HDTV, MCE, DRM, and DCMA | Ed Bott offers his opinions on the DRM and content protection issues I have been discussing over the past week. To cover Ed’s main points…
1. It’s more of decrypting the signal that we have a problem with. There are ways to capture a protected feeds from many of these technologies that provide copy/content protection, but unless you into watching or listening to pops, clicks, snow, etc then you want to be able to decrypt the signal. All HDTV broadcast today is MPEG-2, and we decode MPEG-2 on our PC’s all the time (watching TV in Media Center requires decoding an MPEG-2 stream). CableCARD is another specific example of the developers of the protection system setting the bar for what other companies must meet to being the technology into there product, I covered this a few times at eHomeUpgrade.
2. While I didn’t cover the DMCA specifically (mainly because not enough people under it, nor do I think anyone fully understands it) I did cover Reexamining Sony v. Universal which I think might give us a better idea of what any company could get way with, without bring the DMCA as a whole into it. The DMCA is always there, but I think that the similarities between Sony v. Universal and MGM v. Grokster would actually give the majority of people a better understand if Sony v. Universal was reexamined. Also, the DMCA fits in with DRM as terms that make people uneasy, so I try and avoid it as much as I can (eg DRM = Content/Copy Protection)