DVD: Degradable Versatile... 246
jomaree writes "The SMH online reports that some DVDs are starting to corrode or "rot". Although somewhere between 1 and 10 per cent of DVDs are affected, it seems the distributors don't want to know.
One list of affected movie titles reveals what might be a sinister pattern emerging:
"One DVD website lists 18 titles known to have at least one bad batch, among them Planet of the Apes (1968), Men in Black: Collectors Edition, Independence Day and the Alien Legacy box set."
Or maybe the person compiling the list only buys sci-fi movies."
Bad DVD player! (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah, or maybe his DVD player is knackered, and it's damaging all his disks...
Say it with me now... (Score:3, Insightful)
Conspiracy (Score:4, Insightful)
But I find it oddly convenient that I am not legally able to dupe my DVD collection, and THEN magically they start to break... total boon to the studios and MPAA!
Although, in an odd way this could be the YRO savior... think of it... this is a perfect reason to extend 'fair use' rights to digital media... DVDs break...computers crash, all necessitating backups... with DVDs rotting, it becomes alot harder for the RI/MPAA to argue against allowing 'perfect digital' duplicates...
Mr. Valenti, I now have a perfectly valid and (IANAL but seems) legal reason to dupe my DVDs. I would love to see someone go to court and sue because the product was faulty and they are not legally able to make copies, and the studio wont replace it because the DVD is out of the 90 day warranty period... this could be very interesting!
_CMK
Re:Good for distributors. (Score:3, Insightful)
I've considered opening a movie rental store. If otherwise good discs suffered this kind of problem I'd be tempted just to burn off a new copy and keep the original as proof of ownership. I'd like to see them take me to court for that. They couldn't do it without publizing that their discs were rotting.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux, isn't sexy. This, however, is the stuff those stupid segmants on the 10 o'clock news are made of.
Original site - karma whore (Score:5, Insightful)
Possible DMCA killer? (Score:4, Insightful)
If it became commonly known that not only do DVDs degrade, but also you can't legally copy them to preserve the content that you already paid for, maybe there'll be enough disgruntled people writing to their Congresscritters that the DMCA will get a serious review.
That won't help Joe Sixpack until legally licensed DVD-copying shops start to appear, but until then us geeks might be able to legally help out our buddies...
I was afraid of this. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Let's hear it for DivX :-] (Score:3, Insightful)
For one it takes along time. I used to not think I would need a new computer but with my pIII 850 it takes a *long* time (like 8-9 hours) to rip and encode a single DVD, and my roommates p4 2.53ghz it still takes 3 hours to rip/encode a single DVD.
Also, I have yet to really decide what to rip them to. I could rip em bit for bit but that takes up too much space. Encoding them in any codec just means I will probably have to re-encode them in a few years once that becomes obsolete.
Also, even though Divx is pretty good you can still tell a major difference in picture quality (especially if the DVD is like 720p originally).
I don't know. I imagine if/when I get a DVD burner I might just burn backup copies, that is probably the way to go.
Perhaps this happened to me. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Good for distributors. (Score:2, Insightful)
Bad Law fosters Civil Disobedience.
This story is a crock...wait for more info (Score:3, Insightful)
CD's, DVD's...they are not 'glued' together, as the article states. This guy should be shot.
Anyone that knows will tell you why they refer to the 'stamper' when they talk about mass duplication. I'll wait for a more knowledgeable source to comment on DVD 'rot'...Sure, if you keep them on the dashboard of your van, or floor of the basement...but falling apart just by laying around in a case...not sure about that one. I can see delamination from a faulty stamping procedure, but these machines are expensive and are operated in clean rooms. Each disc is verified, etc. You'd know if you had a chronic problem, and then you have a different issue, such as fraud for selling bad goods. To say that 10% of the DVD's in general use are now faulty sounds like a bit of FUD.
Record companies want it both ways (Score:1, Insightful)
Years ago, there was a time when the only media on which the average consumer could buy recorded music was pressed vinyl disks. Since there was no way to copy these disks, and they degraded slightly with each use (on most people's record players,) they were treated more as a physical good than intellectual property. If your record broke, you bought another one. If you wanted to buy a used one for less than a new one, you knew you would have to settle for lower quality, and a product that would probably break again sooner than a new one.
These days, there are many easy ways to copy music. Record companies now treat recorded music as intellectual property, and are doing everything in their power to stop your ability to copy it. They would even like to say that you don't "own" the music on your disk, that you have merely "licensed" it for listening, although they know that no consumer is going to accept a software-type "shrink-wrap" agreement on their CD's.
But guess what. If your CD breaks, they still expect you to buy another one. The record companies want it both ways. It's licensed, so you can't copy it. But it's a commodity, so you have to buy another copy if it breaks.