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More on LinDVD 86

Posted by Hemos from the cool-stuff dept.
periscope wrote to us about the Wired story that's currently running about InterVideo's LinDVD. We've mentioned this situation before, but now it looks like something's actually going to happen. As I said before, InterVideo has the CSS license to produce a player that the MPAA won't throw a hissy-fit over.
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  • Reinvent CDI (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Your desire is admirable, but unrealistic. If DVD quality could fit on a CD then we wouldn't need DVDs. The closest you'll get is CD-I, aka the "Green Book" CD format (later superceeded by the PC-compatible "White Book" format), which had its high-point in popularity around 1993. With that, you can fit a TV-quality (i.e., MPEG-1) movie on one or two CDs (e.g., Star Trek VI requires 2 CDs).

  • Who cares ? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    This is of little importance. Who cares about DVD anyway ? This controversy will blow over in a few weeks. Slashdot readers should be more concerned about the moneygrabbing marketeers [slashdot.org] and their revenue generation schemes the trolling [slashdot.org] for eyeballs & clickthru guide and the warez trading [slashdot.org]!

    Wake up slashdotters, before its too late and Slashdot becomes full of trolls and other offtopic crap...

  • And just what the HELL do you think you're going to get out of doing [video editing] on a MPEG2 stream? It's so pointless it's not even worth considering.

    Now wait a moment. MPEG-2 has all the information I need to turn a sequence of compressed frames into multiple images. (Possibly fields, is MPEG-2 stuff inherently interlaced like a TV signal?) Those images, when I'm manipulating them, are going to be uncompressed, I'm not editing the raw MPEG-2 data stream, at least not if I'm modifying individual frames. I don't see that I would do that much different if I was using MJPEG.

    WTF do you think all the low-end boards (that need video compression) use MJPEG?

    Because it doesn't require as much processing power? (Although it does require a lot of disk space...)
  • You are free to ignore LinDVD, just like you're free to not buy DVD movie discs. I have about 40 discs now and I would love to play them on Linux. What are my options?

    • Help the cause for producing a 100% free open-source DVD playback solution: ac3play [alsa-project.org]
    • Buy a copy of LinDVD. I'll wait and see WHAT and HOW it does its stuff. Is it distribution agnostic? Non-x86 users probably want support for their CPU, etc.
    • Buy a hardware DVD decoder board. SigmaDesigns [sigmadesigns.com] new Netstream 2000 comes to mind.
    • Burn all my DVD's and go back to VHS.
    I'll definitely not burn my discs, the video and audio quality are just too good to go back. If you don't have any DVD's the story changes however........
  • So here's a challenge: who can come up with a single sentence, say no more than 20 words, which explains why a propietary DVD player for Linux is not sufficient?

    Because it won't work on my PPC/ALPHA/SPARC/WHATEVER.

    This is not a Linux Player, this probably will be a Linux-x86-Player.

    I'm still wondering: Do they rely on the UDF-Patches? Or how are they getting the content from the DVD?

    Ralph

  • Threaten them with the types of things the companies can do, even if they use Windoze, because they have complete control over the playback programs.

    1. They can force you to watch (or wait through) the FBI notice and the "coming attractions", as fast-forward won't work.

    2. They can make the disk not play back unless your modem is used to call their company and a small fee is deducted from your visa account for each play.

    3. You cannot play Japanese disks on your American machine, and vice/versa. You cannot trade your disks with your friends in Europe.

    4. You cannot record any of the disk to a vcr, or edit it into your home movies as a gag.

    I'm sure there are many other things...

  • Too bad that DeCSS isn't cleanroom, it's based off of a stolen Xing key, and some nasty reverse-engineering. This case can not be one by the DeCSS people unless they get the DMCA repealed (yeah right, because afaik it's from a treaty). The DMCA expclitely prohibits the distribution of things like DeCSS, so there is no real legal ground to work on.
  • I thought that the DVD could disable the 'frame grab' features in Windows players... If so, you can only do this if the movie studio wants to let you do it.

    One thing that strikes me is that Personal Computing is all about the user controlling the information flow on his/her machine. But now someone has introduced hardware and software that bounces encrypted data around your system that you can't manupulate (legally). The idea is frankly disgusting and hopefully not a precedent for future technologies.
    --
  • But what if we want to use them under our rights of fair use?

    The law is clear on this -- you don't have normal "fair use" rights with a system that uses CSS, Macrovision and Region Coding.

    So, you have two choices:
    1) Don't use DVDs. Use an open format.
    2) Live as an outlaw with DeCSS. If you are going to do this because the system is immoral, you might as well go all the way and start warezing DVDs.

    There is no moral middle ground with DeCSS, at least not under US law.
    --
  • You make an important point -- it took "the industry" years and years to come up with the DVD format spec, most of this time expended in politics. And, even after all of that, they still had Divx challenging them for a while. You would never get buy-in from any studios to ship movies on the new format.

    One thing that is completely possible is a large capacity optical disk designed for data storage, possibly even based on a DVD drive mechinism, just without the video "features". I just don't see DVD-ROM (etc) cutting it in the long term -- the format was a tacked-on afterthought, and there are too many political and technical landmines hardwired in.
    --
  • "I've got mine, now screw everybody else" ??? That's not at all What my post said. More like "I don't have mine, don't get yours."
    --
  • I didn't have to pay for a DVD player for Win32. It came with the drive.

    Yeah, and Win98 is FREE because it comes with the computer??

    the price of my DVD-ROM drive is slightly increased due to licensing fees

    Yeah. You're paying more than you have to, slightly more, but more than you must. This doesn't bother you at all?

    Ok, fine. Consider what that licensing fee pays for. Add to this cost the fact that you're paying for the DVD cartel's ability to regionalize the product you BUY. Next time you go over-seas and find a great film, you can't play it at home. Maybe you don't travel much, but what if others do? Besides, why should people in Bangladesh be the only ones who can buy DVD discs cheap? Why should Europeans and Americans pay a premium, just because they can afford it?

    CSS regionalization is extensible and licenses expire. This means that next year's DVD-ROMs may be manufactured to be INCOMPATIBLE with your current drive. Will you again pay 'slightly more' for a new drive?

    How about self-terminating ROMs that become useless after X number of plays? CSS is a step in that direction.

    Do you believe that proprietary software now has no right to be on Linux?

    Not at all. What I believe is that when I buy a product, I should have complete control over it. I should not be 'licensing the right to use' it. The software 'license' is principally there to provide legal recourse against copying - I have no problem with that. But if you read your EULAs, you'll find that the company reserves the right to terminate your license at any time... After you've already paid for it even. And you have no recourse.

    What this means for DVDs is that if the MPAA chooses to do so, they'll change CSS and make the current installed base defunct. Cha-ching!

    If DVD technology, and software in general, was sold as a product, with no implied or expressed 'terms of use', there would be no problem.

    unable to see that this is making Linux much more attractive

    To whom? Not the hacker that wants to 'roll his own' player. It's fun to write your own stuff. It's easy to do, if you're not beating your head against a legal document.

    What's more, while this may make Linux more attractive to the non-hacker, it also makes Linux more controlled, and more closed; more dependent on the 'good graces' of the corporate world. This goes 180 degrees against the principles of Linux. Linux is about having a choice, having introspection into the how and why of the system.

    Making Linux 'more attractive' on terms dictated by corporate interests, is not good for Linux. Windows is already plenty 'attractive' on those terms. Linux is supposed to offer an alternative way of doing things, not the same way on a different OS.

    It's really a philosophical issue, and no amount of flamage will resolve it. The 'Linux alternative' as I see it, is about choice and openness, not just about the API and UI being different.

    And you criticize this application?

    I would like to. I would like to be able to look at it's code, see where it's done well and where it's held together with spit and wire. I'd LIKE to criticise it. As it stands, there is no way for me to review it on technical merits.

    [rant]

    I'd like to do my own tune-ups too. I resent having to pay my mechanic for the fact that he made the investment in a proprietary device that will read the codes off of my car's computer, just to tell me that I need new spark-plugs. The cost of that device, if it were a commodity, would be irrelevant - a tank of gas maybe. As it stands, I pay for an hour of work (for the chip scoping) and gain nothing but the knowledge that I could have already had with the device being built-in.

    [/rant]

    Point being, proprietary technologies are a way for companies to get the consumer by the ya-ya's; open technologies (and hardware specs) give the consumer choices. Implementations may be proprietary, that's fine, but the interfaces should be open.

  • We want to be able to create our own compatable tools without having to sign away any rights.


    ---
  • Hmm... that is a very interesting idea. I would have to wonder how well a movie would fit on a CD, but perhaps MPEG-4 could do that. 640 mb is even a fairly reasonable download... Not great, but could be done.

    And if it were to catch on with independent studios, that could be really cool. I especially like the idea of releasing an old movie with an up-to-date soundtrack and such... that could really be cool.

    Very interesting idea, I would love to see what could be done with that... With the relatively low cost of CD-R's, it would even be pretty reasonable. I do have to wonder how well something like that could take off against DVD, but if it could... That would be great....
  • ROFLMAO.... Can't moderate and post on the same thread, and have zero points, otherwise you'd get it for a very astute and funny post.

    However, please correct me if I'm wrong but aren't there PCMIA video decoding cards for laptops which could connect to your VHS player?

  • Okay, just let me know when it's ready for me to buy it. Then I'll be able to get a compatible drive and start buying DVDs.

    Not that I won't also have DeCSS and related technologies so I can use my DVDs on unsupported hardware also...

  • It's been done. See the CNN story [cnet.com].
  • Out of curiousity, why do you feel that you have the right to royalty-free dvds? The companies that developed the format pumped in serious cash; why shouldn't they have the rights to the fruits of their labors? You always, technically, have the option of starting up your own format.

    Also, I feel that your teeshirt analogy is not a good one. Shirts have been around for a hell of a long time, and even with today's patent system the patents would have expired long ago. Thus, under normal conditions nobody could force you to pay royalties for making shirts.

    However, if a company came up with a new fiber for making shirts that made shirts unstainable and last twice as long, would it be unreasonable for this company to want money if your use their new methods?

    While I agree that the current situation sucks and that royalties are annoying as hell, especially for free software developers, I don't feel that you or I have any natural born right, in almost all cases, to force a person or company to release their creations on anything other than their own terms.

  • It probably wouldn't be that hard to implement a plug-in replacement library based on DeCSS. It wouldn't be "legal" in eyes of the MPAA's lawyers, but there's not much they can do to stop it, aside from stomping on people brave/foolish enough to mirror it openly.
  • How do you propose to clean-room reverse engineer the unpublished algorithm without violating a clickthrough license agreement? You'll have to disassemble a compliant player, or else take apart a hardware decoder and take a microscope to the decoder ASIC. The former is exactly what happened with the Xing player, and the latter is unlikely to be undertaken by someone with an interest in making the reverse-engineered version public.
  • Oh that would help. Instead of having a few zealots trying to figure out everything and others being content with the binary-only, they'll have hoardes of alternative OS people trying to figure it out for playback.. Give people playback, and you won't have so many people trying to figure out how to, not caring if copying is made possible. Besides, blacklisting entire user bases of operating systems is plain silly. As if no Windows users do "bad stuff" (If I understood correctly, DeCSS was developed primarily under windows, with the support of linux added mainly to legitimize the product and get open source zealot support :) Case in point, I would be half tempted to work on playback system for linux if I didn't have the now somewhat working dxr2 board :) Since I have a working hardware solution under linux now, I'm more apathetic to software players... Now if there was a freely available software player with a closed, yet trustworthy (i.e. known *NOT* to transmit personal information/trash system) compnent, I'll bet you laziness sets in and people would care less about breaking CSS.
  • It's a good idea. The most important thing for this format, though, is content. Is anything still allowed to go into the public domain? I mean we'd need a proof of concept, maybe Nosferatu. It's a good film for smart-aleck irony purposes, if you know the story of the film Nosferatu, it should be in the public domain, and actually the copyright holder on it (Mrs. Bram Stoker was found to own the rights) tried to have all copies of it destroyed. Since it is silent it could be released with a cool soundtrack created by Copyleft-friendly bands (if there are any). Well, I'm just dreaming here, obviously... but I still think it is a good idea if anyone is up for it.
  • The law is clear on this --

    Yeah, the law is clear that the "man" is outright out to control the internet, peoples rights, our privacy, etc.. etc...

    It is going to come down to two classes of people:
    1) The sheep and lemmings - your average Joe on the street.
    2) The rest of us - "hackers" and "freedom fighters".

    If you don't stand up and fight for your rights or what you belive in - you fall into catagory #1! - PERIOD!

    In the U.S., if I remember right, we became who we are because we got sick and tired of being controlled, being told what to do and how to do it.(no offense to the folks in the U.K.). The uprisings against DeCSS and the likes of the corporate control and government controls like DMCA and UCITA are just an extention of that. Those that are fighting this stuff, not only in the U.S. but around the world are standing up saying "We have had enough, we won't take any more!" This is all just a non-violent way of fighting a revolution. Look at it this way no one is getting mamed, injured or killed!

    So those that are tired of the control and being told what and how to do things and the way you can do it - NEED to fight these things.

    Gabriel/TSS!

  • What is this, a bunch of offtopic crap?
  • Great Userfriendly take on that situation:

    http://www.userfriendly.org/cartoons/archives/00 apr/uf001703.gif
  • Note: This post may attract flaming but, some things should be set straight.

    In keeping with the spirit of open source ethics, Monastiero says that InterVideo is looking at ways to open up as much of the product as possible to the OS community.

    While we may not see the decryption, navigation, etc. opened, this is a very promosing statement from InterVideo. I know that MPEG-2 decoding is having some trouble right now (I'm subscribed to the livid-dev [linuxvideo.org] group), so obviously CSS and navigation aren't the only problems prohibiting a public, free, open source player from the linux developer community.

    While, I don't agree with the MPAA at all on the way that DVD encryption is being handled (I'm also boycotting the MPAA, I've had to resist buying several DVDs just to know I'm doing the RightThing(tm)), I do think that a player with some open specs may speed the development of other open-source projects (i.e livid).

    "But the CSS, Dolby, and navigation code will definitely not be open source. We're doing this to add a legal player to the market that the DVD industry can also be happy with."

    By reading this, I get the impression that they are just pasifying the MPAA for now until some laws change. Being a fairly well known company, they would be committing suicide to go all out and create a free, open source DVD decoder/player. Maybe InterVideo isn't so evil after all, maybe their waiting for the right time? Sure hope so.



    --
    Homer: "No beer, No TV make Homer something something";
    Marge: "Go crazy?";
    Homer: "Don't mind if I do!"
  • As much open as possible. Well when it's not 100% it's not good enough.

    I still won't be able to use it under FreeBSD even if I try to port it myself because of the CSS piece. Or on Linux/sparc.

    Don't tell me that I should "just" give in and run Linux/i386. That would sound just like "go with the mainstream and use Windows".

    Using this under Linux would be damaging to open source as a whole, and if the mentality takes on in the Linux/i386 world ("we have apps and the rest should just give up and use Linux/i386 too") that would be very bad for open source. It would remove the incentive for many (companies) to go open source.
  • I am not a linux zealot or anything like that, but I do believe in open source. I have no interest in DVD so this is coming from the point of view of an outsider:

    - First, although the company says that they will try to the program open, if it is not under the GNU then how can any open source advocate (i'm guessing a lot of the linux users are) possibly use these. If you are willing to buy closed source software just because it is the only thing out then you sound like a hypocrit (sp) to me

    - Second, DVD in general violates the open source ethic. If a company can make a product and then can regulate the use of it to the extremes that the DVD producers are, there is nothing open at all about the product.

    Just a thought
  • These rants always amuse me.

    I wonder how you intend to stop EVERYONE from buying DVDs.
  • It's more likely that the LinDVD people just e-mailed some "quotes" to Linus, and he approved them. Usually what happens in these press releases is that the person being quoted doesn't even write the quote, let alone say it. They simply approve what was written by the PR person.
  • These Bastards. Last night i was trying, once again to 'remove' some of the 'features' of a really great video card, which i paid for.(A creative TNT2 ultra.) All of these great features have one thing in mind. Preventing me from enjoying my dvd's. The built in macrovision in the tv out chip is really pissing me off! I bought this card, not only for gaming, but to watch dvd's. The Picture looks wonderful while recording our quake 3 matches, but, the macrovision encoded pic is crap. the Matrix looks like it was filmed underwater! Sometimes, if i load the software inthe correct order, the cinemaster dvd player won't turn on MV. If it does after the video starts, it crashes the entire machine!! This is directly tracable to the driver,Written by creative and Nvidia!! These bastards are in on it too!!! It just works so much better to rip to harddrive, remove macrovision, and CSS, and watch it from there.
  • If there ws just one simple library that did the CSS decoding, porting it would require minimal effort (especially considering everyone already knows how it can be done with DeCSS) and I'm sure the company would do that.
  • Besides, its more fun to rock the boat anyway!

    Mike Roberto (roberto@soul.apk.net [mailto]) - AOL IM: MicroBerto
  • I don't know if I'm the only one with mixed reactions to this. On one hand it's nice to see a blessed player on the market, but at what cost?

    $29.95 :)

    I understand what you mean. Although I'll probably fork over the cash for this (not happily, though) so I can finally watch my movies legally, I'm not going to stop distributing DeCSS. The lack of a DVD player for Linux is being addressed, but not the fundamental idiocy of CSS, Macrovision and Region Coding. Fine, we can play them. But what if we want to use them under our rights of fair use? What if we want to copy them to tape so we can watch them on the TV, which may not have a DVD player? What if we buy a whole lotta movies over here and move to a different country?

    <rant>
    Recently I've gotten really interested in this anime series, Rurouni Kenshin. Downloading it is a pain, and I'd rather just buy them. However, since I don't speak Japanese, I'd need subtitles, which the VHS wouldn't have. And thanks to Region Coding, I can forget buying it on DVD as well. You hear me, CCA? You're forcing me to pirate! This is just one example of why Region Coding is stupid.</rant>

    Here's my [radiks.net] DeCSS mirror. Where's yours?

  • Sure, we could create a better format; but they'll never use it. This isn't exactly a free market here, this is the format made by the industry for the industry. If they had actually allowed people to compete for the format, we wouldn't have ended up with the shitty format we have now. This isn't really a matter of big business trying to screw us over. It's the inevitable butting-of-heads that Open Source and Big Business has coming for a long time. Maybe we will change the software busniess, but it'll take a lot of time. In the meantime, I think we all need to support the underground movement of an open source player.

    Here's my [radiks.net] DeCSS mirror. Where's yours?

  • The lack of a DVD player for Linux is being addressed, but not the fundamental idiocy of CSS, Macrovision and Region Coding. Fine, we can play them.

    Can we? The details on the binary aren't available (neither is the binary) yet, but what do you think the odds are of it working on SPARC, Alpha, PPC or Amiga hardware? On less common distributions? On the next kernel release or the one after that? On *BSD or GNU/Hurd systems for that matter?

    The linux community should (and to a large degree does) shun binary only programs for good reasons. This should be no different.

  • This sounds like a really great idea. One suggestion - distribute it under a slightly modified version of the GPL - specifically add one clause stating that in accepting the license the licensee explicitly agrees that the software is for use only for legal fair use - NOT for making copies of works the licensee has no legal right to copy, and like the other conditions of the license breaking this one results in the immediate loss of it. Only get a lawyer to write it, run it by the FSF and make sure they agree it will hold. This could be a significant point in your favour when you get taken to court.

  • This is all well and good, but if the player doesn't work on some systems, it is likely that support will be slow, just like most regular products. The point of deCSS is that the MPAA shouldn't be fscking us with its encryption scheme. And now that they're throwing subliminal messages [slashdot.org] at us with it, I think it's safe to assume that CSS is going to be locked down very soon.
  • I only hope that I will be able to play movies in a terminal window via the command line. GUIs are for wimps. Not macho geeks like me :)
  • I don't think that was the issue he was brining up. Plus, most importantly the code that handles decryption will be closed and that is the most important part. No one really cares about anything else... Well ok, having a good interface to watch the movies is nice. To me the real issue is that this is not an open format and the MPAA gets to tell you how to use stuff you bought. Just a rant.
    Molog

    So Linus, what are we doing tonight?

  • This product looks pretty good to me. We all want more applications for linux, and here comes a desperately needed one. And now people here scorn it because it conflicts with other interests. Hey, don't take it out on this product. It was bound to happen, sooner or later. I'm glad it happened sooner, because this is a product that is quite useful, and will help the OS. Why any supporter of Linux would scoff at this product is beyond me. The fact remains that at the time that deCSS was produced there was no DVD player, and so this really changes nothing. It makes me wonder if the hard-core free-software guys are becoming too radical - thinking only of their court cases, and nothing of the user experience. In fact, the two are not mutually exclusive, and I'm suprised to see it presented that way here.
  • You say what is needed is a free alternative on Win32, to show the masses that they do not have to pay to play DVD's.

    What exactly are you talking about? Maybe every other DVD-ROM drive is different than the one I have, but I didn't have to pay for a DVD player for Win32. It came with the drive.

    I don't have to pay to play DVD's. I just have to pay for the DVD's itself.

    Of course, the price of my DVD-ROM drive is slightly increased due to licensing fees my DVD-ROM maker has to pay, but how of an increase per unit would you think that is? And it's a one time cost for the consumer, not a cost per play.

    And you criticize this application? Are you crazy? Do you believe that proprietary software now has no right to be on Linux - it's free or be damned? Are you so caught up in your own rhetoric as to be unable to see that this is making Linux much more attractive, by provide much needed software? Shouldn't we try to encourage more companies to provide software as well, rather than flame them for hurting this or that free software issue? Give me a break...

  • But will it allow us to fast foward through all of the advertisement shit?

    No?

    Well, um, then will it allow us to get rid of the subliminal messages?

    No?!

    Well, then I'm sure it will allow us to actually use DVDs we bought legally in different zones.

    It won't? What, exactly, is it that we are fighting for? Is to be able to get force fed content through Linux rather than through Windows? If that is all it is, then I want my contrabution to the EFF back, because that is just plain stupid. Now, if we are, in fact, fighting for our rights to decide what goes into our head, our right to have some say over big copyright intrests about IP, and our right to actually own what we buy, then this is completly meaningless, and I think it would be a shame if anyone would patronize this pathetic attempt at appeasement.

    Let's not take the bone they are throwing at us and keep on fighting for the meat.

  • Maybe you can write some sort of a wrapper to display the movie in text. See http://webpages.mr.net/bobz/ttyquake [mr.net] on a similar project =)
  • And what about hardware decoder boards, like th Hollywood+. Sigma Designs won't make drivers to use this board under Linux
  • Yeah.. I'm glad I'm not the only one that thought that sounded kind of creepy- Like Linus possessed by some sort of Promo/Marketing Daemon.

    Isn't this one of the seven signs of the appocalypse?
    -

  • It's cheap, and there's plenty of cracks available so you don't have to pay their TAX. Plus you own the fucking thing.

  • Freedom or death. I'm being a bit extreme, but that's it: I'm not going to alienate *my* freedom, *our* freedom, just to allow the corporate bastards in hollywood to buy a few more benzos. And save me the bit about paying the artists -- Valenti and co. have no problem screwing other countries' cinema industries and artists. But hey, they're doing it "legally".

    As a sidenote: I'm not being nationalistic here. French cinema sucks as of late. I've only seen one passable french movie lately (Peut-Etre [peut-etre-lefilm.com]) and it was'nt that good anyway.

    The MPAA is a cartel, a monopoly, they should be treated the same way Microsoft is being treated, there is no question about it. Getting moral lessons from those bastards is beyond any kind of decency. They are infringing laws as much, if not more, than your average Joe-w4r3z kiddie. The fact that they have power and money to get away with it does'nt make a difference.

    Now there's one thing that bothers me above all, it's the message they're trying to pass, that *us* free software advocates/users are just freeloaders. Listen: I barely have any illegal MP3z, I don't have *any* so-called "pirated" software with their illegal End-User Lick my Ass, and I've even managed to lose my only ripped-off movie: SW Phantom Menace -- one of the crappiest movies I've seen last year. I use Free Software, and I have a whole bunch of CDs I bought at the monopolistically inflated street price in shops.

    SO GET OFF MY BACK WITH THE MORALIZING BULLSHIT

    The MPAA and friends are just like those conservatives politicians you find fucking in brothels with 16 year old girls.

  • The whole point of DeCSS was to make something to watch DVDs with. Nobody's advocating stealing them, so that ultimately means buying DVDs in order to make DeCSS and the battle worthwhile. That means lining the coffers of the MPAA, which isn't desirable.

    But the MPAA isn't the enemy here - ignorance is.

    Our foe is the MPAA's ignorance of the futility and harmfulness of CSS. Our goal is to convince them that DeCSS isn't harmful to their bottom line - much like VCRs weren't back in the 80s. They don't believe it yet, but once they're convinced, the battle will be won.

    If we really want to make MPAA the enemy, we should forget DVDs (and DeCSS) altogether and push for newer/better/open distributed video standards to replace DVDs rather than decode them.

    Ultimately, we need to decide what we really want.

  • So if I don't happen to be running Linux on a main distribution,I'm still locked out of playing movies I paid for

    First it's "The Industry won't give us a player!"
    Now it's "The Industry won't give *all* of us a player!"

    I can understand the frustration, but what confuses me is the misdirected efforts of the Linux/Free Software community.

    Look -- the legal and technical framework that was built into the DVD format sucks. You know it, I know it, 10000 other Slashdot posters can't shut up about CSS, Region locking, etc, etc, etc. So, what's the natural reaction? Keep buying those DVDs and try to 'hack' the system with DeCSS, mashing the buttons on your playstation, whatever. Interesting, sure, but don't fool yourself into thinking that little hacks are a long term solution to the future of closed digital media.

    You can't play the DVDs that you paid for in the exact manner you want. That fact is a very important aspect of the design of the DVD format. You should have known it, and probably did know it, when you put your money down on the counter. The only real solution is to stop buying DVDs until they fix the format!

    Time and time again, Slashdotters declare that they won't use Windows 2000, Mac OS X, Solaris, and so on because of the licensing conditions. But for some reason, you'll happily tramp on your principles just to see "The Matrix" in glorious 525-line resolution. Would it really kill you to boycott buying/renting the DVD and instead support the (relatively) free formats of VHS or even LaserDisc?

    There's lots of complaining about the MPAA and their tactics on this board. But the implicit message is always "I want to watch DVDs!" -- while you may be condemning them, you are actually implicitly supporting the MPAA and their encrypted, copy-protected digital media vision of the future. By "buying in", you are implicity part of the problem.

    You are all gadget freaks; You are all early adopters; You actually have a lot of power in this market (the market value of Slashdot/Andover proves this). So quit being complicit with the MPAA's master plan, and start voting with your wallets for media formats that you can support!
    --
  • A binary-only player raises several questions-- will it work with all the distributions? Probably not. Especially foreign-language distros.

    The other critical thing, as pointed out to me by a poster in the previous article about whether or not there is a DVD player for Linux, is that x86 platforms are not Linux. If this is binary only, this still leaves PPC, MIPS, Alpha, Sparc, 680x0 and whatever else you've got Linux on (Z80? 6502? Homebrew core on Xilinx FPGA?) in the dark. This is a player for a FEW distros running on x86 platforms only. It is NOT a player for "Linux" in general.

    We still leave out other OSes as well-- AmigaOS, BeOS, BSD, Commercial Unixes, and whatever else. And this gains us nothing in the fight against silly region codes, price fixing, forced commercials, playback conditions, and the general loss of traditional rights associated with the format.
  • While I don't disagree on the main point of your message, perhaps you're unaware that many of the current software DVD players (ie for Windows) do let you do things like stop frame, frame grabbing, and frame advance.

    Indeed, there are other programs out there that will let you capture a video clip (sans audio) by repeatedly sending "grab frame" and "frame advance" messages to the software player.

    But yes, I'd like a player (or better, access to the player source) that lets me do whatever I want with the data stream. For example, I'd like to see a player that gives me the option of doing a split-screen display to simultaneously view two (or more) different camera-angle tracks (current players limit you to displaying one or the other) if present.
  • Hi,
    Well, it's good to see my submission got in. I wrote some information for you all in an earlier story from today, at:

    http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/03/31/156 238&cid=87

    That should help to clear some things up for you.

    Cheers,

    Jonathan (periscope).
  • If the Xing-player is shareware, then the clickthrough is probably enforceable... If you don't pay for the software, you have no right to expect to be able to use it - thus an EULA could be legit. The reason shrinkwrap and traditional click-through licenses aren't valid is because you've already bought the software by the time you see the license.

    There's a good chance that the anti-reverse engineering clause is void, but the idea is to not bother breaking it, just to save ourselves one more legal hassle. And we all know how a company or association (MPAA) can win even when they're in the wrong, just by buying the trial, especially against poor hackers who can't really afford lawyers.

    So, the idea is to avoid as many sticky legalities as possible.

    I've seen many legal opinions on the issue and most people seem to believe that for the purpose of being a key, a key isn't copyrightable. (You could copyright a poem, but if it's a required key, people would be free to use that poem in that context.) But, even assuming the key can be freely distributed, why try? What would be ideal is simply writing the codec to strip the keys from the first disk inserted after installing, that way we don't have to distribute any keys or possibly copyrighted material.

    What could also help the cause is someone to write a tool that uses a software decoder and hacks it to write .VOB files to the HD, that way we can say that we aren't trying to pirate movies, that many easier ways already exist. Especially if we only release a library, incomplete from a pirating sense, but essential for a player.
  • It wouldn't matter. You can't write a contract (which a license is) for performance of illegal acts, nor can one which forbids illegal acts have any force, it's assumed that illegal acts are outside the scope of contract law.

    Besides, there's no sort of operation I'm wanting to prohibit. If someone wants to write a player with an export option, I'd support that, as there are *many* legal uses for copying part or all of a movie.

    I'd prefer to just distribute the library in such a way that it has no functions directly of use to a player, so that movies could be read through the codec, but not written. Not that it'd be hard to add, but so that it'd be clean the way it was released.

    Actually, there is one license solution to this...

    Use something incompatible with the LGPL and BSDL, have it grant the same sort of rights, allow linking, etc, but prevent the addition of any functions to the codec, all changes required to be in a seperate library or implemented by the maintainer. But primarily, prevent distribution of the library with any application the primary obvious purpose of which isn't to *view* movies in realtime. This was the library couldn't be modified into a pirate player, and applications couldn't include it (like a GPL module) by default, they'd have to fit the license (be primarily a DVD player) to use it...

    This way any player could include the codec, and pirates could even use it, or a player which existed mainly for making copies, but they'd have to link to a site which distributes it and have the user start the procedure, which would be enough to show that it was a seperate package.

    Just throwing ideas out. If I ever get close to finished something like this I'll make sure I talk to a bunch of prominent people and/or a lawyer or two before I do anything.
  • I'd prefer to have a decent open source and easily modifiable player instead of having to crack some buggy incompatible commercial player.

    Especially because I'm sure the players for Linux are being written just to satisfy the "There are no players - we have to write our own" claim. The companies won't bother making them work well, or supporting other fringe OSes. If we don't make it work, why will they?
  • Two ways, one is to make sure the code is never run, so the click-through doesn't become an issue. That may mean manually decrypting the install files as well, or finding an older version, which would be less protected.

    Or, simply by using the information gained from hearing about DeCSS's attempts (without actually looking at their code) enough could probably be assumed to aid in analyzing device communication and reverse engineering that way.

    Clean-rooming the Xing source isn't what I meant to say, I meant that Xing (or another software player) would be disassembled and analyzed, this information would be sent to the programmers, who not having seen Xing's source, or DeCSS wouldn't be influenced by it.

    As long as the programming is done clean-room, that should be all that matters. A way to distribute clients without an actual player key would be helpful though.
  • The "subliminal messages" article was apparently an April Fools joke. I'm making this reply for the benefit of future web searchers who hit this comment without knowing surrounding detail. See the comments on the "subliminal messages" article.
  • I was playing around with the idea of signing the appropriate NDAs so that I could create a free/almost free set of binary libs. Then I took a gander at the DVD faq. End of that idea.

    Straight from the faq, here's why:

    "The official DVD specification books are available from Toshiba after signing a nondisclosure agreement and paying a $5,000 fee. One book is included in the initial fee; additional books are $500 each. "

    "Implementation of DVD products and use of the DVD logo for non-promotional purposes requires additional $10,000 format and logo licenses."

    "Any company making DVD products must license the patented technology from a Philips/Pioneer/Sony pool, a Hitachi/Matsushita/Mitsubishi/Time Warner/Toshiba/Victor pool, and from Thomson. Total royalties are about 6% (minimum $6) for a DVD-Video player, 6% (minimum $6) for a DVD-ROM drive, 5% (minimum $2) for a DVD decoder, and 10 cents for a DVD disc."

    "Dolby licenses Dolby Digital decoders for $0.26 per channel."

    On the bright side, getting the specs of CSS seems to be free. So it technically shouldn't be a problem to create a legal binary lib--as long as you don't mind selling off your soul in the NDAs that they'll make you sign.

    For the libs necesary to drive a fully functional dvd player, however, you have a $15,000 startup fee, together with a $7/player distribution fee. While I am fond of open source, I'm not willing to bring my bank account balances down to $0 to support it.
  • ...other "rebel" operating systems, like {Net,Free,Open}BSD and BeOS?
  • I know my karma is probably going to take a beating for this, but... hey, I could have AC'd, so be nice. Anyway, here goes....

    Does anyone else think that quote from Linus at the end of the piece sounded more like a market-droid than the real Linus talking? "Their digital video and audio products will greatly enhance the Linux multimedia experience" ??? Let's hope Transmeta doesn't have him so insulated from reality now with quote-spewing PR flacks, that he ends up completely out of touch with reality, like Bill Gates....

    #include "disclaim.h"
    "All the best people in life seem to like LINUX." - Steve Wozniak
  • I would like to request that you publish an addendum to the article noting that no linux DVD players *presently* exist.
    As another poster pointed out, Creative's DXR2 decoder is (basically) working under linux. Information is at: http://gdxr2.havoknet.com/howto/dvd- HOWTO.html [havoknet.com].

    I know this isn't a software player, but if your goal is to play movies (rather than make a political statement,) it should work fine. (Not that I disagree with the political statement.)
  • ... the next Micros~1. Why does everyone hate Micros~1 (well, not everyone but a lot of people)? It is because they leveraged their operating system to dominate the PC market, by making programs from competitor's incompatible with Windos. This is the reason for the anti-trust suit, this is the basis for their nasty tactics, and this is why Micros~1 is seen as a great evil beast.

    DVD stands for Digital Versatile Disks. The DVD consortium deliberately didn't want them called Digital Video Disks because they want them to be used for everything from computer software, to audio and video content. Its all supposed to go on DVD and it may all end up using the CSS encryption standard.

    Well, I don't see why DVD CCA couldn't use its encryption standard to bully people and get an unfair competitive advantage in the Information Technology marketplace the same way Micros~1 used its Windos monopoly. After all, you won't be allowed to reverse engineer to make it work if you don't license it from them.

    The King is dead, long live the King.

  • I still disagree that it's unrealistic. MPEG-4 was not around when these formats were introduced. And I think we could even do better than that. MPEG-1 is 3 generations behind, in terms of space and quality. DVD's use MPEG2, which is great for quality, but not necessarily for space. I still think that if you combine MPEG-4 with a large block format you could get DVD quality under 640 meg. (Basically, the concept of large block compression, is a compression scheme which only has positive returns on large data sets, such as tokenizing on simlarities between data.)
  • One thing we could aim for is to get together and create a competing open format. I know it sounds nuts, but it could be the eventual goal. When Linus first created Linux, he thought of it as just a project for a few people, and it spead like wildfire.

    What if we take MPEG-4, combine it with some sort of large block compression, and create a format that will fit DVD quality in 640 megabytes, which will then go on a CDR. Then we convince independent movie studios to support it, and we enjoy independent movies on our computers. If the market for them gets big enough, maybe it will spread to the mainstream stuff. Even if it doesn't, a new point of view probably wouldn't hurt most of us.

    Just a crazy idea, but something to consider.

  • I disagree. When most people complain about open-sourcing DVD players, the argument they use is "to make it faster" or "better" or "run smoother" or "look better". None of these things have anything at all to do with the CSS encryption. Theres a simple algorithem, and thats that./p

  • Dammit. I can't watch movies that I PAID FOR either. I've been trying so hard, but I can't find a VHS player for my laptop anywhere. The EVIL MPAA has struck again.
  • Yay in the fact that the authors intend to keep only the CSS/Dolby/Navigation stuff closed source. Given other comments regarding look-and-feel of DVD players, this gives us a real chance at making the screen look nice.

    Boo on the cost. $50 for Dolby 5.1? Not bad, but you may as well buy a component player for your TV after buying all the parts and software. "Buy us because we're the only legal ones" isn't necessarily a great marketing strategy either. And then there's the issue of the MPAA and having to make major portions of the software closed-source.

    My guess is you'll see this software bundled with the major distros in the next year or two, which then makes much of this a moot point.
  • When did Linus ever have an open source edge? He wrote the original Linux, not out of a desire for a free Unix (like rms's GNU project), but out of a desire to avoid Minix's limitations... and probably a "because I can" deal.

    He released the source because he could. There is no reason to hide source code unless you believe that it is a valuable product... most hobbist programmers include source on their web sites. Shareware developers, however, did not.

    When the Linux kernel and GNU tools were combined and formed a free Unix-like OS, Linus released the kernel under the GPL. The earlier release was a public domain type of deal.

    Linus write Linux because he could, not to change the world. RMS and the FSF worked on GNU because of a fundamental belief that computer code should be free. They sat in the ivory tower of the MIT LCS and worked on GNU, and later got an Office across the river and continued to work on GNU.

    FSF have been Open Source advocates. Linus is a programmer whose work, a simple kernel for the 386, happened to complete the picture for a much larger program to recreate Unix. the GNU/Linux designation DOES make some sense, given that Linux was useful to run GNU software (and later all the neat projects that have come since), not because there is a particular love for a kernel.

    Alex
  • How useful would a non-source-code paper about CSS and DeCSS be? A document describing the encryption algorithm and how it is used in thorough detail, but not in the form of source code in some programming language, would be much closer to the "protected speech" most judges are familiar with. Yes, it could still be challenged on trade secret grounds, I suppose.

    Just a thought.

  • The point is not to watch DVD on Linux. (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:00AM (#1154936)
    IMHO, a lot of people are barking up the wrong tree when they say claim that DeCSS is for watching DVDs on Linux. To all of you - problem solved because now there's a free player!

    The real issue - and I feel this is how DeCSS should be defended - is the right to write a royalty-free clean-room DVD player on any platform. Trying to take this right away is really tough - kind of like trying to take away the right to who can make T-shirts.

    Given that, there are a few ways to prevent someone writing a player:
    1. patent some critical component. this is pretty tough given that DVD is just an encoding/file format. (then again I hear that GeoWorks seems to have patented WML)
    2. don't give out the file format, except on restricted licenses. Buy^H^H^H Lobby for laws (DCMA) that make it illegal to reverse engineer software i.e. DVD players (even though this activity is currently considered fair use).
    3. even better, 'lobby' for laws that make any reverse engineering - even black box - illegal. period.
    As far as I can tell, DeCSS is being fought with #2.

    I'm just waiting for the day when corporations can achieve #3. Then, you'll see how cheap CDs and DVDs are currently. Well, actually most of us will see movies for free - only those of you 'privacy' freaks who don't want to share your personal preferences to get enhanced customer service will have to pay for anything.

    Ahh, Monday!

  • Missing the point! (Score:3)

    by fugue ( 4373 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:24AM (#1154937) Homepage
    This isn't about getting DVD support for Linux. It's about the right to play DVDs wherever you want. How about NeXTos, OS/2, dunno about BeOS, PalmOS (yeah, right, I know), etc? How about "fair use"? It's nice that Linux will be able to play DVDs, but the MPAA well knows that you can keep most people happy by giving them baubles, not rights.

  • It seems like there are a few problems with DeCSS, like that it was partially based on Xing's player against a perhaps effective click-through license, and that it was packaged in a way that effectively made it a piracy tool.

    An unenforceable click-through license that is also probably illegal in several countries as it does'nt respect the consumers' rights. It does'nt take a lawyer to guess that there must be a few countries where trying to impose an illegal clause to the contractee is illegal in itself.

    As a sidenote, drifting topics: I was wondering about the comments I've read lately re: the GPL being unenforceable as no money were changing hands. First of all, were that true, click-through licenses would be even weaker than that, and even shrinkwrap licenses for that matter (you pay BEFORE you're able to read the license, and even when you're allowed to read it, it's so unpractical that it must be on shaky legal grounds). And then, the GPL states clearly "since you have not signed [this license] However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works."

    By current copyright law, anything you publish is under your copyright, and therefore falls under its restrictions, namely that you can claim rights to derivative works and distribution. As such distribution and modification are usually prohibited, it's foolish to claim you are not aware of the rest of the provisions in it as soon as you start exercising them.

  • His comments are spot on. (Score:3)

    by FreeUser ( 11483 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @09:15AM (#1154939)
    I wonder how you intend to stop EVERYONE from buying DVDs.

    This is just silly. Nowhere in his "60's rant" did he claim to be able to "stop EVERYONE from buying DVDs." You can't even stop everyone from espousing completely rediculous points of view such as neo-nazism or pro-Microsoft FUD, much less take on a huge, well entrenched and well financed trust of media conglomerates.

    The poster is encouraging those of us who care enough about this issue to be concerned to not fall for a closed-source trap which will allow the aforementioned trust of conglomerates to deflect public interest from the issues at hand, quite possibly undermine the DeCSS defense, and allow them to continue to dictate terms of usage to consumers in violation of the law[1].

    Whether or not you agree with the views espoused, your characterization of his comments to mean he is out to force EVERYONE to abide by his views is simply absurd. He is trying to convince, not coerce. And an ever growing number of us are convinced.

    [1]See previously posted legal arguments regarding how (a) the DVD CCA is an illegal trust, (b) how region coding is in violation of international trade law, and (c) how CSS prevents fair use, in direct violation of law in several countries including Germany.

  • Can't we re-reverse engineer CSS? (Score:3)

    by WNight ( 23683 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:30AM (#1154940) Homepage
    It seems like there are a few problems with DeCSS, like that it was partially based on Xing's player against a perhaps effective click-through license, and that it was packaged in a way that effectively made it a piracy tool.

    I propose that 'we' should clean-room reverse engineer the spec. It should be just the CSS part, the minimum necessary to let a seperate player play the movie, specifically it shouldn't do any actual file access, or compile to a standalone program.

    If we avoid any legal complications, such as possible license violations, or making it a tool to specifically break copyright, we should be alright.

    And if it's against the DMCA, well, it's a USA law, and quite frankly, the MPAA can go ... well, perform anatomically impossible actions. A server in a country outside the USA can host the CSS-Auth code, much like we downloaded secure crypto from non-USA sites.

    But, anyways, cleanly reverse engineer the code, make all details of the process and the end result public.

    That way anyone can use it. I'd love to see hardware that ignores CSS. It'd rock to buy a DVD player that didn't just have region bypass, but didn't include the concepts of regions at all.

    I will boycott DVDs (the movies on them, not the hardware, or writable, etc) until the MPAA gets the hell out of my business. What I watch, when I watch it, how I watch it, and in what 'region' I watch it is none of their business. I won't let them use my own technology against me.

    And when I say 'we', I'm serious. I'm a coder, not the best, but pretty good. I've seen the source to DeCSS, so I shouldn't be involved in that segment, but I'm going to research clean-room reverse engineering to see how much can be known and still have it 'clean', and then I'll start to describe the process, to the best of my ability, for others to use. Supposedly the keys are easy to crack, even if you don't start with a specific key for plaintext, as long as you understand a few of their mistakes. This will be ideal, because starting with a player key might make it harder to claim it was cleanly reversed. In fact, if there's a way to automate this process, and get it down under a minute or so, every player could determine its own key by cracking the ones on the disk when first installed, thus meaning we don't have to actually distribute anything they could object to under international laws.

    Anyone in Iraq willing to run a server? (If you can think of any country less willing to cooperate with pushy US megacorps, let me know.)

  • Mixed Reactions (Score:3)

    by Kagato ( 116051 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @06:29AM (#1154941)
    I don't know if I'm the only one with mixed reactions to this. On one hand it's nice to see a blessed player on the market, but at what cost?

    Besides the fact that this is a binary for pay distro that probally won't work a couple kernel and library revisions down the line I'm more fearful of how this can damage the current MPAA cases.

    The gov't case against Microsoft was hurt when Netscape was gobbled up by AOL. There's no question that the MPAA's next move will be to say "Hey there's Linux software now. There is no reason for anyone to have DeCSS. There is no reason for anyone to do any reverse engineering. Only hackers use DeCSS. And we all know hackers are Evil." And judging by the beating geeks have been taking in court I'm very fearful of the outcome.
  • it does nothing about the basic idiocy of CSS, and the ability of the MPAA to dictate where you watch movies, and what players you watch on.

    Look at the basics of CSS, and you'll also realize that DIVX isn't dead it's just hiding. All you need is an Internet-connected DVD player with a RAM-based key.

  • dear cnn (Score:4)

    by Signal 11 ( 7608 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:00AM (#1154943)
    Dear CNN,

    In your recent article about the protests in DC over the copyright act you quoted the MPAA as saying that "linux DVD players were available". I am dissapointed that the reporter failed to ask what players were available and then communicate that information to the protesters. More importantly, I feel that by omitting the fact that no DVD players for linux are presently available commercially the article was biased towards the MPAA and portrayed the protesters in an unfair light. I suspect your readers (like myself) would have been interested to know that no linux DVD player exists (legally) as a direct effect of the MPAA suing everyone who has created one.

    I would like to request that you publish an addendum to the article noting that no linux DVD players *presently* exist. If you would like additional information about the current state of DVD use under linux, feel free to contact me. I would be happy to provide you with as much information as I have on the issue of linux DVDs. Thanks.

  • Not the real point... (Score:4)

    by Blaise ( 8438 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @06:28AM (#1154944)
    Though i do admit it's a useful step in the right direction, i can't help but think that this will have as an unfortunate consequence the fading to the background to a certain extent of the current court cases. The facts remain that the MPAA is still bitter about the ease with which the LinDVD people cracked their "security" algo. As well, the way in which the developers have been treated makes me ill, and i'd rather spend the 29.95 $ trying to make the DeCSS case a landmark.

    "This is another exciting day for the Linux community," said Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux operating system. "[Linux] continues to attract industry-leading software companies like InterVideo. Their digital video and audio products will greatly enhance the Linux multimedia experience."


    Anyone else think this quote is rather unfortunate? I really didn't think Linus would take this "Businessman's view" of the whole ordeal. Granted it's nice, but they've openly stated that a lot of their code won't be opensource, including the navigation code (which has no copyrights or other trade secrets attached to it AFAIK) Quite honestly, it seems to me that Linus might be losing a bit of his OpenSource Edge...

  • This is a Bad Thing (Score:4)

    by jabber ( 13196 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @06:57AM (#1154945) Homepage
    The release of an "MPAA blessed" DVD player for Linux is a bad thing. Here's why:

    Most folks don't realize the underhanded tactics of regionalization and pay-for-CSS licensing. They only realize convenience and the 'poor hackers' inability to watch "The Matrix" on their Linux PCs.

    The release of an 'official' DVD player for Linux makes it as convenient to watch DVD movies on Linux as it is on Win32. The 'poor hackes' should be satisfied by that - in the public eye.

    The fact that regionalization and licensing of the ability to watch your (owned) movies is still there is not a convenience issue, so most people don't care. If the 'poor hackers' keep complaining about 'consumer rights', the MPAA cronies like CNN will just label us 'anarchists', mention kiddie-porn and bomb-making info that is to be found on-line....

    Those 'nasty pervert hackers', always causing trouble...

    This is not a step in the right direction. This is an MPAA maneuver to remove the one argument that speaks to the general public. What's needed is a FREE alternative on Win32, to show the masses that they do not have to pay to play DVDs.

  • Re:What's with the Linus quote? (Score:4)

    by Robotech_Master ( 14247 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @08:43AM (#1154946) Homepage Journal
    Fluffhead wrote...
    Does anyone else think that quote from Linus at the end of the piece sounded more like a market-droid than the real Linus talking? "Their digital video and audio products will greatly enhance the Linux multimedia experience" ??? Let's hope Transmeta doesn't have him so insulated from reality now with quote-spewing PR flacks, that he ends up completely out of touch with reality, like Bill Gates....
    And I'm mildly annoyed, I'd like to note--I mentioned the very Wired News article linked to in the /. submission, in a post I made [slashdot.org] in response to the original LinDVD article [slashdot.org]. Even quoted the last paragraph. Nobody replied or moderated me up.

    Now, the article's suddenly been noticed as if it's Hot Headline News, Stop The Presses, and considered hot news, and everyone's commenting on the quote in the last paragraph as if they never saw it before. Oh well.

    My take on Linus's quote: Well, Linus isn't RMS. He's never claimed to be. He's not the die-hard ideologue Stallman is--and he's no dummy, either.

    Open-source or not, a Linux DVD player app is something that will nonetheless improve the viability of Linux as an alternate operating system. Like the similarly closed-source apps WordPerfect, StarOffice, and so forth, it provides yet another thing that Linux doesn't yet have--and presumably provides it in such a way that people like me, who never could manage to get the DeCSS player apps to work, will have something user-friendly that we can drop the DVD into and go. And that's a good thing for getting more people to use Linux rather than Windows.

    Anyway, for all we know the Wired flacks could have cut Linus's quote, or reworded it, to leave out any mention of "I'd rather it be open source, but..." We all know how movie posters and boxes mangle quotes from film reviews to suit their purposes...

  • How do we explain the problem to the public? (Score:4)

    by bfields ( 66644 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:19AM (#1154947) Homepage

    This is an interesting situation; most of us seem to agree that the availability of proprietary DVD-playing software for Linux doesn't really cut it.

    Now how do I explain this to my aunt?

    Before we could just say that reverse-engineering CSS was necessary to enable us to create a Linux-compatible DVD player. With this no longer the case, we can now say "we need a free/open source DVD player"; but then we need to explain what "free" and/or "open source" mean, and it gets harder; a wrong choice of words could lead someone to believe (mistakenly) that, for example, we're just cheapskates who want everything for nothing.

    So here's a challenge: who can come up with a single sentence, say no more than 20 words, which explains why a propietary DVD player for Linux is not sufficient?

  • Okay, so there's going to be a closed source version of a DVD decoder, Woo Hoo!! great news, right?

    Uh-huh, right. Try these scenarios on for size:

    • there's no mention that the decoder will be supported for all of the major distributions, let alone minor or alternate language ones.

      So if I don't happen to be running Linux on a main distribution,I'm still locked out of playing movies I paid for (if I were willing to buy CSS encoded DVDs in the first place, which I am not --I'm boycotting the damn MPAA until this thing is resolved).

    • What happens if the company is/goes public and a company such as the so-called evil empire (M$, AOL Time Warner, etc. ) buys enough stock to effectively control the decoder. They now effectively also have power to control my access (changing a closed spec, etc.) so as to render any investment I may have made in the DVD player and/or DVD's moot without my having a say so.
    • Lastly, a closed source decoder means that I have no idea how well the decoder is written, whether it does other things (like tracking my usage patterns, etc.), how well it obeys system rules, does it work with all video cards, etc.
    So thanks but no thanks. I'll vote with my money to continue the fight for a control free solution like deCSS.

  • Did you read the article at all? They are going to "make as much of the program as open as possible". Now, as they go on about, this won't include the CSS decoding, which is understandable. I don't necessarily agree with the MPAA, but you hsould at least get your facts straight before ranting about something.

  • This really doesn't help... (Score:5)

    by |deity| ( 102693 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @07:16AM (#1154950) Homepage
    <60s style rant>
    ... in some ways this makes the situation worse. DeCSS was designed to provide a means to create a linux dvd player. However now the battle is more important then the original problem was. The lawsuites and prosocution of innocent people has changed what the battle is over. It started over the desire for a linux dvd player, it has become a fight for some of our fundamental rights.

    This seems to be a way for the opposition to change the focus of the battle. Soon you'll hear them say "see if all of the linux users had just been willing to wait they would have had a *legal* means of viewing their dvds." Now fewer people are going to think that DeCSS is important. Fewer voices means less real change. Less chance of our being able to defend ourselves in the future. The outcome of the whole DeCSS problem is more important then if a few people want to watch dvds on linux.

    None of us should use this dvd player. Not a single one of us should even buy a dvd. If we do, we are supporting their efforts, their lawsuites, and their PACs. If we want change we have to hit them where it hurts in the pocketbooks. </60s style rant>

  • This is not the point at all ... (Score:5)

    by (void*) ( 113680 ) on Monday April 03, 2000 @06:52AM (#1154951)
    The whole point of this is that Free OSes cannot play or use DVDs. This is not about Linux.

    And not just that. As PC users, we want flexibility. I want to manipulate the video stream. I want to be able to stop a frame, capture it, and perhaps make a parody. In a film-making class, studying such things one frame at a time is one way of learning the craft.

    There are just so many legitimate uses of DVD and digital media. I can't even think of all of them on the spot. To the MPAA: You never had any issue with how your movies are used. True, if we publish anything defamatory, you can sue. That not copyright law. Copyright law only extends to distribution, and many of are willing to abide my those laws! Who gave you the authority to dictate use terms upon us? Whatever gave you the authority to choose our OS for us?

    And I am not even saying that this is an us-vs-you issue. By us I mean you too, in the future, when your future studios can't and won't be able to use these locked-in materials. Ever think about that? Don't tell me that the Warner-Fox-MGM-blah consortium will remain bed-fellows forever?

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