Thrush

iTrader: (1)

Chatting at work got me thinking..... DRM and file encrpytion - what a load of bollocks!

Look back in the day, after the vinyl era, media became so easy to copy.

Cassettes - no DRM or hardware/software restrictions, and a cassette player with less than 2 cassette slots was unheard of!

Video (VHS) - as above, tho double VHS machines were quite rare... Still nothing to stop you copying a VHS tape

Recording from TV onto VHS - in the 80's a US High Court ruled it was not copy infringement at all and totally legal....

Move onto the optical age;

CD's - initially weren't copyable, but of course that soon changed : CD copier hardware stand alone units flooded the market, computers with CD burners and ripping software are commonplace - nearly every major OS release supports this as standard - just look at Windows Media Player

DVD's - these were harder to crack, with file encryption steadily getting more and more intricate. Of course software became available to copy the majority of DVD's, rip them, re-encode, etc. We are led to belive these are not completely legal, yet it seems with the publicness of them and availability seems to denote they are allowed to be used... Stand alone DVD recorders come along soon after DVD burners in computers, tho again Copy Protection built into DVD's made them not massively popular (the stand alone)

Onto the digital age;

"legal" MP3 and AVI/video codec downloads such as iTunes are DRM'd to the hilt - you pay for music from iTunes you can't do fuck all with it except use it on your one computer and your ipod. And thats it. Can't send it to your mate, can't put it on your girlfriends ipod, can't put it on your laptop to play when your at work.

Same with apps like BBC iplayer - you download a programme shown on BBC1 and you can only watch it on the computer it was downloaded to? WTF? How's that when it's so easy to record that programme from live TV to a PVR or DVD, or onto a computer using a DVB-T program, yet the download from iplayer is DRM'd?

And back to MP3/AAC music - I can pay £8.95 for a CD, or pay an equel ammount for an iTunes album download. Difference is tho, that CD can be played in any CD player in the world; any computer in the world; it can be ripped as many times as I want, put on as many other computers, ipods, phones, CD-R's, DVD-R's, usb flash keys as I want, yet my iTunes download, which cost the same but yet I don't get a physical "item" (so I end up with less) will only let me use it on my one computer and one iPod?

WTF?

Why do we take this? Why do we find it acceptable to see usage ability to be more and more restricted as time goes on? And we seem happy about it? No-one seems to do anything to stop it, other than the nerds that create the encryption-breaking software, but the man in the street doesn't know how to use this - my old dear doesn't even know what DRM is or does, let alone how to get around it....

I just don't get how/why we seem to think this is okay?

Sure, I can see it from the company's point - Apple sell this music in digital download form and don't want one person buying it, then giving it to a thousand people for free, but considering that is so easily done with CD's, and the prolificness of torrents etc, I don't get it?!?!?

I would never entertain buying a digital download if it is restricted by DRM. Look at play.com - no DRM at all, and in most cases, CHEAPER than iTunes! Now to me, THAT makes sense, iTunes doesn't...

I'm not advocating everyone go out and download music/films through illegal channels, and not pay for anything, but I don't think whats currently happening is right either....

Buy a DVD and you can watch it, your girlfriends mum can borrow it, you can watch it at work on a lazy day, take it on holiday with you and the kids can watch it when it's raining - or buy a movie download and you can only watch it sat at your desk on your little TFT monitor....

I could record a programme off BBC1 on either a PVR, VHS recorder or DVD recorder and watch it in any room of my house, or download it using FREE iPlayer service, but be restircted to watching it sat at my desk on a tiny TFT screen?!?!? I don't think so!

So I say again - WTF

Fil

buy... music or films errr

Jim Galbally

thrush, you dont think its a tad easier to copy and MP3 than it is a VHS?

ctrl+c , ctrl+v

collierm

Have to agree with what you've written. Personally, if I'm paying for something, I want a physical copy of it, its just too easy for some Yahoo to delete my purchase history, and if I delete the file, I'm fucked.

DRM is bollocks, RIAA and MPAA claim all sorts of financial bullshit, but piracy is nothing new, now they have tools to try and stop it whereas before they didn't, hence all the heavy handed tactics.

I'm looking forward to the new Amazon MP3 store, DRM free, its a great step for people who buy online. Me I'll stick to Vinyl and CD's.

turbotoaster

its a very strange thing really, as i havent paid for a movie or song in about 3yrs now and i dont think i ever will again, but i do have a 28" monitor so i suppose it is like im using a tv anyway(only £250 aswell, not a 28" tv)

I download full 1080p films and watch them, and because i dont have the disk i dont need to buy a ps3 or seperate bluray player to watch them which in turn saves me more money.

An example that id be very concerned about by buying movies or songs is the problem i had only a week ago, my hard drive died on me, now there was 30gb with of music and 150gb worth of videos, if i were to have paid all that money for them and suddenly my computer were to crash, what happens to all that, would i have lost it all and had to pay again?

Graham S1

As someone who still buys music the old fashioned way (physical product), can someone tell me, what happens, when you've purchased £££'s of songs from say iTunes, and you have a HD crash and it all gets wiped out. Can you download them for free again?

(edit- doh, just seen post above mine.)

Turbocabbie

technically at this time its still illegal to ripp a CD

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7176538.stm

with regards to downloaded and purchased digital music, loss of this is covered by many house insurances these days.. check with your insurer

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/07...ads_insurance/

RichieST

iTrader: (2)

Itunes creates back up discs for you. They don't actually contain playable mp3's, but all your files are compressed and stored for backup. I backuped all 750 songs i have on my itunes, it took 6 discs!

RSrussell

wow what an essay
someone has either too much time on their hands or are , well just sad

Thrush

iTrader: (1)

Jim - yes of course it is, but my point was back then there was nothing to stop you copying a VHS, and two video machines and scart cable was all you needed! Then double cassette decks came along and you just pushed two buttons - same with CD's onto tape - two buttons and off it went. Then CD's to CD's, then it's one button to rip, and another to burn.... Thats my point, not how easy it is or was, but the lack of physical prevention - comparred to today when we all seem to be very happy that things have gone BACKWARDS in terms of userbility and what you can do with the media you have paid for and own....

Turbotoaster + Graham - personally, I think anyone who has a lot of digital media stored on HDD's and doesn't back them up is a fool. I have loads of MP3's and video's on HDD's, as I have three computers so it's far easier to watch a film via the media PC plugged into my TV and play music from it, than using DVD players or constantly changing CD's all the time. So I also have two backups of each meda type. I have a seperate USB HDD with a back up of everything on it, and my ipod also contains all my music, so I see it as highly unlikely, although not impossible, that my main server HDD will fail at the same time as my backup HDD and my ipod.....

Russell - erm, both