“High Definition Content Protection (HDCP)—you can’t live with it, but you practically can’t buy an HD-capable device anymore without it. While HDCP is typically used in devices like Blu-ray players, HDTVs, HDMI-enabled notebooks, and even the Apple TV in order to keep DRMed content encrypted between points A and B, it appears that Apple’s new aluminum MacBook (and presumably the MacBook Pro) are using it to protect iTunes Store media as well,” David Chartier reports for Ars Technica.
Chartier reports, “When my friend John, a high school teacher, attempted to play Hellboy 2 on his classroom’s projector with a new aluminum MacBook over lunch, he was denied by the error: [This movie cannot be played because a display that is not authorized to play protected movies is connected. Try disconnecting any displays that are not HDCP authorized.]”
Chartier reports, “John’s using a Mini DisplayPort-to-VGA adapter, plugged into a Sanyo projector that is part of his room’s Promethean system. Strangely, only some iTunes Store movies appear to be HDCP-aware, as other purchased media like Stargate: Continuum and Heroes season 2 play through the projector just fine. Attempts to play Hellboy 2 or other HDCPed films through the projector via QuickTime also get denied.”
More in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Markim” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: DRM only inconveniences paying customers while the thieves just laugh, then strip it off and start copying. Don’t hurt yourself kowtowing to Hollywood, Steve.*
“It’s better to be a pirate than to join the Navy.” – Steve Jobs
*Of course, as Disney’s largest shareholder, Jobs is a major part of Hollywood, so he must do his kowtowing in the mirror.
Hooray DRM – It stops honest consumers while pirates just do as they please anyways.
One more reason to continue to Bittorrent. I use transmission on Mac OS X.
‘Hellboy’ is now part of the curriculum?
What happened to History?
It’s gone to hell, boy…..
This is wonderful News. Apple is now the leader in DRM industry wide!!!
Please Steve, keep the DRM coming on all of your files and products..
Douchebags
Rape
Me
“Don’t hurt yourself kowtowing to Hollywood, Steve.”
Thanks for telling it like it is, MDN!
I’m quite curious how do pirates remove DRM from HD content (Blu-ray or iTunes)? I haven’t heard of any new feats by any of the cracking communities (DVD Jon or similar) confirming this. As far as I know, there is no way to rip Blu-ray disc with DRM, nor capture HD stream from HDMI protected with HDCP. In other words, at this point, pirates still aren’t able to distribute full Blu-ray HD content.
I’ll assume the only HD content out there (on torrents, limewire, etc) is the stuff captured on TiVO or some such device. That isn’t really the real thing (much like those DiVX renditions of DVD movies aren’t the real thing either).
Those who like to claim that MDN never criticizes Apple: please bookmark this article.
As for Apple being the leader in DRM, if you watched the industry closely, you’d know that Apple is really dragging its feet on this. Other than the new MB(P)s, no other piece of Apple hardware supports HDCP (ironically, to Apple’s detriment, at this point). If you haven’t noticed, the ever-popular Vista (now entering its third year of its miserable existence) has been labelled the slow dog that it is because of the implementation of its thorough support of HDCP and DRM in general. Most Windows laptops had already had HDCP for quite some time.
Apple really had no choice here. HDCP is a hardware standard that has been adopted rather long time ago. There is only so much Apple can do in its fight against DRM. Not to mention the fact that, while SJ and Apple are very vocal against DRM, they actually don’t mind it at all; it keeps the iTunes/iPod ecosystem locked in and strangers locked out.
So, let’s keep bashing our Apple for (presumably) reluctantly adopting the copy protection technology that competition has had for quite some time.
I agree, too many people think MDN is biased. Ok maybe they are. In the sense that bill oreilly is. They are biased towards truth.
No doubt, some fundamentalist nutcase will see this story and have the teacher fired for trying to recruit kids to Satan worship.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=blu-ray+cracked&aq=1&oq=blu-ray+cr
I’m actually shocked MDN that you didn’t try to spin this somehow or try to make it seem like Apple shouldn’t take some responsibility here.
I was starting to think you guys were mindless zealots. But that is not the case.
This regular MDN reader isn’t at all shocked by MDN’s Take.
“over lunch”
What part of over lunch do you not understand?
So teachers are not allowed a lunch break?
Thank godlessness it wasn’t some lame movie with a gun fanatic actor toting foam tablets as a way of getting mythology into schools…
or worse
Creation nudge-nudge-wink-wink science…
HDCP actually stands for High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection. See Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDCP.
That said, I’m disappointed Apple is taking a page from Microsoft in using HDCP. More incentive to pirate!
It is entirely possible that the encryption came from the studio who supplied the movie file. Apple doesn’t “rip” the movies they put into iTunes, the studios do and since this is an issue with Hellboy 2 and not all iTunes movies, it is probably the studios doing this. Why they chose Hellboy 2 is a quandary – maybe they thought no one would notice…
Welcome to the format wars! I’ll deal with the encryption if someone would just settle on some frickin’ standards. There are way too many connections, codecs and encryptions right now. Anyone here remember the days of composite video? One cable, one standard (per country, anyways). Yeah, it sucked, but it sure was simple. Then VGA (and infinite xxGA’s), but still the same connector at least and the ability to change resolutions manually or automatically. Now, both of those are still widely used, plus we have DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI (pick a version), DisplayPort, Component, S-Video, RGBHV, and that is not a complete list. I’m not even going to try to list the codecs and encryptions! Maybe Apple can lead the industry to adopt the new DisplayPort throughout.
I hope that it can push farther than 15′ without a $300.00 cable, though.
Where is Wang Chung’s love child – Zune Tang – when you need him?
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Terrible.
Remember the good old days when you could just record whatever you wanted to a VHS tape?
Yeah, me neither.
Fact: no high definition content is released by film studios without some sort of content protection. Doesn’t matter what the consumer or the electronics manufacturers want.
Fact: If you support file sharing, then you’re doing it at low resolution rates. Cheap facsimile of the real thing.
Fact: HDMI sucks. For those users who sent audio signals to their trust old amp (using SPDIF or Toslink) and video signals to their HD display, HDMI simply doesn’t work. The HDCP “handshake” isn’t reliable, and both audio and video signal are intentionally downgraded to a picture quality no better than a good upconverted DVD. There is absolutely no reason to have all audio and video signals in one cable.
I’m not sure what to make of DisplayPort, because as this article states, HDCP is the sad reality that even Apple has to live with. However, I absolutely refuse to replace my existing home theatre to HDMI-compatible components. Looks like DVD quality is as good as my system will ever display — not because the equipment isn’t capable, but because of HDCP.
Let’s at least hope that studios get their heads out of their asses and allow electronics manufacturers to offer users other connectivity options at full resolution. I want to see a DVI resurgence or at least have Blu-Ray / Apple TV with separate HD audio and HD video connections.
Just like music: lets get all the content available with DRM first, then start the decryption process.
Who wants to have to manage multiple terabytes of ripped HD content anyway. The DRM is pointless since you’d delete the files to get the space back anyway. Physical BlueRay sales/rental and online SD/HD rentals (iTunes or streaming) are the only viable long term models for the common person.
HDCP is built-in to the new Nvidia GPU chipset. HDCP is also the first thing needed\required to the development of a Blu-Ray HD DVD Player Application it is also required to Play iTunes HD content with iTunes on the MacBook and MacBook Pro.
Apple’s first step will be to expand HD Movie Rentals to iTunes for HDCP enabled Macs and PCs to expand HD Rentals beyond the Apple TV. Once this is done then Apple can start the process of developing a Blu-Ray enabled software player for Mac OS X. Until that point there is little reason for Apple to even talk about adding a built-in Blu-Ray drive to any Mac. Once all Mac have the HDCP enabled Video Chip sets and iTunes HD Movie rentals have been expanded to the Mac then expect the Blu-Ray talk to start warming a bit.
The Mac Pro might even get a Blu-Ray RW Drive built to order option as early as MacWorld (albeit without the ability to play copy protected Blu-Ray Movies). Would not hold my breath but their is a chance.
Bill O’Reilly is biased towards truth.
And Dick Cheney is the second incarnation of Mahatma Gandhi.
Gee, macdailynews, over the weekend, I sent you an email regarding the fact that the new MB’s & MBP’s won’t play iTunes movies on external displays – EVEN APPLE’S OWN CINEMA DISPLAYS – Get the led out guys, the story isn’t that you can’t play the movie on a projector, the story is that iTunes movies won’t play on my $2000 Apple display! From Apple’s own discussion site:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=8451993