go and download the HD movies you want (like I'm sure most people here do), but if you want to make a good faith effort to stay on the "legal" side of things, these technologies need to be in place by Microsoft.
It wasn't their decision, after all. They need to attract content providers to have a good reason to support the PC platform, AND they need to attract consumers.
Even if massive DRM was removed from say, Blu-Ray, tomorrow, it would not increase the sales of players nor movies. Why? Because DRM isn't as big of a "problem" as some people on these comments seem to think it is.
That said, let's look at the law here. You have no "constitutional" rights in the US to do whatever you want with whatever you want. You have no "rights" to download, store, digitally alter media produced by someone else if they don't want you to.
If you want the ability to do that, stand up to your government and push them for laws that favor your ability to do this more.
But hey, then that puts more "control in the hands of that evil, terrible thing we call government!"
Can't have it both ways.
On the Apple side EyeTV 250 plus is a nice gadget as well. I'm a big fan of mine. External unit, built in hardware encoding, plus I think its a whole lot easier to use than Windows Media Center and is more consumer-friendly than MythTV. Not knocking MythTV either, that is an awesome system and if I were going for a homebrew PVR I would take that any day. But if you want something easy to use that syncs to iTunes and doesn't require running another computer I'd go that route. Plus I'm running XBox Media Center so I can still get to everything on my TV via the network share :-)
Wonder if they can turn the flag on during a program, and would that stop Microsoft Media player stop recording? Just think of it! You're on the sofa; beer, popcorn & girl in hand, watching the murder mystery movie. 20 mins from the end the plucky detective and his sidekick bust in to the room where the murder is lurking with gunsight trained on them.... Recording stops... you either have to wait for the DVD or wait t ill it's repeated.... I bet some Station controller would do it for "snitz and giggles"!!
Laters Sol "Have you found the secrets of the universe? Asked Zebade "I'm sure I left them here somewhere"
Step 1: Install.
/dev/sda1, /sdb1, /sdc1 are different fucking drives. I'd set my data drives the way I wanted them thanks, I don't need Linux deciding that for some reason /media/Video1 should now map to THE FUCKING WINDOWS PARTITION. After two hours of hunting, I find the barely-documented "UUID" setup ... why the fuck does Linux not use that by default?
Step 2: Try to figure out what "default" settings are for my PC.
Step 3: Try to figure out why the fuck Linux keeps deciding randomly (on reboot) that
Step 4: drivers, drivers, drivers. I own 2 ATi capture cards (TV Wonder, HDTV Wonder) and 3 ATi (All-In-Wonder) video boards. Not a fucking one of them "fully supported." Advice I get from the Linux posers? "Duuude ati sux go buy nvidia and get a hauppauge or homerun capture card." Sorry: The hardware I already bought a couple years backworks fine. I'm not going to go spend $300+ on this.
Step 5: Back to WinXP and the ATi recorder software. It's not perfect but it beats the hell of of MythTV, which seems to ONLY work if you have the EXACT FUCKING SAME HARDWARE CONFIG AND CABLE PROVIDER AS ONE OF THE WRITERS.
I tried. I really tried to give MythTV a shot. No fucking way am I going to deal with that, and no fucking way am I shelling out ridiculous amounts of cash when I already have working parts. The Linux guys always scream about how they can fix anything, code anything, blahblahblah... well? Give me a working driver so the ATi capture hardware works and video playback doesn't look like crap compared to the Windows video playback, and I'll switch. Till then? Mythbuntu remains one more example of why Linux fails.