Sony's New Nagging Copy Protection = NOT !

[BJ_M]

"You can put away your Sharpies, because Sony has launched a new CD copy protection scheme that is actually designed to be easily cracked: 'The copy-protection technology is...far from ironclad. Apple Macintosh users currently face no restrictions at all. What's more, if users go to a Web site to complain about the lack of iPod compatibility, Sony BMG will send them an email with a back door measure on how to work around the copy protection.'"

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=581&e=3&u=/nm/20050616/tc_nm/media_music_cd_dc

Sony BMG, the world's second-largest music company, is rolling out CDs with new technology that serves as a "speed bump" to hinder people who want to make illicit copies.

Users will be allowed to make three additional CD copies for their own use and to store the music files on their computer in a protected format from Microsoft.

Sony BMG's new copy-protection effort comes with at least one downside: PC users are unable to transfer the songs to Apple's popular iPod portable music player, because Apple has declined to make its software compatible with Microsoft's Windows Media digital rights management (DRM) system.

The copy-protection technology is also far from ironclad. Apple
Macintosh users currently face no restrictions at all. What's more, if users go to a Web site to complain about the lack of iPod compatibility, Sony BMG will send them an email with a "back door" measure on how to work around the copy protection.

A UK firm called First4Internet, which created the technology, said the primary goal is not to prevent copies of the songs from ending up on illicit, peer-to-peer file-trading networks, which the industry blames for million of dollars in lost sales.

Instead, it aims to dissuade people from burning unlimited CD copies in what is sometimes called "schoolyard piracy."

"This technology is a speed bump. It's trying to dissuade the average consumer from making as many copies as they like," said First4Internet Chief Executive Mathew Gilliat-Smith.

"You're not going to stop tracks getting on P2P sites," he added. "It's designed to stop casual piracy ... It's not saying you'll stop people from doing it, but it makes people stop and think."

Sony BMG also uses a separate copy-protection technology from Sunncomm Technologies. Previous copy-protected CD schemes have been quickly defeated, including one instance in which computer users cracked Sony's "Key2Audio" technology by scribbling on a disc with a felt-tip marker.

Some 2 million of the CDs using the First4Internet protection have been sold since March in the United States.

Gilliat-Smith said a version of the copy-protection technology that works with Apple Macintosh computers is on the way and that the music companies are in talks with Apple about iPod compatibility.

"The whole industry is in discussions with Apple, and we hope to have a solution soon," he said.

Sony BMG is a joint venture between Japan's
Sony Corp (SNE.N) and Germany's Bertelsmann.

[thecoalman]

This sounds similar to what I saw on Sony MP3 player type device. It only played a propietary Sony format though. I was going to buy right up until I saw that. The way it worked was you could rip the disc to this format where it would be banked on your computer, you could then transfer to the device. Where the trouble began was you had to unbank it from the player to get it back to the comp. Essentially you could make one usable copy that could only be on one device.

If this tech is anything similar people are just going get pissed and use conventional methods to rip it....

[BJ_M]

i have a sony mp3 player (my kids really) with actrac3plus on it .. works fine , but it will also play mp3s also just fine .. but with the actrac3plus format it will run like 80 hours on a set of batterys , vs 40-50 as mp3 (it is also a cd player)


several apps will compress to actrac3plus , not sure what you are saying as a problem as there are not any issues ..

[Cornucopia]

BJ_M--which apps are those and do they work bi-directionally? (maybe I already know, but I'm always checking for more tools for my toolbelt)

Scott

[BJ_M]

http://www.minidisc.org/atrac3.zip

ATRAC3 codec , works with most encoders (goldwave, winamp, audiograbber, cdex)

also plays ATRAC3plus

to encode to ATRAC3plus, i think sonicstage and sonys own app (which I got free from them) is about it ..

www.sonicstudio.com


OpenMG is used on ATRAC3 -- to convert it back to mp3 or wav is a pain i understand.. i just have the origianl tracks so dont worry about it ..

ATRAC3plus quality is very good ..

[BJ_M]

http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Sony_ATRAC3_Audio_Codec.htm

also

[BJ_M]

You can get sonicstage out of any of the larger update files 4 sonicstage which can be dled from

ftp://ftp.support-nwwalkman.com/Pub/SonicStage/

it is free from sony - not warez

[DVD Polizei]

It's rather difficult to copy protect analog signals.

Of course, if you have a ton of these CDs then it wouldn't be worth your time, but if you buy a CD every week, just get use your audio card inputs from a normal home stereo CD player.