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[Stuggernaut]

Ok I know everything under the sun is being and/or has been pirated at some point. It seems to me however that the biggest concerns are software, beit for PC or for consoles, and movies/music.

It also seems to me that piracy exploded when burners became mainstream and cheap.

So....

Why is it that manufacturers don't make proprietary storage media for copyrighted material and do NOT release burners to the puplic that can copy this media.

Yes yes...I know that it will not STOP piracy, but if you make it really hard and/or really expensive to do successfully then it will reduce its impact a lot.

For instance if you had software that only fit on the PM (Proprietary Media...I don't want to type it all the time) and that PM was different in capacity than DVDs or CDs then it would be difficult for piraters to use standard media to copy it. So choices would be limited to running media off of hard drives and "tricking" the system, or something similar. An example would be a game. If the game required data from a disk, and that data was a specific size that was bigger than a CD/DVD then neither of those could be used to store the data and it would have to be stored on a drive....anyway, you get the idea.

I know it is not as easy as I am trying to make it sound, but come on...it can't be so far fetched. Some one here please explain to me why this can't work.

Seems simple.

Storage media for copyrighted stuff.

Storage media for everything else.

 

[Gattsu25]

 

[Kiriku]

Why is it that manufacturers don't make proprietary storage media for copyrighted material and do NOT release burners to the puplic that can copy this media.

Well, if they made such storage medias, would people buy them? I mean, they're making CD/DVD burners because people buy them. Why would CD/DVD burner manufacturers care about the companies making software? That's none of their business at all. Caring would only make them less money, and they have no (rational) obligation to care anyway. If only the software developers themselves were making the CD/DVD burners though, things could be different IMO.

 

[jett]

Piracy is unstoppable. It's a useless fight.

 

[Kiriku]

Piracy is unstoppable. It's a useless fight.

Not stopped, but piracy can be post-poned, slowed down. Look at GC. It took a long time for people to actually figure out how to play illegal GC games, and it's still kind of a hassle.

 

[Defensor]

It will always be around somehow.

 

[shuri]

Sony makes some ok dvd burners. 'enuff said.

 

[Slo]

Piracy is unstoppable. It's a useless fight.

It's not necessarily useless. The fight is unwinnable, but it's all about deterance. Things like car alarms and The Club deter petty criminals who might think about stealing your car, but don't do a thing against people who steal cars for a living. If someone wants to steal your shit bad enough, they're going to do it. I don't care if you park your car in Fort Knox, there's always going to be some mofo who could go all Mission Impossible on you and get at your car. That doesn't mean that I shouldn't even bother to lock my car doors at night. Anti-piracy measures are not intended to stop those badass Sam Fisher kinda people, they are intended to stop the Joe Sixpack from burning copies of Monster Truck Ralley 2005 for all of his buddies at the hunting lodge.

 

[Stuggernaut]

Well, if they made such storage medias, would people buy them? I mean, they're making CD/DVD burners because people buy them. Why would CD/DVD burner manufacturers care about the companies making software? That's none of their business at all. Caring would only make them less money, and they have no (rational) obligation to care anyway. If only the software developers themselves were making the CD/DVD burners though, things could be different IMO.

BUT....

If it was illegal to distribute burners for the new media because of copyright laws then joe schmoe couldn't just go get one for $99 at Walmart. Yes you would still be able to get them if you tried hard enough I'm sure, but it would slow down or stop the vast majority. Eventually companies would have to reduce software/cd/dvd costs to reflect a downtrend in piracy (assuming it worked ;P) ... but that is wishfull thinking.

All I know is that the way it is now, you present people with the software that makes burning everything as easy as clicking a button, and the hardware to do it record time, and the broadband internet to share it on, and then you say...but don't do anything wrong. Too many people have no morals, and too many people have no will power to resist trying it.

My overall theme here is quit trying to get people to feel bad about it and stop doing it (IE the recent ad campaigns) and just work on taking away the ability to do it all together.

EDIT : Hit save too soon there...

Think of the general public like a child. You let your child play with your hoem theater equipment and they break the remote...you say Damnit! And tell them not to do it. Then a week later you have a paper plate jammed in your DVD player....then peanut butter fingers on your TV...what do you do? Do you give them more peanut butter? Better paper plates? And then say "Please don't use these things wrong"....hell no! You take that shit away and say "Hope you learned your lesson" or some other cliche parent jive.

 

[Deleted member 1235]

So....

Why is it that manufacturers don't make proprietary storage media for copyrighted material and do NOT release burners to the puplic that can copy this media.

Yes yes...I know that it will not STOP piracy, but if you make it really hard and/or really expensive to do successfully then it will reduce its impact a lot.

Isn't this essentially what nintendo does now?

 

[slayn]

because piracy prolly helps them and they don't want to get rid of it? =\

 

[DJ Demon J]

If only the software developers themselves were making the CD/DVD burners though, things could be different IMO.

Like, Sony, for example? :rolleyes

Most of you in this thread haven't a clue about the real causes of piracy and the reality of stopping it (yes, it can be stopped).

 

[epmode]

Most of you in this thread haven't a clue about the real causes of piracy and the reality of stopping it (yes, it can be stopped).

you're not seriously going to write something like that and not follow up, are you?

 

[TheUnknownForce]

There is no stopping Pirates! Oh, videogame pirates...same deal. As long as people can either dump media on a computer or have people on the inside, piracy will always be present in videogames. They would just be harder to accomplish is all.

 

[Kiriku]

Like, Sony, for example? :rolleyes

Most of you in this thread haven't a clue about the real causes of piracy and the reality of stopping it (yes, it can be stopped).

Sony Computer Entertainment are making CD/DVD burners now?

Yes, you can stop piracy. You simply stop producing anything that can be pirated.

 

[Stuggernaut]

Most of you in this thread haven't a clue about the real causes of piracy and the reality of stopping it (yes, it can be stopped).

Yes I too would like that statement backed up.

And again...I don't think piracy can be stopped, but why help it. Yes, I think Nintendo did the right thing with the game cube...slow the piraters down to a crawl and in most cases only hardcore people are going to get involved.

Oh, and the arguement that piracy drives hardware sales I have heard before and I can't believe intelligent people actually stand by that. Piracy STOPS people from buying games unless there is some feature in the game that will not work (online play for example).

Good games sell hardware, not pirates.

 

[DJ Demon J]

Companies like Macrovision and Sony DADC (makers of SecuROM) can easily up the level of protection in the software. The catch is, it can slow down the game (requiring the hardware to make more frequent checks to determine legitimacy of software taxes the system) or cause hassles for the consumer (see CD drives not reading discs). If a gamemaker wanted, they could make a game work only on a very specific piece of hardware.

Also, there are already talks among PC BIOS manufacturers (Phoenix/American Megatrends IIRC) to work in code into BIOS (and even more interesting, talk among AMD/Intel to place code in their processors) to make anti-piracy protections so ingrained into the base level code of a computer to shut down piracy completely. Such heavy-handed techniques combined with vigorous enforcement (tracking down those who distribute circumvention devices and sending them to jail) would put a stop to piracy. Everyone says, oh it always can be cracked...this isn't always the case. A combination of software, hardware AND online verifications (logging in to verify a game is legitimate each time you play) would completely stop piracy. Will any copyright owner do it? Who knows, maybe the music industry will reach a level of desperation to do this.

 

[Kiriku]

Companies like Macrovision and Sony DADC (makers of SecuROM) can easily up the level of protection in the software. The catch is, it can slow down the game (requiring the hardware to make more frequent checks to determine legitimacy of software taxes the system) or cause hassles for the consumer (see CD drives not reading discs). If a gamemaker wanted, they could make a game work only on a very specific piece of hardware.

Also, there are already talks among PC BIOS manufacturers (Phoenix/American Megatrends IIRC) to work in code into BIOS (and even more interesting, talk among AMD/Intel to place code in their processors) to make anti-piracy protections so ingrained into the base level code of a computer to shut down piracy completely. Such heavy-handed techniques combined with vigorous enforcement (tracking down those who distribute circumvention devices and sending them to jail) would put a stop to piracy. Everyone says, oh it always can be cracked...this isn't always the case. A combination of software, hardware AND online verifications (logging in to verify a game is legitimate each time you play) would completely stop piracy. Will any copyright owner do it? Who knows, maybe the music industry will reach a level of desperation to do this.

If someone can create a "pirate-safe" system like that, someone can also crack it. It's not about "if", it's about "when". It would obviously be a big challenge, but the challenge is exactly what is driving people to crack programs and security systems.

 

[Fularu]

Last time I heard something wasn't crackable or was meant to stop piracy, it ended beeing cracked pretty fast.

Nothing of man?s design can't be undone by an another human, that's as simple as that. Hardware protection? write a soft code that circumvents it. (ever heard of dongles?). Software protection? reroute it. Online protection? disable it. Media protection? find a way to enslave the original media reader and do it.

Nothing, to this day and age, hasn't been cracked, and never will be, people may not properly crack the thing but they'll find a way around it.

Piracy won't be stopped for obvious reason, that's free advertising. I remember reading an interview with an EA executive that, quite to the contrary beliefs, piracy helps drive software sales. Sure the bad games sell les,, but the good or great games sell, because many people feel the need to own something that they like/love

It has been proved that online mp3 sharing increased the cd sells a lot, making unknown groups million sellers.

Sure mettalica may lose one sell or two, but in the end, the musical industry wins.

Same goes for games, madden sells 6 millions copies across all systems, if piracy were such an issue, don't you think sales would have slowed down? Movies sales are at an all time high, yet you keep hearing about piracing killing the industry

Piracy is here to stay because it has a vital importance for the very industry, it gives fre and unlimited advertising

 

[Fularu]

HK and china are special cases, because people just can't afford the games.

I'm talking of piracy in the western countries and in japan, were it hurts the most.

Piracy in asia is not really hurting the big players since those people, in the first place ,don't have the income to buy games.

 

[Doth Togo]

Organized crime rings, syndicates, mafias, cartels and other groups fund the innovation of piracy. Not only does private industry have an interest in going after these criminals, law enforcement groups do too. The easy, low risk money from selling pirate games/movies/music goes towards funding more sinister things, like....gun smuggling, prostitution, slave trade, etc.

...

 

[Hellraizah]

I agree 100% with the original poster. It's truly stupid that nobody is making proprietary discs that cannot be copied by a simple CD or DVD burner (only Nintendo did it, and it seemed to work pretty well).

DJ Demon J, I remember reading that you are working on anti-piracy stuff (or something related to this). I would like to know what is going on right now in the piracy fight, are they making true advancements ? Will something concrete be done soon ?

 

[Doth Togo]

I agree 100% with the original poster. It's truly stupid that nobody is making proprietary discs that cannot be copied by a simple CD or DVD burner (only Nintendo did it, and it seemed to work pretty well).

DJ Demon J, I remember reading that you are working on anti-piracy stuff (or something related to this). I would like to know what is going on right now in the piracy fight, are they making true advancements ? Will something concrete be done soon ?

He and I both work on piracy matters. Yes, we are making significant advances. Read my post above. Operation Bandwidth, Operation Buccaneer, Operation Digital Piratez and Operation Fastlink all relate to fighting piracy. Check out www.cybercrime.gov for more info on Operation Buccaneer.

 

[Stuggernaut]

He and I both work on piracy matters. Yes, we are making significant advances. Read my post above. Operation Bandwidth, Operation Buccaneer, Operation Digital Piratez and Operation Fastlink all relate to fighting piracy. Check out www.cybercrime.gov for more info on Operation Buccaneer.

I keep reading that you are part of some anti-pirate movement...which is great...but I have a question.

Admitingly I have downloaded my share of software/mp3/movies in my time...mostly when I didn't have a real job, family life, etc. but now I usually buy my stuff. Although I have still occasionally gotten a game first before buying...

However I still see it running rampant in areas I used to visit. I for one would like to see it end and have even seen some minor reporting in the past that resulted in ISP's threatening service stoppage to the offender.

My point...

What is worth reporting to people? It seems like all anyone ever wants are the "big guys". Well if someone who has 400+gb of movies and games is too small...then what about 400+ of these people that you can find with 10 minutes of searching on the internet?

Where is the line drawn? Or is it just random?

 

[Tellaerin]

Also, there are already talks among PC BIOS manufacturers (Phoenix/American Megatrends IIRC) to work in code into BIOS (and even more interesting, talk among AMD/Intel to place code in their processors) to make anti-piracy protections so ingrained into the base level code of a computer to shut down piracy completely. Such heavy-handed techniques combined with vigorous enforcement (tracking down those who distribute circumvention devices and sending them to jail) would put a stop to piracy. Everyone says, oh it always can be cracked...this isn't always the case. A combination of software, hardware AND online verifications (logging in to verify a game is legitimate each time you play) would completely stop piracy. Will any copyright owner do it? Who knows, maybe the music industry will reach a level of desperation to do this.

Richard Stallman has some interesting things to say about that idea.

Proprietary software means, fundamentally, that you don't control what it does; you can't study the source code, or change it. It's not surprising that clever businessmen find ways to use their control to put you at a disadvantage. Microsoft has done this several times: one version of Windows was designed to report to Microsoft all the software on your hard disk; a recent "security" upgrade in Windows Media Player required users to agree to new restrictions. But Microsoft is not alone: the KaZaa music-sharing software is designed so that KaZaa's business partner can rent out the use of your computer to their clients. These malicious features are often secret, but even once you know about them it is hard to remove them, since you don't have the source code.

In the past, these were isolated incidents. "Trusted computing" would make it pervasive. "Treacherous computing" is a more appropriate name, because the plan is designed to make sure your computer will systematically disobey you. In fact, it is designed to stop your computer from functioning as a general-purpose computer. Every operation may require explicit permission.

The technical idea underlying treacherous computing is that the computer includes a digital encryption and signature device, and the keys are kept secret from you. Proprietary programs will use this device to control which other programs you can run, which documents or data you can access, and what programs you can pass them to. These programs will continually download new authorization rules through the Internet, and impose those rules automatically on your work. If you don't allow your computer to obtain the new rules periodically from the Internet, some capabilities will automatically cease to function.

Of course, Hollywood and the record companies plan to use treacherous computing for "DRM" (Digital Restrictions Management), so that downloaded videos and music can be played only on one specified computer. Sharing will be entirely impossible, at least using the authorized files that you would get from those companies. You, the public, ought to have both the freedom and the ability to share these things. (I expect that someone will find a way to produce unencrypted versions, and to upload and share them, so DRM will not entirely succeed, but that is no excuse for the system.)

Making sharing impossible is bad enough, but it gets worse. There are plans to use the same facility for email and documents--resulting in email that disappears in two weeks, or documents that can only be read on the computers in one company.

Imagine if you get an email from your boss telling you to do something that you think is risky; a month later, when it backfires, you can't use the email to show that the decision was not yours. "Getting it in writing" doesn't protect you when the order is written in disappearing ink.

Imagine if you get an email from your boss stating a policy that is illegal or morally outrageous, such as to shred your company's audit documents, or to allow a dangerous threat to your country to move forward unchecked. Today you can send this to a reporter and expose the activity. With treacherous computing, the reporter won't be able to read the document; her computer will refuse to obey her. Treacherous computing becomes a paradise for corruption.

Word processors such as Microsoft Word could use treacherous computing when they save your documents, to make sure no competing word processors can read them. Today we must figure out the secrets of Word format by laborious experiments in order to make free word processors read Word documents. If Word encrypts documents using treacherous computing when saving them, the free software community won't have a chance of developing software to read them--and if we could, such programs might even be forbidden by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Programs that use treacherous computing will continually download new authorization rules through the Internet, and impose those rules automatically on your work. If Microsoft, or the US government, does not like what you said in a document you wrote, they could post new instructions telling all computers to refuse to let anyone read that document. Each computer would obey when it downloads the new instructions. Your writing would be subject to 1984-style retroactive erasure. You might be unable to read it yourself.

You might think you can find out what nasty things a treacherous computing application does, study how painful they are, and decide whether to accept them. It would be short-sighted and foolish to accept, but the point is that the deal you think you are making won't stand still. Once you come depend on using the program, you are hooked and they know it; then they can change the deal. Some applications will automatically download upgrades that will do something different--and they won't give you a choice about whether to upgrade.

(...)

Treacherous computing puts the existence of free operating systems and free applications at risk, because you may not be able to run them at all. Some versions of treacherous computing would require the operating system to be specifically authorized by a particular company. Free operating systems could not be installed. Some versions of treacherous computing would require every program to be specifically authorized by the operating system developer. You could not run free applications on such a system. If you did figure out how, and told someone, that could be a crime.

This should give you some idea of why I don't want 'anti-piracy measures' like this to ever be adopted by hardware manufacturers. They do far more to restrict legitimate use than they do to fight piracy, IMO, and the potential for abuse is huge.

 

[The Faceless Master]

Organized crime rings, syndicates, mafias, cartels and other groups fund the innovation of piracy. Not only does private industry have an interest in going after these criminals, law enforcement groups do too. The easy, low risk money from selling pirate games/movies/music goes towards funding more sinister things, like....gun smuggling, prostitution, slave trade, etc.

...

i.e.

PIRATING GAMES SUPPORTS TERRORISM!!!

 

[Tellaerin]

i.e.

PIRATING GAMES SUPPORTS TERRORISM!!!

I really don't believe the majority of pirate operations out there are terrorist fronts. Of course, if you can scare enough people into equating 'piracy' with 'terrorism', it helps pave the way for companies to introduce privacy-compromising 'anti-piracy' measures that no one in their right minds would willingly accept under normal circumstances. FUD is everywhere nowadays--it's getting kind of ridiculous.

 

[Doth Togo]

Am not scaring anyone, friend. It's a fact. It's why we do what we do. China, being the number one country to sponsor piracy, also tries to undermine western economies by pirating goods. It's an unspoken economic battle that's been going on for years.

 

[dark10x]

What about Dreamcast? The DC used GC roms, a disc format which could not be read by any normal drives. However, after just 1.5 years, the system was cracked and the DC became one of the EASIEST systems to pirate games for.

Now, I think GC has made the best strides. Normal piracy for GC is quite tough to pull off...

 

[hirokazu]

\Why is it that manufacturers don't make proprietary storage media for copyrighted material and do NOT release burners to the puplic that can copy this media.

Yes yes...I know that it will not STOP piracy, but if you make it really hard and/or really expensive to do successfully then it will reduce its impact a lot.

the GC seems to be doing pretty well against piracy like what you say, though still doesn't stop it completely.

anyhow, what you are saying, well Sony is getting ready to employ, in the form of UMD on the PSP anyhow.

 

[Doth Togo]

What about Dreamcast? The DC used GC roms, a disc format which could not be read by any normal drives. However, after just 1.5 years, the system was cracked and the DC became one of the EASIEST systems to pirate games for.

Now, I think GC has made the best strides. Normal piracy for GC is quite tough to pull off...

Agreed, Nintendo really made good efforts to fight piracy for the GC.

 

[Dave Long]

The bottom line for Gamecube is that it's not "easy" at all to pirate games while on Xbox and to a lesser extent PS2, it's a piece of cake. I'd wager that Gamecube sales for the most part reflect all the people actually playing Gamecube games. I don't think you can say the same about Xbox games. There's probably a large quantity of people not buying stuff but still playing it through unscrupulous means.

 

[Mashing]

Companies like Macrovision and Sony DADC (makers of SecuROM) can easily up the level of protection in the software. The catch is, it can slow down the game (requiring the hardware to make more frequent checks to determine legitimacy of software taxes the system) or cause hassles for the consumer (see CD drives not reading discs). If a gamemaker wanted, they could make a game work only on a very specific piece of hardware.

Also, there are already talks among PC BIOS manufacturers (Phoenix/American Megatrends IIRC) to work in code into BIOS (and even more interesting, talk among AMD/Intel to place code in their processors) to make anti-piracy protections so ingrained into the base level code of a computer to shut down piracy completely. Such heavy-handed techniques combined with vigorous enforcement (tracking down those who distribute circumvention devices and sending them to jail) would put a stop to piracy. Everyone says, oh it always can be cracked...this isn't always the case. A combination of software, hardware AND online verifications (logging in to verify a game is legitimate each time you play) would completely stop piracy. Will any copyright owner do it? Who knows, maybe the music industry will reach a level of desperation to do this.

You can't send data over the internet to game publishers as it's illegal for them to see what's in your systems active memory. If it wasn't, Blizzard would have nailed every single cheater on Battle.net already. Atleast unknowingly... they can sneak it in in the license agreement (which no one reads) and then there ass is covered