[Comments] Apple Forced to Respond to Digital Copying Issues

Wednesday, January 24, 200l

Hang on, folks! Our colleague Charles W. Moore's latest article, a true must-read item, points out some very nasty caveats about the consequences of so-called copyright protection schemes. As it turns out, these may in fact affect how you can use your new Apple DVD products, and Apple is beginning to take note of the criticisms.

Yes, there are issues with what can and cannot be copied to and from digital sources. This is a complicated state of affairs, as it turns out, and so far it looks like Apple Computer is playing ball with the rest of the industry in ways you may not fully understand. For that matter, we don't fully understand, but we do know that "copyright protection" schemes are in the works that could greatly restrict what ordinary computer users, including Mac users, can do with their equipment. So much for "digital lifestyle," which looks more and more like something that can expand only along certain industry-approved lines.

At any rate, we have received an actual communication from an Apple source ["All-points bulletin, Apple does read Mac Web site content! "-- JHF]. The message is a copy of an email sent to John Gilmore in response to his essay quoted by this editor and our colleague Charles, and we have quoted portions of the Apple email below. You should study this carefully for accuracy and spin on both sides, as the points being debated are not small ones. (Gilmore's words are in red.)

"[addressing Mr. Gilmore] I read with great interest your recent commentary on the DVD-R General format and how it impacts fair use. I agree with most of what you say, but I do have a few points of clarification I wanted to pass on.

They don't say that you can't use it to mix and match video tracks from various artists, the way your CD burner will.

You actually can do this, as long as you have non-encrypted source material. There is nothing to prevent writing any digital data to a 'General' format DVD-R. The only thing it can't do is contain encrypted data, since there is no place to write the key.

It doesn't say that you can't copy-protect your OWN disks that it burns; that's a right the big manufacturers have reserved to themselves.

You can't do this with 'authoring' media either. The encryption is usually applied at the replication stage.

They're not selling you a DVD-Authoring drive, which is for "professional use only".  They're selling you a DVD-General drive, which cannot record the key-blocks needed to copy-protect your OWN recordings, nor can a DVD-General disc be used as a master to press your own DVDs in quantity.

You could actually use a general disc to transport your data to a replicator; they'd just have to copy it onto an authoring disc or to a DLT tape for you before mastering.

These distinctions are not even glossed over; they are simply ignored, not mentioned, invisible until after you buy the product.

These points are not ignored or hidden. I personally have spoken to numerous editors about the distinctions between the two formats. The data sheets and FAQ documents for both iDVD and DVD Studio Pro also point them out.

Movie companies insisted on a "region coding" system for DVDs, because they would make less money if DVD movies were actually tradeable worldwide under existing free-trade laws.. . Similar controls exist in DVDs to prevent people from fast-forwarding past the ads or those nonsensical "FBI Warnings".

Region coding, CSS encryption, Macrovision, and the locking out of "user operations" (as occurs during the FBI warning) are all choices made by the particular author of a DVD. Any or all of these can be employed when authoring with DVD Studio Pro, or most other authoring tools. They are all optional, and I know many DVD authors who don't use them because they feel, as you do, that they are unfair to their customers.

Apple offers the DVD-R General drive because it allows us to give our customer something they really want: the ability to put their movies on a "real" DVD at a low price. It's hardly fair to condemn us for the fact the the drive doesn't do everything that an Authoring drive does. And we had nothing to do with the original decision to create the two different types of drives/media.

We work hard to give our customers great tools. Your assumption that there is some hidden agenda is pure fantasy."