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Copy Protection On CDs Is 'Worthless'
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Nov 06, 2002 05:09 PM
from the healing-the-crippled dept.
from the healing-the-crippled dept.
zotler writes "NewScientist.com has an article about how copy protection on audio CDs is worthless. I thought this was funny since I just read this earlier Slashdot article 'BMG copy protecting all CDs'." The article also neatly sums up the technology behind current fair-use-inhibition stratagems.
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Copy Protection On CDs Is 'Worthless'
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Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously though... If it can be played, it can be copied... no matter what kind of protection they use... Why waste the money and resources to 'secure' the CD, and piss off and lose customers?
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Insightful)
I buy all my music, whether I buy CDs or download from emusic.com, and the last ten CDs I bought were all over ten years old and were all on sale for no more than $12.00 (US). And I know a lot of other consumers just like me: Disafected and out priced.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Funny)
You must have meant moist, referring to that Britney Spears - Yowzer that is moist.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:4, Informative)
Amen, brother
I only buy used CDs. When the Music Industry starts treating their customes with respect again, then I'll start buying new CDs.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't forget that they would love [slashdot.org] to stop that, too. After all, buying a used CD is an unlicensed activity.
---
Dum de dum.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:4, Insightful)
Hmm. I knew the record industry hates resales because they don't get a piece of the action.
Why did I suddenly get a chill at the thought of having to sign a 3 page EULA when I buy a piece of music in a store? I'm suddenly feeling very paranoid.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Funny)
They could give out a Big Black Guy Named Ben (tm) [newgrounds.com] with each CD.
"Don't copy the CD mother f*beep*cker"
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Insightful)
I got a better question: Why try to 'protect' one of the easiest forms of media to duplicate?
I mean seriously, if they got to the point that it was possible to totally secure music so that it couldn't be copied (even with a mic to a speaker), what's to prevent an ameteur band from re-singing the song and recording their version of it?
Would it sound the same? Nope. Potentially, it could sound better. Look at the popularity of remixes today. I guarantee you, it'd just drive the need for RIAA independent people to surface.
What the RIAA should be doing is enticing their customers to buy the CDs in the stores. Didn't the recent Eminem album launch with a DVD in it? That's pretty damn cool. They should think about doing more stuff like that. Heck, include Video CD's with band interviews or remixes or something, I dunno. If you're having trouble making your product sell, make it more appealing.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only won't the RIAA admit that the music is crap and that they won't do anything to improve sales on their end, they now have to focus on only one or two areas of sales to "prove" that sales are down, and ignore areas where sales go up.
Desperate or misguided, I can't figure it out...
Recession? (Re:Not Totally Worthless) (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see Sears blaming "pirates" on lower washing machine and refrigerator sales.
Nor are airlines complaining about stowaways causing ridership to be down.
RIAA: Charge me a decent price for a CD (lets say, 1hr at minimum wage) and I'll buy them. Oh, and perhaps promote more than your top 15 bands to me.
Re:Recession? (Re:Not Totally Worthless) (Score:5, Funny)
I spent 5 days downloading the latest Maytag Washing Machine. It was totally worth it.. I was able to get it 3 weeks before Sears had it!
My only problem is that my clothes are all pixelated now, and you can hear someone coughing when the dryer is on.
Maybe if they offered more in the box, I'd actually buy a Washing Machine. You know, like some behind the scenes extras, and maybe a biography of the Maytag Repair-Man.
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Informative)
Royalties. (I hope this is the correct word in English. Forgive me, I'm German.)
If you perform someone else's work in public, if you record it on a media and give away copies, if you broadcast that recording to the public, you have to pay royalties to the author(s) of a song. You also have to pay royalties as well when you play music to the public, e.g. a large public party or the music you play as a cafe owner to keep your customers happy. (That's why royalty-free music is a niche market, btw.)
There are royalty collection organizations in most states, the GEMA is the one here in Germany. I once had the dumb luck of writing a small tune that was then performed by my band on German national TV. As a result, we instantly got a little royalty check through GEMA, since these TV stations paid royalties to GEMA for broadcasting music.
(This, btw., is another reason why some celebrity musicians perform for free on globally broadcast charity events. It's a royalty bonanza.)
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong. Covers are royalty free when played live, even at a paid concert. Once that performance is recorded, THEN royalties come into play. If my combo decides to play 'Rime of the Ancient Mariner' at a local club, we don't owe ASCAP dick (we would, however, probably owe Iron Maiden an apology). If that performance were recorded and then sold or distributed, we would then have to pony up some copyright ducats - based upon the number of copies produced.
IANAL. IAAM.
-72
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:4, Informative)
Copyright law... ASCAP.... etc... You can play it, but if it becomes a recorded performance... you can be sued and thrown in jail. (assuming you did not have proper permission. Trust me, you don't.)
The author's real point is that CD Drives will continue to be upgraded, and that the newer firmware will defeat these copy-protection schemes. Hogwash.
Most SA2 discs are copyable, if you can find older firmware for your CD-Burner. My Panasonic works fine with firmware rev 1.05 or lower, not with newer firmware. Also, older firmware is not available from the manufacturer.
I think we have been and will continue to see the manufacturers "playing ball" with the entertainment cartels. As the author states, there is very very little that would need to be done to make PC CDRW drives read the TOC like every other disc, but where are the burners that support this??
RIAA brand music is already obsolete. Kids don't listen to Britney for the music, they want to belong to the herd. Go ahead and re-record OOPS!, and then get a cute girl and an expensive plastic surgeon. You'd need to sell those CD's for $20 a pop too.
~Hammy
Re:Not Totally Worthless (Score:5, Insightful)
i agree. (Score:4, Insightful)
Halderman reckons he has a solution for them. "Reduce the cost of new CDs; if discs cost only a few dollars each, buying them might be preferable to spending the time and effort to make copies or find them online."
amen!
I would actually buy CDs!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I would actually buy CDs!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I would actually buy CDs!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
Heck, I'd settle for a "send us a list of MP3s you have and we'll send you a fair priced bill for digital use" service.
The RIAA would make a few bucks off me that way.
Re:i agree. (Score:5, Interesting)
Unfortunately, I'm having a hard time imagining a price for CDs that's sufficiently cheap that copying them becomes unappealing. On my computer, I can copy a CD in about five minutes (drive to drive), and I can rip one in about three, depending on how much music is on it. I don't generally steal music, but that's because I hardly ever find music that somebody else has that I would like to have but that I don't already have. (Did that make sense?) Even at $3 each, it'd still be possible to copy a CD-- or even download it, if you can find it on the Internet-- faster and less expensively than you could drive to the store and buy it.
Re:i agree. (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, friend, you spend considerably more than five minutes every day doing things like brushing your teeth and going to the bathroom. Pop the CD in optical drive 1, the blank in optical drive 2, click here and here, then forget about it while you take a shower or something.
Multitasking is the key insight.
Plus you are forgetting the other stuff that comes with a CD or are you printing out color pages of the CD covers....
Strangely enough, I've never given any thought at all to CD covers. If they're important to you, then that's between you and your God.
Not just the copy protection... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not just the copy protection... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not just the copy protection... (Score:5, Insightful)
You think that's something new? That's always been true. It can't explain why CD sales are down. Records have had filler since the beginning. Even the old 45 RPM singles had an A side and a B side.
And the fact is, some music is more accessible than others. Some songs are instant hits, the first time you hear them you like them. Other songs take a few hearings before you appreciate them. I know I've bought albums for one or two hits, but after I've listened to the CD half a dozen times I like several of the other songs just as much.
But if they do start selling individual songs, most people will only buy the hits. Without being more or less forced to listen to the other ones because of the album format, they'll never get past that accessibility barrier. This means that a typical artist will only sell one or two songs where they now sell a whole album. And since we all know that CD prices are not based on manufacturing/distribution costs, this means that the sellers will have to charge almost as much per song as they do for a whole CD now.
In other words, for the record companies and everyone involved to continue to be as profitable as they are today, they'll have to charge probably five to ten dollars per song downloaded! That's just basic economics based on the number of hit songs per CD, and based on where the costs are for a record company (most of which won't be reduced by online distribution).
That's the reality. I hope you consider that a "reasonable amount" to pay for a song, because that's what it costs to create them.
Worth & worthlessness (Score:4, Informative)
The costs of producing the music are nearly beside the point, as are the media costs. The other stuff sets the price.
Emphatically, I think a more efficient model can be created, but as with books the transition to the internet has been slow. But eventually I am certain will be plenty of $1 songs, and that the artists will be better off -- esp. the small-market ones not blessed by the marketing focus of a major label. In fact, it may be the big names that produce mediocre music who suffer.
Re:Worth & worthlessness (Score:5, Funny)
"We started trying to use underhanded methods to get our music played, then it became standard industry practice, now you get to pay the cost."
Are We Sure... (Score:5, Funny)
while copy protection is worthless (Score:5, Funny)
Metric or US? (Score:5, Funny)
Constant Restatement of the obvious (Score:5, Interesting)
What one man can hide, another can find.
Cheers,
VonKraken
Re:Constant Restatement of the obvious (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't it clever how they dodge the question my not repeating the word compliant in the response, but instead using a similar word, compatible? I guess one must be on one's toes all the time these days, even technical FAQs are no longer a haven from sneaky public relations propaganda.
Re:Constant Restatement of the obvious (Score:4, Interesting)
not that macrovisions earlier products were that much better.. it's all about marketing to the few right key people and then rolling it out as something that hw/media producers _MUST_ have in their products even if it's totally worthless.
Well, duh (Score:5, Insightful)
Such as:
the idea of CD copy-prevention is "fundamentally misguided".
And:
To ban upgrades, he argues, would lead to "buggy software and poor hardware."
And best of all:
Halderman reckons he has a solution for them. "Reduce the cost of new CDs; if discs cost only a few dollars each, buying them might be preferable to spending the time and effort to make copies or find them online."
Are you listening Ms. Rosen?
Re:Well, duh (Score:5, Insightful)
When you get just past whipper-snapper age you'll realize that monetizing every life transaction is ridiculous. It makes sense in terms of CD purchasing because it is a mass-media transaction, but in terms of friends and families it isn't a good idea.
You may make $25 to install that TIVO, but treating everyone in the world like a business transaction will result in personal alienation. Ultimately, it may COST you money because people don't enjoy doing business with, or referring business to, people who act like they are God's gift to those around them.
My suggestion is to instead say "sure but it'll cost you lunch/dinner/bottle of wine/six-pack" based on the job, which you then share with them. People enjoy giving gifts far more than paying money, even if the cost is the same. That way, also, when they "pay" you, you get to do something novel... SOCIALIZE!
Because, frankly, you sure as hell need it.
I've already stopped buying CD's (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes and No... (Score:5, Insightful)
Then again, for a while now those people are also the least likely to try to copy a CD so I guess there is some truthfulness to the original claim.
Either way, we all know that there's an industry model change on the way. That's easy to predict. Knowing what it is or when it will hit, that's the hard part (always has been, always will be). It reminds me of Warren Buffet's comments about the invention of the automobile -- (paraphrased) nobody could have predicted how it would develop with any kind of guaranteed accuracy, but it would be fairly obvious that buggy-whip manufacturers were on the way out.
Re: Yes and No... (Score:4, Insightful)
> One thing that a lot of people seem to ignore is that most people are pretty clueless about the relatively easy methods of circumvention.
In principle, only one person needs to circumvent. After that the copying is easy.
As silly as it sounds ... (Score:5, Insightful)
All copy protection is useless (Score:5, Interesting)
I always understood that *any* copy protection of media such as this is useless, because at some point the content has to be decoded to analog so that the speakers can physically create the sound. At this point you can capture the analog signal and encode it in any digital format you like.
A simple (and ineffective due to quality issues) example is connecting a line-in cable from your CD player's head phones jack to your PC's line-in, and then recording and encoding to ogg.
What's stopping people doing this?
Re:All copy protection is useless (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think they are worried about this type of copying. It isn't bit for bit perfect.
Recording analog to digital will always introduce noise to the signal. Remember all those old CD's that sounded worse then the original tapes? (Say, like AC/DC, Back in Black). That's because transferring analog to digital sounds like crap.
Re:All copy protection is useless (Score:4, Interesting)
For what it's worth all it takes is a turntable, my iMic USB A/D converter from Griffin Technologies and FinalVinyl on my iBook with CD burner to get the job done.
from the article.... (Score:5, Funny)
is this man insane??? doesn't he know that making an audio CD is a horribly expensive thing and the HUGE royalties given to the artist forbids such tactics?
Oh wait... someone hit me in the head with a 2 by 4 again..... sorry, my bad... I lost my mind for a minute there...
Cat & Mouse (Score:4, Interesting)
Another reason the copy-protection is a waste... (Score:3, Informative)
Classic Mistake (Score:5, Insightful)
thinking that the security must be perfect
in order to be effective.
The systems do not have to be perfectly
secure to be effective. They just have to
encourage most consumers to follow the
rules set down by the copyright holders.
--
Doesn't matter to me (Score:3, Interesting)
Instead, I'm enjoying my "old" CDs, installed my old Technics phonograph, and actively search out obscure stuff -- mostly CDs, some vinyl -- in local record stores. My music listening experience has gone way, way up, and I'm spending less than ever -- but finding stuff I like.
And I'll occasionally drop into Kazaa to listen to new stuff and try and determine, say, why Justine Timberlake is putting out new albums that sound like vintage Michael Jackson or why U2 and Aerosmith insist on putting out a new greatest hits album every other week or why Bob Dylan's *old* stuff is far and away better than anything he's put out since Infidels (which was, IMHO, the last good Dylan album). But that's about it.
case and point.. (Score:5, Informative)
http://www6.tomshardware.c
Three out of four were successfully copied (two versions of safedisc, cactus data shield, and the one they couldn't get by: TAGES, which is used in games).
Stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
No matter what they do to CDs, if you can play them at all (whether it is in a Car stereo, home stereo, computer, discman, whatever) you can always feed your line out to the line in on your computer.
Obviously this is a pain in the ass. But if you're set on not buying a CD nothing "they" can do can keep you from making copies.
As far as signal degradation goes, your line in can [theoretically] be of the same quality as your stereo's line out, which is as good as your going to hear it anyway. So while it's not a purely digital transfer (although it could be with a high end stereo/soundcard) you shouldn't really notice the difference.
If you're an Audiophile that can notice the difference, you're probably not going to be copying CDs/Making MP3s anyway.
I know, I know, you read all this and you're saying, but what about the time it takes.... Yeah you're right, but you gotta deal with that. Start it and walk away, or check your email, or read
My two cents
(Read this 999 more times and you can afford one CD)
This is new. (Score:5, Funny)
Why don't they offer more content instead??? (Score:5, Interesting)
Preventing copying is obviously not the point (Score:3, Insightful)
The point of the music industry putting their ineffective and badly done copy protection on their CDs is not to prevent someone who wants to make a copy from doing so. It's so that they can make people afraid of going to jail for violating the anti-circumvention portion of the DMCA. We've legislated that any technology intended to prevent the theft of intellectual property can not be circumvented. No matter how ineffectual, badly done, or downright broken it is. If you buy a CD-ROM drive for your computer that will play the copy protected CD, you have definitively broken the law and can be criminally prosecuted. THAT is the point.
Bad Article (Score:4, Interesting)
I do think that [some] future computer CD players will be made such that they correctly play those mangled CDs, which would indeed make _this_ form of copy protection useless (if not backed up by laws like the DMCA). However, that does not port to copy protection in general, which is what I initially thought the article was about. Plus the copy protection works against current technology, and that's all that can be expected of it. (Although I recall something about a German magazine detailing how one could disable the copy protection using a felt-tipped pen.)
The author ends his article by saying that selling CDs for cheap would be a solution for the record companies, as it people would find it too much trouble to find their music online and burn it on CD. I can't speak for the rest of the world, but I find finding [ack] music online and downloading it less of an effort than going to the store, searching for the CD, and paying for it. Besides, does the author _really_ believe that reducing prices by an order of magnitude would _solve_ the record industy's problem??? I think it would rather create a currently percieved but nonexistent problem...
Rant off.
---
The more laws and order are made prominent,
the more thieves and robbers there will be.
-- Lao Tsu
Copying CDs on a PC (Score:4, Informative)
Some CD's should be listen protected (Score:5, Funny)
However, it's more fun to implement this with a microwave than to buy them pre-destroyed.
Music sales down? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Music sales down? (Score:5, Insightful)
U2, Peter Gabriel, and Rush have all had new albums in the past 18 months. Indeed, Gabriel has had 3 new albums since the millennium, though only one is a classic studio album (Ovo, the soundtrack to the millennium celebrations, which I think is at best overwrought; The Long Walk Home, the soundtrack to The Rabbit-Proof Fence, which is quite good, maybe as good as Passion, and Up, which is spectacularly good in places - e.g., Signal to Noise and Sky Blue). U2's new album was also quite good, if not quite up to the quality of say Achtung Baby or Joshua Tree.
The problem isn't the music, it's the marketing: the record companies only want to sell pablum to teenagers. There are good bands out there, the old ones still doing their stuff and new ones with real quality (Radiohead obviously isn't a "new" band, but they are a nineties - oughts band, and their work is head and shoulders above most of the stuff you find in your local record store, just to mention the most obviously commercial example). But the money is spent pushing JLo and Justin Timberlake and American Idol because the record companies have *created* the bands and can *control* them from start to finish.
So true! (Score:3, Insightful)
So true. The record companies have to lower the bar. The urge to take is much too high compared with the prices of CD's right now. They're going to have to find a balance.
I mean, say most teenagers have a joe-job at maybe $6.00 an hour. To buy a CD, they have to work two hours flipping burgers or delivering papers.
OR they can spend 20 minutes downloading the same album from the internet. What do you think they're going to do?
The RIAA is going to HAVE to change their model if they want to survive.
$15.00 CD's * Angry customers who leave = $0.
$5.00 CD's * Happy customers who stay = More than $0.
=-Jippy
So let me see if I got this right... (Score:5, Informative)
1) Goes to the store and buys a new copy of some Top-40 Fluff band of the minute.
2) Tries to play it in his new "Super Fancy 500 feature Play-Any-Format CD player", but it can't play the new CD because the CD thinks his player is a PC player.
3)Tries it in his similar car CD player, with similar results.
4) Says "screw this", D/Ls his favorite songs for free, burns them to CD, and lives happily ever after, perfectingly *WILLING* to pay for new CDs, but he can't, because they won't work with any of his "Advanced" stereo eqpt.
Hats off to the file sharing companies for coming up with this brilliant scheme to deprive record companies of their most secure source of income, the Honest Customer! Wait, they ARE the ones who came up with this copy protection scheme, aren't they? No? Hmmm.....
An example of common business sense? (Score:4, Insightful)
So, in other words, the RIAA should respond to supply and demand.
I have a great idea, must patent, must patent (Score:5, Funny)
Now, why has not anyone in the music industry come up with this yet. Clearly, after every 30 seconds of CD-listening, the copy-protection contained should ask (with a sexy female voice) guestions like : "On page 3, of the pamphlet that came with CD you purchased, which one of the following ten options best describes the hair color of Britney Spears, punch ff>> 1-10 times to enter your answer". Simple as that, copy-protection re-inveted!
How copy protection fosters piracy (Score:5, Interesting)
I've got a toddler in the house, which means that CD cases left in the open get opened and covered in peanut butter fingerprints. C'est la vie, so I went ahead and ripped my library via iTunes to a pair of 80 GB drives, and now I've got a wonderful, searchable, kid-proof music library.
I simply can't imagine going back to having to deal with physical CD media anymore. I'm happy to rip the disc when I get it and put it in the storage room, but that's about it.
So, if I really wanted music that was on a copy-protected format that was effective, I'd HAVE to pirate it to listen to it.
Other folks are in the same boat - everyone who listens to music on systems not compatible with this protection. The presumption behind this copy protection is that users will replace their in-dash CD players with a compatible one. Instead, I think it is MUCH more likely users will return the CD to the store, and download the tracks from a P2P site.
It only takes one user to crack the copy protection to make the content available online. But EVERY case where the copy protection works is a lost sale for the record company.
They need to understand that the effectiveness of a copyright protection scheme is inverse proportion with how difficult the copy protected version is to use compared to a cracked version.
This is one of the reasons dongles have been disappearing in the software industry - users would crack a legit copy just to use the software on a laptop!
Intelligent suggestion (Score:4, Insightful)
This is one of the few intelligent suggestions I've heard for stopping music piracy. Production costs, printing costs, and royalties to the artist amount to less than $1.50 for most CDs. If the music industry was willing to cut some of the fat out of the middle man they might be dealing with more honest customers. But, clearly that's not their main concern.
DVD vs CD (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:DVD vs CD (Score:4, Insightful)
TWW
Protected CD's for DJ's suck ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Bertelsmann (BMG Music) will stop to sell uncrippled CD's. This means such cd's will not play at certain older & newer CD players, certain car players and will not play in your computer. This for the price of 20US$ to 22US$ per CD !
As DJ I am very worried because one scratch crashes my CD into oblivion. The copyprotection does not let me play half of my cd's on my old cd players in my house (and I have three of those).
The protection on these cd's is the Cactus Data Shield from Midbar. The protection is currently only being used on EUROPEAN cd's. A lot of the cd's being used in Europe are not available in the US what leaves only one option, buying them here and praying they do not get damaged + work in the CD players you use at that time.
The error is in your player, not in our copyprotected cd's.
---
BMG distributes a lot of the cd's that are currently being used by me as DJ and shows no respect for their customers whatsoever by creating CD's that work on only 80% of the home/pro audio equipment. Additionally they say "the error is your player's, and not in our CD's".
I am at a very moral dillemma because every time I buy music I first search the MP3's and then write down the titles I want to find. Some of these titles are only to be found on CD's and some of 'm are only to be found on vinyl.
legally bought music is working against me now!
---
I used to go to the recordstore and get about 20-30 records whereof 1 or 2 where usable. Whenever I go to the recordstore now I give 20 titles and get 15 useful numbers out of it. I currently have over 800 CD's and over 22.000 records of vinyl. Currently I am buying more on CD because carrying all the vinyl is breaking my back
Since I cannot use the cd's wherever I want and 1 scratch can kill the CD because of this lousy copy protection I need to buy the CD *and* burn the same MP3's to seperate CD's to be sure I can keep using the music I want to play legally!
The secret agent not working everywhere!
I have bought the CD of James Bond (Universal) and it seems not to work in my PC (where I play the most of my music, my PC speakers are the best in my house!) and they seem not to work in my old cd players of my own DJ equipment! Next to that the shop does not want to take the Bond CD back. With the line of defence BMG has by saying "their cd's are fully redbook compliant and it's your player's fault" they also tell you you can bugger off by bringing it back to the shop where you bought your precious CD.
I have bought several other CD's like "Solid Sounds" which is giving me errors as well. Currently I am trying to recover one of the legally bought CD's by searching the MP3's and burning them in the same order on another CD because I cannot just copy it and the CD is damaged by (over)usage as DJ.
BMG's reply of one of their CD's
---
Whenever you send a note to BMG you get the following mail back (unaltered):
"we are sorry you have troubles with our copy protection technology. The copy protection reacts on the special new technology that is build in in burners. Unfortunately htis technics was built in many new CD players, even if they can't copy a cd.
"The copy protection yet does not recognize wheather that burner technics is build in a cd player or in a burner. That's why the cd playern might not play a copy protected CD. Since burner technics are also built in car radios, this may be the reason, why you can't listen to a copyprotected cd in your car.
"As far as we were adviced, our copy protection is according to the Red Book Standart as well as all labelling on the cd.
"A standart home CD player is one that has no burner technics built in. Our Cds play on all Cd players without burner technics.
"There will be no cd manufactured without copyprotection any more."
This seems to limit a lot of options and costs me a lot more to find the numbers, import these from wherever possible and find them on mp3 to have a backup CD of my original CD! Of'course they tell "we are sorry" though they also tell us "the fault is in our bought players and there will be no cd's manufactured without protection anymore"... I wish I should not have read this blasphamy towards a lot of customers!
Moral dillema, I am for the music, not against!
---
Because I am a DJ I cannot tolerate (for myself) to be using illegal material! I live by the music and I live FOR the music and not AGAINST. Seems to be BMG has the same reason but not only FOR the music but to protect their precious wallet!
Re:Protected CD's for Radio Stations suck ... (Score:4, Informative)
This issue has spread through several DJ-related email lists since many DJ's with large collections like to reduce the number of CD's they have to carry by burning just the tracks they want to CD-R. Again, what is the likelihood of a "copy-protected CD" getting airplay?
Third, many DJ's record their shows in advance on a PC and burn them to CD-R. Once again what is the likelihood of a "copy-protected CD" getting airplay?
(quoting Tom Lehrer) "Now let's not see all the same hands!"
Hmm... (Score:5, Interesting)
Copy Protection == PAIN (Score:5, Funny)
BTW, how does having a corrupt TOC adhere to the Redbook? Just curious how they managed that.
So, anyways, I end up bringing the f*cking things over to my place to burn off onto *real* CDs for her, which unfortunately ends up with her seeing my setup when she brings me over homemade cookies to say thanks. Next thing I know, I'm putting every bit of music she owns to CD... and I mean *every*, considering I have a turntable, cassette, CD (old-skool, to read those f-ing cds), and 8-Track all on my line-in. So I end up spending all day and night pulling off all this music (it took days and days of 24 hour play to get this stuff in), and more days and nights of doing some rudimentary cleaning on pops and crackles. She ends up so happy with it, she tells everyone else in the complex about it during the monthly condo meeting... I now have a computer slaved to nothing more than audio reads, and literally SHELVES of cookies and cakes and preserves and everything else you can think of. If you consider the average phono/tape/8-track/cd to be roughly 1 hour in length, it's going to take me over 3 months just to read this shit in.... and it still hasn't stopped. They don't even say hi anymore, just leave a stack of music at the door with a bag of something homemade on top... the guy from the other end of the complex left his DVD player and a bunch of out-of-region DVDs for me last week (he's maxxed his region changes). And every time I say I'm too busy for this crap, whatever sweet lil grannie it is this time looks up (wayyy up, I'm 6'4") and says "Don't worry dear, whenever you get to it. I kind of like the silence."
Therefore, based on the imperical evidence of the growing hell life is becoming, coupled with the expected dentist bills I'll get soon from all the cavities I'm sure to develop, I'm forced to conclude not only that copy protection == PAIN, but also that CP==EVIL. And, based on this, I'm lead to the conclusion that Hillary Rosen must be the bane of my existance.
It's time for it to end. I can't take another day of "The Beach Boys greatest hits!". Someone tell me where the bitch lives. It's time to go give her a cookie.
Copy protection will result in MORE piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
What the music industry executives don't quite get, yet, is that it only takes one successful rip of a CD to spread like wildfire over sharing networks (which incidentally are digging deeper and deeper underground).
Given the quality level of a lot of music out there now, it's clear to me that absolute CD perfection is not the desire of the masses. Back when piracy was done (more slowly) by multiple generation analog re-recording, the quality level would drop each generation. It didn't take long before it totally sucked, and even then people often would put up with music 4 or 5 generations deep, just because it was free. Digital basically eliminates the generation problem, completely. Therefore a semi-sucky rip is actually good enough for the masses because it won't get any worse from there. And all it takes is for someone to rip it by playing it on a device that can play the copy protected CD and recording it via a sound card input. And if the device has no electrical analog output (permanently wired headphones, for example), it can still be captured by other means (some player will have to be able to play it for big home sound systems or else the music industry will be cutting out more market than piracy). It might suck to have to record music with microphones propped up against speakers (possibly with filters and noise generators to mask watermarking), but the quality of that won't be any worse than 2nd or 3rd generation analog was, and will probably still be better, anyway. The "analog hole" does exist, and it means that people can rip the music and swap it online, anyway.
What the copy protection is targeting most effectively is not the online trading, but rather, the casual CD duplicating. Many people do buy CDs then make copies for their friends. And with holidays approaching, the reverse will be common, too (buy CDs, duplicate or rip them, and send the original to your cousin for a gift).
Because of the fact that online music swapping is already virtually ubiquitous, it won't be much of a stretch to engage in that practice even more in the future. As more and more CDs fail to be playable on equipment that people paid good money to buy, be that an actual stereo system, or a custom made personal computer system running the latest Debian Linux, people will more often explore getting their music for free from the internet instead of buying CDs that don't work. They aren't going to just trash their stereo systems, and they aren't giving up on computer systems that still do other functions well. They will just get music in other forms instead of the store bought CD. And it's not because they necessarily want free music (those that do are already swapping anyway); it's that they want music that works, and swapped music may eventually be all that does. And to the extent the music industry doesn't want to serve this market, the more they drive this market away from buying any CDs at all.
Yes, there is a lot of piracy going on, and probably a lot more than there ever was. But it's the music industry itself, that will effectively destroy the CD format as we know it today. You just watch. They will do it.
When Will They Ever Learn.... (Score:4, Funny)
at the planned conference,
Mr. Halderman's Sharpie
is displayed; he leaves.
Line out? (Score:3, Insightful)
As long as you have a headphone jack or line out on your copy-protected-CD-reading stereo, you can plug that right into the line in of your sound card, and rip away.
Crippling the CDs won't prove nothing... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: CD Copy Protection (Score:3, Insightful)
Most or all companies that make up the RIAA (and probably the MPA) will go belly up, and they will probably do it within our lifetime. Some will fight the new technology til the bitter end. Some will try to adapt and will fail anyway. Some may actually pull it off.
Then a new system for profiting from music will evolve, one that accepts file sharing as just part of the environment.
The RIAA faces one central problem today -- They don't own all the destro channels anymore. It's that simple. In the retail store world, one cannot execute a major release without going through the gatekeepers, the RIAA. It can't be done. It's easy to see why the RIAA wants to maintain the status quo. It guarantees revenue!
Literally any other method of distributing music is an enemy of the RIAA. But what we don't hear in the grand copyright/music argument is that there is no harm. Downloads, according to the numbers, have no affect right now on CD sales. It is, therefore by definition, harmless.
CD copy protection is a dumb idea. It's a limp attempt to hold onto the old ways, like Jack Horner refusing to shoot on videotape. The only way to curb piracy is to offer a fair deal for the product for which you create demand or to not put the product out at all.