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Studios Forcing ReplayTV to Collect Viewing Info 164

Posted by CmdrTaco from the man-that-sucks dept.
superposed writes "The San Francisco Chronicle has articles here and here about an ongoing court battle between ReplayTV and several major media organizations. A federal judge has required SonicBlue, makers of ReplayTV, to begin collecting data on how customers use the systems to swap shows and skip commercials, and hand the information over to the studios so they can make a case that copyrights are being infringed. SonicBlue is appealing the ruling, saying that collecting the data would violate their privacy policy. " It seems strange to me how much legal hoopla SonicBlue has been dragged through considering how many of these things they've actually sold. Update: 05/05 14:22 GMT by M : See the previous story as well.
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Studios Forcing ReplayTV to Collect Viewing Info More

Studios Forcing ReplayTV to Collect Viewing Info

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  • Great... (Score:1, Funny)

    by kingharrison ( 574393 )
    Now everyone will know I watch Powerpuff girls.

  • A new low! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Karl Cocknozzle ( 514413 ) <kcocknozzle.hotmail@com> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:23AM (#3465629) Homepage
    Instead of making a case of their own, the "content-industry" has conveniently gotten the judge to order the other party to make their case for them.

    Sheer genius, but also very depressing. Our legal system is more screwed up than people think. Way more...

    • Re:A new low! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by truesaer ( 135079 )
      This is just discovery. Because SonicBlue has the ability to get stats on the use without much trouble, they need to provide them as part of the discovery process for a lawsuit. Your statement is kind of like saying "This deposition is crazy. Now they want the person being sued to just tell them about their actions in this case?"


      SonicBlue needs to make a legal argument why ReplayTV does not infringe on copyrights. As a replayTV owner, I really hope they are able to do it....


      Anyway, I think the studios will win. It can't be hard for SonicBlue to gather the data in aggregate, so I bet the court will think thats ok. And I'm not sure how beneficial the data will be for the studios....I doubt people are really swapping files much, since you can only do it with other people that have the brand new units. The commercial skip is fairly analagous to recording with a VCR and fast forwarding. Its not instant on a VCR, but its close to the same.

      • Re:A new low! (Score:4, Informative)

        by stevew ( 4845 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:52AM (#3465721) Journal

        Let's look at this another way (as I'm a replay owner too). The judge has ordered the company to invade your privacy - Ever hear of the 4th ammendment??? The requirements for a search warrant are even close to being met here! Now - the judge said that our identities will be protected for the time being... how nice.

        Support the EFF - they are at least looking into helping us. Whether they can or not is another matter. I was a disinterested 3rd party to this proceeding until the judge violated my rights. Wait you say - doesn't a judge have the power to do just that - yes they do, but it mustn't be a global invasion like this, but specific and for specific legal reasons. I gotta think that this is wanting in that department. I sure hope so.

        Again - drop a check to the EFF. $10, or $20 or whatever you can afford. They seem to be the only people concerned about this BS.

        • This has nothing to do with the fourth amendment though. Discovery is not a fourth amendment violation.

          • Re:A new low! (Score:3, Interesting)

            by Anonymous Coward
            His point was that, in the process of discovery,
            HIS 4th Amendment rights are being violated.
            SonicBlue's records are ok to bring into the
            court - but the judge is saying: reach into
            HIS house and create new data based on what
            you find in HIS house.

            I don't see how MY constitutional rights are
            somehow put into limbo because SonicBlue and
            the studios are in court.

            • Re:A new low! (Score:2, Insightful)

              by Anonymous Coward
              • It's a civil, not a criminal case.
              • It's not a government agency collecting the data.
              • The end users are not being investigated as a prelude to being arrested and charged with a crime
              • The judge has ordered that users be identified by "unique identification numbers" rather than by name

              or to put it more simply, it's not a 4th Amendment violation.

              • Re:A new low! (Score:5, Interesting)

                by cduffy ( 652 ) <charles+slashdot@dyfis.net> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @01:02PM (#3465953)
                Even though this is a civil case, involvement of the courts still implies state action -- that's been established ever since Shelley v. Kramer -- and so the government is still responsible for the constitutionality of their courts' actions in such cases. Discovery is reasonable when it enables each party involved in a suit to requisition data from the other. Not so when innocent 3rd parties are suddenly forced to provide otherwise non-public information without their consent.

                [IANAL]

              • Re:A new low! (Score:1, Insightful)

                by Anonymous Coward
                1. It does not matter if it is a civil or a criminal case. It's the court ordering them to do so. Sonic Blue could not be ordered to tap your phone w/o raising 4th ammendment issues.

                2. It's a government organization ordering the collection - which is in all relevant ways equivelent. If the government could circumvent the COnstitution by ordering or paying private companies to do dirty work for them, the Constitution would be irrelevant.

                3. The fact that the end users are not being investigated is more ammo for the 4th ammendment argument. It's no different than a court ordering QWest to tap the phones of all of it's customers and to report to the nature of all conversations, along with a number which personally identifies each customer.

                4. Unique ID numbers are functionally no different than names. They are both tracible back to a single identifiable individual.

                Scythe
              • And the distance from "a unique number" to someone sending me a nasty-gram insinuating that I've violated the DMCA, or copyright or whatever is how far?

                I have one of these devices - and the agreement I had with Sonic Blue has been invalidated by the judge - not Sonic Blue, and I have NO recourse but to either turn the device off, or un-plug it. That SUCKS!
      • "It can't be hard for SonicBlue to gather the data in aggregate, so I bet the court will think thats ok."

        Instead of "betting", read the articles. The judge specified that individual users behavior be tracked, and linked to an anonomous ID. This is *not* aggregate data collection. Somewhere there would be a record of every movie you watch, and how often, and when, and every keystroke you use with their machine.

        Central District Court Magistrate Charles F. Eick told SonicBlue to gather ``all available information'' about how consumers use the Santa Clara company's latest generation ReplayTV 4000 video recorders, and turn the information over to the film studios and television networks suing it for contributing to copyright infringement.

        Also:

        The plaintiffs asked SonicBlue to turn over information on how individuals use the recording devices. SonicBlue said it does not track that information. The magistrate, who is supervising discovery, ordered the company to write software in the next 60 days that would record every ``click'' from every customer's remote control.

    • Re:A new low! (Score:3, Insightful)

      by blair1q ( 305137 )
      Our legal system is exactly as screwed up as people think if people realize it often consists of as one overworked, possibly incompetent judge being presented "facts" by two lawyers of varying degrees of competence.

      The amount of randomness that adds to the system is anathema to justice.

      --Blair
    • This would only be "making the case for them" if SonicBlue is indeed infringing, and knows it.

      As truesaer already pointed out, it's called "discovery", and it basically works like this:

      a) Various EvilSuperMegaCorps say: "You're violating our copyrights! We'll sue!"

      b) SonicBlue says: "No we're not!"

      c) Judge says: "Prove it! I know you have that data, now hand it over!"

      On first blush, this may seem intrusive, but imagine if you were the litigant, suing EvilSuperMegaCorp for copyright violation. In that case, of course you would expect that the judge would order ESMC to hand over the data about the use of that material that you know they're collecting.

      Two lessons here:
      1. If you ever provide personal information to a corporation, you can expect that information will eventually be handed to somebody you don't want it to (perhaps through a lawsuit, or a bankruptcy, or theft, or whatever.) If you don't want it out, don't give it out.
      2. The level of misinformation about the US legal system among slashdotters is astounding. Witness the multiple posts about "this violates the Bill Of Rights!" (Yes, I know not all posters are US residents, but that doesn't excuse most of them.) (Then again, maybe it's just the least informed that post the most. ): ) If you're really interested in protecting your rights, don't you think you ought to know what they are?

      IANAL, although the more I read uninformed posts like these, the more I think about entering law school...
      • Fine - it happened discovery - so what.

        From my point of view - one of the guys who owns this device - the court has ordered Sonic Blue to violate my privacy. They have been ordered to spy on me. No more or less than that. Can there court-ordered observation of my viewing habbits and use of this box be argued to be anything else?

        So, if you do finally admit that they have been ordered to invade my privacy on behalf of the media industry - then even though it is a company doing the spying, it's at the government behest, and therefore the company is merely an agent of the government. It doesn't matter who gets the data, it's the government that ordered them to do it. Last time I heard, there is some expectation of privacy that I have of my home and papers unless I'm personally suspected of a crime. The government isn't allowed to go on fishing expeditions. That is ALL this really amounts too when looked at from the position of the stuckee.

        Look - I have nothing to hide except the use of the 30 second advance button ;-) Any copying of shows off the box have been to other media in my household, i.e. legally permitted fair-use (Hollywood - you REALLY need to except that you lost the betamax case..)

        At the same time - I'm now subject to a court-ordered search of my premises without ever seeing the search warrant? That is what invasion of my data is considered isn't it??

        Tell me how it isn't the above?

      • Re:A new low! (Score:4, Informative)

        by civilizedINTENSITY ( 45686 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @06:20PM (#3467136)
        Judge says: "Prove it! I know you have that data, now hand it over!"

        *Wrong! The judge gives them 60 days to write the software that will collect more information than they have ever collected before. The fact that you think they are already collecting this data indicates you didn't read, or can't understand, the articles mentioned. Yet you suggest /. readers don't understand their rights? You misconstrue the context, creating a "straw man". The facts are that discovery is being used to generate *new* data that exceeds the privacy policy as put forth when the devices were sold.
    • Instead of making a case of their own, the "content-industry" has conveniently gotten the judge to order the other party to make their case for them.

      There is also the irony of gathering data on alleged copyright infringment by using actual copyright infringment.

  • And therein lies the problem... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thumbtack ( 445103 ) <thumbtack@[ ]o.com ['jun' in gap]> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:27AM (#3465645)
    The content industry sues..and sues, and sues. Rather than working things out with the developers, they bankrupt them with legal fees. Then they step in, buy the company for cents on the dollar, and either kill it, or castrate it to where it does nothing like it was orginally designed to do.

  • Question (Score:4, Interesting)

    by dr_eaerth ( 149359 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:29AM (#3465653)
    Could someone reply to this and answer a question I have, which none of these articles has answered? Why SonicBlue, and not Tivo? What's the difference between these two PVRs that lets Tivo get off scott free?

    I can't afford either, but from all I've read, they're the same thing: digital VCRs. Maybe ReplayTV should have copied Tivo.
    • I think the point may be that TIVO *does* collect user selection and programming data.

      Now, my question is this: why are the studios forcing Replay to collect something that will -- I'm assuming -- be used later to incriminate ReplayTV?

      These studios -- and Valenti and Rosen, in particular -- must think they're the King and Queen of America -- they can do anything, ask anything, require anything.
      • I think the point may be that TIVO *does* collect user selection and programming data.

        Yes, they do, anonymously. This order goes even beyond that, in that a unique ID will be assigned to each users data. Tivo is capable of doing that, agreed, but they do not and their privacy policy forbids them from doing that without the user's explicit consent...

        This is a heavy blow to privacy, and probably illegal according to the 5th amendment. I sincerely hope they tell the judge to fuck off and take it to a higher court somehow. Stupid legal system. :P

    • Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)

      by dnight ( 153296 )
      The Replay has some sharing capabilites built in, the Tivo doesn't. I think it's the ability to swap recordings between two Replay units that they're objecting to.

      But this is America, and tampering with data to manipulate the system is done every day. We should all go buy ReplayTV units from Best Buy, set it to record only the most inane infomercials, and return it within 30 days.

      And Sonicblue should provide all the info in hardcopy.
      • The Replay has some sharing capabilites built in, the Tivo doesn't. I think it's the ability to swap recordings between two Replay units that they're objecting to.

        I didn't know that. Can recordings be swapped to non-ReplayTV machines (which might have the ability to save a permanent copy, like a CD)?

        • Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)

          by Tide ( 8490 )
          Yes, there are several programs that do this. SwapDV [swapdv.net] is probably the most prominent tool, Replayer [forbesfield.com] is another, and a third is ReplayPC.

          SwapDV lets you pull shows from your ReplayTV and can even show up on your UPnP network as another Replay box to stream shows from, acting as a nice backup. Users can also burn the MPEGs to CDs and DVDs or swap them with P2P clients. Gnutella integration is coming also from what I understand.

    • Re:Question (Score:4, Informative)

      by PhunkyOne ( 531072 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:40AM (#3465689) Homepage
      Why SonicBlue and not TiVo? There are probably two reasons

      The first is that you can easily send shows over the internet, etc with the sonicblue box. We know this for a fact pisses the industry off. Not only can you send shows, etc, it's marketed strongly that way.

      Secondly I think they are probably attacking SonicBlue because they are the weaker company. They have less dollars and most likely less lawyers. Once they get standing and precident from a case that's easier to win they can move on to going after the big dog with that in their pocket.

      • Your reasons are good ones, and your first reason has additional support. You always fight the easier case first, and use that as a jumping-off point for harder cases.

    • Re:Question (Score:5, Insightful)

      by shokk ( 187512 ) <ernieoporto AT yahoo DOT com> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:49AM (#3465716) Homepage Journal
      Simple. Tivo has a commercial skip that the user engages (fast forward) and the ReplayTV has automated it. ReplayTV has made it too easy to ignore the media's wallets so they have drawn their collective ire. Tivo is unfortunately waiting in the wings to see the result and has not noticed that whatever paintbrush is used to color SonicBlue will be spattering on them. We as consumers are now too lethargic to protect our privacy and other rights, so we don't bother to fight it any more than to post a few blurbs in a message board. So all that is left is for these media giants to become more powerful as they steamroll over everything. So laying down for a raping is what the market will bear at this time.

      • Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)

        by dumbunny ( 75910 )
        The first article states:

        The Electronic Frontier Foundation of San Francisco and San Jose's TiVo Inc. , Sonicblue's main competitor in the digital video recorder market, rushed to Sonicblue's defense, saying the order could prove a setback to consumer rights and could have a chilling effect on new technology.

        It definitely sounds as if TiVo is aware of the gravity of the situation.

      • Where are we, the public, going to get the resources to fight this kind of thing?
        The media companies are enormous, have enormous resources, and seem to have much more political power than the public.
        Maybe it's not that we're lethargic, maybe we have lost so much faith in the legal system that it seems pointless to fight.
        • " Where are we, the public, going to get the resources to fight this kind of thing?"

          You can't. That's capitalism for you. As the who said once "meet the new boss, same as the old boss"
        • Who rus the country?

          The people or their representatives?

          If 99% of the people do X then X is legal.

          If you want to drink alcohol, drink it.

          If you want to copy TV programmes, copy them.

          If unrestricted copying becomes legal (and copyright is abandoned as a quaint custom) artists will still make money while people want new art. Don't worry about it.

          www.digitalartauction.com

          The public is bigger than the government - last time I looked anyway - or are Americans just sheep these days?

  • Here's how. (Score:4, Funny)

    by qslack ( 239825 ) <qslack@@@pobox...com> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:30AM (#3465656) Homepage Journal
    ATTN SonicBlue:

    Hand the media companies what they want. With one catch, however. Send them the files in Claris Works 1.0 on 600 floppies. Don't forget to accidently catch a virus that just happens to latch itself onto Claris Works files.


    • When Napster was going down the tubes, as a news reporter in Nashville, TN, I did a piece on the company that was propped up by the labels and nailing Napster.

      Napster was required by law to send all of the relevent material to the company that was handling the lawsuit, which I can't name right now, I don't think they exsist anymore, I might be mistaken.

      SO THEY DID. IN HARD COPY.

      Napster mailed long, old dot matrix printouts to the office in reams that (I kid you not) were at least three and a half feet tall.

      Moral of the story... they complied with the company. And the company couldn't afford to compile all of the infringers by hand but instead tried to have a chilling effect on Napster by getting a few of them scared.

      So my suggestion would be paper.

      Besides, I cannot believe that this is even happening. This is extremely "Farenheit 451" in the way that the television companies are trying to legislate the way we watch television that they supposedly give away for free.

  • Helping prove they are guilty (Score:4, Insightful)

    by 1010011010 ( 53039 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:31AM (#3465664) Homepage
    "The studios" have, of course, decided in advance that SonicBlue is a criminal enterprise, and that the Replay is a tool of the devil. Now, SonicBlue is being compelled to help "the studios" prove their pre-selected conclusion.

    Not only guilty until proven innocent, but they have to help win their own conviction.

    Sucks.

    To quote Chuck D, "Fuck Hollywood"
    • The process is called discovery and it's clearly a good thing. It's also important to remember that this is not a crimnal case, it's civil. Many rights don't apply to civil cases, because you can't go to jail.

      Personally, I don't know what the judge was high on. Discovery should not cause harm to third parties, like me!

      • The process is called discovery and it's clearly a good thing. It's also important to remember that this is not a crimnal case, it's civil. Many rights don't apply to civil cases, because you can't go to jail.

        Except that "discovery" typically does not involve the court telling either defendant or plaintiff to spy on third parties. Unless all of ReplayTV's *customers* have now become parties to the case. If so the judge might need to move the next hearing to a sports stadium and be prepared for a very long hearing...

  • Gathering evidence (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Trevin ( 570491 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:31AM (#3465665) Homepage
    Isn't there something in the legal system that says a defendant may not be forced to testify against himself? It sounds like that is what's going on here.

    • No (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The 5th Amendment applies only to criminal cases, not civil cases. The court may force any potential witness to testify in a civil case, regardless of whether or not it would incriminate the witness.
    • That only applies in criminal cases. The Bill Of Rights restricts what government may do. (The gov't is the litigant in criminal cases: "The People v. John Smith.")

      IANAL (BIPOOTV.)
    • That's for criminal cases. Civil plaintifs get to ignore pesky things like that.

  • Too featureful product - court orders (Score:4, Interesting)

    by shoppa ( 464619 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:35AM (#3465675)
    I think that us techies should be reminded of something by this story:
    Be Careful what Features you add to your Product. They may be used in some future lawsuit as a way to violate your customer's privacy.
    There have been too many instances over the years where a "feature" not really needed by anybody has been misappropriated. See, in particular, creeping featurism [tuxedo.org] for other documented side-effects. Unfortunately I think legalism will soon make this entry.
    • Be Careful what Features you add to your Product. They may be used in some future lawsuit as a way to violate your customer's privacy.

      This is one of the reason why it sucks to be a hardware manufacturer, I guess. The likes of MPAA and RIAA could threaten to sue you because your hardware could in principle be used to violate (copyright) law.

      In the case of software, if you have closed source (like Microsoft), it seems very difficult to *prove* it has or doesn't have some feature or ability. In the case of open source software, while you can easily demonstrate it has or doesn't have some feature, there is nobody to sue, except for trying to curtail the circulation of said program (see DeCSS).
    • But here, the features to collect that data don't even exist yet -- they're being forced to write new software to collect the data in question!

      Hence, being feature-poor is evidently no defense.
      • That's ridiculous - they're being asked to write software, that may incriminate themselves at a later date (is this legal in the US?).

        If the Studios involved want the data, surely they should be the ones writing the software and not SonicBlue! Mind you, I wouldn't trust them to just get viewing data... :(
        • They're not being ordered to testify against themselves, exactly -- the mechanism (discovery) is intended to require that each side hand over any evidence it might otherwise keep hidden. Forcing one side to collect new evidence as part of the discovery process, particularly from third parties... it's ridiculous, I agree, but not exactly self-incrimination.

  • How many they've sold (Score:3, Insightful)

    by truesaer ( 135079 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:42AM (#3465695) Homepage
    How many they've sold is irrelevant. The studio's know that this kind of thing will probably be popular someday, so now is the best time to fight it. Why wait until lots of consumers have them and like them? They're expensive and rare right now, so they're going to have an easier job ahead of them. I have a replayTV and I like it better than TiVo....my only complaint is that the menus are too sluggish when you're scrolling through or trying to bring a different one up, but I suspect that has been improved since my model is over a year old now.
    • OTOH the kinds of people who own these things are wealthier and more hooked into what's going on in the world. The sort of people who contribute money to politicians. I think SonicBlue should make it perfectly clear to their customers what's going on, and who's making this happen. They should be sure to add an explination that copyright isn't a right, and can be changed by politicians with enough motivation. Hint. Hint.
  • Doesn't this fall under the 5th Amendment somehow? They should have the right to avoid incriminating themselves. The burden of proof is on the suing party to show their side as being true. Or is corporate America somehow immune/unbefitting of the constitutional laws? They are an entity, too, composed of real people, whether you like them or not.

    • Re:5th amendment? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by aengblom ( 123492 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:47AM (#3465708) Homepage
      The 5th AMendment does not apply here. The 5th Amendment only prevents companies/people from testifying against themselves. This would not be testimony, but evidence.
      • BZZZT. Right answer, wrong reason. Apparently, all of those people who bitch about courts not knowing the Constitution can't be bothered to read it themselves, because if they did, they'd realize that "[n]o person . . . shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself." Seeing as how this is a civil suit, the Fifth Amendment has zero application here. However, the fact that they're being directed to engage in evidence gathering for the other side seems pretty far removed from a reasonable discovery ruling to me.
    • First, the right to not testify against yourself is for criminal cases. Thus, OJ could sit out his criminal trial for murder, but not the civil lawsuit against him for wrongful death.

      Second, as pointed out by another poster, evidence is not testimony. For example, DNA samples can be taken to ascertain whether you were the rapist. That is far, far more intrusive than looking at your TV watching diary.

      You are correct for the burden being on the plaintiff. However, the plaintiff is entitled to "every man's evidence" in pursuing his claim. So he can subpeona documents, witnesses, etc. (There are quite a number of limits on this, too tiresome to enumerate, but the idea is to get to the right answer by making as much evidence as is reasonably possible available.)
  • Of course this is a violation of the 5th Amendment. My question is, why aren't SonicBlue's lawyers screaming bloody murder about this to the press?? The average American is going to be much more outraged by the fact that a judge is forcing this company to testify against itself than that the company has to collect statistics. I know I certainly am.
    • This is discovery, not testifying against themselves -- discovery (making each party cough up evidence in their posession) is a usual process.

      The thing that makes it different here is not that they're required to hand over evidence, but that they're being forced to collect that evidence on their opponent's behalf from innocent 3rd parties.

  • Partialy SonicBlue's fault? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Tide ( 8490 ) <[moc.niamodsdahc] [ta] [dahc]> on Sunday May 05, 2002 @11:56AM (#3465736) Homepage
    As a ReplayTV 4000 owner and operator of Planet Replay [planetreplay.com] a content 'borrowing' site, Im appalled by all of this. But one has to wonder - SB made sharing only possible through the use of unique internet IDs and their servers to translate and initiate the P2P. If the P2P didn't require their server, there would not be any way for them to track what we do as easily as they can now.

    I'm glad SB is not just rolling over though. Just like Diamond Rio and the MP3 player suit, the Digital PVR suit needs to hit courts and law set, good or bad. People keep referring back to the Sony timeshifting case, but the problem list that was analog, this is digital. It needs to go to court and get settled, but having SB collect evidence for the plantiffs is just ridiculus.
    • The centralized nameserver doesn't give SB much data, actually, certainly not enough to comply with this order -- they can more-or-less tell who's sending shows to whom (although they can't differentiate between that and adding an address book entry), but they can't tell from that what's being sent, much less what commercials are being skipped.

      The myreplaytv features give them somewhat more, but still not enough for the skipping data; to comply with this, they're going to have to do a client-side software update, presumably adding things to the system log.
  • This was posted a few days ago, IANAL but then as now it seems like the main thing replay may have going for them is that they have to keep a unique id with the data from each user, and that id stays with the data so this is not true anonymous data collection.

  • from the man-that-sucks dept. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Inthewire ( 521207 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @12:00PM (#3465751)
    Taco, I never knew.

  • Commercial skipping on PVR and VCR (Score:4, Informative)

    by dmanny ( 573844 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @12:25PM (#3465833)
    I have two Tivos, love the concept but many cautions about buying in at this point.

    But on the subject of commercial skipping I would point very strongly toward the better Panasonic VCRs and similar models that have automatic skipping. My techno savy 70 year mother got the first one in my circle of contacts. Now I have influenced several people to go that way. A simple demonstration is all that it takes. The only person that did not get a Panasonic after I showed them the feature in action was buying a low end deck for his toddler.

    We have been working on watching Seinfeld for once and for all -- All episodes in order, as collected by Tivo, dubbed to VHS for additional buffer space. The broadcasts are frequently out of episode order. The Panasonic VCR is virtually 100% effective at catching the commercials with the only annoyance being about 50% of the time it does not detect the final short segment of the program as being non-commercial content.

    Also Panasonic VCRs have about the best rating for reliability in Consumer Reports.

  • Here is where the problems are (Score:5, Informative)

    by Sc00ter ( 99550 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @12:25PM (#3465834) Homepage
    I've seen a lot of posts about why not TiVo and why Replay.. Here's the deal:

    1. TiVo by default does not remove commercials. You either have to hit your fast foward button, or enable the 30sec skip backdoor code. And either way you still have to be there to do it. The new ReplayTV units remove the commercials automatically so you don't even know they are there at all.

    2. ReplayTV allows sharing of problams to other ReplayTV units (also to computers running a program to make the ReplayTV think the computer is another ReplayTV). Now, again, this isn't a big deal until you realize that I can get HBO and record Six Feet Under or Sopranos and now share them with people that don't pay for HBO. This would be in effect the same as buying a movie, and copying it for others that don't own the movie.

    Also, TiVo does collect user data, but it's ANONYMOUS, it does not link you to your TiVo unit unless you call in for service and they half to (they have you key something in on the remote). You can also make a 5min phone call and be removed from this.

  • Question (Score:2, Funny)

    by rant-mode-on ( 512772 )
    When they get all the data, are they going to be allowed to pick out the bits they want, or are they going to be forced through all the irrelevant mundane data that they're not interested in?
  • A federal court is requiring a private entity to invade the privacy of private citizens -- fascinating. I wonder how the Replay TV customers feel about their conduct being tracked at this degree of granularity. Is such even within the scope of ReplayTV's agreements with their customers?

    It would be nice to get a class of consumers to intervene in that action, or to seek some sort of extraordinary write, perhaps a writ of prohibition to keep this court from doing to American citizens what no other branch of government can do.
    • How about a class-action suit against SonicBlue by their customers for Invasion of Privacy. IANAL, but even if anonymous statistics are generated it's still a privacy violation of a targeted group.
      Suppose the government would keep statistics about Latinos, and the crimes they commited, against whom, and so forth (oh they already do?). This is no different.

      -------

    • screwed is the appropriate response.

  • What If? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by carrier lost ( 222597 )
    General Armaments, the maker of the SideWinder 9mm pistol, will challenge a court order to track the shooting practices of customers and send the data to violent crime victims and family members, the company said Friday.

    U.S. District Court Magistrate Charles Eick told GA to create software within 60 days to monitor everything customers shoot at, everything they miss and any bullets they transmit through others.

    MjM

  • People watch TV to be entertained, they don't watch it for banal adverts. The advertising industry can produce interesting and amusing commercials, as is witnessed by the various programs that show only funny adverts from around the world. Also, didn't TiVo stats show that during the last superbowl the ads were replayed more than the game [yahoo.com] (and here [slashdot.org])? Its time the industry woke up, and stopped boring people.
  • It's been known for a long time that there is no such thing as privacy any more. From Carnivore, to traffic/red-light cams, to PVR companies being forced to hand over information to the media, what's left of our "privacy" is dwindling daily. The solution(s)?

    1: Go live in a cave without any form of technology at all.
    2: Live as a hermit in society today, only letting your electricity/gas bills track you.
    3: Come to the conclusion that the only part of the world that is ours anymore is the few cubic centimeters inside your skull.

    What's my answer? #3. Don't kid yourselves, you're only delaying the inevitable.
    k_d
  • OK, I know, this is not a criminal case (and IANAL), but this seems incredibly obviously illegal for a judge to make this request.

    This judge is asking Replay/Sonic to gather data that will be used against themselves in a civil action. This should be the primary defense instead of "it goes against our privacy policy" non-sense that any judge would just tell them "so, modify your policy and process my request."

  • Just wondering, shouldn't right to privacy be a default value to respect of the consumers?

    Meaning if a company wants to invade your privacy, they should be required to get your permission rather than you having to fight off every F*&Kin company that seems to assume they have the right to invade your privacy. Rather than the "if you don't respond, we then assume we can invade your privacy" it should be "if you don't respond and agree to invasion of your privacy then we legally can't invade your privacy"

    This would certainly reduce alot of concern and stress to the people along with reducing the sales hype that uses "your privacy is our concern".

    Wouldn't privacy interest be consistant with not responding?

    Bell South called me the other day wanting to sell me some sort of new "privacy" service. I didn't listen to the complete sales pitch because by simple logic I shouldn't have to buy my privacy.

    War on terror......which seems to have brought privacy issues to the limelight --- what could be more terrorizing than having to buy privacy?

    sounds like buying protection from the mob...
  • Is a ReplayTV useful to me if I buy one and never setup an account (i.e. never hook it up to the phone line)?

    Presumably, I could still manually record shows and share them, I just wouldn't get their automated listings. Correct?

  • What about the Fifth Admendment??? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by 3seas ( 184403 ) on Sunday May 05, 2002 @01:05PM (#3465962) Homepage Journal
    Sounds like the Judge isn't familiar with the US constitution to me.

    According the the fifth admendment, one does not have to provide information that may be used against them in a court of law.

    How is it that this judge does not know this?
    Have they ben following the MS anti-trust case to much?
    • People don't care about the constitution anymore, we've given that up years ago.

      Judge Learned Hand said it best, "Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no Constitution, no court, can even do much to help it."
    • The Fifth Amendment clause preventing self-incrimination applies to individuals, not to organizations or corporations. That's why a company can't object to a subpoena of its records or, say, a disclosure of its financial books during the discovery phase merely because the information contained therein might incriminate them.

      Personally, this seems like a Very Good Thing to me, since I don't want companies to avoid having their wrongdoing come to light just because the main evidence is internal.

      For those of you who are law-geeky enough to care about references, check United States v. White, 322 U.S. 694, 701 (1944); Baltimore & O.R.R. v. ICC, 221 U.S. 612, 622 (1911); Hale v. Henkel, 201 U.S. 43, 69-70, 74-75 (1906).
      • What you have expressed may be all well and fine, but a company can hide their wrong doings in many other ways, like shredding of documents, which even the US government has done, or at least an employee of in being ordered to...

        There is other recent examples too, like Enron and even more current another company which I do not recall the name of but only that it sounded like Enron until the news promo said it wasn't. And of course, as a simple matter of fact, there is Microsoft which with the inherent possibility of Bill consulting his former judge father, has been able to apply the 5th amendment, maybe not in direct statements but certainly in actions which many preceive as acts of purgery (cept for some reason the court doesn't seem to..)

        It seems what you are refering to is not something so avoidable by not applying the 5th amendment directly or even indirectly.

        Although I do not have quick and easy access to reading about another case (link) I do question whether or not such a situation as this could intentionally be set up to entrap consumers, making it appear to not be such a set up but in effect being just that. With an overall target not of attacking specific consumers but of trying to get laws passed which as not in the general publics best interest and even perhaps not in the best interest of the talent either.

        recent article comments dealing with music [slashdot.org]

        My video tape collection has grown, since DVD's have caused tape to greatly drop in price to be compairable to going to the theater (which typically is not play such older movies anymore).

        But I've had a VCR for far longer than my video tape purchase habbits ..... So the only difference between using the VCR over the last several decades and this slashdot article is what?

        The Ability to track and report??? Gastopo tactics?

        Which in effect is and invasion of privacy of the people.

        Is not being a long term US citizen good enough to have privacy as a default thing for companies to respect of the people/consumers?

        I'm getting really tired of "having to tell companies I do not want my privacy invaded" for it cost me in time and postage to do such "required batteling for my ...... right to privacy"....

        And given everyone and their sub company has jumped on the privacy sales pitch bandagon, it's not getting any better.

        How much more is it going to cost me to continue the battle for my privacy, and do I now have to be concerned about what products I buy and how they might be used to invade my privacy?

        And such cases as this where the effect is entrapment.....

        I don't think the case you refered to really applies or addresses the bottom line issues of consumer rights.

        It is wrong for a judge to put the task of invading the peoples privacy in the hands of a company who sold a product to the people, using that product against them.

        Especially considering that the only reason it's being done now and not over the past 30 years is because it can be now done.
      • The Fifth Amendment clause preventing self-incrimination applies to individuals, not to organizations or corporations.

        Wasn't it using the 5th ammendment which got US corporations declared to be "legal people" in the first place?

        • Wasn't it using the 5th ammendment which got US corporations declared to be "legal people" in the first place?

          The 14th, actually, based on a Supreme Court case: Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad, in 1886. The Court's decision was later used to justify giving corporations most of the protections afforded citizens under the 5th Amendment, but not all. The clause against self-incrimination has been curtailed where corporations are concerned.

  • Wait a minute, so the court has ordered them to collect information on customers user habits. This information is handed over to the studios, who in turn use the data to prove that ReplayTV, a product of Sonic Blue, is infringing on the copyright of the studios.

    So, wouldn't this have the potential of allowing the studios to sue Sonic Blue in the end? As far as I know, you tell the police to investigate a crime, not the family of the victim.
  • In the previous article on this, many suggestions were put forth to skew the results of the information gathered. Don't do any sharing outside your own personally owned devices. Record shows, then fast forward through them and watch the commercials only, and be sure to backup and watch the same 3 seconds of a paticular commercial several times. Fast forward through the whole show, then do it again, to the same show. Record shows you hate then delete them without watching at all. For shows you paticularly like, run them two or three times, don't fast forward or mute the commercials. If even 10% of the people who own one of these, does at least one of these actions, SonicBlue can probably get the data thrown out as unreliable, because the lab animals knew they were being watched and changed thier habits or at the very least, you can make shows you like appear more appealing, because they are being watched several times before being deleted.
  • Joe Krause, a co-founder of a new Silicon Valley group, DigitalConsumer. org, said the media companies are "trying to make the argument that consumers have signed a contract to watch the television commercials."
    Remind anyone of a Slashdot article a few days ago? http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/05/02/055021 4&mode=thread ("Turner CEO: "PVR Users Are Thieves")
  • The Supreme Court already decided in the Betamax case that it doesn't MATTER if video recorders can be used for infringement, because they can ALSO be used for NON-INFRINGING uses as well Didn't the Supreme Court already decide this case with Betamax? Why is this clueless judge even allowing this to move forward? Do they (the content providers) have something on him? Seems to me that the only difference between this and a VCR is the storage medium involved (a disk platter instead of tape).
    • That's my thoughts, when it comes down to the reality of it. VCR recordings, while not automatically removing advertisements (though I'd heard rumours of ones that did) do give consumers the ability to skip through ads. I'm sure most of us who've taped television with advertisements have been able to fast-forward and almost press 'stop' right on the exact moment our fave show re-starts. It's only one small step up from this, to automagically removing ads.
      I don't know anyone who -purposely- watches ads in a recorded show, but I have from time to time played a damned good, funny ad back and had a chuckle.
      How about that - make better ads that people don't laugh at for the wrong reasons :P
  • Of course everyone screams about this without reading up on it. The judge is requiring SB to report the content viewing habits of users of the 4000 series Replay box. The problem with it is the automagic ability to skip over commercials. This always pisses off the TV industry because they can't charge X amount of dollars per commercial slot at certain times if the advertisers can show somehow that the network's audience numbers are too high. The judge is requiring SB to provide statistics on commercial skippingh abits of users in order to decide whether their ReplayTV box actually screws the television networks over as they claim. The home recording cases in the 80s allowed people to use VCRs to record stuff and watch it later (called time shfting) because the commercials were preserved. A recorder that automagically removes commercials doesn't fall under the ruling of those cases.

    The retarded part of the whole thing is the TV networks conception that not watching commercials is somehow evil. They don't get money from me watching a McDonalds commercial (even though that is how they charge advertisers), they get money from me buying a Big Mac and a Coke. The only reason they're going after PVRs is because they fuck up their audience statistics. If a show has a specific rating they can assume a certain number of people are watching and charge advertisers accordingly. All an advertisers has to do in negotiations is whip out a paper that says there are a million ReplayTV and not have to pay the netwok as much money as they are charging. It's greed on two fronts screwing over ReplayTV users.
    • The retarded part of the whole thing is the TV networks conception that not watching commercials is somehow evil.

      What they are missing is that all advertising is simply a kind of gambling. What next, postal spam companies want people who throw away their material unread (and possibly unopened) fined?

      They don't get money from me watching a McDonalds commercial (even though that is how they charge advertisers), they get money from me buying a Big Mac and a Coke.

      Actually the TV companies get money from McDonalds trying to persuade people to buy Big Macs and Cokes.

      The only reason they're going after PVRs is because they fuck up their audience statistics. If a show has a specific rating they can assume a certain number of people are watching and charge advertisers accordingly. All an advertisers has to do in negotiations is whip out a paper that says there are a million ReplayTV and not have to pay the netwok as much money as they are charging.

      However ReplayTV and the people using the hardware they sell are not party to any of the negotiations broadcasters and their advertisers enguage in. It simply isn't (nor should be) anyone else's problem. Not ReplayTV's, not their customers and certainly not government or the general public.
  • Tune your Replay/Sonic Blue to the Teletubbies when you're not watching. Cut your TV off, and let the commericals come through...When they raise their advertising rates to Superbowl levels, advertisers will quit paying, and Teletubbies will be canceled. Falwell will be elated, and he'll shut up. This way we get rid of two of the scourges of society.
  • If all of the /.ers who are upset about this war the media is waging against our freedoms aren't contacting their senators and congressman about this, then you are conceeding victory. Tell your representatives that you don't want to see them accepting money from the media. Tell them that a vote for the media is A VOTE AGAINST THE PEOPLE. Contact them once a week. We must start to wage total war! Get your friends and family involved. Our rallying cry should be "Fuck Mickey!!!!!"
  • step 1: gather data
    step 2: apply trivial content protection
    step 3: hand over encryted content
    step 4: require subscription service to view data at $0.75/user's info (fees would be on a per-lawyer basis...sharing of the data would be expressly prohibited).
  • Well, I guess the entertainment industry will know what the rest of the world already does--people don't like commercials, and given the chance, they won't watch them. I wouldn't, but as a college student I can't exactly afford ReplayTV.
  • I just wish we had ONE prosecutor with the guts to file a RICO suit against the xxAA. Or file barratry charges, or something!
  • I'm worried about this whole monitoring thing, especially in light of the earlier comment by the CEO of Turner Broadcasting [slashdot.org] to the effect that people who don't watch commercials are stealing programming. If the content industry wins this one against Sonic Blue, what's next? Will some astute judge order webcams installed in our homes to make sure we don't skip out to the bathroom during the commercials? Will our telephones have embedded anti-content-theft software that deactivates them during commercials, lest our attention be illegally diverted by conversation with real humans?
    • Way back in the ancient era of dead-tree data, I used to tear the ad pages out of magazines before archiving the hardcopy (the idea was to save on storage space). Was I stealing the magazine (which I had already paid for) when I removed the ads??

      The trouble with this sort of lawsuit is that it's a real short hop from here to criminalizing use of ad-blockers in ANY medium, from TV to web, lest the user "steal" from an ad-supported host by deprecating its advertising demographics and thereby its advertising revenues.

      It's also a close parallel to legally-enforced artificial support of other obsolescent revenue models, oft-discussed hereabouts.

    • If the content industry wins this one against Sonic Blue, what's next? Will some astute judge order webcams installed in our homes to make sure we don't skip out to the bathroom during the commercials? Will our telephones have embedded anti-content-theft software that deactivates them during commercials, lest our attention be illegally diverted by conversation with real humans?

      Maybe billboards will have cameras to track people not looking at them. There will be fines for not reading junk mail (probably email spam too).
      If anything this is further proof that the US is not a capitalist country. If it was then anyone making such claim would be considered a fool. With this kind of court case being laughed out of court (by the judge/B).
  • If they start recording information on what we watch and what we skip they will soon be telling their advertisers that we don't care about their commercials and we don't like our shows interrupted.

    Seriously, I've been thinking about this one for a while. There is only a chance that a viewer will stick around for the commercials. If they start showing customers (ie: Pepsi, McDonalds, yatta) that we flip or "skip" then the advertising customers will not want to pay up.

    Advertising is a crap shoot. Anything from banner ads to newspaper ads to tv ads. Even if they (us) see them it doesn't mean they care.

    I'm 110% for Nielson style ratings. I want the network to know I like Futurama before it's too late, I don't want Night Court to go out of syndication again... ... just seems that the more information they gather the less likely it will be that they will sell advertising (for the prices they do).

    But who knows. Most companies spend their advertising budget on "conceptual" ads that don't even tell the customer where to get the product. When was the last time you saw a Pepsi commercial which said: "Go to your local Rite-Aid for Pepsi this week!" ? Of course that is a bad example. Simply tell us where to get the product, how much and why it's better. Save Mrs. Spears for the porno (that we are waiting for).
  • ...I skipped this story last time because I didn't read that part of Keller's statement.

    He claims that VOD isn't on the side of the betamax case, but what is the point? I enjoy VOD right now from Time Warner/AOL [the people who pay Keller]. I also enjoy it with no advertising what so ever.

    Why is it that I get no ads with VOD? Because I fucking pay a monthly fee. HBO on demand, iControl - both are funded directly by me, the consumer. (iControl is a pay-per-view based model)

    These technologies are a step forward because it gives us what we all want. We want media, free of ads. Subscription based viewing is nice because you get what you want for a price you can swallow. It's similar to the pay-per-single music idea. No ads, it's on when you want, you can fast forward and rewind - and his parent company is selling it to me.

    How can he complain? Especially since I'm watching "Contact" on a Turner station and the volume for commercials is about 20% higher....

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