Will you be rushing into the new Hi-Def formats in 2006? (1 Viewer)

[Nils Luehrmann]

A) This would only be true if we are to believe the worst case scenario described by some, which so far is based on a great deal of speculation and not facts.

B) If these companies are being "Unreasonable", then you must be implying there is a more "reasonable" solution to preventing piracy. Please tell us what that reasonable solution is?

 

[RobertR]

It's not my responsibility to think up solutions for the movie studios, any more than I have to tell the chef at a restaurant how to make a great tasting dish if I think what he serves me tastes lousy. Why would you accept a solution that pisses people off AND doesn't really solve the piracy problem?

 

[Edwin-S]

Well, they could actually start going after organized piracy with the full force of present law, rather than dream up ways to potentially deactivate legally acquired hardware. IMO, combatting organized piracy is not the real reason for the types of copy control being advocated by the hardware and software producers. The real issue is the one that has been going on since the invention of magnetic tape: that issue being the ability for regular, law abiding consumers to make duplicate copies of copyrighted material. Content producers have been pissed off for a long time over consumers being able to make copies of anything, be it audio, video, or computer data.

Content providers do not want consumers to have the ability to produce copies of any kind.....not even archival copies of a consumer's own collection. Consumers would not have the ability to copy discs; lend copies to friends or family; or even lend the originals to friends or family in the utopian world envisioned by media companies. In their world, all copies sold would be keyed to a single machine. When that machine died so would the ability to play that particular copy of the movie. If you wanted to keep watching that movie you would have to purchase another copy. Better yet, they would ultimately like to prevent the ownership of any hard copy of their property.

The issue doesn't appear to be about piracy. The issue is about who controls the use of the content after the initial purchase has been made. Since the issue is consumer rights vs content producers rights, there does not seem to be any satisfactory solution that would satisfy both sides. The only power consumers have in this battle is to not purchase any device that circumvents their ability to use the content, that they have purchased, in ways that they see fit. Under the present pro-corporate regime format failure is the only way for consumers to send a message to companies, that they will not accept having their perceived rights to content ownership being stripped from them. At least, that is how I see it.

 

[Nils Luehrmann]

Well that was one long way of saying you don't have a reasonable solution.

Simply saying they should trust consumers to be honest, and then be responsible for trying to track down and stop those who are not is quite unreasonable given the impossible and cost prohibitive task of tracking down every person who makes or uses an illegal copy of a DVD.

BTW: They have "actually started going after organized piracy with the full force of present law" - but besides the problem of trying to enforce these laws especially against piracy groups outside the US, you also have the problem of piracy from individuals - all of which can result in higher costs passed on to honest consumers and more restrictive delivery systems.


If you could make an exact copy of your car for 99% less than the cost of the car... should that also be perfectly ok to do? Who is going to design and sell cars if everyone could simply steal your design and make copies for a fraction of your costs? Remember, someone had to pay to make the film, create masters for video distribution, design the menus and art work, and market the product. Pirates just have to pay for the cost of duplication, which in many cases can be as little as a few pennies per disc.

Furthermore, when you buy a DVD, is it your opinion that it comes with a lifetime warranty, such that you should be allowed to make a copy so that if and when it stops working because of wear and tear, you can then simply replace it with a copy?

When you make a "back-up" copy, you are basically saying you have the right to never have to replace a product due to your own wear and tear. If it weren't for the cost and copyright laws, imagine how that attitude would effect other products we regularly have to replace due to wear and tear.

The whole “back-up” copy is part of the problem, and unfortunately a common excuse that those who are not using these copies as back-ups will always fall back on as an argument against these anti-piracy methods.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

Edwin - show me who has stated that disks will be keyed to a single machine? That would be like selling your car and having the new owner find out that it won't work!

What if you really got a bum disk, and brought it back to the store for an exchange and they wanted to see the error? Yeah, right.

I don't think that very many of us are aware of just how widespread this piracy is. There is a country or two out there that are cranking out illegal copies like there is no tomorrow. If the country in question doesn't want to enforce our laws, then the studios need to come out with (hopefully) a better way to stop them. I can't blame the studios for doing this. It IS their property.

Glenn

 

[Cees Alons]

Nils,

That's nonsense.

Saying what?
I'm a fervent opponent of pirating and illegal copying. Many people on this forum know that. I underwrite the mission of this forum and even help keeping it honoured by others.
Your discussion technique is getting malignant, you are getting personal and your italics are totally uncalled for. .

And you're logic is flawed: I'm never criticising "copy protection methods", in general and as such. I have, however been criticising one particular "method", the installation of a rootkit. And you're not telling me (I do hope) that you are defending that method.
I have also questioned certain aspects of the DRM, such as the possibility to "close down" a player bought by someone else. I think it's an unfortunate choice. They can do it: but I won't buy such hardware (firmware). Which is my right.


Cees

 

[george kaplan]

Again, without trying to get too political, this is kind of like the classic argument about whether it's better to convict a bunch of innocent people to make sure no guilty people get away, or better to let a small number of guilty people get off to ensure you don't incarcerate innocent people.

Now, in this situation, it's complicated by differing opinions of fair use. I personally think that I should have the right to play a dvd I buy in my living room, and then take it up to my bedroom and play it there. I think that with the risk of disc failure (through no fault of my own, but rather faulty manufacturing), that I should be able to make back-up copies. Now, perhaps I'd be willing to forgo the ability to make back-up copies if there was a guarantee that I could buy a new version if the current one went bad, but that doesn't exist. Lots of films go into moratorium, and I shouldn't have to wait until God knows when to be able to replace a bad disc, just because they no longer press it and I wasn't able to make a back-up.

So, for me, it's a matter of weighing my rights to fair use against the studios rights not to have piracy. Now, I don't know how the studios should prevent piracy, but if they can't do it without infringing upon my fair use rights, then I'm not buying into it.

For those of you who don't believe in fair use, and are perfectly willing to say that the studios have and should have all the rights in this fight, well, you're entitled to your opinion, but don't expect me to join you in rolling over for them.

 

[Edwin-S]

No, I do not. Like I stated in another thread I, personally, do not copy discs. I do not back up discs, record TV shows, or time shift material; however, I know that most people out there do do those things. I can see why they are not willing to give up being able to do those things, just to get what they consider an incremental increase in picture quality.


There is one situation where I do believe that people should be able to make an archival. The eventuality of a movie going out of print. Not every film is going to remain in print and available for purchase. What happens if a collector's original disc goes to home theater heaven and the film is no longer in print. If he/she has no back up, what then? Wait for the great and good media companies to re-release the film? What if they never re-release it because the sales were considered too low. Now the movie buff has no access to the film at all,because he/she didn't make a back up and the media company won't make the film available. That is just one case where making an archival backup makes sense. Do you think a person is wrong to protect themselves from that possible eventuality. Or do you actually think that content providers will make every film they release available in perpetuity?

I sure don't, because I'm facing that situation right now. I have a film called "Night on The Galactic Railroad" on VHS. I have looked to see if the film has been released in its original OAR on DVD. As far as I can see it hasn't been. That means I have to maintain the VHS version. Am I wrong to want a duplicate in case the original one breaks? CPM, the original provider, sure isn't helping me out, because they won't release the film on DVD. In fact, they have probably let the rights lapse because the film wasn't popular amongst their regular demographic.

I can see exactly why people do not want to give up the ability to copy their own property.

 

[Nils Luehrmann]

Malignant? Unbelievable. Yes, it would be so much less malignant to say your post is nonsense and use the laughing emoticon. If you would like, I'll try and follow your example in the future.

 

[Cees Alons]

Yes it is. But hey, those are your own words it's referring to!


Cees

 

[Dan Hitchman]

There is no way in hell I'm buying first generation players or discs. I learned my leason with DVD. They look to be bare boned and some (like the Toshiba HD-DVD players) don't have all the specifications covered. HDMI Ver. 1.3 isn't even available for players or pre-amp/processors and receivers yet!

Also, the first discs probably won't be indicitive of the quality that may come within a year or two since not every studio authoring house will have the ability to encode at high resolution and/or lossless or uncompressed audio with the tools that are out now. Also VC-1 and MPEG-4 AVC HP encoding is still in the primative stages. They may have more artifacts than many videophiles will be willing to stomach on large front projection systems (which is where I'm headed). Remember the first DVD releases in 1997 and 1998 with MPEG-2??? God-awful (especially from Warner Brothers)!!

I wouldn't be surprised if a super-duper extended edition of Lord of the Rings doesn't come out with 7.1 discrete, high resolution surround in a couple years. I'll buy that!!!

Any disc that isn't quality encoded in 1920x1080p (if that was the source material) and at least high resolution lossless audio I will not buy... even if it's my favorite film of all time. The specs. allow for the best, so I want the best. Especially if we're buying premium priced media!

Dan

 

[dpippel]

This debate is really starting to get personal when there is absolutely NO NEED for that. Everyone here has a right to their opinions on the DRM issue. If you're sick of hearing it then DON'T READ IT. Just because someone doesn't agree with you doesn't make them wrong and it doesn't make you right. There's still WAY too little information about how the whole thing will shake out for ANYONE to make definitive statements one way or the other.

I'll say one more thing on the DRM and copy protection issue, and it's just this:

To date the entertainment conglomerates have spent billions of dollars trying to prevent the piracy and theft of music and home video. All they have to show for it is dismal failure. According to their own data they're still losing BILLIONS OF DOLLARS ANNUALLY TO PIRACY. It doesn't seem that there's been a copy protection scheme or data encryption method they've conceived and employed that hasn't been cracked, hacked, or circumvented in short order. Despite their huge investment in time and money they're no closer to solving the problem now than they were one, two, five, eight years ago. All they've managed to do is inconvenience and alientate legitimate consumers and in some cases criminally obstruct their rights. Why should anyone think that the DRM which will eventually show up in high-def DVD will be any different or any more effective?

The irony is that all of this is going on while the REAL pirates and the REAL problem, the chop shops in China and SE Asia that mass-produce pirated music and video then market and sell it worldwide, continue to ply their trade unabated and relatively untouched by the law. Is it any wonder that legitimate consumers are questioning motives here and not trusting what's going on? The direction the industry has taken, treating every customer like they're just a criminal waiting to be caught and prosecuted, is wrong and it needs to stop. IMHO.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

George, when a disk does go bad - due to a manufacturing defect, you should be able to get a replacement for it. Don't forget Universal's mess with many of their early disks. I had my copies of 'The Thing' and "The Jackel' replaced for the price of postage. I'm not going to quibble over 5 x 37 cent stamps and an envelope.

The studios have learned a lot since SD first arrived, and I personally do not expect any disk and/or player crashes due to an error, just because this is a new technology. IIRC, there were a few questions about exactly what the DVD standards were when DVD disks first started to come out, but I feel that the new formats won't leave any questions as to what the disks have to have on them in order to work/play correctly.

What prevented me from voting was the last question. I think I will be buying this year, and this is what I think will happen.

HD will roll out and BR will be right behind it. A price war for the players will start up, and I expect both sides to be under $300 by the end of this summer. I also don't think that HD will make it through the summer. This Fall, the player prices will drop again, and easily be under $200. before the end of this year. Sometime shortly after that, the studios will just stop making SD disks at all, and at the worse, they will be selling hybrids, with BR on one side and SD on the other, or allow the BR disks to be downconverted according to the TV set's maximum range.

Glenn

 

[JeremyErwin]

A small sidetrack:

Were it not for bandwidth considerations, and certain technical complications (almost certainly tangled up in DRM), I could imagine the following fair usages:

fan provided subtitles, and commentaries.
small videos comparing two or more films of a director, highlighting similar camera angles and compositions. (film is not merely a succession of still images-- most modern directors have learned to move their cameras...)

I think that those uses would at least invite more than a cursory fair use examination. However, the technical expertise required to assemble such pieces is somewhat rare.

I seem to recall a dismissive comment on the merits of a certain widely known, and widely available DRM removal tool, that easy access to the original source material is not guaranteed by fair use rights. But it's all about easy access, these days.

Just imagine if the HTF also had the occasional post like this.


I wonder if managed copies would have allowed that sort of thing...

 

[george kaplan]

In an ideal world, but not necessarily in the real world. Let's say that Disney has put a film "back into the vault". Now your copy goes bad. Are they going to send you a new copy? Maybe, maybe not. What if you have an OAR disc of a film, which has been bought by Sony, and now they have released it only in pan & scan. They might send you a replacement, but it might not be the OAR version. And even if you gave a studio the benefit of the doubt for wanting to do the right thing, they might not be able to. For example, what if you have a complete, uncut version of a film, and in the meantime the studio has lost the rights to some songs in there, and have been forced by losing a lawsuit to only provide it with music replacement. I doubt seriously if you'd be able to get a replacement copy with the original music intact under such circumstances.

I have not backed up the vast majority of my dvd collection, and frankly, my dvd collection would probably be my primary backup for my HD disc collection, since I already own 99% of the titles I'm ever going to want, and what I don't own isn't available on dvd, and ain't likely to make it out on an HD format (what are the odds of The Great Gildersleeve making it to HD ever?). Nevertheless, I still would be extremely wary of a format that attempted to keep me from making backups for my own personal use. I am not a pirate, and if the studios try to either redefine my fair use as piracy, or eliminate my fair use as the only way that they think they can fight piracy, then to hell with them.

 

[Ryan-G]

I *really* don't think alot of people have fully thought through what will happen if Piracy is not reigned in right now . Piracy of movies and TV material is prevelant, perhaps even moreso than Napster was, and it's effects are *far* more damaging.

Off the top of my head, directly effected and will face significant financial impact...

Every movie studio, every theater, every type and form of video rental, Retail chains like Best Buy and Wallmart, Cable TV companies, and TV studios.

The potential impact is *huge*, probably more than sufficient to collapse the entire economy if video piracy becomes commonplace as it is threatening to. If large numbers of people forsake Cable TV and Movies in legal channels, it's going to cost jobs, alot of jobs. Many of which are highly technical leaving large numbers of people with a skill set that doesn't translate to any other market. It'll further impact the biggest retail chains hugely. With many of the largest names in the financial world sidelined and/or broke, there's no way the rest of the economy could support the sudden weakness. No way the economy could withstand the loss of so many jobs.

It'd effect not only America, but other countries too. Canada, Australia, and other locations that get significant traffic and income from the entertainment industry.

It easily could touch off a world wide depression. Think about it for a moment, How much money is spent making Movies and TV? How much revenue is generated by Theaters, Rentals, and Retailers? What would happen if those expenses dried up? Just as simply, it'd touch off a landslide, starting at the top. Investors and highly paid entertainment types would lose massive amounts of money, meaning they buy less expensive equipment, killing products and profits from lines directed to them, which means more lost jobs, which starts the cycle over again.

*That's* what piracy is building up to, and left unchecked it *will* happen. For the expense of just 45$ american it will give access to all Movies and TV, just leaving the computer on all night.

So yes, DRM is necessary, and if you can't make backups of a few discs for whatever reasons, it's a small price to pay. Because the alternatives are much, much, worse.

I'm sorry, I've said it before, but it's become too prevelant now. When I've got one coworker who carries around movies she buys for 5$ that are still in the theater, another coworker telling me about leaving Limewire on 24/7, and a third telling me about how her husband the mechanic just downloads everything they want to see so they cancelled their cable, we've got a problem. I work in the medical field, where most people are lucky to find the "On button". It's *not* the niche technophile anymore, it's the average person.

Which is where we've gotten to a point where it's do or die.

 

[Marko Berg]

DVDs are still selling in spite of the file sharing. Your doomsday scenario is not immediate, and it's certainly not going to bring on a worldwide depression.

Piracy is no doubt rampant, but that doesn't mean consumers should be subjected to all sorts of stupid, poorly implemented DRM restrictions such as what Sony developed. There are other avenues the studios can pursue to combat (professional) piracy.

George said it very well:

 

[AaronMK]

I agree that piracy is a big problem, but not that big of a problem.

Is this some kind of reverse psychology tactic, kind of like the Divx Fan website from a while back?

 

[Ricardo C]

But it could be...

Right now, few people have the bandwith and storage space to regularly download HD movies. But in ten years, they will. And digital copies made today will look the same then. We're moving towards all-digital content delivery, hence why Hollywood wants to control the creation of copies of their product as much as possible.

Not saying I like the new DRM schemes, but I do see the point for the ir existence.

 

[Parker Clack]

Let's get the thread back on track. Take the rest of the discussions to other threads that already exist. The question is will you or won't you buy not about why you won't. The arguments will stop now.

Parker