Sony's Digital Rights Mania finally lands them in court

[disso]

From memory longhorn was the codename for the new version of windows coming out. It has now been named Windows Vista.

As for changing OS, no one can force you, but as in the past, new driver and program releases will be less likely to support older versions of windows.

[rirsa]

Much as we all love to bash Microsoft, I'm not sure Microsoft is the issue here. The issue here is that next generation DVD will require a protected content path and without the technology MS is building into Vista you basically won't be able to view nevermind copy a Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. You'll also probably need a new TV and monitor to view this stuff as well so careful what you buy.

For more read:

http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/har.../hdcp-vista.ars

[A440]

Much as we all love to bash Microsoft, I'm not sure Microsoft is the issue here.

Well, cut through the corporate-speak here on the Microsoft site and it looks like they are trying to prevent as much user control as they can.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winhec/track...ediapcarch.mspx

This was before they changed Longhorn to Vista (an incredibly ironic name for an OS that's going to make it harder to watch video) and before they change Vista to (I stole this joke) Mom Apple Pie And Freedom OS.

An excerpt:

"Protected User-Mode Audio (PUMA) is the user-mode audio engine (completely new for Windows Longhorn) that runs in the software protected environment. PUMA also includes the same level of audio output protection management that Secondary Audio Programming (SAP) provides in Windows XP, but it is done in a completely different way and takes advantage of the Windows Longhorn software PE.

Protected Audio Path (PAP) is a longer term project to introduce audio encryption all the way to the audio codec chips."

Protected from whom? The users. Who are assumed to have such criminal intent that we should have our computers crippled all the way down to the chips. As SonicStage users, we already know how incredibly charming audio encryption can be.

Dex, I'm with you about not "upgrading." I am fond of a word processor, XyWrite, that dates back to DOS, was abandoned by its bankrupt vendor more than a decade ago and has been maintained by a fanatical little band of devotees.

Want to see their machinations? Look at http://www.serve.com/xywwweb They have extended this little, fast, efficient non-GUI DOS program (<640KB) into something that bends Windows to its will. It's so perverse it's beautiful.

XyWrite ran perfectly on Win 98, which had a DOS kernel, but Win XP fights it every inch of the way--before tweaking, it ran slower on my 1.6 Ghz VAIO than it did on my 75 Mhz Toshiba Libretto. Personally I think Microsoft deliberately made its DOS simulator slow and creaky. So I partitioned each new XP computer and used Win 98 until my latest: Sorry, no Win 98 video driver.

How do Linux users deal with the driver problem?

Edited November 29, 2005 by A440

[dex Otaku]

Incidentally, PUMA was in part developed to make utilities like Total Recorder impossible to implement in the future.

[Killroy]

When i was about 20 years old, the only possible way to make copies of my favourite music from vinyl was a cassette tape deck. Analogue copies in realtime, but not that bad however. DAT and MiniDisc have been a geat advantage at this times, with a high boost in sound quality and reliability.

In 10 years, when my son will be of that age, it seems like it will be the same for him; history always repeats itself...

But to help him out, I'll collect high quality playback and - especially - recording devices like some of our beloved MiniDisc recorders. The more DRM stuff they will add until down to the hardwarel level, the more precious high quality analogue recording devices will become, so handle your MD decks with care :-)

Pure accident, that the most popular and high sophisticated "streamline" audio devices like iPod or Creative Zen are NOT capable of high quality, uncompressed analogue-to-digital recording? I rather think, that their designers already included their vision of the future's perfect "pay-per-listen-and-don't-even-think-of-making-copies" media consumer too... (The beyond-future consumer will require an DRM-chip implanted straight into his head to be able to listen to DRM protected music, but that's hopefully still a long way to go...)

So, thanks to Sony for still offering affordable Minidisc recorders for advanced consumers who think a little bit about the future!

Chhers - Killroy.

[Deanage]

Pure accident, that the most popular and high sophisticated "streamline" audio devices like iPod or Creative Zen are NOT capable of high quality, uncompressed analogue-to-digital recording? I rather think, that their designers already included their vision of the future's perfect "pay-per-listen-and-don't-even-think-of-making-copies" media consumer too... (The beyond-future consumer will require an DRM-chip implanted straight into his head to be able to listen to DRM protected music, but that's hopefully still a long way to go...)

I see your point here. However, I can't agree with the Creative products not having a recording feature because of piracy. iPod, yes, because Apple have iTunes music downloads. Creative don't sell music downloads so why should they care what people do with their music?

My friend has a 20Gb Zen Touch (awesome playback device, except for the skittish touch pad), and he's had no trouble playing dodgy P2P aquired music on it. Maybe the technology isn't mature enough to make a portable HD recorder cheap enough for Joe consumer.

[emeb]

How do Linux users deal with the driver problem?

Several options:

1) Avoid hardware that isn't supported under Linux. This is the only option for critical subsystems (video, memory, disk I/O, etc). Typically, critical subsystems will be supported within a few months of general availability.

2) Live with non-functional hardware until a driver is available. Possible with optional peripherals (webcams, sound, scanners, etc). This can take sometimes take years. Or never...

3) Dig in an write your own driver. I've done this and it can be fairly entertaining, especially if you're lucky enough to attract other hackers to help.

Generally, if you're a Linux user (I am) you get used to checking these things before you put your money down, or you're shop at stores with a liberal return policy. In general I don't feel too left out, and for situations where there is no Linux support and never will be, there's always dual-booting to WinXX.

[rirsa]

See Mark's Premature Victory Declaration?

http://www.sysinternals.com/Blog/

includes more intersting material on SonyBMG Saga:

Turns out that F-Secure, SonyBMG and F4I were arguing over the issue some time before Russinovich went public:

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/con...1129_938966.htm

Also NY State's aggreesive AG is wondering why his people can still buy infected CDs at major store weeks after the recall:

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/con...1128_573560.htm

Also video of Texas AG filing suit against SonyBMG.

[SleepingInRlyeh]

WRT to MSFT DRM, if you look at what it does, I agree it tries a balancing act. The problem with any DRM is you need an end-to-end solution, which means the same DRM on your PC, devices, etc. so that any file you are licensed for can play on any of your devices.

If DRM is going to occur anyhow, this seems to be the least of all evils and approximates "fair use". If you look at iPod, you can only play their stuff on iPods or a PC / Mac. Same with Sony. Their DRM only works on PC/Mac and Sony devices. MSFT licenses its DRM, so you have more choices like iRiver, Creative, etc.

The Vista secure path as advertised would be seamless to the user. It means the kernel would be less hackable either by people like Sony/F4I or by hackers looking to circumvent the DRM. Most people aren't going to hack anything. They're going to buy a computer with MacOS, Vista, XP, or whatever. They will never notice a difference between Vista and current DRM like iTunes, Sony, WMedia, etc.

But, what they will notice is if they buy a new DVD and they can't play it either because their PC doesn't support the device or they "registered" it on their DVD player and it now won't work on their PC.

The saving grace there is that they will hopefully send it the way Divx (the copy-protection technology, not the CODEC) went by refusing to buy it.

As long as ears and eyes are analog, piracy will occur. Like the above poster mentioned, it may be with a casette deck and mike (or a video cam on a tripod pointed at a monitor), but the hardcore copiers will still do it. It just makes it harder for them.

If DRM is transparent to the user like iTunes or Windows Media, most people won't even notice it. Yeah, you'll get the vocal Linux zealots screaming about it because Linux won't be able to play certain files, but in reality they don't count because the amount of people running Linux on their computers is a negligable market share. The margins are pretty slim on media devices these days, so most companies are only going to support the largest market shares which are Mac and PC. Even Jobs had to support Windows to make iPods the success they are.

As a side note, the other thing is companies *love* DRM because it hooks you in. If you have an iPod, you have to buy your online music from iTunes. If you have a MD, you have to buy it from Connect. And if you have a WMedia device, you have to buy it from Napster, etc. So you have the love triangle of Music Vendor - Device Manufacturer - DRM/Format Provider. They all make money off of each other and are dependent on each other.

Being more Sony specific, Sony and Apple are kind of alike in this way. Both are the vendor/device maker/DRM-Format provider in one house. The difference is Sony BMG makes Sony DRM-fascist which hurts them against Apple. Apple (Computers) doesn't have a record label, so they're more concerned with making the customer happy with the DRM experience even if it means a few ripped-off songs.

In the end, DRM is here to stay. Anyone who does it right (Apple, WindowsMedia) will have success. Anyone who does it wrong (Sony) will pay a price. Vista, Blu-Ray, etc. will be interesting. It will be interesting to see who gets it right and who makes mistakes. I bet Vista gets it right and Blu-Ray etc. are rejected by consumers.

That's my hope, anyhow.

[A440]

I hope DRM is not here to stay. It's snake oil. Pirates will get around it, and ordinary people will be infuriated by it. With any luck, it will also present legal problems because it violates the idea of fair use.

My hope is that Vista (which ought to be called Blinders) is roundly rejected by consumers who are presumptuous enough to think that when they buy a CD or a DVD they actually own it and can do whatever they want with it on their own computers. It's called the first-sale doctrine. The Sony DRM debacle ought to alert people--and legislators, too--that people don't like their computers calling the mothership every time they want to play a CD or doing mysterious things behind their backs.

Meanwhile, iPod isn't tied to iTunes DRM quite so tightly as Jobs seems to have convinced the labels. iPods wouldn't have sold as they have if you had to fill them exclusively from CDs you owned or from iTunes (20,000 songs from iTunes would make your iPod worth $20,000--which would be kind of a loss if you dropped it accidentally and broke the HD). iPod depends on mp3s and file-sharing (or CD borrowing/burning) to be a sensible economic choice for the consumer. That's obvious to anyone except a record executive.

Edited December 3, 2005 by A440

[zerodB]

DRM and OS issues aside, it seems that a new chapter in this saga has unfolded.

Yes, a new security risk has been discovered with DRM software in a different set of Sony/BMG Music CDs to the titles previously afflicted with the "rootkit" software. This security vulnerability involves copy-protection software made by a company called SunComm technologies, and can allow hackers to gain control of computers which have run this software.

At present, just under 30 CDs seem to be affected, including releases by Alicia Keys and "popera" group Amici Forever. (See here for a complete list of affected titles.)

But the scariest aspect of this latest news, is that these releases have been avaliable for quite a length of time now, the security flaw only having been discovered recently. We can speculate that this may have been due in part to the recent attention such copy-protection software has recently raised.

Fortunatley, Sony BMG have released a patch (available here).

So, I guess the main question to ask is: when will the fun ever stop?

-zerodB.

NEWS SOURCE: http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5984764.html

Edited December 7, 2005 by zerodB

[A440]

Sony BMG was a merger. Old Sony labels--Columbia and Epic--tend to use XCP. Old BMG labels--Arista, BNA, RCA, ATO--have been using Sunncomm for more than a year.

The Sunncomm is actually worse. If you haven't disabled Autorun, it plants itself in your computer BEFORE you see the licensing agreement that's supposed to offer you any choice.

The Electronic Freedom Foundation has sued over the Sunncomm because that kind of behavior is clearly invasive.

Here are some details.

http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=936

"MediaMax phones home whenever you play a protected CD, automatically installs over 12 MB of software before even displaying an End User License Agreement, and fails to include an uninstaller."

Sony isn't the only company that uses MediaMax. Look carefully in the fine print on your CDs.

Also, Sony still hasn't provided any uninstaller for XCP. The guy who blew the whistle, Mark Russinovich, said he could easily write an uninstaller and he doesn't even have the source code. By not providing an uninstaller, Sony BMG Music has proved how little it cares about consumers.

http://www.sysinternals.com/Blog/

"I could write an uninstaller in an hour based on my own research of the software without access to the source code. They have source code and an existing uninstaller. I find the delay utterly inexcusable."

And Sony's supposed recall isn't exactly taking the CDs off the shelves, as New York's attorney general found.

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/con...ign_id=rss_tech

"It is unacceptable that more than three weeks after this serious vulnerability was revealed, these same CDs are still on shelves, during the busiest shopping days of the year," Spitzer said in a written statement.

Greed makes Sony do some very stupid things. I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Sony's head of technology, Phil Wiser, was a honcho in Liquid Audio, one of the early (failed) encrypted formats. He knows how this stuff works, so Sony's attempt to put all the blame on the copy-protection software vendors just doesn't ring true.

Edited December 7, 2005 by A440

[lyceemoliere]

Sony BMG was a merger. Old Sony labels--Columbia and Epic--tend to use XCP. Old BMG labels--Arista, BNA, RCA, ATO--have been using Sunncomm for more than a year.

The Sunncomm is actually worse. If you haven't disabled Autorun, it plants itself in your computer BEFORE you see the licensing agreement that's supposed to offer you any choice.

The Electronic Freedom Foundation has sued over the Sunncomm because that kind of behavior is clearly invasive.

Here are some details.

http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=936

"MediaMax phones home whenever you play a protected CD, automatically installs over 12 MB of software before even displaying an End User License Agreement, and fails to include an uninstaller."

Sony isn't the only company that uses MediaMax. Look carefully in the fine print on your CDs.

Also, Sony still hasn't provided any uninstaller for XCP. The guy who blew the whistle, Mark Russinovich, said he could easily write an uninstaller and he doesn't even have the source code. By not providing an uninstaller, Sony BMG Music has proved how little it cares about consumers.

http://www.sysinternals.com/Blog/

"I could write an uninstaller in an hour based on my own research of the software without access to the source code. They have source code and an existing uninstaller. I find the delay utterly inexcusable."

And Sony's supposed recall isn't exactly taking the CDs off the shelves, as New York's attorney general found.

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/con...ign_id=rss_tech

"It is unacceptable that more than three weeks after this serious vulnerability was revealed, these same CDs are still on shelves, during the busiest shopping days of the year," Spitzer said in a written statement.

Greed makes Sony do some very stupid things. I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Sony's head of technology, Phil Wiser, was a honcho in Liquid Audio, one of the early (failed) encrypted formats. He knows how this stuff works, so Sony's attempt to put all the blame on the copy-protection software vendors just doesn't ring true.

Does the above mean that there are even more cds that may have released gremlins than were described a few postings back? If so- is there a list of companies and/or cds that we can check our cd collection against?

(I asked a similar question above and there appeared at that time to be a very limited list of cds with thewse gremlins) Does this mean that theres a larger list to check? Or worse still- no accurate list to check? Are there computer files to check for and where would one find these?)

BTW- Hooray for Spitzer!!!!

[A440]

Does the above mean that there are even more cds that may have released gremlins?

Yes indeedy. We've all been software guinea pigs for a while. Most are labeled with that circle/triangle Copy Protected logo, but it's beter not to Autorun ANY CD, regardless of labeling. Turn Autorun off as detailed above, or if you want to live dangerously, hold the Shift key down while inserting to disable Autorun in that particular instance.

To look at a CD, put it in your CD drive and Explore it. Anything but .cda or .wav files is suspect, particularly if there's an autorun.exe on the disc or anything called mediaplayer or something like that. .mp3, .mpg or flash (.swf) files are probably OK--just videos or added content--but be very suspicious of anything else.

Here's a list of Sunncomm CDs:

http://www.eff.org/IP/DRM/Sony-BMG/mediamaxlist.php

Here's Sony's list of XCP CDs:

US:

http://cp.sonybmg.com/xcp/english/titles.html

and for Canadians:

http://cp.sonybmg.com/xcp/canada/titles.html

If you have a poisoned CD and still want to hear the music, I suggest running CDEx to extract the audio and burn it onto a clean CD.

http://www.download.com/CDex/3000-2140_4-10226370.html

You're likely to see a list of audio tracks followed by a data track. Copy the audio tracks to a blank CD. Guess what the data track is?

[Syrius]

Would you believe me if I told you I dreamed of putting a music CD in my computer, then remembering about the XCP crap, and not being able to find the Shift key to disable auto run?

[dex Otaku]

see also http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/

asof today, more about the suncomm DRM there.

[hobgoblin]

there is a reason why you can turn autorun off (alltho the option is hidden in the most silly of places).

[dex Otaku]

Sidebar: http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Legal_Sony_gra...tising_backlash

[jadeclaw]

The incompetency of Sony BMG is reaching previously unfathomable heights:

MediaMax Bug Found; Patch Issued; Patch Suffers from Same Bug

And the advertising Grafittis could mean legal problems as well, as spraying walls is a violation of many city ordinances - even if the property owner has been payed for this vandalism.

[Continuity]

My friends at the office have been following this closely for quite some time now.

Want to know something funny? A co-worker rented Stealth the other day to watch at home. 27" computer screen with a TV tuner inside. Really sweet setup.

Reading up on all this stuff makes him paranoid... so he holds down the shift key when inserting the DVD into his comp. Guess what...

The comp wouldn't even read the DVD until the shift key was released.

Held it down for 15 minutes. As soon as he let go.. EULA.

New software from old copy protection mogul Macrovision it seems.

[rei-gouki]

... Reading up on all this stuff makes him paranoid... so he holds down the shift key when inserting the DVD into his comp. Guess what...

The comp wouldn't even read the DVD until the shift key was released.

Held it down for 15 minutes. As soon as he let go.. EULA.

New software from old copy protection mogul Macrovision it seems.

I get the feeling this could put a dent in Microsoft's ability to sell XP - Media Center Edition (and anything they want to flog along that vein) as well as other companies ability to sell computers as an integrated AV solutions to huge video libraries. This probably means anyone who wishes to watch anything on a computer will be forced to make a clean copy. In recalling some of the antics at Ubersoft, a proprietry standard from an OS company could be forced on anyone wishing to make a DVD or CD that has "extras" for computers - afterall, we ARE talking about compromising security of an OS that is not originating from the copyright holder here.

That's not to say selling such devices can't be done... a setup that re-ghosts the PC Master HDD regularly would keep it relatively clean. Of course that's not to say some hacker won't find the access codes for any phone-home ability and have the recipient server spammed to death making it irrelevant.

... hmm... still, the problem stated is intriging. If access to the DVD drive is disabled while the EULA is up, I would suppose there would be little hope. Otherwise, there should be little problem.

[zerodB]

New news: It appears the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool for December (on Windows Update) removes the XPCD rootkit mess.

[hobgoblin]

they took their sweet time...

[KrazyIvan]

My friends at the office have been following this closely for quite some time now.

Want to know something funny? A co-worker rented Stealth the other day to watch at home. 27" computer screen with a TV tuner inside. Really sweet setup.

Reading up on all this stuff makes him paranoid... so he holds down the shift key when inserting the DVD into his comp. Guess what...

The comp wouldn't even read the DVD until the shift key was released.

Held it down for 15 minutes. As soon as he let go.. EULA.

New software from old copy protection mogul Macrovision it seems.

Hmmm. I guess "AnyDVD" saved me then. I just played it in my computer. No EULA.

[jadeclaw]

Sunncomm an outfit, specifically designed to defraud investors of their hard earned money?

Stumbled over this article on p2pnet.net.

It lists the shady history of Sunncomm in detail,

showing the tell tale signs of a complicated pump and dump scheme.

Edited December 20, 2005 by jadeclaw

[rirsa]

Unsettled by the Sony Settlement

http://weblog.infoworld.com/foster/2005/12/30.html