BAD: First HD-DVD, now Vista DRM
Jan. 30th, 2007 01:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andygates
I can't keep the grin in any longer. Vista's extremely silly Protected Media Path (PMP) has been hacked. That didn't take long, did it? Alex Ionescu describes how he did what he did in his blog, but daren't release actual code for fear of a black helicopter visit by DMCA attack lawyers.The weird thing is that the commercial success of the entire IT sector relies on many perfect copies being made form everything. That's the whole point: it's why cassettes were good too. We get involved, we dick around, we don't just passively consume. Mixtapes are cool to share. The business model that was appropriate for manufactured pressings of vinyl - few high-quality originals dispensed from the central vendor - is totally and catastrophically broken by fast easy digital copying. That model assumes a need for relatively low losses as the product is relatively expensive to produce; with digital media the cost of reproduction is trivial but the bean-counters haven't yet worked out that this means that massive unit losses are financially acceptable.
The example of the MP3 player - mine is full of personal rips and allofmp3.com downloads - is canonical: because I can get lots of cheap easy music, I do. Some I pay top whack for, and that's the profit. But I wouldn't have bought the half-dozen CDs I have recently unless I had been energised and enthused - and engaged - by the dozen downloads. And (listen up, suits) I would not have bought all eighteen; or all six, more likely one or two. I would have passively flicked over MTV and Scuzz and shrugged and done something else. Rob Zombie has a dollar to spend on shampoo and carny chicks because of piracy.
Anyway, there's the memetic imperative. Information wants to get copied. We, as memetic entities, like copying information. "Hey, have you heard this?" is a memegasm. And to play something, you have to decrypt it somewhere along the line. So even without black-hat snarkiness at the corporate bishops, DRM will fail every time. And it deserves to fail, and it will not be mourned.
A wise geek observed that the internet routes itself around damage. DRM is getting the same treatment, and with good reason: encrypted, unplayable data is damaged data. The internet will route around it. All things being equal, if you insert broken and healthy data into the memestream, the broken data will be copied less and will eventually die (a phenomenon which also explains the self-healing of Wikipedia and survival of healthy bittorrents). DRM data is broken as designed.
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no subject
Date: 2007-01-30 07:04 pm (UTC)That's just the thing -- I don't for one femtosecond believe that the recording industry actually thinks that this is costing them real money. They have been desperately trying to find or generate a study that doesn't say that very nearly nobody who downloaded something for free would have otherwise bought it.
Their current business model, to be viable, depends on them being able to sell you something several times. Vinyl wore out, as did cassettes, and that was aces with them. However, I can now make a lossless copy of my CD collection, and if I have a decent redundancy scheme (and ATA RAID is damned friggin' cheap at this point), I'll never wear any of my music out and need to buy a new copy. This likely scares the piss out of them. It's becoming progressively easier for indy bands to get their music out without going through the labels, and that scares them even more -- they have to work a lot harder these days to push their assembly-line-produced artists, and they have a much briefer shelf life.
Make no mistake: what the entertainment industry wants, and will do everything in their power to get, is the requirement that you pay them every single time you listen to or watch anything, and that this state of affairs persist forever. That's why copyrights don't expire any more, and why they want DRM to be carved into the silicon and, when feasible, wedged in front of every wire, port pin, and pixel.
They're not stupid. Fortunately, the math is still heavily against them; if you sell encrypted content, you need to somehow give the key to the viewer so they use it. They're trying very hard to make that key inaccessible, but that's of course no easy feat. With HD-DVD, I believe, they can invalidate specific decryption keys, so that new discs won't play on boxes that use compromised keys (which is going to thrill the owners of those boxes, you can be sure -- you tell grandma that she's got to flash the BIOS on her HD-DVD player, grandma is going to stop buying HD-DVD discs), but that just turns into a footrace with the crackers, and there are a lot of them, and the key is in the box somewhere. My worry is that they'll find a way around the math problem, at which point the viewer is well and truly fucked.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-30 10:29 pm (UTC)Hanlon's razor. Although it beggars belief that they could be so stupid, I find it less credible that the entire industry could pretend for so long. When you say they want to charge for every time you hear a track, I think you have nailed the issue: they view every use of the Play button as a performance and want recompense accordingly.
Playing recorded media, especially immortal media, is not the same as a performance. The public know this, the memes know it too. "Another spread vector? Neat!" That's why MySpace's little tunes box is such a hit: hear what I think is cool. Take my memes, because that makes me cool.
Fly, my pretties...
Grandma's HD-DVD player had better not be too precious - not as absurdly precious as Vista threatens to be. I think the average punter will give it two chances, two disks that refuse to play, before returning the item to the store as broken. And then you've got a mass of grumpy consumers, and it doesn't matter what the EULA says. Granny cannot flash her BIOS; if it flashes itself all the time, the exploiters will just find an alternative vector. The entire stream from performer to audience cannot be encrypted unless the singer gargles and the audience is that blind guy in Sneakers.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 02:51 pm (UTC)The thing is, pure stupidity really doesn't suffice here -- they've seen the studies and surveys, and the raw fact of the matter is that almost nobody who downloads music for free would otherwise have bought the music -- the industry is, simply and provably, not missing out on revenue they would otherwise have gotten. Even the very stupid can understand that, though it is counterintuitive when you insist on making the mistake of thinking of a digital recording as physical property. The industry is flat-out lying, but I'll grant you this -- I think they might have gotten to the point that they're not able to know that they are, the same way Wintermute wasn't able to know the word that would free him. Financial interests warp ontology, which, for me, is the central terror of capitalism. And humanity.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 06:17 pm (UTC)But, I think there were two threads getting tied around each other, and in my uncaffeinated state I only saw one of them. I don't think Hanlon's Razor is exactly right here, because it's not stupidity that causes the problem -- it's the possibly-unconscious hammering of their worldview to fit into a meme structure which, though inconsistent with the facts, is self-consistent and essential for their survival. Which is worse than either stupidity or lying, really, because it's consensual insanity.
(Please note that I've been reading a lot of William Gibson lately, which is in part responsible for my current tendency to think of corporations as insane organisms.)
no subject
Date: 2007-02-01 02:08 pm (UTC)I disagree about the internal consistency of memeplexes though; I think most of the big ones are shockingly inconsistent and that they get away with it only because our eye is only on one or two aspects at a time. The right-wing Christian "pro-life, pro-war" 'plex is perhaps the most obvious, but "listen to our stuff / don't listen to our stuff" has to come close.
Internal consistency lends a memeplex beauty - a sort of topographical, structural elegance that I expect Ravenbait sees intuitively. But it doesn't necesarily make the memeplex any more useful, or strong.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 12:10 am (UTC)* for context, about a third of the way down the page, http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2000/september6/kornberg-96.html
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 01:57 am (UTC)I liken industries of the large variety to the Catholic Church: they must force themselves to believe certain things in order to uphold all they've said and done before. The logic doesn't matter- it's a psychological game they play with themselves and their consumers in order to stay viable.
Then there's the point of advertisement v. failure...The local coffee roaster's having issues with our town council over signs and variances. He is willing to force the issue because he can get publicity out of it, meaning he'll take on the battle in order to get more business. I can't argue with that as a strategy, so long as he remembers to watch for signs of misfire. The truth is that bad publicity is STILL publicity. Getting attention is a lot of what things come down to in marketing.
Not only is the need to undo such things and speak of them a memetic imperative, it's also fundamental to our method of survival. When humans STOP looking for ways around blockades, they're doomed.
Completely unrelated? I want curry.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 02:51 pm (UTC)And now I wank jerk goat, dammit.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 04:45 pm (UTC)Friend who works high up in big music company: "So, prospective employee, can you think of any difficulties the music industry is facing at the moment, and how you might face those difficulties?"
Prospective employee: "Erm...No. No I think the music industry's in pretty good shape at the moment."
Friend who works high up in big music company: "Do you want to think for a bit longer on that?"
Prospective employee: "No, no I'm good thanks."
I'd like to say they didn't get the job, but knowing the company in question, I think they probably did.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 01:27 am (UTC)I really hope they didn't get the job. That's as bad as the person I interviewed once...
Me: This is a fast-paced environment, and with two companies overseeing our operations, procedures can change rather quickly. Would you say that you adapt to change well?
Candidate: Oh, yes. I handle change well. Twenties and tens are easy, but hundreds are a bit harder. I think I can do it, though.
It took me a moment to realize she was talking about counting money back to people. At that point, I didn't care whose daughter she was.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-31 05:25 pm (UTC)Where have you been when I can't sum things up succinctly enough to adequately defend my theories? You're completely correct about dogma, only I hadn't made the full connection.
Wow. Still thinking. Good, very good.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-01 01:54 pm (UTC)Best thing about the Ashton Court Festival, the jerk goat. Hooray for massive diversity - it means that even if the music sucks at a community fest, the food is good.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-04 03:43 pm (UTC)Here's what I'm seeing so far: links about technology or government spread. Quizzes/polls with the potential to improve self-esteem or prestige spread. Quirky items spread. If something requires a lot of time or thought, however, it is less likely to do so. People get part of the way through the task and decide it's not worth completing.
If the content of that last paragraph is correct- and I'd need a larger sampling to be certain- then the best way to have a successful memeplex would be to keep it simple and make certain it makes people feel good. In that case, making people feel they are doing something wrong by saving money or sharing with a friend will eventually kill these types of restrictions. Knowing that you are not a bad person overall but are likely to be treated as one for something like this makes people rebellious and determined. By restricting, the corporate world is actually fueling the need to eliminate barriers.
Anyway, I have an idea now about self-repairing memeplexes and psychology that I'm attempting to work out. It could make a good story.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-04 10:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-02-05 12:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 12:17 am (UTC)Things that take a lot of time or thought (ie effort) are high resource hogs. They run the risk (per moment) of being derailled (interrupted). For highly complex anythings to exist they must be modular in their construction, conversely to construct something non-modular with high complexity it will require isolation and be likely to have low adaptability (due to its resource demands on its environment)
Nice to be reading your stuff again Andy. Must say I've missed it.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 01:30 am (UTC)A secondary reading and response will most likely occur. I need to read your response again when I'm not so tired. I appreciate the input and your opinion, though. It's been great to have reason to think. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 06:33 am (UTC)Reproduction success seems to favour the less intelligent (an example of non-meme-form behaviour noted for comparison)
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 11:19 am (UTC)Over and over and over
Like a monkey with a miniature cymbal
The joy of repetition really is in you.
And there's Munky repeating it to prove the point. :)
Attempting to reboot brain.
Date: 2007-02-24 03:08 am (UTC)Largely, my belief that catering to the lowest common denominator would be successful is due to how attention-deficient much of the consumer culture has become. Shiny things with quick reward are generally more successful because people haven't any understanding of long-term value. We're an instant gratification society; without quick payoff, people wonder why they should invest their precious time, especially if they can get a cookie down the street a bit sooner.
Re: Attempting to reboot brain.
Date: 2007-02-24 08:25 pm (UTC)We're an instant-gratification society so there's no merit per se in a really nice biscuit from the artisan cookiehaus - until you rule in other competing memes like the wholefood movement, good eating being cultured = sexy, etc.
ADD jackdaw memes spread very fast. Doesn't matter if they're shallow, because they are virulent. If you've seen Dogma, the rebranded Buddy Christ was a perfect parody. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 11:10 am (UTC)This is of course one of the things that's very cool about programming: you can freely re-use your stuff.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-06 11:36 am (UTC)Going to mull this one over for a day or so, too, but I must say my notebook's pleased with the scribbling you've induced me to generate. The process of examining the phrases and connections leads me to all sorts of ideas for writing.
Perhaps one day soon, I'll spend some time in learning the programming skills I didn't pick up or that are new since I last invested in doing so.
no subject
Date: 2007-02-24 03:10 am (UTC)True, and also true of most varieties of media. You can reuse the same drum riff in music, or the same bass line, and just as the things you say make me imagine stories, that which we see on television, read in books, etc, inspires the creative to twist the tale to suit their own imagination- their own "what if" moments.
Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-12 08:35 pm (UTC)Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-12 09:17 pm (UTC)Actual physical reward looks better but I think to really take off, a meme might have to be something of a ponzi scheme and so physical reward may not be possible.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-24 03:16 am (UTC)The reason behind my question was that I noticed a propensity for LJ meme items with prettier graphics or more novel result displays spread more quickly. Additionally, anything with gossip potential seems to move well, too, perhaps because it gives some a feeling of receiving forbidden treasure?
Just thinking, still. Always, even when not doing it as well as usual. ;)
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-24 08:29 pm (UTC)From that, I'd have to speculate that a successful meme would offer several rewards so as to appeal to multiple demographics.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-13 10:30 pm (UTC)In this case I would ask myself how would this meme-unit percieve the reward? External behaviour (thrive or fail), stimulus response (like a cell operating more effectively in certain "reward situations"), emotive equivalent (perception of positive result, "reward seeking"), intelligent function (picking rewards that will result in better function or maximising the amount of reward. some humans function at this level), strategic operation (meme function is able to understand nature and cause of reward and its results and will seek to alter environment to maximise reward occurance. Requires complex organism able to sense and visualise both "real" and "not-real" (ie possible) events and that has an awareness of sequence of events. A few humans are able to operate in this mode as their norm.) , and so on.
So which memes reach what Turing level?
Are there meme-virii? Replicating and corrupting the cell information of their hosts? Is a community level meme more (bigger) complex and higher functioning or does it lose cohesion to synapse speed (mob iq thus less intelligent)?
My eventual answer to the question of reward response would be that the meme world is like our own (as meme, as below) their are many many simple forms, and many more complex forms. The later would likely require an equivalence of self-preservation to stay "alive".
My perception are so far, analogous. (but that could be just a function of my technique of observation...)
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-14 09:10 am (UTC)Bacteria aren't self-aware, dogs may be, people think they are. Susan Blackmore made a brave stab in Meme Machine at deconstructing self-awareness and free will as both being constructs whose function is to make us better meme-environments. Thinking that we have free will means we think we have choice, which adds weight and importance to our memetic selections - which, in turn, makes us stronger selectors.
Songs and recipes certainly aren't aware; religions may be; what sort of pan-medium metameme would qualify as a self-aware entity? Is that what is really meant by the Singularity or the prevalence of self-aware-AI mythforms in pop culture? By comparison to memes online, memes relying on direct or literary transmission move desperately slowly. Maybe we're riding the cusp of a memtic transition that parallels the first biological organisms climbing out of the primordial ooze.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-15 03:16 am (UTC)Religious, cultural philosophies and economic theories strike me as some that might be aware (and thus selective). Certain ones like eurigenics (sp?), behind-the-scenes government, and secret societies might fall to the more strategic meme, selectively self aware and active. Cults and corporate-theory strike me as more likely the lapdogs of the latter than of the former.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-24 08:20 pm (UTC)Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-01 09:38 am (UTC)Is it the rich effluent that such a outwardly-appearing toxin finds "rewarding" in both pleasant existant (abundance) and expression (room to expand)?
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-01 09:42 am (UTC)Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-24 03:37 am (UTC)Self-preservation on an instinctual level or even on a autonomic one won't require awareness, but for self-aware creatures, wouldn't something survive better if it had been analyzed and understood? I'm hypothesizing- I don't know for certain and would love your opinion(s).
The memecomplex wouldn't need to be self-aware, but can an entity that lacks such awareness spread one?
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-02-24 03:31 am (UTC)Realizing that this isn't what you asked me, I want to turn the Turing Test thought around for a moment. Do you think it's possible that the success of memeplex is actually based on the need to explain and identify traits, issues, complexes, etc? Do we respond better to things that compartmentalize us like one would identify the parts of a machine and what they do because we are so difficult to understand without that?
I think, largely, the answer to my rewards question comes down to two things: an ingrained need within humans to be praised for reassurance of worth, and the way in which we were nurtured- trained, really- to seek rewards.
If that's correct, then I might enjoy a reward that turns up much later because I was taught to cherish the process of thought and rewarded when I used it, whereas my neighbor might prefer getting candy or a compliment because they were taught to measure their worth in the tangible rewards received. Someone who desired a combined reward would then only develop as life experiences (hopefully) taught them to examine their "truths" and see if there was room for adaptation in them, or a need to adapt to survive.
My feelings about how well or quicky simple meme spreads versus a more complex one could be directly tied to those learned and inherited traits. If a culture values quick reward and the majority have been taught that things equal proof of personal acceptability within a society, then that's most likely what will spread the fastest.
On the other hand, if society rewards based on merit, thought, and contribution, then more complex ideas will be the ones that spread.
Ultimately, however, regardless of what point in history each culture is in, I must wonder which has the most staying power? Will any meme based upon quick reward or simplicity stand the test of time, or will only those which challenge the mind do so?
Your points on the type of reward were very helpful, and the analogous nature appreciated. They may be based on your technique of observation, but I see them of proof of the power of your technique.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-01 09:54 am (UTC)The Alpha manner means more resources to work with, and less area/vloume to spread oneself over (graph networks sometimes use that as a success indicator, return vs work, contact vs maintainance)
For those beings (or memes) not able to sustain an Alpha position they lose out to better "players". In some cases this result in extreme penalties as the society attempts to enforce the Alpha's structure (ie the one made currently popular). Does "reward" consist of lack of persecution, and/or servility in return for a vote of confidence and supply?
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-02 01:46 am (UTC)When I chose the word "reward," I was thinking in Pavlovian terms, really, but reading what you wrote, I feel that "enforcing" really is closer to what happens. Society reinforces the behavior(s) it finds valuable or useful in a given time by praising, envying, or punishing for "inappropriate" actions, so yes, I suppose it does reward by not persecuting, prostrating, buoying those who comply, etc.
I'd like to believe that there's a subgroup of society that fights this. In fact, I choose to believe this because it's what keeps me going on a daily basis.
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-02 10:51 am (UTC)I consider the internal response to be hard wired ("evolutionary" in that successful reward-seeking behaviour results in proliferation, "depression-seeking" results in self neutralisation)
I would disagree on the surface, with the term "enforcing". I'm not wanting to diverge to far from the meme angle into one of my tired old rants. I'm looking at a society as a group of individuals and the value for those individuals.
For the meme (or similiar concepts) an example could be the modern pagan paradigm. Many "culturally-similiar" individual (paths/trads/whatever) but when they come together a "social normalising" occurs. Some memes flourish, some meta-meme (acting as Alphas) are reinforced by having support and positive feedback. Others are changed, adapted or irrevocably maimed by the coming together (Some for the better IMO). Like "natural" selection "Nature" takes no interest in which meme is correct or accurate, just which ones breed better, root easier, and can steal the nourishing light.
I'm of the opinion that a higher order sustainable method is available both in meme form and social relations but evidence is strong that any effort suffers from the "libertine assualt*" of barbarians at the gate.
(*following the extreme liberal stance that anything is permissable providing the individual can pay the price. The ultimate conclusion is private standing armies to enforce personal rights. Although an army of who has never been sufficiently explained without going from liberal to dictator/feudal...)
Re: Still thinking.
Date: 2007-03-04 04:50 am (UTC)This is something I'm more than willing to do.
I like the term "depression seeking." There's much truth there.
Feeling like "enforcing" wasn't really what I wanted, "reinforcing" felt closer to the way I see society handling traits, etc, these days. My feelings, however, are probably greatly influenced by my personal experiences and the fact that I've not set foot outside North America. While there are many similarities between English speaking countries, there are some important differences, as well.
As for your "tired old rants?" I haven't heard them, and unless someone tells me they are specifically directing them at me, I enjoy pondering opinions that get called rants. If ever you feel like elaborating, I'd like to hear them. They'd be new to me, I suspect.
When you use the term "normalising," do you mean it in terms of a balancing out, the culturally defined middle ground for a situation, or something else? That word always brings Philip K. Dick stories to mind, and I end up wondering who and how we define what normal is, and I'd rather ask than assume you mean it one way over another.
There's a reason I'm neither liberal nor conservative; both sides can become extreme to the point of inaction and irritation. I admire the passion with which such opinions are spoken- as well as the individuals dedication to their cause- but they can both take on Fundamentalists bents that I don't find admirable.
(There is a connection here...) Have you seen the movie "Idiocracy?"