The Finnish parliament returned the controversial new copyright law proposal back to the ministry which originally drafted the proposal. The proposal was based on EUCD(European Union Copyright Directive) that wa supposed to be implemented in national legislation in all EU member states by 22nd of December, 2002.
Only two countries have so far implemented the EUCD requirements into their legislations -- Denmark and Greece. The Finnish proposal for national copyright law was criticized mostly because of vague wording in various important sections. After the parliamentary hearing today, the proposal was returned back to the ministry, after heavy criticism from PMs.
Vice chairman of Finnish Conservative Party, Mr. Jyrki Katainen, confirmed that the very rare dismissal was caused by the extreme unclearness of the law proposal. Unclear legislation with sentences upto 2 years in prison would have posed a serious risk to unitended citizens.
According to Finnish digital rights group, EFFi, there's a small risk that the next proposal could damage the small victories consumer right groups managed to get in to the now-dismissed proposal -- Finnish version of the EUCD implementation clearly stated for example that DVD region coding can't be considered as an effective copy protection mechanism and would therefor be legal to circumvent. But according to EFFi's vice chairman, Mr. Ville Oksanen, it seems that Finnish parliament is pretty much against multinational corporations' wishes to tighten the control of "fair use rights" that consumers currently have.
Internet access provider Verizon Communications has asked the appeals court to block a previous court ruling that forces Verizon to disclose the identity of a P2P user to RIAA.
"Verizon will use every legal means to protect its subscribers' privacy," said John Thorne, a senior vice president for Verizon. "If this ruling stands, consumers will be caught in a digital dragnet, not only from record companies alleging infringement of their copyright monopolies, but from anyone who can fill out a simple form."
Verizon does not oppose disclosing the identity of the customer, but the legal methods used by RIAA to request it. RIAA is trying to use fast legal procedures provided by the DMCA to get the name of the pirate. Verizon sees that it violates the privacy of their customers and insists that RIAA must file a lawsuit before getting anything.
If RIAA has its way, they could obtain the identities of thousands of users at a whim.
A company called ClearPlay offers currently a service that allows (paranoid...) American consumers to "sanitize" their DVD movies when they play their DVDs on their PCs. Now their plan to enter the stand-alone player market is threatened by the movie industry.
The service, which costs $7.95 a month, allows users to download filters to over 300 popular DVD titles and when applied, filters will filter out the American equivalent of Devil himself -- the magic F word(let's say it all together.. FUCK) -- as well as nudity, violence, "profane references to a deity" or anything else that could disturb a clean, good citizens.
Now the company plans to launch their stand-alone DVD player, aimed for masses that aren't interested of using PCs for movie watching purposes. But Hollywood is against the idea. According to the MPAA and the Directors Guild of America, the movie should be watched as intended, not censored by a company who has its own views of what is acceptable or not. Eight major studios have sued the company in last month, trying to block the player from entering the markets.
The whole debate raises interesting questions: consumer should have the right to decide how s/he wants to watch the movie s/he has bought. But then again, by filtering the fuck words from the movie doesn't really change the underlying structure of the movie at all -- so, if the movie is about horrors of Holochaust or something similiar, removing nudity and "fuck"s from the movie don't make the movie suitable for six-year-olds in any way. And also, there should be something like artist's rights that allows the director to decide how his movie should be screened. And don't the movies carry the age recommendation labels already -- if the movie is R, is there really any point try to make it PG by removing big, maybe even critical, amount of content from it and therefor essentially altering the movie itself.
Development team of FLAC(or Free Lossless Audio Codec) has decided to join forces with Xiph, the development organization behind Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Theora, IceCast and various other free-of-charge open source multimedia platforms.
FLAC is a fine addition to the existing Xiph family of multimedia platforms as it doesn't compete with lossy compression codecs such as Ogg Vorbis. The "Lossless" in its name means that the encoded music doesn't lose any information whatsoever and can be brought back to the original quality by simply decoding the file. This is not the case with lossy formats, such as MP3, Ogg Vorbis in audio world or in video world, DivX and MPEG-2. In lossy formats, part of the original audio (or video) is actually removed, the material will be twisted and changed to "sound like" the original, but not exactly like the original. And lossy formats can't be decoded back to match the original files. The difference is somewhat like making a 500-page novel into smaller size by using smaller characters -- that would be lossless, since it is in smaller physical size, but all the information is still there -- compared to an Reader's Digest abbrevation of a novel -- the story is pretty much the same, but you can't start guessing all the details that are missing and therefor can't be an identical version to the original.
Prassi Software has most colorful history. Their Prassi CD Replicator was one of the first CD-R softwares that was able to handle the primitive CD protections that were emerging in the software market and considered very good piece of software. But Prassi was sued by Adaptec/Roxio, for utilizing their technology, and Prassi lost the case.
Prassi came back as Prassi Europe and with the Prassi Primo product line, including CD-R and DVD solutions. The PrimoCD wasn't too impressive, but PrimoDVD is a very competitive product, and favored by PS2 users. And then Prassi Europe was aquired by Veritas.
But now, from out of nowhere, the guys make an announcement at Prassi.com.
January, 2003 - Prassi is back
Two years passed already since the selling of Prassi Europe and Px Engine technology to Veritas Software. We finished our consulting there and we are now back again on our own with a blank sheet of paper in front of us.
The software market changed dramatically. Nevertheless, we believe that we can again build and maintain compelling software for the optical storage industry. We intend to do this in a modern, not aggressive, and sustainable manner. In the next few weeks we'll have a new business plan.
easyInternetcafé chain has been found quilty of copyright infringement by British High Court. The chain allowed users to access music download sources on the Internet, and burn the downloaded files on CD for a fee of £5 (about $8).
The British Phonographic Industry (BPI), Sony Music, EMI, and Universal Music Entertainment started fighting the service already 18 months ago. EasyInternetcafé withdrew the service, but BPI still demanded compensation thought to be up to one million pounds ($1.5M). The court, however, did not set any penalties yet.
EasyInternetcafé is a part of the easyGroup, founded by Stelios Haji-Ioannou. He is also behind companies like easyCar, easyJet, and Stelman Tankers. Haji-Ioannou will appeal against the judgement.
Software maker Lindows, founded by the MP3.com founder Michael Robertson, has launched its attack against Microsoft's Media Center XP by releasing a low-cost PC with iDot that comes bundled with LindowsOS v3.0 and various multimedia applications.
Computer's prices start from $399 without a monitor and it includes software tools for DVD and MP3 playback as well as other multimedia formats. According to the Lindows, the computer boots in 10secs and can be used with on-screen menus by using mouse or keyboard. Computer can be attached to a regular TV and uses low-cost PC parts from Via and other manufacturers. The computer is about the size of a thick phonebook.
According to various surveys, so-called "Home Theater PCs" are gaining momentum and while most of the users still prefer to build their own HTPC systems, brand name manufacturers are jumping into the bandwagon with Media Center XP PCs.
MPEG-4, a "new" audio and video standard, developed by the Moving Pictures Expert Group, is getting its final pieces together and standardized. ISMA(Internet Streaming Media Alliance) is planning to standardize MPEG-4 DRM specifications as soon as possible.
Lack of standardized DRM has been sought as the final obstacle in wide-spread use of MPEG-4 in commercial applications such as video-on-demand over TCP/IP networks.
According to ISMA, alliance has had extensive talks with Hollywood studios over the proposed DRM specifications and has hear lots of praises for its open DRM architecture ("open" being in different meaning as in "open source", rather meaning "anyone can license it by coughing up enough money") and overall MPEG-4 standards.
A german website Heise-News reports that Yamaha would stop manufacturing CD-R drives. Accordng to the source Yamaha's primary focus would be musical instruments and consumer products. The reason of this decision is the competitive pressure of cheapo manofacturers.
I would have imagined that a news item like this would had attention from bigger websites. On the other hand, our Yamaha contact told us earlier that Yamaha is about to relase a DVD writer.
The market position of DivX MPEG-4 codec is getting stronger and stronger. Cyberlink produces on of the most popular video software titles, like the PowerDVD player, and the addition of DivX should be mutually quite beneficial.
Cyberlink will integrate DivX video technology as the default MPEG-4 codec in all of its software products including PowerDVD, PowerDirector, PowerProducer, PowerVCR, StreamAuthor, VideoLive Mail, Medi@show, and Talking Show. These popular multimedia software products will be sold directly to consumers through CyberLink¡¦s retail and electronic software download (ESD) channels. Additionally, Cyberlink will distribute DivX powered software products through their wide-reaching original equipment manufacturers (OEM) channel to millions of consumers across the world. CyberLink and DivX will work together closely to deliver compelling software products to OEM manufacturers of PCs, digital video cameras, digital still cameras, video cards, and other widely used consumer hardware products.
Frank Bruvik, a Norwegian student from the city of Lillehammer, was found quilty of online piracy on Wednesday. Bruvik had developed a Web service that allowed visitors to download copyrighted music files simply by clicking links on his page Napster.no.
"This was the most high-profile piracy site in Norway for downloading music and an important victory for us," Saemund Fiskvik, director general of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry in Norway, told Reuters.
Bruvik was sued by IFPI, the Nordic Copyright Bureau, Norway's TONO performing rights society, and record labels, such as EMI, BMG, and Sony Music.
The fine ordered by the court was 100,000 Norwegian crowns (about $14,520). The original claim was five times larger than that.
"The ruling said it is illegal to distribute the links, but that it's legal to use them. That is a victory for all Internet users in Norway," said Bruvik's lawyer Stray Vyrje.
Recording Industry Association of America announced today that its chief executive, Hilary Rosen, will step down from her post by end of this year. According to the statement, she's leaving to spend more time with her family.
Rosen became CEO of the organization in 1998 and during her reign, the RIAA has transformed itself from the previous anonymity to become an acronym that is recognized worldwide and very often associated with various lawsuits the organization has fought during the last couple of years.
Rosen became a CEO when the Internet was rapidly growing and MP3s were approaching Joe Average's living room, although the Joe Average didn't know that yet in 1998. In 1999, a small start-up called Napster changed everything -- RIAA's world, people's thinking of what's legal and what's not and much, much more. Since then, the world of P2P has shadowed Rosen's organization while its members, the record labels, have failed miserabely to make any good out of the new technology and opportunities it offers.
Plextor, one of the leading companies for the development and production of CD-ROM drives, CD-Recorders and CD-ReWriters is expanding its range with the PX-504A, which writes DVD's at 4-speed, rewrites at 2.4-speed and reads at 12-speed.
The PX-504A comes in internal version with a Tray load mechanism.
The Retail package includes: PX-504A (DVD Recorder), 1 DVD+R disc, 1 DVD+R/W disc, E-IDE (ATAPI) cable, audio cable, Plextor CD/DVD Utility Software (PlexTools), Nero 5.5 and InCD recording software, Pinnacle Studio 8 software, PowerDVD software, 16-language manual.
The PX-504A is supported by a unique two-year On-Site Collect & Return** guarantee by Plextor, by which any inconveniences resulting from a defect are reduced to a minimum. The firmware is stored in FlashROM which makes it possible to quickly and easily upgrade to the latest version. CD TEXT is also completely supported.
With the PX-504A, the user has a perfect all-in-one product for creating own home videos, back-ups, composition of photograph collections, saving music...
RealNetworks has released the last piece in its open source multimedia streaming jigsaw by releasing the much-awaited Helix DNA Server as an open source product. Real made big headlines in last summer when it announced that it will release all of its media delivery products as open source.
Company released its client software, dubbed as Helix DNA Client and its encoding product, Helix DNA Producer, in last year and claims now that over 10,000 developers are already working with the products and developing their own customized versions of the tools.
Real has been locked in a long and expensive fight with Microsoft in order to dominate the rapidly growing multimedia market. Both companies have extended their reach to new areas, such as mobile phones, stand-alone multimedia players, etc. Both companies have also tried to lure the Hollywood and record labels to choose their platforms as the next industry standard for multimedia distribution in digital age.
The Finnish IT website Digitoday has published an interesting interview of two Direct Connect hub OPs. Here are some of the highlights translated. Nickname 'Gadget' is an OP of the Finnish FinX hub and 'General' maintains several Swedish hubs.
General bashes the Finnish for being careless and indeed people are if what he says is true. Gadget tries to bring out the good things that come out of Direct Connect communities.
General:
On my hubs there are hard drives of 12 Finnish companies currently shared for public. You Finns are plaqued with some kind of general stupidity: The number shared Finnish corporate files are much higher in comparison to other countries.
Best example are the AutoCAD designs of a company that are shared on a hub, which must be quite valuable. Why on earth do you share your online banking files or you medical record files?
I repeat – you are stupid folk and you do not know the meaning of data security.
Gadget:
All internet communications channels can be used for piracy. For example e-mail, FTP or instant messaging can be used to transfer copyrighted material just as easily as with Direct Connect.
Always when people gather to communicate, they form communities that are more productive than the individual separately. This is also the case in Direct Connect communities.
A federal judge decided today that American ISP, Verizon Communications has to disclose the name of the alleged P2P user in its network to RIAA.
Judge John Bates decided that according to the controversial DMCA law, Verizon has to disclose the identity of the user who RIAA suspects of using P2P networks for distributing illegal MP3s.
Verizon had suggested an alternative route, where copyright owners, such as RIAA, would sue anonymous "John Doe" and if found guilty of charges, the ISP would then disclose the user's identity, not earlier.
In a very unsurprising move, Norway's "white-collar crime" unit, Økokrim has decided to appeal the court decision earlier this month where the Norwegian court found that Jon Johansen didn't break the law when he allegedly "created" the controversial DeCSS tool.
According to Johansen's counsel, this wasn't a suprprise move. "There were signals from Økokrim quite early, that they would appeal and that they see this case as dealign with an important principle. We believe that the first verdict was extremely thorough, but that doesn't prevent them from appealing," he told to the press.
It's all about digital rights these days. Microsoft aims to add one more dominant market position to it's portfolio?
Microsoft has moved itself a little closer to its goal of becoming the entertainment industry's vendor of choice for Digital Rights Management. Today it announced the release of the Windows Media 9 Data Session Toolkit, together with key customers for the technology.
These include CD manufacturer MPO, which supplies several major music companies, Universal Music Group and EMI.
The point of the Data Session Toolkit is that (as its name suggests) you use it to create a second, data, session on CDs and DVDs. This is a protected Windows Media Audio session which can be used to control playback rights, and which can also be used to provide second session-only material, e.g. (as Microsoft sweetly suggests) "support for 5.1-channel surround sound through a PC running the Windows(r) XP operating system."
MPO general manager Philippe Thorel says the company intends to use the Toolkit alongside "our own Private Audio (tm) copy management system, to combine content protection with automatic control of consumer requests for private copying. We can now offer our record label customers the ability to deliver high-quality audio for PC playback as well as the opportunity to collect new revenue from consumers who wish to make additional secure copies of their music."
The next attempt to copy protect audio discs. Will they never get tires?
CANNES, FRANCE (MIDEM 2003) - January 19, 2003 - Macrovision Corporation (Nasdaq: MVSN), the world's leading developer and vendor of digital rights management ("DRM") and copy protection technologies, announced today that it will release the CDS-300™ multi-level protection and rights management solution for music CDs in 1Q 2003.
CDS-300 - the first combined Midbar/Macrovision product - provides multi-level security that inhibits unauthorized file sharing and piracy, while allowing consumers to make limited copies of rights-protected music CDs to their personal computers. With CDS-300, users can make a back-up copy of the original encrypted disc on any PC through the Microsoft® Windows Media® Player and listen to their music without the CD present.
CDS-300 includes the following features:
- Enables playability on PCs through the Microsoft Windows Media Player.
- Users may copy files to their Windows Media Library for playback without the original CD.
- Creates barriers to "open source" Red Book audio sessions.
- Music files will not play if distributed over the Internet or e-mailed.
- No Internet connection or additional plug-ins necessary for the consumer.
- Maintains original audio quality.
Hilary Rosen, the chairman and CEO of the RIAA, told press in Cannes, France that ISPs (Internet service providers) should pay RIAA and other copyright organizations "taxes" because their users use P2P networks -- and therefor distribute and download illegal music, movies, etc.
"We will hold ISPs more accountable. [..] Let's face it. They know there's a lot of demand for broadband simply because of the availability (of file-sharing)," Rosen said. Rosen suggested that a fee or "royalty payments" have to be imposed on ISPs and they can then pass the fees to their customers.
Because it is virtually impossible for ISP's to monitor who uses P2P networks and who don't -- and who use P2P networks for legal purposes and who don't --, it would basically mean that all users would have to be charged for the "RIAA tax", whether they do anything illegal or not.
High Fidelity Review posts mosts interesting news from the CES2003. According to the source, audio CD compatible DVD-Audio.
Intial release seems to be based on dual sided mastering, which makes very much sense. Of course this would hurt the usability a bit (handling, etc.). But in the future the source promises a single sided solution. The compatibility with CD audio would definitely soften the shift from CD to DVD based home audio.
It seems that Finnish equivalents of American RIAA, Teosto, which represents songwriters and publishers, and Gramex, which represents music producers and artists, want to force Finnish day nurseries to pay royalties every time nursery staff sings along with kids.
Currently most of the Finnish cities have an existing deal with Gramex to use pre-recorded music in government-owned day nurseries. But now it seems that also Teosto wants to have its slice. According to Teosto's rep, every "musical performance" that uses copyrighted songs -- including sing-along by staff with the kids -- should be liable of paying royalties to Teosto. Also Gramex wants to force the private (those not owned by government) day nurseries to pay for the records they use in nurseries.
In last year both organizations demanded Finnish government to abolish the system that allows churches to use religious hymns without royalties, even if the songs would normally require royalties to be paid (the copyrights cease 70 years after the original composer's death).
Ok, the news that shocked the world yesterday, are now clearer. RIAA really made a deal with large tech companies and dropped its support for so-called "Hollings' bill" and similiar legislation modifications that would require tech companies to implement hardware and software-based copy protection mechanisms to all consumer products.
But the deal has its price. Technology companies agreed to support legislations that would allow copyright owners, such as RIAA, to hack P2P users' computers and spoof P2P networks. Tech giants also agreed to object any possible Congress proposals for broadening consumer "fair use rights" to copyrighted material.
In Taiwan, where the government has declared a war against pirates, namely VideoCD pirates, the stakes are getting higher. In latest bootleg releases, such as 007: Die another day, the end credits have been replaced with text Catch me if you can, Chen Ding-nan!" Chen Ding-nan is Taiwan's justice minister.
"Their behavior is really rampant. But let me take advantage of this free propaganda via the media to again remind them that prosecutors never stop cracking down on piracy," said Chen when he was approached by reporters yesterday.
Mitsui continues to stay on the edge in CD-R media.
Mitsui Advanced Media, Inc. announces the release of their new 52X speed CD-R Media
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado.– January 1, 2003– Mitsui Advanced Media, Inc. (MAM) a subsidiary of Mitsui Chemicals America, Inc. and leading manufacturer of recordable (CD-R & DVD-R) media, today announced that their new 52x CD-R media will be available in January, 2003. The media will incorporate Mitsui’s patented Phthalocyanine dye and is rated for use in writers from speeds 1X to 52X. Phthtalocyanine dye was introduced by Mitsui Chemicals and has proven to deliver outstanding performance for speed, compatibility and longevity.
Memorex aims to hold to it's market share on the DVD recordables, and delivers high speed CD-RW's too.
LAS VEGAS, CES 2003, Booth 10736, Jan. 10 /PRNewswire/ -- Memorex Products, Inc., the industry sales leader of digital optical storage products, today announced 4x DVD and CD-RW 24x Ultra-Speed media, demonstrating its continued commitment to offer the highest capacity, highest speed recordable media. Memorex 4x DVD media and CD-RW Ultra Speed media burn at twice the speed currently available.
According to Wall Street Journal, the music industry association RIAA is about to join almighty technology companies, led by Intel, HP and Microsoft, to oppose so-called Hollings' bill which is strongly supported by the movie industry association MPAA.
The reasoning behind RIAA's possible decision to do so is not clear, since the Hollings bill basically would make it absolutely, totally illegal to copy or backup copyrighted material in the United States and would require hardware and software manufacturers to implement blocks to make it reality.
The addition of the other major immaterial industry against the proposed bill might be fatal to bill's future, since MPAA and RIAA are pretty much equal in size in terms of lobbying power and revenue.
Sand Video Inc. demonstrated a high-definition (1,920 x 1,080i), real-time H.264 decoder implemented on two Xilinx Inc. field-programmable gate arrays at the Consumer Electronics Show last week. The company promised to deliver commercial samples of a silicon implementation in Q4 of 2003.
H.264 is one of the competing encoding standards for the upcoming HD-DVD standard. DVD-Forum decided to go with the old red-laser technology with HD-DVD, which means that in order to provide high-definition picture, new codec has to be used in place of the current MPEG2. Red-laser technology severely limits the capacity of the storage medium and hence MPEG2 is out of question at higher resolutions.
Sand Video will be delivering both an H.264 encoder, and an H.264 encoder/decoder chip. The chips also decode MPEG2 video for full backwards compatibility. The company will also be providing a "companion chip", which will work with an existing MPEG-2 decoder IC. With the companion chip DVD-player manufacturers can easily add support for HD-DVD, should DVD-Forum go with H.264 for HD-DVD9.
Los Angeles federal judge ruled on last week's Friday in a landmark decision that the owner of Kazaa, Sharman Networks, can be sued in the United States.
The ruling is a landmark that many, many countries and companies have been watching carefully, since with this decision United States basically applies its own law to foreign companies and possibly also to foreign individuals if the ruling is going to be used also against Sharman Networks' executives.
Sharman Networks claimed that it can't be sued in the U.S., because company is headquartered in Australia, registered in small island of Tuvalu and runs all of its servers outside U.S. However, the judge decided that since many of the Kazaa's users are Americans and that most of the movie studios and record labels who are sueing it are American, it can be sued in the U.S.
Now, because of this decision, Sharman Networks' case will be bundled with the other FastTrack companies' cases. In so-called "FastTrack case", the movie and music industries (MPAA and RIAA) have sued three software companies who distribute P2P clients that connect with FastTrack P2P network; Sharman Networks, Streamcast (which owns Morpheus that used to use FastTrack network, but doesn't use it anymore) and Grokster.
Hackers are having fun with the RIAA. This time their site was hacked to promote file sharing tools, such as eMule and Kazaa.
-RIAA - 0wn3d by.... ;p
-oooh riaa want's to hack Filesharing -Users / Servers ? - better learn to secure your own server...
-Sorry Admin - had to deactivate ur accounts - they'll be reactivated after 2 hours
-greetz : Rage_X, BRAiNBUG, SyzL0rd, BSJ, PsychoD + all the others who want to stay anonymous :]
-wanna contact ? mailto:h4x0r0815@mail.ru
RealNetworks (Quote, Company Info) plans to hit the CES trade show floor Thursday with a new Helix DRM digital rights management technology touting support for the popular (and competing) MP3 and MPEG-4 formats, among others.
Helix DRM replaces the company's Media Commerce Suite (MCS), which provided DRM only for RealAudio and RealVideo formats, and is part of RealNetworks' ambitious open-source push for adoption among content producers and consumer electronics manufacturers.
RealNetworks VP of media systems Dan Sheeran told internetnews.com the decision to support competing formats with a DRM product would let content owners, for the first time, deliver secure content to any PC or non-PC device using a single DRM and a single engine to support all formats.
As with many undertakings by Real, the latest strategy shift puts the company nose-to-nose with Microsoft (Quote, Company Info), which has its own DRM product for its proprietary Windows Media format. Sheeran described Microsoft's DRM suite as "a distasteful offering" because it forced media and consumer electronic companies into using only the Windows Media format.
"Helix DRM is compelling because once you get beyond the PC, neither the Real or Windows media formats are dominant. On music players, the dominant ones are MP3 and on DVD players, it's MPEG. With Helix DRM, content producers can still protect the products, even in standards-based, non-proprietary formats," Sheeran said.
CDR-Zone.com reveals interesting news about a new Nero plug-in for latest generation Windows Media Player. Unfortunately they do not reveal the source of their news, but it appears to be straight from Ahead Software.
The Nero Fast Burning Plug-in enables the Windows Media Player 9.0 Series to burn CDs at full speed, up to 26 times faster than before, greatly decreasing the time it takes for each burning session. In addition, the plug-in will provide Windows Media Player 9.0 users the option of eliminating the two-second gap between audio tracks.
"Nero has always been synonymous with quality, and Ahead Software has developed a reputation as the leading CD/DVD software development company," states John Tafoya, Vice President of Business Development, Ahead Software Inc. "The winning combination of our high-quality Nero Fast CD-Burning Plug-in and Microsoft's Windows Media Player Series 9.0 provides a powerful tool for the consumer market."
The Nero Fast CD-Burning Plug-in will be available at no charge.
Lik-Sang is a major console accesories dealer and one of the most significant MOD chip dealers internationally. Recently they were forced to bring down their business by major console makers Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft.
Now Kcgeek.com publishes an interesting interview of Alex Kampl.
There are obvious positive effects to using a modchip on a console system. A $200 console suddenly becomes a fully functional uncrippled computer. Unfortunately, this very desirable effect looks to be in danger, by recent legal action taken against your and other's companies, as well as individuals. It seems logical that once the machine has been modded, its manufacturer would be under no further support obligation. In light of this...
To your knowledge, has it been made clear by manufacturers that this kind of modding merits further punitive action than discontinuing support and service(i.e., legal action)?
If not, is there a way that the clearly legitimate(under the understanding that purchase==property) uses of modchipping can be protected? If so, how?
Microsoft has released their latest version of the infamous media format. Previously Windows Media has been quite competitive in low bitrate video, but has been defeated by most other formats in audio. It will be interesting to see if v9 makes any change.
The release includes new player and encoder software.
REDMOND, Wash. -- Jan. 7, 2003 -- Today Microsoft Corp. announced the immediate availability of Windows Media® 9 Series, the next-generation digital media platform that offers benefits for hardware and software vendors, the media and entertainment industry, consumers in the home, and organizations looking to communicate and train more effectively.
Microsoft also announced a new licensing program for Windows Media Audio and Video 9 Series that enables device manufacturers and software developers to build high-quality digital audio and video features into a broader range of their products -- with longer terms and lower prices than those of other technologies such as MPEG-4 and MPEG-2.
Windows Media has been widely adopted by device manufacturers, software vendors and content providers, with more than 170 devices, hundreds of applications, and hundreds of thousands of popular songs and movies currently available supporting it. Today's release of Windows Media 9 Series and the new licensing program delivers on Microsoft's long-standing vision of enabling digital media everywhere. With innovations such as high-definition video at up to six times the resolution of DVD, the first 5.1-channel surround sound streaming audio, and a faster, more-televisionlike experience with media on the Web, Windows Media 9 Series provides dramatically improved media playback for all users and offers the most comprehensive platform features for hardware and software manufacturers, enabling them to build their own unique products and services.
Jon Lech Johansen, now 19, was found not quilty on Tuesday by the Norwegian court. Johansen was accused of violating computer break-in laws by contributing to the development of DeCSS, a tool that circumvents DVD copy protection.
"I'm very satisfied. We won support on all points. I had figured that we could win, but it can go either way," said Johansen after the verdict was read.
The three-member court was unanimous in its decision. Hollywood representatives will most likely appeal, because of the nature of the case. The ruling will set a model for courts around the world in future similar cases.
Mercury News has posted an interesting article about Sony's and Universal's commercial streaming service. It seems that there is quite a bit of doubt concerning the success of this kind of a business model.
Personally I think that if an online service would sell the music with reasonable pricing and in high sound quality, it might have plenty of potential customers. If you would get a commercial quality service with a fair pricetag, why bother hunting the files with P2P software?
2002 will be remembered as the year the recording industry showed it could sue and sell at the same time.
After trying only to shut down peer-to-peer networks on which their music is pirated, like the late Napster and its robust offspring Kazaa and LimeWire, the major labels have finally begun to compete with them.
Not all that successfully -- at least not yet. No one said that coaxing people to pay for what they can readily steal would be easy. Some analysts predict it will be futile.
But give them credit for the belated effort. The major labels have transferred much of their catalogs to the Internet. They have built a model, based on paid subscriptions, that they hope eventually will lure a generation of consumers who, by the labels' own fault, have come to view free music as a birthright.
Sony has announced a very innovative portable combo device.The beauty of the concept is that the same device provides both recording and playback.
December 2002 | Sony's new MPD-AP20U looks a lot like a DiscMan, and quite a bit like some recent laptop-market CD recorders, but its powers transcend such one-trick ponies. Combining CD recording and DVD-Video playback as a portable computer drive and—after a quick costume change in any handy phone booth—battery-powered MP3/Audio CD playback as a standalone CD player, this dual-identity drive "blurs the line between computer peripherals and CE devices," according to Sony IT Products marketing manager Robert DeMoulin.
The drive also illustrates Sony's current CD-R strategy, in that it stays out of the speed race (eschewing showy 48X specs for a comparably modest 24X), and emphasizes other value-adding attributes like portability, a Memory Stick slot, DVD-ROM playback, and standalone use as CD-Audio player with trendy MP3 capability. The drive also boasts 10X CD-RW recording, 24X CD read speed, 8X DVD-ROM reading, and an 8MB buffer to support data transfer in the most perilous of recording conditions. (Sony's BurnProof-equivalent buffer underrun-protection technology, Power-Burn, helps in this respect as well.) The Memory Stick slot (now a staple of Sony CD and DVD recorders) enables users to transfer content to CD-R from digital cameras or other devices that support the portable storage format, and also allows them to play back MP3 files stored on Memory Stick when the drive is in standalone mode.
The U.S. Supreme Court reversed an earlier temporary hold on a case involving DVD descrambling on Friday. The stay was initially requested by DVD CCA to prevent DeCSS sourcecode from being posted on the Web again. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a California Supreme Court decision ruling that the entertainment industry cannot force a Texas resident who published a software program on the Internet to stand trial in California.
The California Supreme Court decided on November 25, 2002, that Matthew Pavlovich, who republished an open source DVD-descrambling software program called DeCSS, will not have to defend a trade secret lawsuit simply because he knew that his publication could cause "general effects" on the motion picture and technology industries in California. The court laid out clear jurisdiction rules for claims arising from publishing information on the Internet.
"The entertainment companies should stop pretending that DeCSS is a secret," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "The Supreme Court wisely recognized that there is no need for an emergency stay to prevent Mr. Pavlovich from publishing DeCSS."
The Pavlovich decision is one piece of a larger legal struggle over Internet publication of DeCSS by thousands of individuals in fall 1999. European open source developers created DeCSS so they could play their DVDs on Linux computers among other uses. DVD CCA, the sole licensing entity for a DVD-scrambling technology called CSS, sued hundreds of named and unnamed individuals and entities in the case on December 27, 1999.
Internet access provider Verizon Communications has asked the appeals court to block a previous court ruling that forces Verizon to disclose the identity of a P2P user to RIAA.
A company called ClearPlay offers currently a service that allows (paranoid...) American consumers to "sanitize" their DVD movies when they play their DVDs on their PCs. Now their plan to enter the stand-alone player market is threatened by the movie industry.
