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Posted by anthonyberet on 12/27/06 00:37
From:
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36574
HD disk format wars are over
Opinion A clear victor emerges
By Charlie Demerjian: Tuesday 26 December 2006, 01:22
THE NEXT GENERATION disk format has been settled once and for all.
Thanks to the due diligence, hard work and unprecedented cooperation
between the media companies, the hardware vendors and the OS vendor, we
finally have a solution. It is quite easy, Piracy, the better choice(TM).
Yes, in a year where Sony rootkitted it's customers, lied to my face
about their actions (hi John, still have your number, kisses), and fell
flat with anything related to Blu-Ray, things couldn't get worse right?
Well, the other camp, HD-DVD is only slightly less nasty, but still
unacceptable. Standing shoulder to shoulder, they both failed in the market.
MS and the media companies sold you out hoping to reap more and more
profits. Let me just say I held out no hope that they would behave in
anything less than a socially irresponsible fashion, but the depths of
their depravity did end up shocking me.
Then came the PC makers, the dumb sheep that they are. There seems to be
a race to see who can pass the buck quickest in this camp. From my
dealing with them last CES where they said 'we have to screw our
customers, we were asked nicely to', to the blaming of people up and
down the food chain from them, it is a comic scenario. Pathetic.
Then comes the chipmakers, AMD and Intel, and the respective platforms,
Live and VIIV. What laughable efforts those are. A year and a half ago,
I said that Intel sold you out, and they did. The DRM infested
nightmares of consumer rights removal that are the media platforms have
one thing in common, the content mafia is quite adamant that they are
still too insecure. The strategy from Intel was to start at a middle
ground and push to the consumer side of things as time went on.
Instead, they started out as MS's bitch and were beaten into submission
like a redheaded stepchild. Now they have the glorious job of jumping at
the every whim of the media companies, way to hold your head high Intel!
I would say the same for AMD, but to this day, I am not sure what Live
does, if it really exists.
Both companies will tout absolutely huge sales figures, and MS will
point to incredible Media Center sales, up thousands of percent this
year alone. Let me clue you in on something, MCE used to mean that you
needed a tuner, you had to meet certain requirements for power, speed
and functionality. These boxes flopped so badly it was laughable,
selling more restrictions for more money is not a bright marketing strategy.
Now, MCE is sold instead of XP home. The requirements? None really, so
basically all sales that were home are now MCE. I defy you to find any
retail customer who actually uses it in that fashion, maybe 1% do.
With the proliferation of MCE, both Live and VIIV stickers moved out
into mainstream boxes. Damn those things sell like hotcakes, umm, what
do they get me besides DRM infections again? No, really, I mean it, WTF
do they do? Anyone? So, both Intel and AMD are jumping up and down over
the 'successes' of their respective DRM for manufacturer kickback
programs. Be still my beating heart.
Basically, what we have is a series of anti-consumer DRM infections
masquerading as nothing in particular. They bring only net negatives to
anyone dumb enough to pay money for them, and everything is better than
these offerings. They sell in spite of the features they tout, not
because of them. The manufacturers still have the balls to look you in
the eye and say that they are selling because of the
programs/features/DRM. Marketers, what a laugh riot.
In the end, every step in this chain of consumer woe that is Blu-Ray,
HD-DVD, Live, VIIV, HDCP, MCE and Vista is flopping. And that is where
the better choice comes in. The consumers have voted with their dollars,
and are staying away in droves. All the walls of the walled gardens are
being built higher and higher, with the occasional brick landing on the
head of someone who pulls out a credit card. Buy now, there is a brick
with your name on it whistling down, operators are standing by.
In the mean time, Piracy, the better choice (tm) flourishes. If you take
10 minutes to look around, you will see that every HD movie is now
available on P2P networks. I haven't bothered to get one, so I can't
comment on the quality, but it sure looks like availability is there.
What was an underground clique in the 1980s and 1990s has become
mainstream and so vastly much easier to do that it is laughable. Before
the technology hits 1% market penetration it is comprehensively cracked
and better for the consumer than the legit versions.
The lawsuits, threats, purchased governance and stern speeches could not
prevent the children of Warner Music from pirating, the less moneyed
masses are a lost cause. (Funny how he wasn't sued though, kind of makes
you wonder...) As of right now, anyone can get any music or movie they
want, for free, much more easily than they can through legal DRM
infected channels. Piracy, the better choice (tm).
If you try and purchase any of this content, you descend into a DRM
nightmare of incompatibility and legal mires. Your monitor will not work
with your Blu-Ray drive because your PC decided that a wobble bit was
set wrong. You just pissed away $6K on a player, media center PC and HD
TV for nothing, you lose. The Warner CEOs kids have a nice new car to
play their pirated CDs in though.
On the other hand, if you downloaded that content, in HD no less, you
save the $1000 on the Blu-Ray player, $30 on the movie, and it works
seamlessly out of the box. The available content is much higher with
piracy, and it is quite on-demand. You don't need to sign up, give them
your details to be sold to marketers who call during dinner and spam
you, you just get the content you want, when you want, how you want.
There is no iTunes/Plays for (not) Sure incompatibility, it just works.
Piracy, the better choice(tm).
On the do
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