Stupid Copy Protection Tricks

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~jhalderm/cd3/">http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~jhalderm/cd3/</a><br /><br />"MediaMax CD3 is a new copy-prevention technique from SunnComm Technologies that is designed to prevent unauthorized copying of audio CDs using personal computers. SunnComm claims its product facilitates "a verifiable and commendable level of security," but in tests on a newly-released album, I find that the protections may have no effect on a large fraction of deployed PCs, and that most users who would be affected can bypass the system entirely by holding the shift key every time they insert the CD."<br /><br /> :rotfl: This is even less effort than <a href="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1367">using a marker</a> to foil Sony's copy protection scheme. I've begun <a href="http://www.ehansberry.com/pages/music.html">focusing my purchasing efforts on music from independent artists</a> anyway which are much more inclinded to give you good music and never try to tick off the consumer with copy protection schemes.

[Brad Adrian]

I still say that RoadRunner's Rhapsody (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11523) program and others like it are the way to go. Just last night my daughter and I learned about a violin player who recorded a CD using a very rare violin. We found the CD on Rhapsody and paid $0.79 per track to download and burn the songs.

It's legal, it's easy and everybody's happy.

[derosnec]

How long until the studios realise that a CD that cant be played, can't be copied :D

[Kati Compton]

How long until the studios realise that a CD that cant be played, can't be copied :D

As soon as they can figure out how to charge you for every time you listen to a song, and there's no such thing as ownership anymore.

[wocket]

EMI have been taken to court in France over defective copy -protected music CD's

You can read about it at http://www.securityfocus.com/news/6866

[surur]

I still say that RoadRunner's Rhapsody (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11523) program and others like it are the way to go. Just last night my daughter and I leaned about a violin player who recorded a CD using a very rare violin. We found the CD on Rhapsody and paid $0.79 per track to download and burn the songs.

It's legal, it's easy and everybody's happy.

I subscribe to realone rhapsody, and its quite a pain to get a song onto your pocketpc. First you have to burn it, then rip it (in a different program) and now you have one cd with only one song on it. Kazaa is *much* easier. I also used MSN digital download service... also quite bad. Bad interface, songs are expensive (0.99 p per song for the old ones, £1.99 for the latest) and the selection is poor. Also if you do a temp download you can not play that song on your pocketpc. Whats up with that. If apple can integrate their devices, why can microsoft do something as simple.

Ive only given up on kazaa because all those american law suits (I'm in UK) have scared the pants of my wife (who could before not have cared less). Ive always actually felt quite guilty about downloading music, and have been subscribing to rhapsody since it came out, and also to the music-match service (I pretended to be american :( ) Having experience with all these services, i can definitely say noting can hold a candle to Kazaa (lite of course) for selection and ease of use.

Having said all that, the selection and service has been improving in recent months, so maybe the future will be better. One can only hope...

Surur

[portnoy]

What I fail to understand is how the music companies seem to think that they can fight against music that is free, and more importantly, easy and versatile, with a product that is overpriced as well as by its own design makes it difficult to use in the way the customer wants to use it.

The way I see it, they should be either making cd's less than free (give them away free with free money included in the case) or making them a better value (easier to use in the ways customers want to use them). CDs already SOUND better than mp3s, that is why I've continued to buy them. But I will not own anything that is going to frell up my computer, or possibly freek out any of my players.

I mean, are these going to play on an Amiga?

[William]

... bypass the system entirely by holding the shift key every time they insert the CD."

Be careful! Isn't it illegal to publish how to circumvent a copy protection method? :lol: :lol:

[mr_Ray]

... bypass the system entirely by holding the shift key every time they insert the CD."

Be careful! Isn't it illegal to publish how to circumvent a copy protection method? :lol: :lol:

Actually it is.
Don't worry, I've already notified the RIAA. :robot: :robot: :robot:

[sponge]

I read something interesting. What if you turn music into something like Hallmark? Sell them as gifts, like with cards for birthdays, etc. Let them download music. If it can be that buying CDs is more "romantic" than just burning one, you'll more likely still be able to live and not go out of business.

[klinux]

Just last night my daughter and I learned about a violin player who recorded a CD using a very rare violin.

Most violinists that are recording artists usually use very rare violins (Strads, Bussoti, etc) :)

I use iTunes and the user experience on there is top notch. Your local library is also a great source (your tax dollar paid for it!).

[Jonathan1]

[quote=Brad Adrian]

I use iTunes and the user experience on there is top notch. Your local library is also a great source (your tax dollar paid for it!).

iTunes and iTMS will be available for Windows by the end of the year. Rumors are now putting it at the end of October. However unless Apple is wise enough to do AAC to WMA conversion they are screwed even before they hit the ground. I like Music Matches offering if it wasn't for the fact that they don't have squat for music on their site yet.

No one has gotten the right formula yet. I think Apple is close if it wasn't for the dang AAC format. It should be interersting to see what happens this fall with so many music stores coming online. I'm betting cash before next summer either the DRM in AAC or WMA is going to be broken. Anyone care to place their bets? :)

[klinux]

The thing is that the DRM Apple use in its AAC is fair. It allows the user to play the file on up to 3 machines and allows it to be burn unlimited CDs of that song. Anyone who wants to circumvent the DRM in Apple's ITMS can easily burn it to a CD (in its analog form) and then convert it back to unprotected MP3.

I think AAC will be supported on the PC soon. Nero and Winamp already does it. I mean if one can playback WMA on Mac why not AAC on PC?

[surur]

About this burning to a CD thing, I find it tedious and wasteful of CD-R's and even Cd-RW's. Does anyone know of any virtualization software to create a virtual CD writer, similar to e.g virtual CD. That would make this whole, burn and rip thing much more palatable.

I'm also waiting in anticipation on iTunes for pc, but I hardly ever listen to music on the computer, but very often on my pocketpc. I'm not going to buy a iPod just to use iTunes, I already have a perfectly good pocketpc. So even itunes will probably come up short. I think in the end though it comes down to 3 things, selection, convenience and cost. Hopefully someday someone will get the magic formula right.

Surur

[Janak Parekh]

I still say that RoadRunner's Rhapsody (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11523) program and others like it are the way to go. Just last night my daughter and I learned about a violin player who recorded a CD using a very rare violin. We found the CD on Rhapsody and paid $0.79 per track to download and burn the songs.
So, I have one question/problem with this method. You download it in some compressed form, right? If so, burning that compressed form to CD and then recompressing it will introduce a lot of artifacts -- much like recompressing a JPG as a JPG. That's a no-go for me. I might try the iTunes music store for Windows once it comes out -- since I have an iPod, and I can move the downloaded files straight onto it -- but I won't go for such a solution otherwise.

--janak

[Jonathon Watkins]

Agreed Janak. You simply don't want to be doing so much compressing and recompressing full-stop. Apart from it being a pain the quality must be pretty bad. I want any download service to be simple and seamless.

[ctmagnus]

My three newest CDs haven't even seen a CD player yet. I just ripped them as soon as I got them. Portable music :rock on dude!: ! One thing the one record company did that I find interesting is they made the CD an enhanced CD that gives you access to the artist's website, from whence you can download more stuff she did.

[Janak Parekh]

My three newest CDs haven't even seen a CD player yet. I just ripped them as soon as I got them. Portable music :rock on dude!:
Last 3? I'd say last 50 or 75 for me. ;) Rippability is a must...

--janak

[klinux]

So, I have one question/problem with this method. You download it in some compressed form, right? If so, burning that compressed form to CD and then recompressing it will introduce a lot of artifacts -- much like recompressing a JPG as a JPG. That's a no-go for me. I might try the iTunes music store for Windows once it comes out -- since I have an iPod, and I can move the downloaded files straight onto it -- but I won't go for such a solution otherwise.

--janak

Yes, you are correct. Re-ripping a compressed format is like copying cassette to cassette (form those of you who are old enough to remember those kind of things), the quality will never be better than the original. Therefore, going from AAC to WAV/AIFF/PCM back to MP3 or WMA will lose quality.

Now, Apple did not put any draconian measure on this because (my guess) is that most people who would go through all that trouble are the same people who do not care about audio quality and would have downloaded the music off of P2P anyway (as opposed to the genuine problem we face here which is how to playback purchased AAC files from ITMS on PPC). That said, I would not be surprised if Apple also created an AAC player for PocketPC that can playback MP3s as well.

Personally, I have stopped ripping and storing music on Windows machines and instead use iTunes and iPod on Mac. Still, using a PocketPC though!

[tsb_hcy]

You guys are all forgetting THE BEST source of music. WinMX is 100 times better than any online service or Kazaa.

[theone3]

Why-Oh-Why dosent the music industry do what the movie industry has done? product placements and commercials.

One before, one after, some on the covers (inside, of course) and demo's of other CDs.

Make the cost of the CD=production cost + maybe 20c for the distributor, and 50c CDS :D

and really, who cares if a few people cut off the ads ;)

[William]

... bypass the system entirely by holding the shift key every time they insert the CD."

Be careful! Isn't it illegal to publish how to circumvent a copy protection method? :lol: :lol:
I told you so: http://www.msnbc.com/news/978433.asp?vts=101020030056
:mrgreen:

[Ed Hansberry]

LOL! “I expect I will be well represented in the case of a lawsuit,” Halderman said. “If pressing the Shift key is a violation of the DMCA, then the law needs to be changed.”

Let them sue. I hope somthing this silly makes it to the Supreme Court so the whole DMCA will be thrown out.

[Janak Parekh]

They're desperate. Their stock has tanked since the paper was released. They sold a useless product unto BMG & co., and now they're trying to lawsuit their way out of it.

--janak

[Kati Compton]

Did you see that they're planning to distribute that copy-protection with other 3rd party software to sneak it onto your machine? Isn't that a Trojan Horse virus, then? 8O

[ctmagnus]

Future versions of the SunnComm software would include ways that the copy-protecting files would change their name on different computers, making them harder to find, Jacobs said.

Isn't this essentially a non-spreading worm?

[Tiberian]

... bypass the system entirely by holding the shift key every time they insert the CD."

Be careful! Isn't it illegal to publish how to circumvent a copy protection method? :lol: :lol:

Actually it is.
Don't worry, I've already notified the RIAA. :robot: :robot: :robot:

And the hit just keep on playing:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/fc?cid=34&tmpl=fc&in=Tech&cat=Digital_Music

As it's already been discussed, but still. Honestly it sounds like a sour grapes campaign on the part of SunnComm. Sounds like they tried to sell an obviously flawed piece of crap product, got caught with their pants down, and are now crying foul. Serves them right that their market share has fallen $10mil since the kid published his report.

So my question is what's next? Are companies going to sue 12 year old kids for writing a book report and giving away the ending? Oh wait, I forgot...the RIAA has already sues children...big bullies! :)