It may seem like deja vu all over again, but the sordid tale of Hollywood's attempt to quash fair use of movie DVD's keeps coming back like a slasher-movie anti-hero.
Kaleidescape just can’t get a break these days. The DVD Copy Control Association (DVD CCA), which licenses the DVD encryption system (Content Scramble System, or CSS), wants to add an amendment to its licensing agreement that requires a DVD to be present during playback.
In other words, you can’t watch a movie stored on a hard drive, meaning Kaleidescape and its fellow movie-management makers would be in violation of the DVD CCA’s licensing agreement.
Here we go again. The DVD CCA already lost its first lawsuit against Kaleidescape, which makes very high-end movie servers. The organization argued that its licensing agreement expressly prohibited the copying of a DVD onto a hard drive.
Kaleidescape said that there was no such stipulation in the agreement, and the judge agreed.
So now the DVD CCA wants to state very clearly that you cannot rip a DVD to a hard drive. Period.
In other words, you can’t watch a movie stored on a hard drive, meaning Kaleidescape and its fellow movie-management makers would be in violation of the DVD CCA’s licensing agreement.
Here we go again. The DVD CCA already lost its first lawsuit against Kaleidescape, which makes very high-end movie servers. The organization argued that its licensing agreement expressly prohibited the copying of a DVD onto a hard drive.
Kaleidescape said that there was no such stipulation in the agreement, and the judge agreed.
So now the DVD CCA wants to state very clearly that you cannot rip a DVD to a hard drive. Period.
I can't tell you how much this annoys me. No, actually I can. Here's the comment I left with the CE Pro article:
Posted by Lee Distad on 06/21 at 07:34 PM
As both a Kaleidescape dealer, and as a staunch advocate of fair use, not to mention a serious technology pundit, I can’t express how wrong-headed I think the DVD-CCA’s actions are. Not only does this new maneuver freeze out media server builders, but it freezes out the end user, end users who PAID for their movies. Clients who can buy a Kaleidescape or other high-end server buy their DVDs from retailers, not bootleggers. Enacting this change in the DVD-CCA’s licensing agreement will, in the end, be cutting their own throats. If that was the only net result, I could applaud their suicidal determination, but unfortunately server makers and customers will also suffer.
Even better though was this comment left by another reader:
Posted by Joel DeGray on 06/23 at 11:11 PM
This is a very serious issue clouded by great miss-understanding and abuse. I own a content loading company and always feel at great risk for my thoughts and comments. None the less I am an American Citizen who has the right and obligation to speak up; after all, it is the US. Government, who authorizes, grants and guarantees the right to make a copy, not the DVD CCA, MPAA nor the RIAA.
Our best communicated understanding of Copyright Law, DRM, DMCA and Fair Use come from those who stand to gain the most by our misunderstanding of it.
I certainly wouldn’t look to an Oil Company for an accurate understanding of Global Warming, and the same is true of the DVD CCA, MPAA and the RIAA when it comes to our rights of access and ownership over intellectual property, music and other arts.
Plainly, copyright law is there to ensure that there is a mechanism to deliver works of intellectual property and arts to the public. It ensures libraries; radio stations and other such outlets exist to enrich the public good. The passing of knowledge and arts are an obligation of a civilized culture, an obligation of existence.
DRM is an access protocol, a technical mechanism in the guise of a utility to prevent unlawful copying and distribution. The true effect is that it inhibits those lawful citizens from enjoying unfettered, fair use of articles which they legally paid to obtain.
Imagine buying an antique book written with ink that for some strange reason could not be read years later under incandescent light, but only by a candle. This is the effect of both DRM and region codes on a DVD, and if they could make a book that would “turn off” once you landed in a foreign country they would…
Truth be told, this is technical extortion and racketeering.
The DMCA is a whopper of a bill which, while oversimplifying, makes it illegal to create or use a tool whose purpose is to unlock a technical mechanism whose purpose is to contain and prevent access to copyrighted material. It is a “Protect Big Business” at the expense of the private citizen. The DMCA does not at all touch upon legal access by rightful owners nor reflect on fair use of the content being held captive by the container nor the encryption technology.
Certainly there is a way to license this, much in the same way a locksmith may legally use a set of lock picks or slim jim.
Big Business doesn’t want this solution- they want to sell you the White Album 8 times.
Perhaps they should focus on providing better works of art and intellectual properties that add value, inspire and promote cultural value, instead of pandering to lowest common denominator quality and quick buck efforts. I am certain that if they live up to their obligation of copyright law we would have better movies and music; in turn they would have greater profits.
Well put, Joel.
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