Apple's New MacBooks Have Built-In Copy Protection 821
raque writes "Appleinsider is reporting that the new MacBooks/MacBookPros have built-in copy protection. Quote: 'Apple's new MacBook lines include a form of digital copy protection that will prevent protected media, such as DRM-infused iTunes movies, from playing back on devices that aren't compliant with the new priority protection measures.' Ars Technica is also reporting on the issue. Is this the deal they had to make to get NBC back? Is this a deal breaker for Apple or will fans just ignore it to get their hands on the pretty new machines? Is this a new opportunity for Linux? And what happened to Jobs not liking DRM?"
Suddenly glad I bought the previous version. (Score:5, Interesting)
What will fanbois think? (Score:4, Interesting)
Oh, Steve Jobs is still an asshole [danstechnstuff.com].
Two screen dilemma (Score:5, Interesting)
For someone like me who has a Dell 20" screen that supports HDCP, but also an Apple 20" screen that does not, we're expected to unplug one screen every time we want to watch something protected in this manner? Get real!
Re:Questions? Answers. (Score:3, Interesting)
That was a lie then, and is still a lie.
I hate taxes. I try not to pay them.
Yet, in order to keep living outside of jail, I keep paying them.
Am I lying about hating taxes? Or am I playing the game that needs to be played?
Re:Two screen dilemma (Score:4, Interesting)
As a Switcheur of two years now, one thing that STILL bothers me is that I can't take screen grabs while a DVD is playing -- even if DVD Player is in a different space or on a different display!
Grrrrrrrr
On the other hand, DVD Player is lightweight enough and good enough at remembering where it is that I can cmd+tab/cmd+q/cmd+tab/cmd+shift+3/click and the movie interruption is something like 4-5 seconds.
But still.
*sigh* (Score:4, Interesting)
The more I hear about Apple, the more I like Microsoft because they did the same thing years ago, thus proving they have a better understanding of the business.
I didn't really mind when Apple locked their hardware. After all, it's their hardware. I didn't really mind when Apple locked their iPods. After all, I could use a Creative Zen. I didn't mind when they refused to remove the iPod-only DRM on ITMS. After all, I prefer buying CDs and ripping them myself, since it's almost the same price, with virtually no hassle or copy "protection". But now, one of the best OS on the market will feature built-in, OS-level DRM? Fuck that. I won't be buying an Apple any time soon, which is a shame because I was planning to do just that with the Chrismas money.
So Microsoft is barely starting to play ball. Apple is locking it's products more and more, and locking the users of the products. Google starts forking Open Source projects to proprietary code (OpenID). The IT world is becoming more and more confusing.
I think it's time to read In the Beginning was the Command Line [shand.net] again.
Re:Obligatory Apple reality check (Score:5, Interesting)
That's why consumers don't have a problem with it. The only ones extremely opposed to Fairplay are the idealists who are against the very idea that they can't be trusted to obey the law. Those types of people aren't in the target market for iTMS anyway, so Apple isn't hurting at all by making profit for shareholders, appeasing media content providers, and giving (actual) costumers what they want.
Apples just work (Score:2, Interesting)
So if this is just an issue with the ITMS, then it will probably not affect my choice to buy an Apple. It will just mean that Amazon gets my music and movie business. If there actually comes a time where I try to play some media, and I get an error, then yes, I will look for other option.
Of course, since MS has created a market where most OEM created cheap, ugly, non functional, and generally useless machines, there options are few and far between. Apple took a *nix and built an OS out of it. As reported here, HP was very unhappy about some Vista decisions. HP also has experience with *nix. HP also has experience with building extremely reliable, functional, and exquisite machines. It is a pity that they no longer have the spirit of innovation to build the ultimate HP-UX laptop, instead of just being the lapdog for MS.
Re:Er, it's HDCP. (Score:2, Interesting)
Exactly. If it wasn't in this iteration, it probably would have been in the next one.
That being said, HDCP sucks, no matter what the device. It's evil because it blocks legitimate uses as badly as illegitimate ones, and it adds a whole new layer of potential incompatibility. There are ways around it [hdfury.com] with extra hardware, but it's stupid to have to pay hundreds of dollars to get around a built-in product defect.
One more reason to download the pirated version of the media even if you bought the legitimate one.
Dear Linux, don't miss this opportunity! (Score:1, Interesting)
Vista sucked beyond imagination, Windows 7 is Vista with a different name and Apple is playing again ad again the bad guy card, both software and hardware wise. What else does Linux need to get some serious consideration among average users?
Re:How many people care? (Score:5, Interesting)
There are vanishingly few "screwed over" customers "angry" about HDCP. Most people never even see the "restrictions" on their "freedom." They subscribe to cable, buy their BluRay players, buy their disks, and it all works just fine. If they didn't, then these stories would be in Time Magazine (or, better yet, TV Guide) and not on Slashdot.
For a couple reasons:
1) Consumers are retarded. I know of lots of people with HDTVs that watch the game stretched and distorted on an SD channel and think its the bees knees. Some of them even have access to the same channel in actual HD and don't even know it.
These people wouldn't know HDCP had downsampled their blu-ray on their non HDCP compliant device unless it hit them over the head with hammer.
And savvy people, the ones who know, mostly just buy compatible hardware.
2) The reality is HDCP really isn't screwing that many people over... at least not yet. That shoe hasn't dropped yet, and it probably won't drop until its obsolete, and people start fuming that their blu-ray disks don't work anymore on anything. And that's not going to happen for a while.
In my opinion DRM in general isn't going to hit people HARD until something MAJOR gets taken down while the DRM they use is in wide use. e.g. Apple closing the iTunes Music store is probably the only thing that would do it -today-. So far all the DRM hits have been minor league... Major League Baseball killing their drm format, or first generation blu-ray players not working with new discs... stuff that only hits small early adopter markets.
Sooner or later though, something big will get taken down, and people at large will sit up and notice. Probably won't be for another 10+ years though.
Re:Obligatory Apple reality check (Score:5, Interesting)
So how does screwing over your customers and making them angry equate to making a profit for your shareholders? The giant media companies aren't the ones giving money to Apple, it's regular people buying their hardware, software, and stuff on iTunes.
I'm sure I don't like DRM any more than you do, but before firing off like that, have a look at how Apple has made use of their DRM monopoly with Fairplay. They've consistently dictated prices over the RIAA monopolies and won. They are using their lock on DRM to act in their own best interest, which also happens to be their customers' best interest.
Apple IS telling the giant media companies to go f*** themselves on price hikes and more oppressive DRM restrictions in favor of their customers needs/demands. I think the most magnificent/ironic aspect of the whole deal is that if it weren't for the DMCA, the RIAA could simply reverse engineer a compatible version of Fairplay and be done with Apple. The media monopolies cut their own throat by lobbying for a law and then allowing someone else to exploit it first. You have to find that at least a little bit amusing.
Now if we could just convince Apple that locking developers out of the iPhone really IS a bad idea, I'd have nothing bad to say about them.
Re:To Steve (Score:1, Interesting)
What title would you be able to play onLinux only? (Score:3, Interesting)
Without seeming to flame (flame mode if you like), we've had experience of locked down platform with Apple's iPhone. Now Apple join Microsoft in having a locked down OS for media playback, nobody can feel smug or superior (apart from Linux users).
Linux users can feel superior for not being able to legally play HD Blu-ray titles or for not being able to buy HD video from iTunes??
Yes Linux users can use software employing AACS and BD+ hacks, but so can Mac OS X and Vista users - even on HDCP enabled hardware. So what's the advantage of Linux regarding this now again?
A Modest Proposal (Score:4, Interesting)
We've discovered that well-heeled snoops using sophisticated radio equipment can, from a non-trivial distance, pick off the EM signals coming out of your monitor and reconstruct the image you're viewing. HDCP would thwart this, protecting the user's privacy. So HDCP can be seen as a pro-user security measure.
By re-casting HDCP as a system security feature, it then becomes obvious where control of HDCP should lie: In the user's hands. If HDCP were under my control, and didn't cost any extra in terms of CPU cycles or power consumption, I'd turn it on and leave it that way. Extra privacy for free!
But more importantly, by re-casting HDCP as a data security feature, applications attempting to manipulate it are correctly seen as hostile. If J-Random-Videoplayer tries to flip the system HDCP settings one way or another, they should get smacked down with EPERM and go no further. Even better, a dialog should pop up and say, "An unprivileged application is attempting to discover the current settings of display encryption (HDCP). This is a system security setting which should be accessed only by administrative programs. How should the request be handled? ()Report as enabled ()Report as disabled ()Report current setting ()Reject request"
Discuss :-).
Schwab
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
Really easy to do.
newegg.com - buy the parts install Linux.
MSI laptop barebones, build it with rest of parts, install linux.
your favorite computer parts maker wil help you find billions and billions of computers without DRM in it, on it or under it. It's actually really easy if you have a little bit of knowledge.
Guys have been hacking bioses, and video card firmware for decades, they will find a way to circumvent the DRM, the 13 year olds and hardware hackers on this planet are far better coders and hardware engineers than any fortune 50 company can hire. I know high school drop outs that know more about a car design and engineering than the top 5 GM engineers know about automotive engineering in general.
We will win, they and the undereducated masses will lose.. Same as it ever was.
Re:To Steve (Score:5, Interesting)
Did you try to play it on an old projector/monitor?
Not NBC... (Score:2, Interesting)
I've tried HD downloads of Heros, and I can play them back in HD just fine over a VGA connection from a Mac mini. It might be only the new systems support this, or perhaps only movies and not TV shows...
Re:To Steve (Score:5, Interesting)
Good luck finding a computer without it.
A 2007 MacBook.
The fact that the same video will play fine on a 2007 Mac but refuse to play on a 2008 Mac proves that the copy protection is not necessary -- if it was necessary it would be applied to all computers equally.
The great irony is that you can boot into Vista on your 2008 Macbook and play the same video.
Re:To Steve (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
yes, yes you can.
pixel noise will start being a problem as all those adapters cause reflections. Also the HDMI signal isn't digital, really, it is a digital bitstream on an analog carrier. (at the frequencies involved everything is analog).
-nB
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What title would you be able to play onLinux on (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:of "blacklisting players" (Score:1, Interesting)
So what happens if the "hacked" firmware switches Apple's key with, say, the PS3's? Would Sony be stuck?
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
But ask an Apple fanboi not to run the latest & greatest and you'll get "that's so 2007!" I'll bet that there's more than one fanboi who would buy a new HDCP-compliant projector in order to not have to give up his pretty 2008 MacBook.
'What a bunch of fanbois' does not an argument make.
Why would I buy an old MacBook? The new ones are better in virtually every aspect. The only real negative is the lack of FireWire. HDCP only applies to DRM'd media. Why would I buy one form of DRM (Blu-ray, iTunes) but gripe about another such that I'd run an older, inferior computer just to avoid it? There's nothing 'fanboi' about it.
Yes, but they can't revoke it now. (Score:5, Interesting)
a 2007 crack [arstechnica.com] is irrevocable.
this is why we have things like anydvd HD, etc, and why they pushed out BD+, which was ALSO cracked.
For further reference on the ease of ripping BLU-RAY for naive users, see this link [floppyhead.com]
Game over, and once again, the MPAA loses.
Re:To Steve (Score:1, Interesting)
all those adapters
If you mean the small video adapter sucks, then yup that's the hidden cost. Somebody else's best choices (Apple) vs somebody else's worst (MS).
(at the frequencies involved everything is analog)
Time has nothing to do with it. Being steady HIGH/LOW doesn't make it digital (or else there would be NO signals). Simply having a definition for HIGH/LOW makes it digital, regardless of how lax or noisey the definition is.
It's like saying there are no integers, only real numbers. There's no such thing as analog or digital electricity. Clasically, digital is two states (HIGH/LOW), with a no mans land between. Analog is a range of infinitely discrete states. Digital signals can be any voltage for HIGH or LOW, which depends on the specifications of the device being used. Beyond the classic description, things start getting crazy. For one device, it might be 0-0.2V LOW, 3.7-5.5V HIGH. For another -0.5 to -0.1 LOW -3 to -2.5 HIGH. There are standards like TTL and CMOS, but the standards only serve a purpose and are not a law. In practice, it's better to think of digital as two separate analog ranges or even just a signal that rises above a level or falls below a level. The old way of thinking about digital came from the days of op-amps. It needed to be differentiated, to help people understand the idea. But, in reality it only matters how you look at it.
High frequencies and signaling problems don't make defining two discrete levels impossible. It just makes retrieving the information intact problematic. Every kind of communication has limits.
Also the HDMI signal isn't digital, really, it is a digital bitstream on an analog carrier.
And you're just fusion waste pretending to matter, man. Modulating digital information onto RF or using differential signaling doesn't make it less digital, any more than putting water in a bottle makes it less water.
If you don't get why it doesn't matter how much analog there is in digital, or how it's a moot point, then you're not an electronics engineer.
If you're trying to say HDMI is bad because of some dislike for the DRM associated with it, then your frustration is misplaced. Don't buy, use or support crippled things - or do, but break the limits. That's my philosophy.
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:To Steve (Score:5, Interesting)
Say what you will of physical media and its attempts at copy protection, nothing even borders on the kind of shit that Apple, Microsoft, Amazon et al are flinging at their paying customers.
Realistically DRM is probably here to stay. But what would be nice is if the industry adopted a single common DRM and movie format that all services and all playback devices could support. At least then a movie bought on iTMS would play on a 360, or a movie bought on Amazon would play on a Zune etc. The current situation of countless providers with proprietary DRMs and formats and partnerships with studios is running the whole digital download industry into the ground. It's like a repeat of digital music and ebooks all over again. These companies are their own worst enemy.
Re:Looks like I won't be buying a Macbook (Score:1, Interesting)
I am, with one exception (I'm not the GP): I do have a dvi->hdmi connector between my htpc and my tv. That is because my tv (Samsung 32LM-something) only has a d-sub connector, not a dvi connector. I run Linux on it, specifically to avoid hdcp, and I don't want a digital-analog shift if it's not necessary.
As a bonus, I get to use my tv speakers to output PC audio because the HD4850 I have can send audio data over that same dvi link...
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
You also have the option of downloading the disinfected - DRM-free - version from the Pirate Bay or various P2P networks. You don't need to play by the media industry's rules. That's what they're afraid of: that people realize that two can rig the game.
Re:To Steve (Score:2, Interesting)
Why does it become the world's responsibility to adapt to the rules that the media industry would like?
Because that is life. How come it is illegal for me enter a rich persons house and take a million dollar artwork that he never even looks at. When you own the rights you have a choice on what to do with it. You can be greedy and only hold it for yourself. You can be open and give it to anyone. Or you can do something in the middle. These are not new rules these are the old rules at play. It was more the the fact that "old DRM" was easier to make it hard to copy and distribute.
Lets take a look at the "old DRM"
Records aka Vinyl: A difficult copy process needing expensive system to copy the audio and then reproduce it. As well you need to put yourself on the limb to give the copies.
Tapes: While the copy process is simpler its quality would degrade over time. Also you still need to put your self at risk selling the media.
CD (early before portable music): Easy to copy good copies of data: However you are still at risk selling bootleg copies to people.
Digital music: There are no barriers to copying and spreading music. So either they need DRM to make they coping process slower and more expensive or some watermarking method to know who the original owner was to sue the pants off him. Or some way to protect their media. You go what about poor me. Well the answer is open that wallet and pay for an OS/Computer/or whatever that can play such media. If you can't afford it sorry you are not entitled to have the latest and greatest music. Or if you strongly disagree with the policy, then you need to smartly boycott the technology and not cry unfair and take illegal copies but do a real boycott by getting more then yourself to it, without going thew the illegal methods. As when you go the blackmarket direction you are showing that you still have demand for the product but you are just to cheap to buy it, not that you have a problem with DRM.
Re:To Steve (Score:3, Interesting)
I stopped using Itunes, and download from Amazon (Score:3, Interesting)
Amazon sells straight MP3's for the same price Itunes sells their DRM'd stuff. ($0.99)
I don't know how the selections compare, but I've found what I wanted so far. It's pretty nice to be able to play purchased songs on my aftermarket car stereo without buying an ipod and an expensive adapter.
The economic crisis will solve this (Score:2, Interesting)
I predict the economic crisis will solve this. Just like the CD market shrinked to make place for the DVD/MP3/mobile phone market, that market will shrink to make place for the basic needs and savings markets.
I predict the now massively broke consumers will turn to the free alternatives, which are the ones for which DRM has already been removed (the warez version). The more well off will become more conscious and will only buy stuff the can copy for their broke friends. Hollywood and the VG industry just will have to live and build its business model around it: you can't get money from where there is no money.
Re:HDCP, not "built-in copy protection" (Score:3, Interesting)
FYI the new Macbook's mentioned do not have an analog out port.
They only have DisplayPort.... so to connect to an analog display you have to use a converter. Unfortunately the converter can't tell the computer that you're not *really* using the DisplayPort capabilities.... so the computer just assumes that you've got a non-compliant digital display attached and duly refuses to provide playback.
What you need is for someone to engineer a dongle of some sort that sends the proper HDCP signal and passes through the video/audio to whatever is on the other side.
Not copy protection, almost the opposite (Score:3, Interesting)
This is not copy protection. If you have a file, whether DRMed or not, you'll still be able to make a billion copies of it on one of these Macs, share it with a billion other people, etc.
All this does, is prevent users from playing DRMed content. Apple is just saying, "if you have one of our news Macs, don't buy anything DRMed, because our Macs are designed to make sure that it does not work. You can buy it, but you can't watch it. If you need to be able to watch your movies, your only choice is to obtain DRM-free copies. If DRM-free copies are not for sale, you'll have to pirate it."
This is one of the most MPAA-hostile things Apple has done to date. I still wouldn't buy a Mac, but they've scored a point with me for making their hardware incompatible with DRM.
DRM becomes trouble when it ruins user experience (Score:2, Interesting)
A good example is how itunes works vs the old buymp3.com site. itunes is pretty easy to use, and I have not faced any arbitrary DRM limitations (buymp3 only allowed playback on the 2 initial computers and 3 CD burns -- this is draconian - and stupid, I could just burn the CD and re-encode it to mp3).
Apple is pretty good at UI, and hopefully has not made a major misstep, but I am going to keep an eye on the situation before buying my next Mac. If this new layer of DRM hinders usability, it's back to Ubuntu for me. I agree with so many others who posted here -- DRM only hurts the honest folk.
Uselessness of HDCP (Score:3, Interesting)
My only experience with HDCP has been entirely negative. Until about a year ago, my ATI Radeon video board had beautiful DVI output that worked with my first-generation HDCP-enabled Samsung monitor.
Without even thinking, last year I upgraded to a much beefier Nvidia board. Unfortunately, once it is coupled with my HDCP enabled monitor the result is a blank screen.
It's completely useless to me.
What I can't understand is this happens by just attempting to boot my computer and run any kind of graphical interface (Windows or X11). Is this the kind of "protection" that HDCP is suppose to offer?
Do I have time to figure this out? No. To be honest, at this point I have no interest in upgrading my graphic hardware ever again and will simply live with the resolution I can get out of my DVI->VGA adapter.