NFL, MLB Support Ruling Against DeCSS

Chuck Fu writes "Both the NFL and Major League Baseball submitted their brief today in support of the lower court's ruling against DeCSS, stating that DeCSS 'threatens to destroy the legitimate marketplace for works of art, music, film, software, literature and other video programming (including sports programming), and will deter the development and distribution of new works in state-of-the-art digital media.' ZDNet and CNet has the story."

A Few Things.

[JesusFish]

Obviously, I'm sure these sports organisations only know what the MPAA has told them about DeCSS.

This case is pretty much the only reason I have DeCSS on my computer, I don't have a DVD-Rom and the DVD Player I do have is a different region than the DVDs I have (which annoys me to no end).

Also:

Unchecked, such piracy threatens to destroy the legitimate marketplace for works of art..."

Yes, because everybody on the net is a pirate. Gimme a break, I don't see the Recording Industry going down in flames because of "piracy".

DeCSS

[Ultra64]

As if anyone even uses DeCSS. At all. It doesn't even work for newer DVDs. I use vobdec personally.

Re:A Few Things.

[Andux]

I'm sure these sports organisations only know what the MPAA has told them about DeCSS.

I agree. Since when do sports leagues have an interest in the movie industry? I can understand the government getting involved to defend their law, but this is ridiculous. What's next, Catholic Church Condemns DeCSS?

what the...?!

[nyteroot]

okay, im pleased by the fact that these major sports organizations are on our side (heck, their being on our side may mobilize a large portion of the population) but it DOES beg the question... why?! what's their stake in it? i dont exactly see basketball players having to use DeCSS for any reason at all.. the question is hard to answer. any ideas?

Re:DeCSS

[hoeferbe]

It doesn't even work for newer DVDs.

Why is that? I thought DeCSS contained not only the key from the reverse-engineered Xing player, but all the keys. Has the DVD-CCA revoked all the keys? If so, how have they updated all the players out there with new ones?

Works of Art = Pieces of Work

[WinPimp2K]

Hmm...
MLB has claimed ownership of all facts (statistics) resulting from their 'performance art' They wanted to charge the media for the right to report game scores (as an anti-fan I considered this vindication in claiming that sports isn't news)
The NFL took to trademarking the names fan groups applied to themselves - so they could charge the fans in direct proportion to their enthusiasm (being an anti-fan, I of course applauded this move - soak the fans for enough and they will eventually get a clue)

An important point to remember is that the sports cartels do spend most of their time dealing criminals and 'morally challenged' individuals. These people - which is what the sports cartels base their opinions of everyone else on are known as 'players', 'agents', 'media', and 'lawyers'. Given the nature of these people it is easy to understand how the sports cartels are concerned about the billions of dollars they are losing illegal viewing of their 'performance art'.
All these talk of 'performance art' has reminded me - when will we be seeing the briefs from the real performance artists (pro wrestling). After all, they do have real money at stake here.

Re:what the...?!

[Necromncr]

Uhm....read it again. They are against DeCSS. Unless you really meant that was your side, but it doesn't sound like it from the rest of your post.

If you don't understand why they are against it, think about it. They own all the copyrights to their sports events' recordings, so every time someone wants to show it in a highlight film or something, they get a cut. Some of the other comments in this thread explain the reasons better, but basically, they are content providers, just like the movie studios, so they think there's going to be hundreds of people pirating "Baseball's Greatest Hits" or something.

Re:what the...?!

[Kwantus]

If you really mean a take-back, don't post AC :)

MLB DVD? Say what?

[BIGJIMSLATE]

Okay, let me ask you a question. Have any of you bought, or plan to buy an NFL or MLB game on dvd? No, didn't think so. Not unless they're starting to actually use film to record the games, shooting it in a nice 2.35:1 ratio, with six channel surround sound, and the OPTIONAL commentaries. Oh yeah, and then there's the problem with making the game actually SEEM interesting, which is virtually impossible since the strike.

Sports may be a bit more savvy

[L-Train8]

These guys are probably doing more than just parroting the Jack Valenti. The NFL was a big player in the lawsuit that shut down iCrave. The Canadian website was webcasting TV shows, including football games, that it received from US TV station broadcasts.

I don't know that the NFL or MLB release any DVD's yet (though they do put out greatest highlights and season retrospectives on VHS), but I'm sure they are very aware of the potential damage to their traditional revenue stream that new technology poses. It's unfortunate that they, like the RIAA and the MPAA, choose to fight progress with legal action, rather than try to embrace technology and fing new ways to make money that take advantage of it. But sports fans have long ago learned to live with the annoying, misguided, and down-right evil actions of sports team owners.

Player Intelligence.

[derf77]

Somehow I doubt most professional baseball and basketball players lakc the intelligence to use DeCSS, let alone comprehend what it does. If these guys were really bright, they'd have real jobs, instead of whacking balls with sticks and throwing balls through nets. Granted they're good at what they do, I don't see how this issue relates to them at all.

So now that we've established that DeCSS has no impact on athletes.. how does it impact the baseball leagues and the NFL? Does it screw the management (greedy bastards)? Does the media cartel have their hands down someone else's pants? They [the players and management and co.] just strike me as another greedy organization looking to exploit the little guy.

Re:what the...?!

[JCCyC]

They own all the copyrights to their sports events' recordings, so every time someone wants to show it in a highlight film or something, they get a cut.

Whoa. Isn't the use of snippets Fair Use? (as opposed to an entire copyrighted work, which would mean replaying the entire game)

Re:DeCSS

[Ultra64]

Not sure, but I've tried a few DVDs and DeCSS either couldn't decrypt them or the resulting files were corrupt. Although it did older DVDs just fine.

Re:DeCSS

[The_Plumber]

Can you use it under DOSEMU (Vobdec that is)? I took a look at the source and and it includes windows.h so I would assume that you wouldn't be able to compile it under GNU Linux... Has anyone ported this to GNU Linux yet? PS What the hell is windows.h?

Re:Player Intelligence.

[xantho]

Hey, Nomar Garciaparra and Kevin Brown didn't graduate from Georgia Tech for nothin'. Of course, if Nomar was really smart, he'd drop this lousy 10 million dollar a year gig and become an architect, right? Not a fucking chance.

--Xantho

Re:what the...?!

[Ig0r]

Haven't you heard?
Fair use was outlawed in 1998 by the DMCA.

--

Re:DeCSS

[Andux]

What the hell is windows.h

Windows API libraries to help the average programmer write small, efficient programs like Microsoft does. Remember: They're not bugs, they're features.

so?

[benshutman]

come on, we all went to high school. when did a jock ever say anything intelligent?


NEWS: cloning, genome, privacy, surveillance, and more! [silicongod.com]

Re:MLB DVD? Say what?

[Begin2See]

Ever heard of NFL Flims or the MLB films archive? They shoot in high-res digital video now, in the 16:9 aspect ratio.

Remember all of those NFL archive films narrated by the late, great John Facenda? You know, the ones that start off, "From the snowy, frigid tundra of Lambeau Field..." They're all on film stock - a great medium for transferral to high-res digital.

Of course noone will buy a game on dvd... but they will buy the aggregate highlights of a whole season, of the career of a player.

Re:Player Intelligence.

[suwain_2]

Somehow I doubt most professional baseball and basketball players lakc the intelligence to use DeCSS...

Not to be a troll criticising the smallest mistakes (in fact, I think I spelled "criticize" wrong...), but you said that you *doubt* that they *lack* the knowledge, effectively saying that you think they do have the knowledge... This is clearly not what you meant, but I wanted to point it out.

Again, the only reason I point this out is that it completely changes the meaning of your post; I am just as annoyed as the rest of the /. population by people starting flame wars over apostrophes...
________________________________________________

Re:Player Intelligence.

[iago]

The Rock was a football player from the University of Miami...not one to nitpick...but

Go Canes :)

Re:so?

[TimmyJoeB]

I take offense to this in that I was a high school jock ( college and post college ), and
I do say some intelligent things. I usually found dweebs like you to be the real losers

Re:so?

[Lord Kano]

I take offense to this in that I was a high school jock ( college and post college ), and
I do say some intelligent things. I usually found dweebs like you to be the real losers

Did you ever think that maybe the intent WAS to offend you?

While the tech sector may have succeeded at producing the likes of assholes like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, at least we didn't create wife beaters like OJ Simpson and murderers like Rae Carruth.

LK

Re:MLB DVD? Say what?

[Rick the Red]

This has nothing to do with killing DeCSS and everything to do with saving the DMCA. Think Pay-Per-View, as in "trivially encrypted and easily pirated Pay-Per-View", the decrypting of which is illegal under the DMCA. I'm surprised all the cable companies haven't jumped on this bandwagon.

Re:DeCSS

[e_n_d_o]

My evil twin who lives in a non-extradition treaty country managed to get DeCSS to work perfectly on his computer, which happens to be an exact replica of mine. :)

Anyway, he reports the following DVDs work properly:

- Titan A.E.
- A Bug's Life
- Jakob the Liar

(These are all the one's he's tried so far)

This was done using the patched DeCSS enabled xine, version 0.3.6, I believe. This player is available from:

http://gape.ist.utl.pt/ment00/linuxdvd.html

I *cough*, I mean he, had to set the DVD drive to region one before Xine would work, using a little prog called rpcmgr11.c, commonly found on the net (just google for it, compile it, read its instructions and set your DVD region code to 1). This worked for both a Toshiba SD-M1401 DVD-ROM and one of those Pioneer slot loading ones, think its called the "305S" or something like that.

I've got at least one DVD, Sting's Brand New Day album, that is not CSS enocded. (Maybe the evil between the MPAA and RIAA cancel each other out :), as its beyond me why this DVD isn't CSSed.)

Sure is neat to be able to watch movies you own on your own Linux box.
---

Here is why they support decss ruling

[Benjiman McFree]

It's pretty simple. A large portion of sports team owners get their revenue from network contracts. If the networks feel they cannot have control over their content(on the net hehee;-), then their product becomes a commodity, like the rest of the IP in the world.

If because of this the sports teams revenues go down, then so do the franchise valuations go down and the professional athelete makes 1/3 of what he does today.

If brodcasters cannot "lock up" their content, then their crapIP will be spread all over the net.(god forbid people actually watch any of their programming anyway they can)

Why don't the network television stations just upload their content to a freenet node is beyond me. They can embed advertising in their content and have the luxury of not having to pay for bandwidth!

Re:Here is why they support decss ruling

[vroomfondel]

That's a good point, and I'll go a step further:

• The Anaheim Angels are owned by Disney
• The Atlanta Braves are owned by AOL/Time-Warner
• The Los Angeles Dodgers are owned by Fox

I can't think of any NFL teams which are owned by large media interests off the top of my head, but NFL teams are even more beholden to TV interests than are MLB teams (baseball teams have ten times as many home dates and many have local TV deals). It sure looks like this is really about the big media folks trotting out their little subsidiaries to parrot their message more than it's about MLB and NFL trying to protect their own IP interests.