View Full Version : Blu-Ray loses the format war to HD-DVD
It's all over, except for the crying. The pr0n industry chooses HD-DVD.
http://www.tgdaily.com/2007/01/11/ces2007_hddvd_blu_ray/
One of the big problems they have with Blu-ray is its expense, followed by its market share. "Blu-ray has superior quality, yes," said a spokesperson for porn studio Bangbros, "but HD DVD is easier to produce, cheaper to produce and there are more HD DVD players in homes than there are Blu-ray players, for example in the Xbox 360."
Sony is also apparently pressuring manufacturers to keep pr0n off Blu-Ray. Why are they shooting themselves in the foot? :inquisitive: This is one of the main reasons Betamax lost out. History repeats itself...
AntiochusIII
01-12-2007, 03:38
Wow. Sony had a bad year alright.
The PS3 saturation and losing to the Wii was pretty sad. And now this.
Thus the power of t3h pr0n is to be witnessed. I suspect it'll be just as potent as the ancient battle that the article referred to.
Sony is also apparently pressuring manufacturers to keep pr0n off Blu-Ray.
If that's the case, then they've lost. No new medium can thrive without teh pr0n.
There are also rumours of Toshiba buisly working on a 2.0 HD-DVD player that costs under $200 USD.
Found it. Lots of rumours about the future of Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, and the PS3.
GadgetNutz's storybreaking reporter, The Bandito, has uncovered a developing story concerning Sony via his network of industry insiders around the Sony camp.
On the heels of various industry reports of the lackluster sales of Sony's new Playstation 3 console up to, during, and beyond the Christmas season, it's no wonder that Sony feels internal pressure to alter it's course to more profitable waters. Obviously, the number one deficit of the new electronic entertainment device is the sheer number of newly introduced technologies, each with it's own seemingly continuous chain of production pitfalls. This same collection of newly deployed technologies directly impacts the pricing, further straining the retail sales of the Playstation 3. Considering that HDDVD technology is moving towards a broader market of consumers, Blu Ray is taking a considerable hit regardless of the Playstation branding.
One doesn't have to pay close attention, or even take a second glance, to see that Sony, as a large corporation, has dropped the ball in it's own court. It has been reported time and time again that Sony has been facing financial difficulties, having to lay off workers, close plants, and refocus parts of their business. What only a few expected, Playstation 3 sales failed to match even the reduced supply during this holiday season. The affect of this has rippled through the major electronics retailers, creating a need to ship stock from store to store, and further impacting what profit margins retailers expected to see from the launch of a major new platform. The slick new Nintendo Wii and the powerhouse Microsoft XBox 360 managed to dominate the market, taking full advantage of the price differential, supply problems, and even the imagination of the consumer market. The season, in reality, isn't even over, and there is already a new captain at the helm, an almost unprecedented event indicating changes to come.
At a cost of over two hundred dollars per drive, the Blu Ray is the force behind the massive cost of the Sony Playstation 3. It is speculated that Sony is bleeding some three hundred bucks per unit, and continues the wild trend of manufacturers losing cash on the console in expectations to get their money back on the software. However, with a scant dozen titles or so, Sony holds little hope of a quick turn around in their fortunes. From it's core, the powerful Cell processor,with it's poor production yields, has added pitfalls to it's on rollout that is compounded by the difficulty in mass producing the Blu Ray in the Playstation 3. The tremendous cost of product, let alone support and delivery costs, may have been a factor in the recent executive level staff changes, but that change (of executives) has pushed the importance of other changes up the ladder of importance.
Sony is rumored to be making drastic changes to recapture the market before losing even more of it's command share to the likes of Nintendo (the success story of the holiday season) or the XBox 360 (still suffering in the land of the rising sun, but gaining momentum everywhere else). In a move that one source says is "aimed at family pricing," Sony is rumored to be working on a Playstation 3 that does not include the Blu Ray drive. Whether this will result in the current low-end model having a change, or a newer "entry level" Playstation 3, remains to be seen. However, this is in stark contrast to their previous, egocentric, statements regarding "what kind of consumer"* will be looking at the Playstation 3.
To further fuel the fire, Toshiba has been reported to be getting ready to announce at CES (The Consumer Electronics Show) a new HDDVD player in the sub-two hundred dollar range. If these reports hold to be true, Sony's Blu Ray hopes may be dashed in even more markets than just that of the video-game arena. The steep pricing of Blu Ray players already make the Playstation 3 the entry level model, and Toshiba may have just put the nail in the coffin of this format. This holiday season was Sony's chance to leap ahead of the HDDVD format, establishing Blu Ray in the consumer market.
Supply problems alone would have likely created problems with Sony's hopes about Blu Ray, but with lackluster sales it is nearly a forgone conclusion. This puts Sony in a terrible position of not only trying to turn their ship around, but if they aren't careful--it could very well sink. A Playstation 3 without Blu Ray technology may save the Playstation from the fate previously seen by Sega's Saturn, but it will be the death nail in the Blu Ray coffin.
Source article. (http://www.gadgetnutz.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=00264)
As always, i'll bring the cynical point of view (http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36574) to this discussion :P
As always, i'll bring the cynical point of view (http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36574) to this discussion :P
Freakin awesome article. :2thumbsup:
As to the rumors of the PS3 dropping its Blu-ray drive... the should've done that from the beginning. They were hoping to use it to force their format on people, and it has clearly cost them big.
Big King Sanctaphrax
01-12-2007, 19:42
Did everyone read this? (http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt) It's some crazy stuff.
The average six year-old could tell you what a bad idea all of the stuff in that article is, if you explained it to them properly.
Did everyone read this? (http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt) It's some crazy stuff.
Teh old (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=76313). But worth repeating, certainly. Everybody should read that article before they even think about using Vista.
Did everyone read this? (http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt) It's some crazy stuff.
That's... um... deranged.
Honestly I can't blame M$ in this whole Vista DRM demon. I blame Hollywood. They have had their eyes on the open PC for years. They figure anyone who watches a movie on a PC instead of a standalone player must be pirating it.
Honestly I can't blame M$ in this whole Vista DRM demon. I blame Hollywood. They have had their eyes on the open PC for years. They figure anyone who watches a movie on a PC instead of a standalone player must be pirating it.
To be entirely fair to them, they are probably right for the most part.
Not that stopping that happening completely would benefit them in any way either.
Sorry, what exactly is this whole DRM issue? (Unsure of what DRM stands for.)
Wad through the article BKS posted and you'll see. But essentailly M$, in order to appease hollywood, getting HD format movies on vistas. They had to give windows the ability to shut down software functions, and des-res output on ports.
Hm, sounds like a bad idea to begin with.
Being fair we don't know if it will be bad or not. It really depends on how draconian M$ was forced into making it. Hollywood capitalists have looked upon the open PC as the greatest threat to their bottom line to ever exist. HD formats gave them the leverage to force M$ to lock down the PC.
Give Hollywood's love-in with DRM, and given that studio execs have admitted that their choice between HD-DVD and BluRay will hinge on who locks out consumers with greater ferocity, the news that HD-DVD has been cracked (http://torrentfreak.com/first-hd-dvd-movie-leaked-onto-bittorrent/), and the first HD movie is being actively distributed by piratical persons may change the equation.
Oh, who knows anymore. I'm never getting one of these ^$!*#$ things. Let this round fail, and let the content aggregators learn their lesson.
Eventually the same that happened to Napster will happen to sites like bit torrent, and personally I think they deserve it.
Somebody worked hard to produce and distribute something that they own the production rights to, and being that I work in production, I can understand their aggrivation with sites like this. I would be extremely sore with people if they could suddenly somehow start reproducing my product and start passing it around for free. That means the company I work for gets less profit, I get paid less, I get less privelages and have to pay more for my insurance, I could eventually have to worry about my job because mass producing my product in the numbers that we do would no longer be beneficial, etc.
And these people who blatantly violate copyright laws by passing these things around illegally are only hurting themselves. And to think of themselves as consumers, they'd have to be completely ignorant to even think they qualify. Being a consumer implies you actually paid for something, these people are thieves.
And these people who blatantly violate copyright laws by passing these things around illegally are only hurting themselves. And to think of themselves as consumers, they'd have to be completely ignorant to even think they qualify. Being a consumer implies you actually paid for something, these people are thieves.
Some thoughts, Lucjan:
Content creators and content aggregators are usually two separate creatures.
One can despise DRM without advocating piracy.
If the aggregators cannot secure their borrowed property or learn how to compete without harming the consumer, they should get into a different line of business.
Eventually the same that happened to Napster will happen to sites like bit torrent, and personally I think they deserve it.
Actually, it won't :embarassed:
You see, bittorrent is completely decentralised, so it's only user to user transmissions that occur. While it's very easy to harvest a list of people downloading a torrent, you also have to be doing so to get access.
Thus, if it is the content holder who does this, then the act that they have recorded is not piracy, as they willingly sent out the material (and thus cannot prosecute. If it's someone other than the content holder, then they too are eligible to be prosecuted.
I'm sure that someone will find a way to crack bittorrent and get those who use it; but as soon as they do the community will desert the protocol and they'll be back to square one...
my 2c :yes:
Content creators and content aggregators are usually two separate creatures.
I don't know what that has to do with the issue, if the creators give all the marketing and selling into the hands of others, it's their choice, does that mean that they don't deserve to get money for what they created? Or do all pirates secretly pay the creators to undermine the publishers?
One can despise DRM without advocating piracy.
True.
As someone who buys originals, I don't like getting restrictions, especially those which make working with a computer harder, and thus pay for the fault and illegal actions of others.
If the aggregators cannot secure their borrowed property or learn how to compete without harming the consumer, they should get into a different line of business.
So you opt for getting rid of the whole business, back to reading books?
Or are you suggesting the creators do have better means of protecting their property?
Or are you saying that robbers should never be punished since "only the stronger survive" and people who cannot protect their property don't deserve it anyway?
I think it's just sad when they heap on so many DRM restrictions that they actually make it easier for people who pirate the content to use it for free than it is for the people who actually purchase the content to use it. What do they think they're accomplishing there?
Big King Sanctaphrax
01-15-2007, 19:47
The real problem here is that the record companies' and studios' business paradigm-the one they're all trying to force us to follow with this DRM rubbish-is completely outdated, and they've missed the boat utterly. Until they come to terms with this, the piracy situation is going to keep getting worse and worse.
The problem is the complete retooling of their distribution methods that the digital age update would require. Means short term profit dips and/or unpredictable fluctuations. And that is something the shareholders wouldn't allow.
I don't know what that has to do with the issue, if the creators give all the marketing and selling into the hands of others, it's their choice, does that mean that they don't deserve to get money for what they created? Or do all pirates secretly pay the creators to undermine the publishers?
You forgot to turn on your mode.
On the one hand, you agree that one can hate DRM without supporting piracy. Then you make reductio ad absurdum arguments about pirates secretly paying creators. I've never understood your vehemence on this issue. Are you a creator? Are you employed by a record label? Does a kid you hate advocate piracy?
It's hard to have a serious discussion about this when you relate every topic back to support of piracy.
The aggregators love to argue that they're imposing defective technology to protect the creators, and conclude that unless they can use rootkits, DRM and tilt bits, musicians, filmmakers and other creators will all be much poorer, and less likely to create the works we all enjoy. Then they turn around and do everything in their power to reduce the payments they make to the creators.
Their position is hypocritical and counter-productive. And let me repeat, this statement is not an advocation of piracy.
So you opt for getting rid of the whole business, back to reading books?
Or are you suggesting the creators do have better means of protecting their property?
Or are you saying that robbers should never be punished since "only the stronger survive" and people who cannot protect their property don't deserve it anyway?
[sarcasm]Why yes, you have summarized my thinking perfectly! I am advocating a combination of primitivism and lawless economic Darwinism! How did you ever guess?
If a business cannot adapt to changing conditions, that business will wither and (eventually) die. The record labels, in particular, have been trying to turn back the technological clock for years, with little success. If they were willing to consider re-structuring their pricing, their approach, make music more of an impulse-convenience purchase, I think they would see a rapid expansion of their market share. Piracy is neither convenient nor intuitive; the majority of consumers would legally purchase music if the right conditions were laid out.
Maintaining an outmoded pricing model while suing your customers en masse is madness, pure and simple. It's possible that the major labels need to suffer a collapse to allow other structures to emerge. And let me repeat, this statement is not an advocation of piracy.
[edit]
Here's a good analysis of why content aggregators are in love with DRM. Please give it a gander (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070115-8616.html) before the next time you tell me I'm advocating piracy.
Privately, Hollywood admits DRM isn't about piracy
1/15/2007 9:59:18 AM, by Ken Fisher
For almost ten years now I have argued that digital rights management has little to do with piracy, but that is instead a carefully plotted ruse to undercut fair use and then create new revenue streams where there were previously none. I will briefly repeat my argument here before relating a prime example of it in the wild.
The theory
Access control technologies such as DRM create "scarcity" where there is immeasurable abundance, that is, in a world of digital reproduction. The early years saw tech such as CSS tapped to prevent the copying of DVDs, but DRM has become much more than that. It's now a behavioral modification scheme that permits this, prohibits that, monitors you, and auto-expires when. Oh, and sometimes you can to watch a video or listen to some music.
The basic point is that access control technologies are becoming more and more refined. To create new, desirable product markets (e.g., movies for portable digital devices), the studios have turned to DRM (and the law) to create the scarcity (illegality of ripping DVDs) needed to both create the need for it and sustain it. Rather than admit that this is what they're doing, they trot out bogus studies claiming that this is all caused by piracy. It's the classic nannying scheme: "Because some of you can't be trusted, everyone has to be treated this way." But everybody knows that this nanny is in it for her own interests.
Like all lies, there comes a point when the gig is up; the ruse is busted. For the movie studios, it's the moment they have to admit that it's not the piracy that worries them, but business models which don't squeeze every last cent out of customers.
In a nutshell: DRM's sole purpose is to maximize revenues by minimizing your rights and selling them back to you.
The history
History repeats itself, especially the bad parts. What I find most puzzling, however, is how history hasn't taught the movie industry this lesson yet.
In 1982, then-MPAA head Jack Valenti testified before the House of Representatives on the emerging phenomenon of VCR ownership. He famously said, "I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston Strangler is to the woman home alone." Valenti said this in response to a claim that the VCR would be the greatest friend the American film producer ever had. Valenti was vehement in his opposition to the idea that the VCR could be a good thing. He, and many in the industry, believed that it was fundamentally wrong to allow the public to make decisions for themselves about how to use a VCR. They even expressed worry that multiple people could watch the same movie on a VCR, but not all of them would have to pay. The idea of Joe User buying a movie for a fixed price and then inviting friends over to see it was anathema to the industry.
Yet by the late 1990s, sales of VHS movies were generating more revenue than movie ticket sales. DVD, the successor to VHS and Betamax, greatly widened the gap thanks to outstanding profit margins. The "Boston Strangler" was nowhere in sight. Of course, Hollywood lost the battle over the VCR, and its enemy became the best friend it ever had. That is, until behavior-modifying DRM was born, and Hollywood saw another chance to take a crack at the holy grail.
The practice
As a quick aside, let's put this piracy excuse to rest. You can easily find almost any DVD online, for free, because CSS has long been cracked and the movies uploaded. All of these new DRM schemes can't change that one simple fact: at least for the DVD market, a pirate's lifestyle is a matter of downloading some easily obtainable software. There is simply no evidence whatsoever that DRM slows piracy. In fact, all of the evidence suggests the opposite, and arguments that DRM "keeps honest people honest" are frankly insulting. If they're already honest, they don't need DRM.
So given the windfall generated by the VCR, which was followed by an even greater explosion in revenue thanks to DVD, why aren't popular services like the iTunes Store being embraced? At a time when TV networks are seeing ratings boosts and fattened profits thanks to downloadable video, how come Disney is still the only movie studio to release new releases on iTunes?
If we believe Ronald Grover's sources in his BusinessWeek article of last week (http://businessweek.com/print/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jan2007/db20070112_399642.htm), the problem is liberal DRM and not piracy, and this is a startling admission. According to him, an unnamed studio executive said that a major reason why studios weren't jumping on board with the iTunes Store and other similar services is that their DRM is too lax. "[Apple's] user rules just scare the heck out of us." It's not piracy that's the concern, it's their ability to control how you use the content you purchase.
As it turns out, five devices authorized for playback is too many, and the studios apparently believe that this is "just as bad" as piracy. Hollywood believes that iTunes Store customers will add their buddies' devices to their authorization list, and like evil communists, they'll share what they have purchased. This makes little sense, because the way iTunes works, you can only issue so many device authorizations at a time. You could share with a friend, but then your friend would have to be authorized to play all of your purchased content, taking up an authorization. Inconvenient, huh? But is it a big problem?
I can walk in to Best Buy right now, buy a DVD, and lend it to every person I know. Who hasn't lent a DVD to a friend or colleague? This is perfectly legal behavior, but you can see that Hollywood hopes to stop this kind of thing via DRM. Thanks to the DMCA, once copyrighted contents have been encrypted, your rights fly right out the window.
It sounds like a bad Hollywood tale: "In a world... where DRM is liberal... there's only one fowl that's not foul... Chicken Little. And the Sky. Is. Falling."
Blodrast
01-15-2007, 21:46
w000t, Lemur is supporting piracy!!!11!one:laugh4:
Whoulda thunk it ? :clown:
Husar, it's veeeery easy to swallow all their propaganda - and there's been plenty of it... Just think logically, would you expect them to say "we're doing this 'cause we're greedy money-grubbing bastards, and we wanna make you pay us as many times as possible for the same thing/service, over, and over, and over again" ?
Would you ?
No, of course not. So what should they say ? Why, of course, emotional appeals, and disguising the truth, work best. Hence the "pirates are robbing the poor artists" claims.
Hence the over and hyper-inflated figures that represent the "losses" that the movie and recording industry suffers because of piracy - and they backed out each and every time they were asked HOW they produced those numbers.
On-topic: I believe there is no such thing as bad publicity. Hence, the fact that HD-DVD was cracked will only make it more popular. Partly because this will increase awareness of it, what with it being in the news all the time - if you keep hearing about one thing, and not so much about the other, which one do you think you'll be more likely to buy ?
Also, quite a few of early technology adapters tend to be rather technical people (or even geeks), and to them the fact that it was cracked will be an added bonus. My two cents, of course.
Oh, one more thing about this DRM thingie: the content industry are literally shooting themselves in the foot with this, but not for the reasons you may believe (piracy, etc).
It's because by implementing things like DRM, they are literally handing the reins to Apple and Microsoft. Think about it, M$ and Apple will for all practical purposes control, what, 80-90% of the platforms that involve digital music and PC-related media.
For example, Apple can already do whatever they want regarding digital music, and the content industry can't do anything about it, because Apple owns like 80-90% of the market for digital music. It's Apple who's reaping the profits, not the content industry. And guess what, they can't easily switch over to another format or company, and why is that ? Why, because people are ALREADY locked in with iTunes, and Apple ALREADY has pretty much a monopoly on the market.
But hey, go for it, they deserve what they have coming.
Blodrast
01-15-2007, 22:02
One more thing, since earlier posts mentioned how bittorrent will die, etc.
Several businesses have been looking into adopting p2p and/or bittorrent as their channel of distribution. Why ? Easy - they can distribute things by using the customer's bandwidth, which not only will be more effective, but it will also be cheaper for the companies.
Also, as a counter argument to your claim that "bittorrent will die", did you know about this:
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/11/22/mpaa_bram_cohen_anno.html
Or about this ?
http://battleangel.org/2005/11/23/bram-cohen-mpaa-reach-agreement/
@blodrast, that's why noone uses the official bittorrent at all.
More interesting is the news of a bittorrent processing unit (http://games.internode.on.net/content.php?mode=news&id=724) which could allow its use in mobiles and the like
You forgot to turn on your mode.
I'm sorry.:shame:
On the one hand, you agree that one can hate DRM without supporting piracy. Then you make reductio ad absurdum arguments about pirates secretly paying creators. I've never understood your vehemence on this issue. Are you a creator? Are you employed by a record label? Does a kid you hate advocate piracy?
Oh, I'm having great fun.:2thumbsup:
My vehemence comes from people who actually laugh at me, telling me that I were stupid to refuse getting games for free because I could. I highly doubt such people would ever buy their games/music except if they were cheaper than the copying costs.
And I like making absurd "statements", it's a hobby of mine.~;)
But also notice that there was no statement, only questions.
The aggregators love to argue that they're imposing defective technology to protect the creators, and conclude that unless they can use rootkits, DRM and tilt bits, musicians, filmmakers and other creators will all be much poorer, and less likely to create the works we all enjoy. Then they turn around and do everything in their power to reduce the payments they make to the creators.
I'm not in the business, but aren't the contracts of creators anything to worry for us? A good creator should always find a smaller label that would happily promote him/her, no?
Their position is hypocritical and counter-productive. And let me repeat, this statement is not an advocation of piracy.
See above, and I didn't say you were advocating piracy.:sweatdrop:
[sarcasm]Why yes, you have summarized my thinking perfectly! I am advocating a combination of primitivism and lawless economic Darwinism! How did you ever guess?
I'm good, no?:laugh4:
If a business cannot adapt to changing conditions, that business will wither and (eventually) die. The record labels, in particular, have been trying to turn back the technological clock for years, with little success. If they were willing to consider re-structuring their pricing, their approach, make music more of an impulse-convenience purchase, I think they would see a rapid expansion of their market share. Piracy is neither convenient nor intuitive; the majority of consumers would legally purchase music if the right conditions were laid out.
Well, the endless amounts of CDs on hold in my Amazon shopping card prove that it is quite an expensive business but punishing a company can sometimes mean to abstain from their good products, using illegal means to enjoy their good stuff while punishing them is simply not right.
I want a couch, a couch is expensive, but I cannot just put one into my computer and copy it so would stealing one be a good idea? Obviously the company producing the couch wants to rip me off and probably rips the south american woodcutters off as well, not to mention they destroy the rainforest. I know, piracy is not stealing per definition, but pirating a couch is a bit hard to do, isn't it? I'm not saying you advocate piracy, I'm thinking you defend it, what many customers "would" do is hard to say, like I said above, as long as copying is cheaper, it simply IS cheaper and many know that.
Maintaining an outmoded pricing model while suing your customers en masse is madness, pure and simple. It's possible that the major labels need to suffer a collapse to allow other structures to emerge. And let me repeat, this statement is not an advocation of piracy.
That's probably right and not advocating piracy.
I was pretty upset when I had to abandon my DVD burner for a DVD drive only to be able to install Medieval 2 correctly, I think the Gothic 3 DVd now also works correctly, which it didn't before. Some copy protections are really bad and the hassle to get HD DVDs or Blu-Rays working and all the technicalities your hardware has to fulfill in order for all that to work simply means that I am likely to skip both formats unless I happen to get the hardware "accidentally" while upgrading my PC.
DVD mocies are now in the region of 20-25EUR for new movies here, if that trend will go upwards for the new formats, they can put them elsewhere, the high quality is nice, but that does not mean that the average movie will be fun for more than 90 minutes so I don't see why I should pay more for movies of the same length. I have always been very selective of the software, music and movies that I buy, I have maybe around 15 music CDs, 5 movie DVDs and probably hundreds of games, so my priorities are pretty obvious, especially the Total War series can entertain me for days, weeks and months, while some shooters are over after about 10 hours, now guess what I would prefer?(of course this is also dependant on taste and other factors)
You are pretty correct when you say they should try to rely on impulsive buys, if all new games cost 10EUR instead of 40-45, I'd be much more likely to just buy one if I felt bad or so but often I will still not do it because if I don't really want a game, it's not even worth 10EUR usually. Even if I bought 3 games then, they'd earn less than if I buy a single game now.:shrug:
w000t, Lemur is supporting piracy!!!11!one:laugh4:
Whoulda thunk it ? :clown:
Why I oughta ...
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v489/Lemurmania/6712529.png
There's a lively discussion over at Slashdot (http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/16/0244242&from=rss) about this topic, and it's not entirely on-sided. Best quote I've read thus far:
I do, however, also agree with the articles conclusion that DRM isn't about piracy, if only because it's so ineffective to be laughable. It's always been, and obviously so, to make the people who do spend, spend more than they should.
Why chase people who won't buy jack, when you can shaft the people who do for more? It's less effort.
:laugh4:
That's an excellent summation of the entire arguement :P
Update: Blu-Ray DRM has been defeated (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/23/blu-ray_drm_cracked/). Why do they bother with this stuff, anyway?
Blu-ray DRM defeated
Copy-protection cracked again
By John Leyden
Published Tuesday 23rd January 2007 17:39 GMT
The copy protection technology used by Blu-ray discs has been cracked by the same hacker who broke the DRM technology of rival HD DVD discs last month. The coder known as muslix64 used much the same plain text attack in both cases. By reading a key held in memory by a player playing a HD DVD disc he was able to decrypt the movie been played and render it as an MPEG 2 file.
The latest Blu-ray hack was performed by muslix64 using a media file provided by Janvitos, through the video resource site Doom9, and applied to a Blu-ray copy of the movie Lord of War. In this case, muslix64 didn't even need access to a Blu-ray player to nobble the DRM protection included on the title.
Both HD DVD and Blu-ray use HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) for playback display authentication and similar implementations of AACS (Advanced Access Content System) for content encryption.
The hack sidesteps, rather than defeats, the AACS encryption used as part of the content protection technology used by both next-generation DVD formats. The approach relies on obtaining a particular movie's unique "key" and can't therefor be trivially replicated to rip content across all titles encoded via a particular format, as tools like DVD Decryptor make easy with standard DVD titles.
muslix64 has however posted a 18KB tool that allows other to try their hand at extracting the keys of other Blu-ray Disc movies
BD+, the second type of content protection on Blu-ray, is yet to fall by crackers but this is something of a moot point today as the technology is yet to be widely applied on discs.
Blu-ray and HD DVD both allow for decryption keys to be updated in reaction to attacks, for example by making it impossible to play high-definition movies via playback software known to be weak or flawed. So muslix64 work has effectively sparked off a car-and-mouse game between hackers and the entertainment industry, where consumers are likely to face compatibility problems while footing the bill for the entertainment industry's insistence on pushing ultimately flawed DRM technology on an unwilling public.
Update: Blu-Ray DRM has been defeated (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/23/blu-ray_drm_cracked/). Why do they bother with this stuff, anyway?
Good to see that it's the honest, paying consumer that will be getting screwed again, no?
So muslix64 work has effectively sparked off a car-and-mouse game between hackers and the entertainment industry, where consumers are likely to face compatibility problems while footing the bill for the entertainment industry's insistence on pushing ultimately flawed DRM technology on an unwilling public.You've really got to appreciate the irony of how they respond to piracy: by making it more difficult and cumbersome for legitimate purchasers of content to use it.... brilliant. :wall:
Not that it matters, I'm steering well clear of both HD and BluRay for the foreseeable future. :yes:
Not that it matters, I'm steering well clear of both HD and BluRay for the foreseeable future. :yes:
Same here, the drives I have seen so far are way too expensive, as are the discs and on top of that, when playing back their content in Vista, it will screw around with your drivers or you will have to install certain drivers or whatever, which sounds really ugly. I'll simply stay with normal DVDs, I only have a 17" LCD anyway(1280*1024 max) and almost everything concerning HD is still very expensive.
Hussar the $199.99 (same price in Euro's probably) Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive is quite useable on an XP PC.
Not that it matters, I'm steering well clear of both HD and BluRay for the foreseeable future. :yes:
I might not steer clear. But it will be HD-DVD first though. The Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on is a fraction of the price of a stand alone player. And useable with XP PC's.
On another note Time Warners says, "Nuts to this format war!" Produces dual format disk. Called Total HD disk (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=1399684). In a nut shell it's BRD on one side HD-DVD on the other.
And the PS3 will be selling for $840 here in Europe, so not sure how it counts as a cheap Blue-Ray player anymore either...
Silly, silly Sony.
And the PS3 will be selling for $840 here in Europe, so not sure how it counts as a cheap Blue-Ray player anymore either...
Silly, silly Sony.
Can't say I feel very sorry for them
Hussar the $199.99 (same price in Euro's probably) Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive is quite useable on an XP PC.
You do realize that you just said approximately 200EUR for a simple reading device?
I already think 45EUR for a new DVD burner is quite an investment, now guess what I think about 200EUR for a read-only drive.
I'm saying Euros here because it seems like one can translate Dollar Prices to Euro prices and keep the numbers concerning computer hardware, despite the current exchange rate.:wall:
Can't say I feel very sorry for them
Well neither do I.
There is a brilliant record of hugely expensive, extravagent consoles failing dramatically. If Sony pull this off it'll be them being lucky, nothing else.
Not to say I don't want one, but it's far out of the impulse buy zone. Especially as it basically needs an HD TV with it. Assume you don't have one and you're looking at £1000 for a new set up and console. Compared to £180 for a Wii...
Even worse, you can buy a xbox360 and a Wii for that amount of money, what more do you need. There has yet to come a title that isn't superior on the 360 when compared to it's ps3 counterpart. It doesn't really need a HD-TV imho, it still looks fantastic on a good normal screen.
You do realize that you just said approximately 200EUR for a simple reading device?
I already think 45EUR for a new DVD burner is quite an investment, now guess what I think about 200EUR for a read-only drive.
I'm saying Euros here because it seems like one can translate Dollar Prices to Euro prices and keep the numbers concerning computer hardware, despite the current exchange rate.:wall:
Yeah they do just seem to repalce $ with th Euro sign. However the HD-DVD drive comes with King Kong. So really your paying 199.99 for the drive and software.
Yeah they do just seem to repalce $ with th Euro sign. However the HD-DVD drive comes with King Kong. So really your paying 199.99 for the drive and software.
And I could install that KingKong on a Windows computer?:inquisitive:
Movies count as software, in this instance. As BRD and HD-DVD are mostly used as movie platforms.
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