The Macrovision albatross
p2pnet.net News:- DRM peddler Macrovision is trying to use the DMCA to turn its, “decades-old, analog-world DRM technology into a digital-age federal technology mandate,” says the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) .
The foundation and the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), Home Recording Rights Coalition (HRRC) and the Library Copyright Alliance have filed an amicus brief filed supporting Sima in a lawsuit launched against it by Macrovision.
“In essence, Macrovision is trying to leverage the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) into a technology mandate, forcing all digital video products in the future to respond to its analog-era DRM system,” says the EFF;s Fred von Lohmann.
“Macrovision’s ‘Analog Copy Protection’ (ACP) technology is intended to degrade the quality of video copies made on analog VCRs. It does this by intentionally adding noise to the vertical blanking interval of analog video signals. This noise confuses the automatic gain control (AGC) circuit used by analog VCRs. In short, Macrovision’s ACP is an exploit against a weakness in analog VCRs.
“Thanks to Section 1201(k) of the DMCA, VCR makers are now forbidden by law from fixing the weakness, which means that analog VCRs have remained vulnerable to ACP. In other words, Macrovision’s ACP is an antiquated DRM technology that owes its effectiveness in the analog world to a government mandate.”
But, Von Lohmann continues, Macrovision’s ACP technology, doesn’t confuse digital video converters which, “simply ignore material in the vertical blanking interval (the vertical blanking interval was necessary in order to give analog CRT displays time to reset their electron beams, something entirely unnecessary for digital displays)”.
Sima’s products rely on a digital conversion as part of their ‘clean up’ process, he says, meaning Macrovision’s ACP noise is eliminated from the resulting video outputs.
“Macrovision sued Sima, arguing that ’stripping’ of ACP noise from analog video signals constitutes circumvention of a ‘copy-protection’ technology, and that Sima’s devices therefore violate Section 1201(b) of the DMCA,” he states, adding:
“The district court granted a preliminary injunction against Sima, which Sima has now appealed to the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals.
“Macrovision’s legal arguments are bogus for a variety of reasons, detailed in the amicus brief,” says the EFF, adding:
“If Macrovision wins, digital video innovators will be stuck carrying the albatross of Macrovision’s analog noise for years to come.”
(Thanks, Jazz)
Also See:
EFF – Another DMCA Misuse: Macrovision v. Sima, August 15, 2006
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