It took over three years, but mandatory
Managed Copy is set to become a reality next year as each studio is required to sign
the recently finalized AACS license by December 4th 2009, and any studio that signs early receives up to a 25 percent discount on licensing fees. What isn't mandatory, though, is hardware support, and although the current generation of players definitely won't work, most expect the majority of new BD devices to. The cost (you didn't think it'd be free, did you?) and the number of copies is up to the studio, but at least one copy will be allowed. That copy can be made via a menu on the disc and can take the form of another Blu-ray Disc or a DRM-laced Microsoft file. Up until now, Apple hasn't joined the party so no joy for iPod users -- although this could still happen. Either way, a connection to either the AACS' or studio's authorization server will be required to make it work. As cool as this all sounds, we're still skeptical; and although we'll be the first to try it, somehow we don't think it'll live up to our expectations.
posted Jun 12th 2009 10:34AM
Hmmm, I smell BS...
optical media is so played out.
And so the dance begins anew! Doesn’t this mean you should get your Blue Ray (i.e. PS3) hardware now? Before all of this “phone home” crap is implemented?
And I wish people would get off of this downloading of full games crap already. The pipes are too sloooooow to down load current PS3 and Next gen PS4, Xbox 720, Wiii 20 to 50+ GIGABITE IPs (titles)! And if devs limit IP size to 8GB because of DVD and low pipe speed limitations then WE ALL LOOSE! MS if you want xBox 360 to last 10 years then it needs an add-on large capacity optical format. Just sayin...
I project its encryption to be broken within a week of its release, if not sooner.
**Warning: Rant Below**
Why do they insist on treating everyone like criminals? We paid for the media, and will make as many archival copies as I please. Here's a great idea, free of charge: Drop all the copy protections; this will lower the price of creating your original copies (no licensing fees) and lower the cost of the equipment required to play said copy; Drop the cost of the media; you will sell well more than enough to recoup your 'perceived losses' as many will buy extra copies if they are cheap (slightly more than the cost of the medium, DVD, alone); Create quality productions; you used to have this down pat, then someone decided quantity was better than quality and now we have maybe 1 good movie a quarter, 10 marginally good movies, and 40 failures.
Once you realize that your customers are not the ones to blame, you can salvage your industry and become better than ever. All it takes is for your executives to look past daily performance results and look at their long-term goals (you do have those don't you?). The American public won't be bullied much longer, we are larger than your entire industry and, when mobilized, we can bury your failing business. Do you want us with you or against you? Keep treating us like criminals and you will have a large backlash!
@Jon,
Except for those of us who care about quality. If/when digital downloads match the quality of HD optical media, then I will agree with you. Not everything in life is about convenience.
meh
exactly, MEH.
"somehow we don't think it'll live up to our expectations."
so ur expectations are set very low, and even then it won't live up to ur low low low expectations? hahahaha
Require new hardware? of course it will.
its funny how these new standard breaking features were all built right into the HDDVD spec. Thanks for not getting your act together Sony.
Except PS3 maybe?
meh cant hurt to dream a little
As long as it is a 1:1 copy .. then whatever fine but if its compressed to all hell forget it ... I will stick with "Manged copy" Master Anydvd
Yep, just another feature that they are just now baking into the "superior" BluRay that was available from day 1 in the HD-DVD spec. With all the spec features they are copying from HD-DVD it's almost like BluRay was just not ready for prime time. What's next, they replace their crappy BD-Java with HDi?
Managed Copy was built into the Blu-ray spec as well. nobody actually implemented it
@sRC
If that was the case then why does it require NEW hardware? You fail. If managed copy was in the original specification, then all original BluRay players would already have it with no software or hardware upgrade needed.
Even if you lacked the ability to put 2 and 2 together, if you read the article you would have come across this:
“It doesn’t seem likely as a firmware upgrade because the specs weren’t done,” he said. “Hardware guys don’t like building stuff that might not be done.”
The most important feature of either of the formats was capacity, and BD has more of it. Managed copy? Who gives a crap. Also, it makes sense that an old BD player would need a hardware upgrade. Unless your BD player has a hard disk, an ethernet/usb port, or a BD burner, there's no way you could get your copy off the device. I know the article is saying that it needs new hardware just to phone home and authenticate, but that doesn't refute what I'm saying.
I don't really care about the format either way, but all of you are nitpicking for nothing.
Then they need to stop breaking the spec by adding all of these "unimportant" features.
Oh wait, thats implying there *was* a BD spec.
So what's the problem? It's not like milions of people absolutely requires this feature and must buy a new player. New generation of players, new features. You see this with every electronic products, cars, etc. You born yesterday??? Is it because it's "from Sony" so it's sooo bad and evil??? You haters, just give it up already.
I hate it because its the same anti consumer bullshit that sony usually engages in, and it hurts adoption of the new format. Every time one of these things happens average joe home movie buyer says to himself "Wow I'm glad i didn't get in to those Blue Rays. They obviously aren't ready for prime time. Ill stick with dvds, they're cheaper anyway."
I like HD movies. I want the format to succeed, hopefully for many years to come.
You know DVD Jon will hack this and build a software server that you run on your pc that it will connect to. Then we'll have blu-ray copy machines for free.
It's already been done by several people:
http://www.doom9.org/software2.htm#rippers
Most of those do HD rips.
"As cool as all this sounds ..."
You think this development is cool? Sounds like Steve Jobs' "bag of hurt" has just been dropped on all our toes to me.
And this requires new hardware? I only know a few people who even *have* Blu-Ray equipment. How does this further adoption by requiring everyone that has already bought into this mess to buy into it a second time?
If you don't run Windows, and Windows media player, this isn't even *useful* let alone "cool."
Having the ability to make a backup copy of a Blu-ray Disc doesn't sound cool to you? Why are you reading Engadget anyways?
Perhaps, if your also ran ecosystem of choice supported HD, this would be of some value to you as well.
Those of us who have HD options wouldn't mind a few more.
I don't make a lot of backups, but I'm sure AnyDVD HD will continue to allow me to make as many copies as I want.
So this give it 1080p support?
Apple left out or didn't choose to participate, either way thats a big roadblock for this. I hope it gets cleared up, as it would be nice to have a copy of my HD movies for on the go playback when traveling, without having to buy a Microsoft phone or media player.
And I don't trust Microsoft DRM at all. They change it too quickly and drop support all the time, see Plays for Sure for their biggest example. I want something that in 10 years, I know will still have a chance at working.
More like, Apple shoots self in foot by not controlling the codec that will be used by law abiding citizens to copy blu ray discs. At least if Steve Ballmer decided if he didn't like Blu-ray nothing would be different. But, King Jobs doesn't like blu ray so too bad for the millions of Apple users.
awesome! this is what media center needs!
I want to, but I haven't felt at all inclined to purchase a BD player or ROM. This doesn't help. How is adoption of BD doing? It seemed like it would really take off a couple years ago, but now I'm left wondering if the winner of the format war was even a contender at the time.
Public adoption of Blu-Ray take at least twice the time it took for DVD to creep into the living rooms of most homes. The sole reason for this is that Blu-Ray requires a 720p capable TV and even many of the "HD-ready" flats screen TVs that are older than 2 years cannot fully display every pixel of 720p. If you television cannot display the minimum requirements then a Bluray movie will only marginally look better than an upscaled DVD flick.
And with people only upgrading their television sets every 5 or 10 years, Blu-Ray has a long road a head until its mainstream. This is different from DVD which could be fully enjoyed even on the fattest Panasonic CRT screens from the early 90s. But Blu-Ray is truly awesome and I'm always blown away everytime I watch a Blu-Ray movie on my TV.
Congrats, only 2 years late!
I'll keep my copy of AnyDVD HD thank you.
Sony can pry my fair use rights from my cold, dead hands.
What about all the owners of the PS3? This type of information is sure to slow the sale of that machine indefinitely until the release of a standardized Blu-Ray player. I know that was one of my incentives for buying the PS3 when I purchased mine, unless Sony can release a firmware update to correct this problem, than this will screw millions of people.
I doubt this will slow PS3 sales, if for no other reason than most consumers won't be aware of this for a long time and the ones who are probably don't care THAT much.
I know that I don't.
If pressed hard enough, Sony might be able to supply this in some form that utilizes the PlayStation Store and its digital downloads, kinda of how the Fox/iTunes thing worked.
I wouldn't worry about buying a PS3.
Firstly PS3 is not a burner, so no hardware upgrade needed there. As for reading, most likely PS3 will have a selection on the Blu-ray movie menu of the disc you want to copy, which will link and authorize you to be able to copy the disc. Either way, I think you'll be safe.
So is this a full high definition, 1080p version of the movie? as if you were still playing off the disc?
the Digital Copy for DVDs sucks, with pretty low encoding rates compared to the actual film, and that would only be exponentially worse for an HD flick.
How dare you expect a bit for bit copy. That will be 14.95 please.
When are these people going to get it into their idiot heads that DRM hurts them, not helps them. Seriously, all denying me the opportunity to, for instance, rip in a format that lets me play on my Blackberry does is force otherwise law abiding citizens onto bittorrent. Make it easy for consumers to do with the content they own what they want to do and they'll not even bother to look into the illegal services. The folks who want to pirate will pirate anyway, why give others a reason to go there?
Oh. Right. Stupidity and hubris.
Knowing Sony,once they start releasing discs with this option they'll probably make it incompatible with the existing players and mandate consumers to buy the newer versions!
Here's an idea. How about no DRM at all, and Blu-ray priced less than DVD's are now?
And free ice cream for everyone!
Also, tacos.
Dont forget a double meat hamburger with upsized diet coke
Neither me or my friends had turn on the blu-ray player for the past 6 months!There is really not much selection of discs to buy ,why even think about copy it!
Have you tried Amazon? There are quite a bit out there.
I can already backup a blu ray disk without this, you rip the disc , or download the movie and burn it to blu ray. Normally .tdk or .mk4 container files
That block diagram fully demonstrates why "rent, rip, return" is the future of physical media. There's half a dozen points of failure in a process which fundamentally copies data from point A to point B. I believe the saying don't fix what isn't broken applies. Ctrl+C followed by Ctrl+V would be sufficient thanks. On a side note, it would be fantastically awesome if making disks was as easy as Ctrl+C followed by Ctrl+V.
Studio's authorization servers?? hahahahahaha..... no. There's no way I'm ever connecting a dvd/blu-ray player to servers run by the studios in order to play a movie on a disc. Nice try, studios, thanks for playing.
You need an internet connection just to copy a disk.
Brilliant!
More like Mismanaged Copy.
Why do I see the potential for piracy here?
Only if you subscribe to the paranoid views of Hollywood and the recording studios who view EVERYONE as pirates.
Just look at that chart... that's how ridiculous DRM is. No one but non-pirates are even going to have to put up with that shit. Rips of BR movies are already all over the internet, so what do they think they are going to accomplish here? Just make it easy for your average person to create DRM-free copies for their computers and portable devices and maybe you'll have fewer people looking for copies on the internet.
Scott:
Lower bitrate = Lower quality
Most HD content that are offered in streamed form are basically compressed versions of their Bluray counter parts. Most are compressed to a quarter of the original size and thus much of the eye candy and quality is lost. I have yet to find any HD material that look as good as any of the BD movies I have. Even the 1080p trailers on the net are severely inferior to a genuine BD copy. It's high bitrate that truly sets BD apart from DVD.
does anybody actually believe by the time this all gets sorted out we'll still be interested in optical media? I mean, there's already half a dozen sources for legitimate internet-to-TV movie rentals / purchasing....in 3-5 years it's gonna be huge. Why bother?
Because some of us still care more about PQ than convenience.
Because optical media is best at what it does, which is storing large chunks of data. Sure there are streaming services but much of the so called "HD" materials is severely compressed and are well behind genuine BD flicks when it comes to quality and detail, there is really no comparison at all. Many top-end BD movies run at 40Mbit/sec, please inform me of how many households have internet connections that can stream at 40Mbit/sec. Most streaming services offer HD movies of a mere 10-15Mbit/sec which will well below a true high definition experience. Not only that but most household have more than one internet user and try streaming a large sized movie while 2-3 other members of the family are using the same internet connection.
Until demon internet connection speeds of 50-100Mbit/sec are in 60% of all households, optical media will still reign.
I think its great how people around here are so in love with specs (like car people) and like car people that have no idea what these specs really mean, but the number is higher so it must be better.
IE the 720 vs 1080 debate but no on ever talks about screen size and the important part of how far away your sitting from the tv.
Out in the real world with people that don’t post on this blog, you find people don’t care about specs numbers don’t mean that much to the mother of 3 who just wants a good quality TV to watch desperate housewife’s on, and for her kids to watch wall•e and at home. And those are the people who pay the bill for these companies.
I totally agree Greg in 3 to five years we will be moving on from all of this because the adoption rate has been so slow. It seems like blue ray is a stepping stone a nice average quality middle rung stepping stone. And I have 2 blue ray players in my home, and I buy movies regularly. But really specs on why people have for internet connection for streaming vs. blue ray? You can’t tell me that the vast majority of people out there care even a little about that?
@Scott
Well, you're half right. However, most evidence suggests that consumers of all types like numbers. Coming to an enthusiast site and claiming most of the posters don't know what the specs mean, just makes you look like an ass.
Your mother of 3 buys a Visio. That, doesn't do much for the bottom lines of companies like Samsung and Sony, who are the ones advancing the tech.
Joe consumer drives sales, Alpha consumers drive the market.
Low margin products are the backbone of the market. Companies know, however that there are enough people who are willing to pay $599 for the first iPhone, or $900 for a blu-ray player, to make a viable target segment.
Writing off early adopters is just as dumb as assuming companies should focus on them.
Homeboy: Err, let me know when you have a steady stream of Bluray disks, maybe trickling in at real time through big metal pipes? :P
not unless time warner and others drop the bandwidth metering charge quality 1080p movies are not going to as popular.
not unless time warner and others drop the bandwidth metering charge quality 1080p movies are not going to be as popular.
What does this mean?, So current blu ray players and optical drives will not work ever?
Thanks
Sooo, the BluRay group essentially made all the current players obsolete with yet another spec revision. All while giving studios yet another way to double dip our wallets.
No thanks.
Well presumably the new discs will still work in old players, you just won't be able to make copies with them
So Apple just made the iPhone 3G obsolete with the release of 3G S. So Toyota just made the Camry 2009 obsolete with the new Camry 2010. So did Nike to your sneakers by introducing a new model.
What you gonna do about it, dick?
@WickedEast
You're a prick.
What am I going to do about it?
I'm not going to support the feature.
I'm not going to buy new hardware.
My profile 2.0 player works just fine and will probably last through the blue ray era just as my DVD player survived most of the DVD era.
I will never pay for the privilege of being able to make a digital copy of a BR movie.
So when is the Blu-ray format supposed to be finalized? They keep on adding more garbage, passed as "features", to the format. Damn it. How exactly do they expect the format to be adopted when they keep on changing things all the time. We've used RCA connectors for decades. No mystery there. HDMI, well, we have more changes to it so you'll need to buy the newer version of the cable. Blu-ray... we have new additions to it, so you'll have to buy a new player. No wonder people don't care much for BD.
So what? Regardless when the format is "finalized", it doesn't prevent you from playing a Bluray movie with a Bluray player. They keep adding features, so? Computers are getting better/more features, so are portable media players, so are cars, does that prevent you from owning any of those???
Waiting for the format to be "finalized" is just pointless.
Consumer electronics tecnology is supposed to be easy for the average consumer to use. With ever changing features and specs like the bluray gorup has done...Profile 1.0, Profile 1.1, Profile 2.0, BD Live, Managed Copy, firmware updates, etc...consumers get confused, angry and eventually simply lose interest. They aren't going to run out and buy new players to take advantage of the features, thus dooming BD Live and Managed Copy to a relative niche status.
With DVD, once the spec was defined, there weren't any other real changes to the format. In most cases any player can play and take advantage of the features of pretty much any standard DVD. This is no longer true in the world of BR which, combined with the historic high prices of the hardware and software, have contributed to a slower growth pattern for the format. The HD-DVD group finalized their spec before releasing the technology on the market.
Sony, as the head of the BR group, is doing what they do best and shooting themselves in the foot.
So... Mangled Copy finally rears its ugly head, eh? No hope of a firmware update to save those of us with a player already, I suspect. Sony, protip: DON'T BE TOOLS. People will buy your shit more often.
Im not running a fucking ethernet cable across my floor to watch a movie.
Im also not buying another player, so enjoy watching your sales plummet.
I'm pretty sure Wi-Fi will get the job done.
Dear Sony Electronics & Movie Companies,
I think I'll just sit over here (money kept in pocket) and wait for you guys to get your gear straight..
Cheerfully Yours,
Dayne
P.S. I love my bittorent collection of your movies.
lol BluRay Group thats just funny ant it i can just see sony all blued up clowning about and comeing up with this!
i have a blue ray drive in my pc which i can back up blue rays if i want and stream them to my media centre and xbox in hd but you know what i dont bother. i have mainly stuck with dvds. i want to watch the film i have paid for in hd i dont want to watch the out takes or the website or the cast list and i dont want to pay extra for them.
the uk needs a subscription downloads service for hd films!!!!
Dear Hollywood,
Fuck you. And yes, Apple was right about Blu-Ray.
Sincerely,
Former movie customers.
Blu-Ray = Bag of hurt
HD-DVD = Bag of joy
My HD-DVD player is still working great. I can also get plenty of other movies that weren't released on that format as well.
And Apple did the right thing with not adding Blu-ray. It would have raised their costs more and provided little benefit. DVDs would work just fine on laptop screens.
LOL. HD DVD is dead. I thought your mourning was over by now. I guess it didn't occur to you that Apple could have offered Bluray as an OPTION??? You're so getting used to Apple shoving stuff down your throat that it's unimaginable to you that Apple could have offered you a choice, right? LOL.
New hardware? I'll stick to the eye patch and hook method.
Thanks.
AAARRRGGGHHH!
Meh, don’t own blueray and never will. I don’t even buy DVD’s or CD’s anymore. Optical media is already obsolete to me. I don’t care how great the picture quality is or how much better the audio sounds. Downloading music and video on demand whenever I want were ever I want is the way to go. Beats waiting in line at wolyworld or fighting your way through a mall and crushes the price of any optical media and the quality difference is probably not even noticeable to the average joe. In a few years it will be on par or even surpass blueray, probably wouldn’t matter if it didn’t, people like convenience and cheaper.
Optical media is dead.
Just look at how on demand and PPV programming has destroyed the DVD rental and sales market, not to mention how it drove netflix out of business.
Oh, wait...
I know that asking for intellectual honesty online is like asking the Sun to turn into sweet delicious candy, but I'm going to try.
Will all of you that pirate all your movies stop acting like you'd stop pirating if managed copy was easy and hassle free? You'd rather steal movies than pay for them, and that ain't gonna change.
And spare the deluge of posts from archival and protest pirates. That might ACTUALLY apply to one tenth of one percent of you, and there's no way to prove it either way.
How about telling us what managed copy is exactly? Terrible article writing.
Downloading a movie at around 8-10GB for an hour and a half film produces a file with invisible differences from the source (Blu-ray). I'm pretty sure that in a few years Blu-ray will become obsolete in many people's eyes as you can probably download that much data overnight or even in a few hours. If you have a 2MB/s connection, you can download the entire movie in just over an hour, so you could actually stream it instantly. I don't think Blu-ray will last much longer, to be honest, and if I did have some BDs, I'd rip it with one of the hacking methods because it's (probably) easier and won't put shitty limits on what you can do with it.
Ok, Ben Drawbaugh needs to wise up, there's nothing "cool" about this. This is a way to force everyone to buy new hardware and take away more rights from consumers. If Engadget had brain they would be ranting against this, not saying it is "cool".
When I first read this article I was very upset, since it appears to indicate that new BDs with Managed Copy will not play on current hardware and that we would all need to buy new players in order to see future releases. However, after about 5 minutes of research I discovered that this is not true--you do not need to buy a new BD player if all you want to do is watch movies. You WILL need to buy new hardware if you want to make authorized copies (i.e. a single backup copy) of your BDs. If, like me and most people who buy optical media in general and BDs in particular, you just want to watch movies from the original purchased disc, this will NOT affect you. Anyways, there is no way in hell that I'm going to connect my BD player to the internet for any reason (including BD Live) so this doesn't affect me at all. However, the day that I am required to access the internet to watch a movie is the day that I begin using torrents.
Wow. I can't believe I found someone that has some sense here, unlikely the "Sony haters" who automatically (like sheeps) bash Bluray and Sony while being just clueless.
It's probably been cracked already. Or soon will be.
I think I'll be able to MANAGE to update my Slysoft apps as needed.
Someone will spoof the server like they did for Vista a while back..
My wife can easily by-pass their money making scheme, it's called the Wal-mart cheappy-bin - 5 bucks..
Holy Jebus! Can they get it any more fracking convoluted? Look at that flowchart. $10 says the first device to ship will explode from trying to figure out what to do.
This is so silly... seriously, does no one at Sony, or the AACS consortium realize their protection HAS BEEN BROKEN for quite some time now? Can't these engineers be put to developing/designing something actually necessary or useful?
For those saying, "I can see this leading to piracy", you are sitting in the boat with Sony rowing... you may want to let them know the pirates have already taken your booty. The piracy is already happening, and cant be stopped. Even Netflix/Your favorite rental store provide access to obtaining said content at essentially the same 'price' as attempting to make a copy of his managed copy. This is a non issue, and hackers/pirates WILL NOT CARE about managed copy, or the protection associated.
When will consumers who actually FUND the stranglehold on the content they purchase wake up and realize this 'feature' that is DRM cannot be tolerated any more? Anyone praising this 'feature' is a fool.
"Why do I see the potential for piracy here?" I dont see a potential. I see a guarantee. But it will be funny if 99.9% of blue-ray owners start to pirate. It will take me a month to stop laughing. seriously.
Sometimes I understand what I read on engadget... sometimes you have to read through the weird humour, slight pompousness. And then there's times like this when I don't have a clue what the hell they're talking about.