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Well, I don't know how true this is. My Girlfriend'ss mom goes to bingo and she buy movies that are pirated. Whether DVD rips converted to VCd format or movies, captured from the theathers (you see people getting up) and then converted to VCD. Now these people are in backwoods Kentucky and the lady is around 50 years old, so this isn't just limited to young people in College. Now she sales these CDs for around $3-5, depending on quality. I don't know the details of how she's doing all this, but some other people have asked and she's said she downloads some and using a program to convert others and that it's pretty easy.


With all do respect, anyone that's willing to watch a crappy quality VCD of a crappy recording with crappy audio is never going to bother with movie tickets or buying DVDs.

Besides, Hollywood makes plenty of money on movies on DVD (they generally make as much on DVD as they do in theaters).

As for ripping DVDs, those ahve DRM and it failed. The current content has DRM and it's been broken (and hardly anyone has HD players yet). DRM isn't the answer and frankly there's no way to stop the theft. In the 80's we rented movies and we copied them. They put macrovision on it and we iether tolerated it or bought a box that stripped the macrovision out (which was sometimes needed just to playback movies).

I think the main reason there's a slowing of growth in DVDs is because peope have the old movies they replaced and because the studios have started charging much more for 2 disk versions. I know I took a pass on the last Harry Potter DVD, because the version I wanted cost much more than it had in the past. I think it's less now, and I may pick it up one of these days, but I'm not willing to pay 5 or 10 bucks extra to see the extras that I'll only watch once (in most cases) and I'm unwilling to buy a stripped down version at all.

I don't steal it....I jsut don't buy it (and I use to buy severa dvd's a month).

Well, that is the funny thing of it. They have Movie night normally twice a month. And they buy more DVDs then most other people I know. They work more under the rule of, Try before I buy. The movies they really want to see, they go to the movies, after that they rent movies and then they Buy the ones they enjoyed best.

The ones that don't know about or think won't be that good, they buy the cheapo VCD versions. Their reasoning is the same I've heard from people who download video games. And that is, they should be paying me to watch this. I'm doign them a favor by playing\watching it.

Of course, most anti piracy methods aren't going to completely stop anything. It's much like in Virginia where it is against the law to have a radar detector. It doesn't stop people from speeding, it just makes it easier to catch people.

This DRM isn't going to stopped the focused groups, but I do believe they will make it a royal pain in the ass for most, and the casual thief will find it too much trouble.

Why is everyone blaming Microsoft ? They certainly didn't initiate DRM. And remember that the DMCA was enacted on May 14, 1998. Yeah, it's taken 9 years for this to finally get into the OS ! And how about starting with Sony ? All Microsoft is doing is obeying the laws that have been enacted since everyone started downloading illegal content from the internet. Do you think even Microsoft wants to tangle with Sony on the issue of DRM which they would certainly loose ? And it's all a knee-jerk reaction however one that was bound to come given the trillions of dollars companies have lost to piracy. The pendulum always swings to the extremes when first set in motion. Hopefully in about 15~20 years there will be some median point where all can agree on what is fair use. The companies providing the content need to realize that they're missing out on a great market and the end users need to remember the law and how it relates to copyright. Something that most people have absolutely no clue on.

I'm not terribly concerned about how much trouble the DRM causes "casual theives". When I think of DRM, I think of how much more difficult it makes it for me to use the content that I purchase. How can I set up a nice movie library on my computer if the content comes wrapped in layers of DRM? Well, I still can, but I have to jump through hoops and subvert the law to do it.

Why is Microsoft advertising fantastic ideas such as virtualising your office PC so that it can act as a media server as well and wirelessly stream entertainment content to your living room if you'd have to break the law just to load that media server with content? Did I break the law when I made mp3 copies of my CD collection to load on my HTPC and portable mp3 player? This is a bum wrap.

I'm not terribly concerned about how much trouble the DRM causes "casual theives". When I think of DRM, I think of how much more difficult it makes it for me to use the content that I purchase. How can I set up a nice movie library on my computer if the content comes wrapped in layers of DRM? Well, I still can, but I have to jump through hoops and subvert the law to do it.

Why is Microsoft advertising fantastic ideas such as virtualising your office PC so that it can act as a media server as well and wirelessly stream entertainment content to your living room if you'd have to break the law just to load that media server with content? Did I break the law when I made mp3 copies of my CD collection to load on my HTPC and portable mp3 player? This is a bum wrap.

For some reason I thought we were going to be able to move movies onto LANs.

As for copying your CDs.....if the RIAA had their way it'd be illegal. The MPAA just happens to have managed to put DRM on content in such a way that it is illegal (in theory, as I'm not sure that backing up a DVD has ever been tested).

You hit the nail on the head.

Unless you've got some links to info that I've never seen, that's not MS, that's the studios that produce HD content.

As I understand the issues, your choices are no DRM, and no support for HD DVD/Blu-Ray in full resolution (if the studios turn the flags on) or you get DRM.

I don't like it, but these standards are being forced on MS (and presumably Apple) by the MPAA.

Respectfully, that is BS. M$ is attempting to control the HDCP channel. The MPAA can't force anything. Here is the link to the article with all of the scary information. Pleas read it in it's entirety.

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut [...] _cost.html

So you have a way to play HD DVD and Blu-Ray (without using some hack that probably breaks the laws in the U.S.A.) at full resolution?

If so, please enumerate the ways you can play back Blu-Ray and HD-DVD on those platforms at full resolution over non-hdcp compliant hardware (and for the sake of this discussion, let's assume that the bit that forces the downconversion of high def content has been turned on).

If you actually think that the studios, which REQUIRE ALL HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players to downgrade video over analog outputs IF a certain bit is turned on (it currently is not because it would obsolete too many TVs), then you're naive.

Most of this article is dealt with here.

My guess is if you were to go buy an HD drive and hook it up right now, it'd work, because the content protecition flags are turned off on most, if not all, released HD content.

WhenI said BS I was talking about how poor M$ had no choice but to do the bidding of the MPAA. No more no less. I read the party-line response to the article. I had no idea that the article was a complete fabrication and that Vista was so benign. Hey I've got a bridge for you, cheap. You should read some of the posts below the response. It appears not everyone is convinced.

Unless you've got some links to info that I've never seen, that's not MS, that's the studios that produce HD content.

As I understand the issues, your choices are no DRM, and no support for HD DVD/Blu-Ray in full resolution (if the studios turn the flags on) or you get DRM.

I don't like it, but these standards are being forced on MS (and presumably Apple) by the MPAA.

Respectfully, that is BS. M$ is attempting to control the HDCP channel. The MPAA can't force anything. Here is the link to the article with all of the scary information. Pleas read it in it's entirety.

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut [...] _cost.html

So you have a way to play HD DVD and Blu-Ray (without using some hack that probably breaks the laws in the U.S.A.) at full resolution?

If so, please enumerate the ways you can play back Blu-Ray and HD-DVD on those platforms at full resolution over non-hdcp compliant hardware (and for the sake of this discussion, let's assume that the bit that forces the downconversion of high def content has been turned on).

If you actually think that the studios, which REQUIRE ALL HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players to downgrade video over analog outputs IF a certain bit is turned on (it currently is not because it would obsolete too many TVs), then you're naive.

Most of this article is dealt with here.

My guess is if you were to go buy an HD drive and hook it up right now, it'd work, because the content protecition flags are turned off on most, if not all, released HD content.

WhenI said BS I was talking about how poor M$ had no choice but to do the bidding of the MPAA. No more no less. I read the party-line response to the article. I had no idea that the article was a complete fabrication and that Vista was so benign. Hey I've got a bridge for you, cheap. You should read some of the posts below the response. It appears not everyone is convinced.

Fine, then show me an OS that support HD-DVD and Blu-Ray that doesn't do what MS is doing.

You may be correct, but I heard all of this when XP came out, and I avoided xp for many months, but in the end, I found there was nothing I couldn't do on XP that I could do on earlier OSs.

You call the MS entry the party line (and if this were some other topic, I'd probably agree with you), but the otehr paper just sounds like the anti-ms paper.

MS has done plenty of crappy stuff over the years, but this issue is one that's initiated by the MPAA and perhaps RIAA. If they didn't insist on DRM, I seriously doubt MS would bother with it....if they would, then we'd have seen DRM back in windows 95.

Clearly, the original article is an anti M$ paper. But rest assured that the M$ response is the party-line. What do you expect them to say. It's all good, it's only for your own protection.. HA HA HA. We would never, I mean almost never, revoke a driver. And I'm sure, well reasonably certain, the new driver would be available first. Well, unless it couldn't be done in time. But understand this whole driver thing I'm sure would be used in only the rarest of occasions and really, now that I think of it, probably never used at all. HA HA HA

If your card is 2-3 years old and Nvidia and ATI are busting there proverbial asses trying to comply with Vista's "robustness" requirements you may not ever get a driver that does comply. It's ok just go buy a new card.

I don't think you saw anything of this magnitude with the release of XP. Yes, the MPAA forced M$ to do this at gunpoint...NOT. M$ wants to control the HDCP channel and it looks like they are going to succeed. Oh, I left out, at our expense.

I've wondered similarly myself about the R600. Could it have been that the hardware (cards) was prepared, but the software didn't match Microsoft's ideas? Could be, but I have no answer.

I've wondered similarly myself about the R600. Could it have been that the hardware (cards) was prepared, but the software didn't match Microsoft's ideas? Could be, but I have no answer.

To my knowledge there are no HDCP GPUs currently available. I imagine that ATI wants the R600 to be the first, so it is probably a good bet that HDCP compliance is the hold up. Welcome to the future of computing.

My medications are closely monitored by the U.S. government, and no, I don't think its trying to poison me. I do know that MS has been in trouble for years with not only the U.S. government, but also with the governments in Europe for its monopolistic practices. I think these Vista problems are just another symtom of M$ trying to monopolize everything, at the expense of the people, of course.

Since you don't use your PC for music or movies, you aren't as much affected as those of us who do. Its those of us who do that will care, and will be forced to pay. And in teh end, everybody will pay, even you.

My medications are closely monitored by the U.S. government, and no, I don't think its trying to poison me. I do know that MS has been in trouble for years with not only the U.S. government, but also with the governments in Europe for its monopolistic practices. I think these Vista problems are just another symtom of M$ trying to monopolize everything, at the expense of the people, of course.

Since you don't use your PC for music or movies, you aren't as much affected as those of us who do. Its those of us who do that will care, and will be forced to pay. And in teh end, everybody will pay, even you.


No the government isn't trying to poison us. The government, and when I say government I'm referring to FED, State and local, is trying to keep us on camera 24 hours a day. Light cams, speeding cams, aggressive driver cams on the beltway, cameras on every street corner. But understand it's for your own safety, they are only trying to protect you from yourself. Thank God for these helpful people, I honestly don't know how we got along without them.

Now for M$, they are just trying to make more money with no consideration as to how they get it.

In an earlier post someone mentioned George Orwell's 1984. I think we are there.