Comments on: Court dumps FCC ‘TV’ rules

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sun, 08 May 2005 21:23:31 +0000

where do you think tvs in canada are made? Why the same plants as the american tv’s… Wallymart probably just places 1 order for both countries…. so don’t count on it

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 08:35:23 +0000

in addition… they don’t need to change their tooling or even their hardware, they can simply update firmware on their BF capable devices to disable BF recognition.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 08:34:22 +0000

Globalization is not just a means for corporations to screw the working man.

Thanks to all that lovely port activity and open trade you can easily order a non-bf tv card from abroad.

Worried about standards not matching? no need.. theyre already developing open source firmware for many cards and drives because of RPC region locking.. what’s one more thing?

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 05:03:16 +0000

…when you take my mouse from my cold dead fingers.

–wfsd.net

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 04:57:31 +0000

posted originally on,
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2005050613105074

Keep in mind that manufacturers who wanted to sell anything after June 2005 had to switch their manufacturing over last year. They’re not about to change back now. They can’t afford to.

The reason is that the money is spent. There’s no immediate competitive advantage to be had selling non-BF gear since the broadcasters aren’t slapping the BF on everything they send out (and they won’t for quite a while precisely for purposes of boiling the frog slowly.) They might as well continue on the current roadmap, especially since there’s a very real legal risk to doing anything else.

The risk comes in two parts:

* Congress may do with legislation what the FCC couldn’t with regulation
* The DMCA is all the MPAA needs.

To that last point: the MPAA needed the FCC to change the default assumptions and make the BF the standard. Prior to that, they would have had a hard time suing manufacturers for producing gear that ignored the BF when that was the only kind of gear around.

However, now that all new gear is BF-compliant, they don’t need the regulation any more because the DMCA works just fine. The first manufacturer to disable the BF will be the target of a DMCA lawsuit, and one of the first things that the MPAA will do is move for a preliminary injunction to lock up the “circumvention devices” in the meantime. Keep in mind that they have already fought this battle and won with regard to DVD player chips.

Consumer electronics is a low-margin business. Having all of your new models locked up in a warehouse under seal for years while you bleed legal fees is not a winning business strategy for a low-margin business.

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 03:52:59 +0000

OMFG YAY!!! I thought I would have to buy a big screen HDTV before the deadline! now we can relax… and record all we want!

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Sat, 07 May 2005 00:24:15 +0000

Yep, george and the GOP (greedy old poops) may just have to give the FCC that power. I can see where that would look like a very big shiny object to george. Oooh…! Give the FCC as much power over the media (both suppliers and consumers) as possible. Yeah, that might come in real handy!

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Fri, 06 May 2005 23:57:44 +0000

on the other hand, it might also give dickheadbush the desire to write it into law. he likes taking freedoms away.

better not get too happy just yet. :/

By: Reader's Write

Reader's Write — Fri, 06 May 2005 23:36:23 +0000

yeah! no broadcast flags! excellent!

i knew this would happen when the courts first said – a couple of months ago – that the FCC (FKKK) “had gone too far” in requiring that all new tv’s and tuner cards and recorders have this technology.

blow it out your MPA-Asses!