I'm not seeing why it's bad that people have the ability to stand behind 'copyright protection'. The content providers aren't forced into it - it's their way of dealing with the system in such a fashion that they can have a livelihood. If you destory copyright protection, you're destroying many peoples' and notably corporations' incentives.
You're referring to a change RealNetwork's made in their MIME association in a G2 beta which was released after a WMP release. The WMP release had been programmed to Play Nicely with the old RN behavior, but the new RN behavior didn't make sense (and in fact was in practice, as noted, buggy). RN released a.1 update to their beta which fixed the issue. It was technically amazing that they couldn't figure this out on their own originally, but hey- now they can have help.;)
And, yes, hopefully they have changed now. If hypothetically there was a situation in which the President of the company had been alerted to the technical specifics of a particular bug by a friendly dev from another Hideously Evil Company, and then that hypothetical company instead decided to continue spewing PR lies for another week and pretending that other companies were complaining too, man, that'd be pretty scummy.
But that's all just hypothetical. And if the president of a different hypothetical company called up to apologize and explain that another company ghost-wrote them into the press release, man, that'd leave you perpetually amused with the ethics of a company.
It's all just hypothetical.
Microsoft bad, RealNetworks good (or getting better).
The associations stuff had to happen, really. Microsoft's documentation on this stuff sucks, and companies like RealNetworks were totally evil in permanently taking file associations. End users just can't cope with that concept. The new generation of association advertisement is a start, but it needs to and it will get better over time.:\
That's version prejudice.:) WMP7 was a complete rewrite of WMP6 and shows it. WMP8 (aka WMP for Windows XP) improved perf and cleaned itself up. Try out WMP9 when it comes out - it's basically the "v3" WMP, which is usually where Microsoft succeeds.
Not really - you can uncheck the "Download codecs automatically" checkbox. And codecs only get downloaded for fourCCs/formattags not already supported on the box that are present in content you are trying to play with, so it's a reactive blockable download. WMP doesn't have any proactive unblockable downloads (WMP's AutoUpdate always shows a "Download/Install Update - Yes/No" message).
"Funky" video codecs? If it's DivX-related, it's got a good chance of being one of the endless bad hacks of the Microsoft MPEG4 codec. If it is, then getting it working in the first place was a miracle. Regardless, this FAQ tip should get your friend going again.
Dude, don't you think people have TRIED that? QuickTime, RealPlayer, MusicMatch, and WinAMP all have anti-user behavior wherein they can proactively take extension ownership without user notification. It's Really Cool to remap the associations in Explorer (or even in regedit) and watch RealJukebox change them back without telling you. Lots of cool user-love coming from RealNetworks there.
I've never seen details of this, but I bet it's a generic Search for Media function. Since proprietary types such as RealNetworks files aren't really of use to anyone without the RealPlayer installed, I'd assume they just weren't listed - and neither were Liquid Audio, QuickTime, a2b, etc. files either.
So the "fix" in that case would be to make the search filter extensible - that way you don't find files you can't play.
I can't believe this got modded up. Who's moderating?
The article does not say that anybody was prevent from playing Real content, just that the IE Media Bar is an annoying piece of cr*p. Which gets in the way of people who like WMP, too - so we all suffer due to bad design. Tain't nothin' like you said.
On what OS? The QuickTime Player on Win32 has profound display problems (massive flickering), making it a poor choice for any Win32-centric deployments. If Apple gets their act together and either releases a good Win32 player or lets other apps play QuickTime, I think they'd get more consideration. I know all Win32 players have their problems, but on an otherwise functional player, this just sticks out like a sore thumb over any problem the other players might have.
Actually, only DVD/CD discs cause metadata requests to be sent. *If* you have "Add files to Media Library when played" checked in WMP's Tools:Options menu, local file metadata is added to the WMP DB, but that's about it. If it bothers you, just nuke the library - wmp*.db or so on your system - every so often.
Or, if you're paranoid and on XP, you can uncheck "Add items to Media Library when played" (under WMP's Tools:Options menu), and not add files to the Media Library. It's kind of a convenience thing - you no like, you no use. You don't want it to exist? Delete the DB on player/OS shutdown, whatever makes you happy.
"The ASF file format is based on Microsoft's MPEG-4 V2 codec."
Nope - you can look up the ASF File Format here, but ASF is just a container. MS's MPEG4 vX codec implementations are just codec data stuffed into ASF.
Also, DivX 3.x is hacks to Microsoft MPEG4 v2 (aka DIV3 - and completely unnecessary), Microsoft MPEG4 v3 (aka DIV4), Windows Media Audio v2 (not supported/supportable in DivX 4), and the Radium pirated FhG Pro codec.
Re:WMA is about 2x as compact as MP3....
on
Non-MP3 Codecs?
·
· Score: 1
Naw, ripping with DRM turned on is stupid. WMP8 pops up a big "Don't Do This" dialog, for example. And none of the encoding tools actually add encryption themselves - all the tools encode to WMA without DRM by default. So no worries there.
You're mixing DRM and the codecs. Given the current DRM implementations, it's doubtful that you're going to see DRM on a DVD player. Presumably all Windows Media on DVD content will need to be 'in the clear'.
Huh? Media Player hasn't supported.mov - nor even had an option to take over.mov - for going on about three years now. We can revisit the past, but I think Windows XP and the current WMP are going in the right direction.
Actually, Windows XP adds this: look under HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\applications\wmplayer.exe\Suppor tedTypes\WMPlayer.exe\SupportedTypes", for example. Wheels are in motion to make things much easier as time goes on.
AOL's a bad example because you've got it wrong. The deal was that AOL would no longer exclusively provide content in RealAudio format, but would at least allow user choice (gasp!) of RM or WMF. RealPlayer doesn't really compete on features: it sucks as a player, and most everyone I know likes other players better - including people that work at Real. [But you see WinAMP at use at MS too...] RealPlayer "competes" because you're locked into using RealPlayer to play their content.
Re 2: It doesn't help that MP3 is bound by IP, and that you have to pay for the Pro encoders. I'm sure if MS could get away with shipping a free Pro encoder, they would. (Cheap b*stards.) "Slanting" fans towards technology that they don't have to worry about IP issues with makes sense to me: I'd do the same thing in their shoes because it makes business sense.
Not so much: DRM is optional for the content creator, so all content created with DRM turned off is "wild" content. It's critical to note that DRM can be turned off during content creation: don't lose sight of that. If a content creation tool does exist that only allows DRM'd content, *then* cry foul.
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I'm not seeing why it's bad that people have the ability to stand behind 'copyright protection'. The content providers aren't forced into it - it's their way of dealing with the system in such a fashion that they can have a livelihood. If you destory copyright protection, you're destroying many peoples' and notably corporations' incentives.
You're referring to a change RealNetwork's made in their MIME association in a G2 beta which was released after a WMP release. The WMP release had been programmed to Play Nicely with the old RN behavior, but the new RN behavior didn't make sense (and in fact was in practice, as noted, buggy). RN released a .1 update to their beta which fixed the issue. It was technically amazing that they couldn't figure this out on their own originally, but hey- now they can have help. ;)
:\
And, yes, hopefully they have changed now. If hypothetically there was a situation in which the President of the company had been alerted to the technical specifics of a particular bug by a friendly dev from another Hideously Evil Company, and then that hypothetical company instead decided to continue spewing PR lies for another week and pretending that other companies were complaining too, man, that'd be pretty scummy.
But that's all just hypothetical. And if the president of a different hypothetical company called up to apologize and explain that another company ghost-wrote them into the press release, man, that'd leave you perpetually amused with the ethics of a company.
It's all just hypothetical.
Microsoft bad, RealNetworks good (or getting better).
The associations stuff had to happen, really. Microsoft's documentation on this stuff sucks, and companies like RealNetworks were totally evil in permanently taking file associations. End users just can't cope with that concept. The new generation of association advertisement is a start, but it needs to and it will get better over time.
A: It's previously been announced elsewhere that yes, it will.
B: Or you could just blocked WMP's plug-in installation.
That's version prejudice. :) WMP7 was a complete rewrite of WMP6 and shows it. WMP8 (aka WMP for Windows XP) improved perf and cleaned itself up. Try out WMP9 when it comes out - it's basically the "v3" WMP, which is usually where Microsoft succeeds.
Not really - you can uncheck the "Download codecs automatically" checkbox. And codecs only get downloaded for fourCCs/formattags not already supported on the box that are present in content you are trying to play with, so it's a reactive blockable download. WMP doesn't have any proactive unblockable downloads (WMP's AutoUpdate always shows a "Download/Install Update - Yes/No" message).
"Funky" video codecs? If it's DivX-related, it's got a good chance of being one of the endless bad hacks of the Microsoft MPEG4 codec. If it is, then getting it working in the first place was a miracle. Regardless, this FAQ tip should get your friend going again.
It builds a media cache, it don't spy. Read the source article that started the mess rather than the distorted version written up there.
Dude, don't you think people have TRIED that? QuickTime, RealPlayer, MusicMatch, and WinAMP all have anti-user behavior wherein they can proactively take extension ownership without user notification. It's Really Cool to remap the associations in Explorer (or even in regedit) and watch RealJukebox change them back without telling you. Lots of cool user-love coming from RealNetworks there.
So the "fix" in that case would be to make the search filter extensible - that way you don't find files you can't play.
The article does not say that anybody was prevent from playing Real content, just that the IE Media Bar is an annoying piece of cr*p. Which gets in the way of people who like WMP, too - so we all suffer due to bad design. Tain't nothin' like you said.
On what OS? The QuickTime Player on Win32 has profound display problems (massive flickering), making it a poor choice for any Win32-centric deployments. If Apple gets their act together and either releases a good Win32 player or lets other apps play QuickTime, I think they'd get more consideration. I know all Win32 players have their problems, but on an otherwise functional player, this just sticks out like a sore thumb over any problem the other players might have.
There's also a(n official) Solaris Windows Media player here (or so).
(FYI: WMV *is* ASF. It's the "audio/video" subset file, whereas an ASF can have all sorts of extra stuff.)
Actually, only DVD/CD discs cause metadata requests to be sent. *If* you have "Add files to Media Library when played" checked in WMP's Tools:Options menu, local file metadata is added to the WMP DB, but that's about it. If it bothers you, just nuke the library - wmp*.db or so on your system - every so often.
Or, if you're paranoid and on XP, you can uncheck "Add items to Media Library when played" (under WMP's Tools:Options menu), and not add files to the Media Library. It's kind of a convenience thing - you no like, you no use. You don't want it to exist? Delete the DB on player/OS shutdown, whatever makes you happy.
"The ASF file format is based on Microsoft's MPEG-4 V2 codec."
Nope - you can look up the ASF File Format here, but ASF is just a container. MS's MPEG4 vX codec implementations are just codec data stuffed into ASF.
Also, DivX 3.x is hacks to Microsoft MPEG4 v2 (aka DIV3 - and completely unnecessary), Microsoft MPEG4 v3 (aka DIV4), Windows Media Audio v2 (not supported/supportable in DivX 4), and the Radium pirated FhG Pro codec.
Generally, any AVI with WMAv2 is orphaned.
I'm interested in getting opinions on superior choices... any recommendations?
WMA is just an audio-only subset of ASF - the file format spec is up at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/WM7/ format/asfspec11300e.asp. You still need a Windows Media Audio decoder, though.
Naw, ripping with DRM turned on is stupid. WMP8 pops up a big "Don't Do This" dialog, for example. And none of the encoding tools actually add encryption themselves - all the tools encode to WMA without DRM by default. So no worries there.
You're mixing DRM and the codecs. Given the current DRM implementations, it's doubtful that you're going to see DRM on a DVD player. Presumably all Windows Media on DVD content will need to be 'in the clear'.
Huh? Media Player hasn't supported .mov - nor even had an option to take over .mov - for going on about three years now. We can revisit the past, but I think Windows XP and the current WMP are going in the right direction.
Actually, Windows XP adds this: look under HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\applications\wmplayer.exe\Suppor tedTypes\WMPlayer.exe\SupportedTypes", for example. Wheels are in motion to make things much easier as time goes on.
AOL's a bad example because you've got it wrong. The deal was that AOL would no longer exclusively provide content in RealAudio format, but would at least allow user choice (gasp!) of RM or WMF. RealPlayer doesn't really compete on features: it sucks as a player, and most everyone I know likes other players better - including people that work at Real. [But you see WinAMP at use at MS too...] RealPlayer "competes" because you're locked into using RealPlayer to play their content.
Re 2: It doesn't help that MP3 is bound by IP, and that you have to pay for the Pro encoders. I'm sure if MS could get away with shipping a free Pro encoder, they would. (Cheap b*stards.) "Slanting" fans towards technology that they don't have to worry about IP issues with makes sense to me: I'd do the same thing in their shoes because it makes business sense.
Not so much: DRM is optional for the content creator, so all content created with DRM turned off is "wild" content. It's critical to note that DRM can be turned off during content creation: don't lose sight of that. If a content creation tool does exist that only allows DRM'd content, *then* cry foul.