Re: Did Blu-ray score a goal in own net with BD+?

This is on IMDB.com today

Viacom Chief Calls For Greater Copyright Safeguards

Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman appeared to part ways with several other media executives -- including Apple's Steve Jobs and Les Moonves, his counterpart at corporate sibling CBS -- as he called for media companies to install more DRM safeguards and watermarks to combat piracy. Doing so, he said, "will usher in an unprecedented period of creative output across the globe." The techie website Techdirt commented that past efforts by media companies to force consumers to accept their current business model has only made the copyright problem worse. "Limiting what people can do and treating them like criminals diminishes value, rather than increases it," it said. Referring to Dauman's remarks, it concluded: "It's hard to craft a forward looking strategy for a rapidly changing market when your boss seems to have nearly all of his assumptions wrong."

Haven't these companies figured out yet that DRM just messes everything up? Ahem Sony rootkit. Just for kicks here's excerpt from an article of the first rootkit mess from Sony...

DRM this, Sony!

By Molly Wood, section editor, CNET.com
Thursday, November 3, 2005

Updated November 10, 2005

I hope this is the week that everyone in the world finds out what a root kit is. And I hope it's a week we look back on in amazement, as we consider just how far Sony was willing to go to criminalize consumers in its efforts to preserve control over its product. Because I believe this is the week that Sony effectively declared war on the consumer, announcing what most of us had already suspected: fair use is a joke in the movie and record industry, and the companies who control mass-market content will truly stop at nothing to protect their profits.

We're not gonna take it
But let me start at the beginning. On Monday, October 31, alert users discovered that Sony BMG is using copy-protected CDs to surreptitiously install its digital rights management technology onto PCs. You don't have to be ripping the CD, either--just playing it from your CD-ROM drive triggers the installation. The software installs itself as a root kit, which is a set of tools commonly used to make certain files and processes undetectable, and they're the favored tool of crackers who are, as Wikipedia puts it, attempting to "maintain access to a system for malicious purposes." In fact, root kits are often classified alongside Trojan horses. And Mark Russinovich, who created a root-kit detection utility and was one of the first to blog about the Sony intrusion, discovered another little gem when he tried to remove the DRM drivers. It broke his computer--disabling his CD drive.

So, let's make this a bit more explicit. You buy a CD. You put the CD into your PC in order to enjoy your music. Sony grabs this opportunity to sneak into your house like a virus and set up camp, and it leaves the backdoor open so that Sony or any other enterprising intruder can follow and have the run of the place. If you try to kick Sony out, it trashes the place.

And what does this software do once it's on your PC? It enacts unbelievably restrictive DRM, including possible incompatibility with computer CD-ROM players, DVD players, and car CD stereos. And in a deep-dive into the Sony end-user license agreement, the Electronic Frontier Foundation found some astonishing fine print. For example, if you lose the original CD or it's stolen, you lose the right to any digital copies you've made. You can't keep your music on computers at work. You must delete your songs if you move out of the country or if you file for bankruptcy. The list goes on and on. As for the artists whose names have been sullied by their association with the root kit, it seems that at least some of them didn't give permission to Sony to use the backdoor DRM technology and want no part of it.

thats nuts.

I appreciate you looking out for my well being, posters5. Fantastic Four 2, Halloween, Dracula and Day After Tomorrow all played exceptionally well on my stand alone player and my PS3. I couldn't speak for anyone else's technical difficulities. And I have to admit I only watched portions of FF2 and Tomorrow, but both of those BD's were flawless. In a related topic I see the Universal's big, end of the year release is going to be Timecop. WOW! I have to admit I'm impressed. Forget Jurassic Park or Jaws or even Back to the Future. Timecop. Because nothing says "buy me" to those day after Christmas consumers like Timecop. Yeah, if this doesn't indicate that Universal's catalog is beginning to run a little thin to those you who still own HD, then what will?

johnson316:

look at what universal is releasing on 11 december. that is the title that people will be buying as presents.

have you not seen the comparison screenshots on the internet? the blu-ray "dracula" looks atrocious.

eddie

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[Post edited by posters5 on Oct 3, 2007 - CDT 4:23 PM]

Which stand-alone player do you own?

Posters5, don't forget Robocop and The Fifth Element on bluray which weren't even as good as an upconverted DVD. They also had to be reissued.

falcon01:

oh, i didn't forget about those shoddy products...i'm just responding to johnson316's pride in owning one of the worst high-def discs ever. (Y)

eddie

Method Man: Live from the Sunset Strip is coming on 12/11. I don't judge. If that is something everyone is interested in owning then so be it.

and i own the bdps300 BD player

Thanks Johnson316 for confirming that FFour2 plays fine on the PS3 [which I own too], as I have this title in my Netflix rental acct.

What I'm curious to know, is IF the mandatory deadline for upgraded Blu-ray Java specs will be met my the manufacturers. As, did anyone hear the recent 10/1 news that the forthcoming Samsung Blu-ray players [including the "dual-format" HD player] are NOW CANCELLED/DELAYED? Did each fall victim to the continued problems with the mandatory requirement for the BD-Live feature?

Samsung Cancels BDP-2400 Blu-ray Player, Delays BD-UP5000 Dual-Format Player
http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Dual-Format_Players/Samsung/Report:_Samsung_Cancels_BDP-2400_Blu-ray_Player,_Delays_BD-UP5000_Dual-Format_Player/1020

-Love Hendrix! (The Loverboy)

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[Post edited by Love Hendrix! on Oct 3, 2007 - CDT 5:35 PM]