Music Cd Copy Protection Run Amuck - Shame On Sony

[Leon Roskilly]

Article in New Scientist

 

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8307

 

Apparently Sony are claiming that there is a patch on their website that removes the DRM software from a computer that Sony have infected.

 

Would you feel safe visiting the Sony website now?

 

Tight Lines - leon

[corydoras]

I just noticed an article on PCPro's site that Microsoft are going to treat the Sony DRM software as malware and they will be including sigs for it in the near future.

 

See here for details.

Edited November 14, 2005 by corydoras

[Newt]

Sony has been unwilling to provide a list of the items that are infected with their copy-protection abomination but you might want to take a look at http://ukcdr.org/issues/cd/bad/ where you can find an extensive list of items that will cause you problems - and not only from Sony as it turns out. To show you only a few

 

CDs reported corrupt in the UK

ALL PRESENT AND FUTURE BMG RELEASES

ALL UK EMI RELEASES

"In the beginning" by Blazin' Squad

"Volcano" by Satyricon

"Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables" by The Dead Kennedys

"It had to be you" by Rod Stewart

and a few hundred others

 

The latest twists on this situation

- it turns out that you are infected by the Sony disks WHILE you are reading the EULA rather than after you click to agree with what Sony said. Ain't that the most slezoid behavior you could imagine from a supposedly reputable company.

- the 'uninstaller' that Sony is offering (written for them by the friendly UK company that wrote the original protection software that started this mess) turns out to make your PC more open to bad stuff than the original protection software so if you got bit, stay bit for now.

[Ian FG]

"In the beginning" by Blazin' Squad

"Volcano" by Satyricon

"Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables" by The Dead Kennedys

"It had to be you" by Rod Stewart

 

Some all time classics on that list you may want to avoid, even for free.

 

'slezoid' ......great word.

 

Sony are going to ultimately suffer for this one, and they wonder why people don't want to pay 15 quid for a CD.

[Ken L]

and they wonder why people don't want to pay 15 quid for a CD.

 

And that's the problem. They think that they can keep on squeezing people for cash without there being a counter reponce. CD's arn't expencive to produce (They give three or four away with some computer mags) but they want the public to pay 15 quid for something that's maybe worth a fiver. If they had lowered their prices, CD piracy would be a smal industry (who whould pay a bloke in the pub 2.50 for a copy when you can pay a fiver and get the real thing) but their money grabbing attitude has spawned first Napster and now a bunch of other P2P networks where people know they can get music for free.

That technology will die a death because it's too easily traced and the record companies are using the courts in an ever more draconian way.

the replacement is going to be direct swapping of recorded music via portable HDD's, DVD's etc which will be all but untraceable.

The ultimate irony is that the greatest single tool to facilitate this kind of music swapping will be the 50 Gig next gen DVD's (About 20,000 songs will fit on one of these babies) that are soon to be launched by SONY !!!!

[Ken L]

This just keeps getting better and better.

Now they're being sued.

Better yet, this issue is going to be playing on the mind of anyone who is making a choice betwen a PS3 and an XBox 360 and wondering what sort of little software goodies might be bundled with their games system - details of your CD, DVD and games playing habits forwarded to www.sony.con every time you log onto online gaming servers anyone ? How about a bit of automated snitching if you decide to buy a pirate DVD or PS3 game from a bloke in the pub ?

Edited November 24, 2005 by Ken L

[Guest @AUTUMN@]

Yes. Installing something into your pc without your consentis a bad thing. My blood boils at the thought of it. What is the purpose of this program?? Is it data mining ?

[Colin Brett]

It seems Sony now have a lawsuit on their hands details here

 

Colin

[jimpy0]

at this time of year when hundreds of millions will be spent on cd's and related products is this not all over the national press

and receiving air time on tv progs such as watchdog/local and national news progs etc

Edited November 25, 2005 by jimpy0

[Leon Roskilly]

My daughter was talking to me about buying someone an MP3 player for Xmas, she mentioned the Sony offering.

 

"Noooooooooo!", I said, "Don't trust anything from that company, they treat their customers with contempt!"

 

I guess that she's now discussing this with her colleagues in the office!

 

TL - leon