No consumer rights against player being hobbled? (1 Viewer)

[Ken Horowitz]

Paul Sweeting's column in Video Business addresses the lack of due process for consumers whose hardware may be hobbled if the product is not used in the way required by the manufacturer. Key quote:

When you “buy” a digital device these days, you don’t so much take ownership of it in the classical sense. As a practical matter, you purchase a long-term lease to use it in certain ways and not in others.

http://videobusiness.com/article/CA6378913.html

 

[Frank@N]

That's part of the reason I opted to preorder a $499 HDMI-based PS3.

There's no way they could revoke the player without killing software sales (assuming the PS3 sells in the millions as expected).

 

[Mark Zimmer]

A lot of that is Congress' fault, with the anti-consumer, pro-corporation DMCA that pretty much guts the rights of the purchaser to any digital format.

 

[Jesse Skeen]

If "Pro" is the opposite of "Con", then Congress is the opposite of....

 

[Sanjay Gupta]

Progress.

 

[JackKay]

If you were the author of a copyrighted material you might look at this in a different way. The problem is "Fair Use". Can you use (or move) copyrighted material from one format or device to another without a residual? All this legal stuff is still being worked out as over extended laws are being made to catch any oversight. Things are moving very fast, and lawmakers and copyright holders are learning, while court battles wage on.

 

[Marko Berg]

Fair use of copyrighted material is not the issue here, rather it is the ability of studios remotely killing a perfectly legal playback device.

 

[Cees Alons]

I agree with Marko's remark.
We can agree with copy right protection. However, the measures taken should never be too unreasonable or draconian, or potentially hit the innocent.

Note that in our digital world, that revoke-function could also be triggered by a severe reading error, or another "glitch". I wonder how easy it would appear to be to revoke the revoking then again.

Also note that currently this can only happen if you buy a Blu-ray player.
HD DVD players don't have this option (yet?). It's part of the BD+ specs.


Cees

 

[Mary M S]

I hate being asked, “Do they not have the responsibility to shareholders to try to cut down on pirating, should they just give up”

I am to intensifying degree becoming inclined to shout: "Not my line of work, you guys figure it out but leave me alone while doing it!"
Have become highly resentful of corporations (literally) passing (and making) the buck off me for their rational's.
I don’t want to TAKE IT ANYMORE! [– shake it off Mary]
I’m more in line with Cee’s above
..and Mark Cuban; who states, bandwidth limitations with projected increase in demand will be an effective deterrence for many years to come.


HDMI glitches, rootkits, electronics which ‘phone home’, flags, revokes.
I put my money where my mouth is so currently I refuse to purchase.
I am being punished for what other people do and I’m not inclined to pay money to be treated so.

I have lived my entire life with the analogue hole, wide open waving franticly right in front of me and have never desired to personally reengineer it ,- to process copies for illegal distribution, nor know anyone who does.
I have seen how numbers of estimated losses are figured, - and I cry BUNK.
Those who do (pirate) will continue to do so, ad naseum.
I am tired of paying the price via incompatibility between electronic purchases, and glitching stuttering performance levels, paralyzed by conflicts the add-ons are increasingly creating.

I can’t get one (out of five or so) PC Burners to function properly or with any reliability, - and I can usually trace the freeze-up back to some sort of CP or watchdog software conflict. When I install a new one, it usually fubars something else, which I can trace to its software trying to dial home.

Life becomes a frigging nightmare trying to make my legitimately purchased hardware and software simply play without hanging freezing breaking, - due to the complexities of constantly evolving CP methods.

Nor I am inclined to pay for the added circuitry and software increasingly layered into electronics just so Corporations can generate ongoing revenue leveraging Peeping Tom in-roads in my living room.
These things decrease the performance level of products at the users end and increase the retail costs - R&D expenditures while studios etc, are trying to achieve the holy grail - ironclad undefeatable CP.

Would I be wrong to assume the consumers end satisfaction with FUNCTION (forgetting to include old-hat items like Playback-resume) are often hurt during lanch of products when the the corporate focus increasingly leans to blending technology advances (HD) with complex non-finalized versions of CP and adding on watchdog/ info collecting software & hardware?
I worry about the new darling of boardroom phraseology
“Adding to the Value Chain”
(Ie: data mining/interactive advertising, rental-like generating business models vs ownership=versions which consitute just 'borrowing' of product, VOD’s future impact on PQ.)

Money and research wasted (from my consumerist point of view - after all, I am paying not making money off these deals) funneled into the areas which are decreasing my end use satisfaction-levels post purchase. Weakening and undermining the performance and quality of many products.

I understand the new information revolution is creating enormous pressures amongst corporations.
You are stepping into the territory I expect to ‘own’ when I purchase a product from you,

....making me really really grumpy

exeunt singing all we are is dust in the wind.