jleader  12-10-2002
04:13 PM ET (US)
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So they want a broadcast flag, and players will be allowed to produce digital output if they implement one of the protection technologies in table A. But there are no technologies in table A.
Is it just me, or does this prohibit digital output?
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Stephen Compall 12-10-2002
02:46 AM ET (US)
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Are they seriously proposing that open source software would be an acceptable way of complying with the BF?
Why not? In government, the unfortunate term open source is "open" to abuse. Note this example from the state of Kansas legislature:
``Make use of open-source software (OSS). OSS is software for which the source code is freely and publicly available, though the specific licensing agreements vary as to what one is allowed to do with that code.''
I felt this was one of the sneakiest bits of the CBDTPA, to "mandate" "open source" without bothering to define what that was. See section 3.d.2 in the CBDTPA: "any software portion of such standards is based on open source code."
For all we know, based on this bill, what some readers might take to mean Free software may as well turn out to be MS shared source. No modification permitted. Or no redistribution permitted. Or perhaps allowing only people who sign an NDA to look at it, or [insert yours here]....
Disclaimer: yes, I prefer the term free software, because open source is even more misleading than the term it purports to replace, and anyway I like the GNU philosophy better.
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Cory Doctorow 12-10-2002
02:39 AM ET (US)
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Table A was originally populated by technologies from DTLA, 4C and 5C -- the three technology groups that cooperated with the BF proposal. Rejected for inclusion on Table A were technologies from MSFT and Philips, who were not fighting Hollywood's fight during the negotiations. IOW, Hollywood proposed to ban their opponents technology and grant their friends an exclusive license on which output and recording methods might be used in DTV devices. This was VERY controversial in the co-chairs' final report and in Tauzin's DTV roundtables. Not surprising, then, that the MPAA emptied out the table when submitting it to the FCC.
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cypherpunks 12-10-2002
02:31 AM ET (US)
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I read to the very last page of the MPAA response before I found the infamous "Table A", the list of technologies for protecting digital content. The idea is that if a TV signal comes in that has the Broadcast Flag set, any device which outputs the digital content has to protect the data with a Table A technology. The report goes on and on about all the rules for adding new technologies to Table A, removing them, etc.
So I get to the last page, Table A, and guess what. Table A is empty! In all the time they've been working on this, the content companies apparently haven't been able to agree on even one technology that is good enough to protect their content.
It's like a shaggy dog story, a joke with a missing punch line. All this fuss about how we need the BF, we've got to implement it right away, no delaying now... and it turns out that the main piece of technology is missing! Let's launch that moon rocket... oh, we forgot to tell you, we never designed the engine. Just drop one in for us, okay?
This makes the MPAA look like a bunch of damn fools, more interested in getting the FCC to legislate their proposal than in actually hashing out the technical details of how it would work. That's a recipe for disaster. Hopefully the FCC has enough technological savvy to see that they are being asked to approve an unspecified and open-ended proposal. There's no basis for estimating the costs of this thing, for example, when nobody even knows yet what the technology is that it would mandate!
The content companies need to go back to their technical people and come up with a concrete proposal that doesn't have an enormous hole in it. Then we'll have some basis to judge what it means.
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Cory Doctorow 12-10-2002
01:47 AM ET (US)
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Yes, of course there's compression in the MPEG2 VOBs in an ATSC transport -- I'm talking about degrading a DTV signal through additional compression (i.e., DivX) and through downrezzing; IOW, turning a high-rez ATSC cap into something indistinguishable from the quarter-size, DivXed NTSC caps currently available online.
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cypherpunks 12-09-2002
11:37 PM ET (US)
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Here's a good line from their response, regarding the list of technologies authorized to protect digital content: "The proposal contains fair and carefully balanced procedures for continually adding new technologies to the list." [page 21]
Readers in the U.S. will be familiar with this phrase "fair and balanced"; it is the slogan of Fox News, a network known for the right-wing bias of its news coverage. It's gotten to the point where that phrase "fair and balance" carries an air of self-parody. I can't help wondering if a self-conscious smirk crossed the face of the lawyer as he penned this line. It's as though they described their proposals as leading to a "brave new world".
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brucee 12-09-2002
09:48 PM ET (US)
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And so Cory believes that there is no compression used in ATSC? Back to DTV school for you.
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Cory Doctorow 12-09-2002
08:53 PM ET (US)
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Cypherpunks, you're missing a nuance here. This is a fight about sharing uncompressed, high-resolution DTV programs over the net -- Hollywood's argument is that there is a new, *unprecendented* threat arising from DTV, which requires new, *unprecedented* measures. Sharing DTV caps at the same rez that NTSC caps are shared at is not a NEW threat.
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cypherpunks 12-09-2002
07:45 PM ET (US)
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Rich is right, it's a losing battle to argue that DV file sharing is impossible. Firstly you can compress it, and secondly people will have more bandwidth and storage available in the future. More fundamentally, it evades the real argument, which is what rights people should have with the content they receive.
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Rich Gibson 12-09-2002
03:32 PM ET (US)
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The cited report did the context shifting...
You mentioned 1gb+/hour...that is what Sonic Blue captures...about a gig/hour. Should that have been _10_ gb/hour?
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Cory Doctorow 12-09-2002
03:26 PM ET (US)
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For comparison, you can't fit even half of a 1080i feature film on a standard DVD.
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Cory Doctorow 12-09-2002
03:26 PM ET (US)
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You are missing context, Rich. The broadcast flag negotiation and the FCC rulemaking ONLY concern ATSC streams. It is only about DTV and DTV devices.
SonicBlue and other PVRs store 480i and lower res. This is 1080i video -- much higher res than ANYTHING stored on a PVR.
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Rich Gibson 12-09-2002
03:14 PM ET (US)
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Hey Cory,
The example sited did not say ATSC. When I read it, it says 'here is a way that infringement currently occurs.'
Storing 1GB+/h isn't particularly hard-that is all that Linux based Sonic Blue does. And it is all you do when you hook up your DV Camera to your off the shelf ibook...
And yes we do have p2p file sharing software installed. Your basic file sharing abilities are theheart of p2p. We don't have p2p search and discovery tools installed, no, but if you have windows, you have p2p. Out of the box. If you have a Mac, you have p2p. Out of the box.
Rendevouz makes it easier, but it is pretty easy for me to click the little antenna icon on my ibook and select 'create network'
But that is all an aside: of course we have the ability to share digital content, and that ability keeps getting easier and easier to do. They are right! And we can't 'win' by denying that fact.
The key is what you think about that ability. Sharing digital content is GREAT!
The Howler is them including this section in their report as if it is a bad thing!
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Cory Doctorow 12-09-2002
03:00 PM ET (US)
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Rich, how do you propose to hit record and infringe on a programme carried on an ATSC transport-stream without an ATSC card?
How do you plan to store 1GB+/h of HD 1080i without a drive array?
We don't ALL have P2P software installed. Most computer users NEVER install a single piece of software. Take a walk through the First Class cabin of the next plane you fly on -- all the suits are running Windows with the default wallpaper. Why do youy think that Netscape 4.X is still in use?
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Rich Gibson 12-09-2002
02:50 PM ET (US)
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Cory...it doesn't say 'ATSC' - it says 'for example' ie. For example, right now you can 'infringe' do this by pushing the record button and having an open share.
As for RAID Arrays and P2P software...neither of these are 'special,' nor in the specific example cited, are they necesary.
We _all_ have p2p software installed or available on our machines. We don't necesarily have clever tools for p2p content discovery, but the report is right...it is easy to share stuff.
The reply, to me, is: so what? Everyone can share content. That is a social good, so let's figure out how to make it so that enough people benefit so as to make it work.
Of course, the open source wouldn't be hindered argument is bogus! Half of it is true...developing security is a challenge, but the whole point of the BF is to require me to use the security-and that is impossible in an open source setting!
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cypherpunks 12-09-2002
02:20 PM ET (US)
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He didn't say you wouldn't "require" any special software, he said you wouldn't have to download it. The implication was that the video card might come with software that would compress the stream into a more useful form. Not owning such a card I don't know if that is true now, or will be true in the future.
I do agree that mandating the Broadcast Flag will complicate the job of all software and hardware developers, including open source developers. What I don't understand is how any such requirement can be enforced in open source software, when people could just edit out the enforcement provisions in their copy of the source. No doubt that would be illegal, but it would be awfully tempting to do.
Are they seriously proposing that open source software would be an acceptable way of complying with the BF? If so that would be an incentive for video card manufacturers to make their software available in open source form, winking at the aftermarket mods to remove the restrictions. This is like how many DVD players overseas have "secret" functionality to eliminate region restrictions, and the manufacturers "accidentally" let information leak about how to enable the overrides.
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