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Technology

Presenting The CDR-ROM 409

Posted by chrisd from the don't-give-aol-any-ideas dept.
nachoboy writes "Here's a cool new idea: the CDR-ROM. Allows a portion of the CD to be written and them mass produced, leaving the remaining area recordable by the user. It may sound funny, but if AOL started sending out CD's like this I might just start keeping them around."
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Presenting The CDR-ROM More

Presenting The CDR-ROM

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  • What would be better (Score:4, Funny)

    by sulli ( 195030 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:49PM (#5400453) Journal
    would be for AOL to use CD-WOM (Write Only Memory) technology.

  • Why would AOL do that? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:50PM (#5400457)
    It's bound to be more expensive than the super cheap plain CD-Rs. I actually think these would only have limited usefulness.

    • Re:Why would AOL do that? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Actually, companies might get a hold of these new CD's and make them even cheaper than CD-R's. They might burn a small ad on the CD so that whenever you write to it or even view it, the company logo might pop up, play a little jingle, or something like that
  • with not only aol software but MSN also.

  • Viable idea (Score:5, Interesting)

    by unterderbrucke ( 628741 ) <unterderbrucke@yahoo.com> on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:50PM (#5400469)
    CD-ROMRW

    The kiddies could use a program to take care of their little Pokemon/Yu-gi-oh/the popular electronic pet du jour, and write it to the cd when they're done and carry it around for them. No need to carry around a disc to play your saved game.
    • Damn straight it's viable.... i've had this idea for years, too bad i'm only like 15 and have no klout in the electronics world at all.

      Number of times one of my ideas becamed a patented product: 2.

    • Think about applications for games. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by carlmenezes ( 204187 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @07:21PM (#5401419) Homepage
      Consider this scenario :

      Games don't use the windows registry at all, or they use temporary registry settings if necessary. All configuration info is kept on the CD.
      The game is essentially playable off the CD. Your saved games go BACK ON the CD. Which is nice. That way you can carry around all your settings in a neat little package whereever you go.
      (If this looks familiar, it's nothing but the Linux concept of keeping configs in files).

      Why would games want to do this?
      1) There is no issue of hard drive space.
      2) The entire game is now portable.
      3) It would be so much more convenient to customers.
      4) It wouldn't cost them more.
      5) They could even take this one step further by creating their own bootable CD thereby eliminating the need for a specific OS, but then...I'm not sure that's a very good idea as it turns a game company into an OS producer too, unless the micro kernel the game runs on is standardised for all games. If you manage that, you've essentially given PC users almost all the convenience of console gaming!
      • I can point out a big problem with this.

        We desperately want our files off of the CD because it takes TOOOOOOO LOOOOOOOOOONG to load from CD. Hell, if I thought I could get away with it, I'd store my entire game in RAM so it'd be blazing fast.
      • I also think this making piracy HARDER, not easier, as one of the previous reply'ers says. TO play the game, you need the cd. And you can't just burn a copy, since it's a special cdr rom, that either you can't buy, or it's an exact size, that you wouldn't be able to match. And per the other reply'er, you could have the option of putting stuff on the HD, or even, totally install to the HD, but the cd needs to be in the tray. Since the whole unique cd type comes up, it'd be a decent anti-piracy method, but of course, with enough time/effort/people, anything can be sidestepped.
        • The games manufacturers could even make the CD-writer try to scribble all over the ROM area so you couldn't copy it onto a writable disk.

          This sounds like an idea that's most useful for console systems. Avoiding the need for a hard disk or a pluggable RAM cartridge for game saves seems like it would be a big win.

          In the PC world, things are more problematic - I wonder whether the market penetration of CD-RW drives (as opposed to just CD-R) is large enough to make this useful for a few years to come? If only 30% of gamers have them, the games manufacturers aren't going to be very interested.

    • Viable Idea - Bootable interface (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Bonker ( 243350 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @07:22PM (#5401422)
      Now imagine this... a custom linux computer interface whittled down to fit in 300 or so megabytes and configured to boot properly and DHCP across a wide array of hardware. The other 400 are for you to store your files and settings for later use. Set it up with a few essentials - text editor, web browser of your choice, various clients, *maybe* some basic compiler tools.

      Take the CD anywhere you chose to and use your own interface/desktop from any PC in the world that will let you have access to the CDROM drive and the reset switch.

  • Copyright (Score:5, Funny)

    by geogeek6_7 ( 566395 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:51PM (#5400473) Homepage
    Not a big jump till we get to the C-DRM or CD-MCA huh? :P

    ~geogeek

  • Not that new (Score:5, Insightful)

    by snack-a-lot ( 443111 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:52PM (#5400492)
    Multi-session CD writes offer a similar functionality. The first widespread use of this was the Kodak PhotoCD - you could put your photos on the same CD again and again until it was full, because it used multi-session.

    • Re:Not that new (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Junta ( 36770 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:08PM (#5400713)
      It is new. I would debate usefulness, but it is novel.

      The idea is that a subset of those sessions are write-once (CD-Rs). Maybe stamped, maybe burned (didn't read the article), but in any event, they can be written only once and never reused.

      The rest of the disc would be CD-RW. So if you wrote a session and filled the disc, you could re-use a session burned to the RW section of the disc.

      Not too useful. *Maybe* you could have a game run entirely from CD, saving progress in the RW area. If the drives are fast enough, and the game writers efficient with game state information required in a save file, this *could* be feasible. This is still a stretch as the cost/benefit ratio is still garbage...

      • Re:Not that new (Score:3, Interesting)

        by phorm ( 591458 )
        *Maybe* you could have a game run entirely from CD, saving progress in the RW area

        A really good idea... but a few hitches:
        -What about drivers for the particular burner, or is there a generic?
        -Needs to have it's own burning software.

        Even rewritable discs have a finite lifetime, although technically so do diskettes.
    • What is that file that is displayed in your .sig?

  • Hmm (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Cyno01 ( 573917 ) <Cyno01@hotmail.com> on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:52PM (#5400493) Homepage
    Wouldnt CDRW-ROM make more sense? why would you have a write once portion of a disc with a part already stamped. With a CDRW-ROM you could save your games on the game cd, no more save files or memory cartriges.

    • Re:Hmm (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Hydrogenoid ( 410979 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:05PM (#5400686)
      Easy...
      Install once, write on the CD "I have been installed" and refuse nay other installation attempt.

    • Re:Hmm (Score:4, Informative)

      by Target Drone ( 546651 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:24PM (#5400870)
      Wouldnt CDRW-ROM make more sense?

      Looking at the specs [optical-disc.com]for this thing it is "Equivalent to an appendable single session CD-R". I get the impression that this might be just a standard CDR. What's new is that the've developed some faster way to write the disc.

      The reason they don't have RW is because they cost a lot more and also because a user could accidently erase the entire disc (or important tracks). One of the selling features is to create a disc with your software and then burn a second session with a disk-id or DRM info. You wouldn't want the user to be able to delte the disk-id.

    • It would make more sense for uses that you have in mind. But, I'd guess CDR-ROM is more useful for people like Intuit. I'm guessing the software vendors are pushing for this...or the media makers are hoping the software people will jump on it.

      It used to be nobody had a CDROM drive. Now days, everyone does. And how long until "everyone" has a CDRW? Pretty much everyone I know (yep, all 2).

      A software vendor could develop an installer that requires you install from a CDRW drive. It only installs if the writeable portions hasn't already been modified (by the installer on the first installation).

  • i've often thought that it's a waste to use a whole cd for 100 or so meg of data or 15 or so minutes of audio . . . it'd be nice if this got widely used!

  • Too little...too late (Score:5, Insightful)

    by djupedal ( 584558 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:52PM (#5400506)
    DVD-R, maybe....but CD-R's are simply too small. Apple and SUSE as an example distribute using DVD. The message is smaller media is already on the demise, so why encourage it. Otherwise, a 'reusable' piece of (free) storage isn't a bad way to gain some respect.

    • Re:Too little...too late (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Abcd1234 ( 188840 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:06PM (#5400697) Homepage
      DVD-R, maybe....but CD-R's are simply too small. Apple and SUSE as an example distribute using DVD. The message is smaller media is already on the demise, so why encourage it.

      Yeah, 'cuz DVD writers and their associated media are so incredibly cheap, right? Oh, wait, DVD burners cost on the order of 5 to 6 times more than their CDRW counterparts, and the difference in media cost is even greater!

      Well, then again, at least compatibility amongst DVD writers is really good, right? No, wait, we have a variety of competing standards, and only now does it appear that a consensus is forming.

      Sorry, but from everything I can tell, DVD writing is still in it's infancy, compared to the now-mature CDRW technology, so I wouldn't ring the death nell on CDR just yet. In five years, though, you might be right.
      • Well, then again, at least compatibility amongst DVD writers is really good, right? No, wait, we have a variety of competing standards, and only now does it appear that a consensus is forming.

        Mods forgive me if I'm going off topic here, but can some explain to me why exactly this sort of competition is so bad? We certainly argue that having a variety of desktop environments / window managers encourages competition and progress.

        Don't get me wrong. I can see some (at least short-term) pitfalls with competing standards. But isn't the idea that the possible outcomes of competition overshadow these pitfalls?

        I say, let there be competing standards, especially while DVD writers are expensive. Eventually one standard will probably prevail, and by the time prices go down standards won't be an issue.

        I could be wrong. Like I said, someone please enlighten me if I'm missing something.

        • Mods forgive me if I'm going off topic here, but can some explain to me why exactly this sort of competition is so bad?

          Whoa, don't get me wrong here. I don't think having competing standards is bad at all. My only point is that, until a single, usable standard is in place, there is no guarantee that Joe Sixpack A would be able to by a set of DVD-Rs and have them be fully compatible with his drive. Moreover, the burned DVD-Rs might not work on Bob's DVD drive down the street.

          Until we can have a reasonable guarantee of compatibility, your regular user will not flock to DVD-R as a CDR replacement, simply because of the difficulty of use.

  • Is this good or bad? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by GrouchoMarx ( 153170 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:53PM (#5400519) Homepage
    Good: Knoppix [knoppix.org] CDs that boot themselves and then let you write to a small section of the CD, so that you can keep a permanent record of the files you write in the computer lab.

    Bad (and the likely goal): CDRs that have DRM features written at the beginning of the disk to keep you from writing "untrusted" content to the rest of it. Watch these replace normal CDRs and hurt the CD remixing industry. (While the RIAA collects a higher piracy tax on them anyway.)
    • ...Watch these replace normal CDRs....

      While this may be the goal, I highly doubt it will actually happen unless a law comes about requiring DRM on CD-Rs. Otherwise, there are simply enough people that won't tolerate DRM-tainted CD-Rs to sustain a healthy market for plain ol' regular CD-Rs.
    • CDRs that have DRM features written at the beginning of the disk to keep you from writing "untrusted" content to the rest of it.

      Could you describe how this could possibly be implemented? You'd have to have something in the CD burner, or software on the computer, which can take advantage of the data which is written to the pre-written part of the disk to enforce these "DRM" features. But 1) the disc is supposedly fully compatible with all existing CD burners (which don't have said features), and 2) anyone can use their own software for burning CDs (cdrecord, at the minimum).

      Basically, without proof, I don't see how this is anything more than paranoid...
      • True, you can't control the recorder. However, you can control the player, which can check for the DRM track, then check for signatures in the music. No signatures on a DRM disc, no playing on a DRM player.
        • Actually, it's a lot harder to control the player than it seems. Just look at DVDs and the whole DeCSS debacle. The movie industry explicitely tried to control all players, and they failed miserably.
    • So don't use them in DRM-compliant operating systems. Put a label on them, clearly stating that they don't work in broken-by-design systems. Say why they don't work on DRM-compliant machines. Raise public awareness.

    • Re:Is this good or bad? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by GoRK ( 10018 )
      Knoppix could already do this with normal CD-R's.. You can burn more data onto a multisession disc that isn't full. Have you actually even used a copy of knoppix that was on a pressed CD anyway? I don't think there have ever been any produced (but there probably have -- distributed with a magazine or for a tradeshow or something)

      It would probably be just as cheap to publish the software onto a CD-R directly than it would be to publish it on a CD-R/CD-ROM hybrid disc anyway.

  • what?! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    how is it a cool new idea to uncheck the 'finalize cd' button?!

  • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Sounds like a step towards DRM (Score:5, Insightful)

    by n1ywb ( 555767 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:55PM (#5400543) Homepage Journal
    Similar to how Secure Digital memory works, since you can't alter the contents of the ROM portion of the disc. It could contain secure hashes, or even codecs or other encryption/communication code. You buy a stack of the discs and burn songs onto them at the music store, then they only let you play them x number of times, a la SD. Or maybe you buy music CDs with the music already in the ROM part, but the R/W part is updated each time you play it. Or the R/W part must be encoded with some kind of machine specific ID so you can't play the disc in other players.

    I know I know I'm being totally paranoid. There are a million and one potential NON DRM uses for this idea.
    • You buy a stack of the discs and burn songs onto them at the music store, then they only let you play them x number of times, a la SD. Or maybe you buy music CDs with the music already in the ROM part, but the R/W part is updated each time you play it.

      That would only work if:

      1. You had to use software to play the songs and,
      2. You where playing it on a CD-RW

      It's technically difficult and expensive. Also, with current technology CD-RW's are only good for a finite number of rewrites.

      Either way, I bet the RIAA is already researching it! :)

      73, Chris KG4TSM

  • Copy Protection use... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MisterFancypants ( 615129 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:56PM (#5400557)
    Could enable publishers to have CD-KEYs on software/games that are unique for each printed CD. Doesn't make the software uncopyable/uncrackable, of course, but it would make things a big harder on Joe Compaq who knows about 'serialz' sites but not much more.
  • It may sound funny, but if AOL started sending out CD's like this I might just start keeping them around.

    Geez, this is exactly what I used to do when AOL was spamming everyone with floppy disks. Remember those?

    • Remember them, I still have a HUGE pile of them (all overwritten of course). Not to mention all the other ISP's that spammed me over the years. Those things are probably collectors items now.

  • Great for copy protection. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Rolo Tomasi ( 538414 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:57PM (#5400573) Homepage Journal
    During the installation, the install program writes your processor's serial number (or soon your TCPA ID) to the CDRR. You probably don't want to "borrow" that CD to anyone anymore.

    Or, you could limit how many times a program can be installed ... endless possibilities.

    • You also don't want your CPU heatsink to fall off, thus causing your CPU to splat its guts out the side.
    • I don't see it being much use for copy protection as most is just bypassed by pirates by cracking the actual disc checks.

      Most likely, the use relating to copy protection will be to eliminate the hassle of the end user having to connect to a clearinghouse to authorize software opon reinstallation.

      For example, you'd install Windows XP and it would connect to Microsoft and burn your authorization code to the CD. If you gave away/copied the CD, it would say "Windows XP Licenced to Bob Pirate, code 4125-35221-53532-2312*, etc." On subsequent reinstalls, you wouldn't need to connect to activate the software.
  • The site is slashdotted and equiring minds want to know ...
    • How is this different than multi-session? The site is slashdotted and equiring minds want to know ...

      It's a disc that is divided into two segments. One segment is your standard ROM disc, that sounds like it will be stamped using normal duplication methods. The remainder of the disc is to be surfaced as a CD-R, allowing people to burn information on there.
  • This is actually semi-good thing.

    Imagine game that you dont need to install, it plays off the CD itself and writes save games there. Bad thing about it -- games could become "one time playable" only.

    Or even worse -- one time installable software, that writes some reg. info to CD itself.

    How about some exams on CD that you pass or not pass and it saves your results directly to CD?

    But again, could be possible to create copy of this CD and do this again, and again, and again... :)

  • Updatable apps (Score:5, Interesting)

    by binaryDigit ( 557647 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:58PM (#5400591)
    I can't seem to get to the site (/.'ed?) but one use that springs to mind is being able to update the data for some application. Right now you purchase some app that might come on a cd, lets say a mapping app. When you want to install updated data, you either get a new cd, or you download, but you can't have the updated stuff with the cd, since it's still on the machine you downloaded. With this, you could download and burn the update and still have everything together.

    Another app could be a way to distribute homework to students. The homework/text is on the stamped portion. As the students do their homework, it can be burnt on the cd. At the end of the year you have a permanent record of the class. You could extend this to storing markup information (bookmarks, notes, etc) and adding supplemantal info as well.
    • ... but you can't have the updated stuff with the cd, since it's still on the machine you downloaded.

      Those are great ideas... but a lot of companies would rather just sell you a new CD ;-).

      --sex [slashdot.org]

  • Good for Canadians... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Abcd1234 ( 188840 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @05:59PM (#5400607) Homepage
    Possibly, anyway. We pay a levy here on blank CDRs. BUT, they must be blank. SO, with something like this, you might be able to conveniently skirt said levies, with a small reduction in capacity.
    • I wonder how blank it would have to be to work? Could you just have a single file that says "Blank-media levies suck. Go to http://www.ccfda.ca/ [ccfda.ca] for more info"? Or would they decide that it's still predominantly blank media?
      • That's a really good question... it would be worth checking out the legislation to see how the law distinguishes between blank and non-blank media. Or maybe the law proscribes levies based on the intended use of the media (I wouldn't be surprised if this was the case). Still, something to think about...
        • Nope. If I use a CD-ROM to distribute my resume and code samples, I still get burnt by the media levy, even though I'm not distributing music. So there's no exceptions for intended media use.
    • If this becomes the case, then you could probably successfully lobby that CD-R's themselves aren't actually blank - they contain ATIP data that tells the drive stuff like the manufacturer, the disc type, the maximum write speed (I dont know if maximum write speed is in the CD-R/RW ATIP spec, but it is in all the DVD recording specs), etc.

      ~GoRK

    • Re:Good for Canadians... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by OneFix ( 18661 )
      The problem with this is that this new format will no doubt be more expensive to produce than CD-R and most likely CD-RW media...the question is...will it be cheaper without levies than your CD-Rs with the levies???
  • I think this is a great idea. If one could extend this idea into maybe a CDRW-ROM allowing a lot of writes or perhaps even a DVDRW-ROM. This way for game consoles, you can actually save your game without the need of a Hard Drive (XBox) or a memory card. This might bring back some of the concepts that were promised by the cancelled (in US) N64 DD, allowing a game to be very changeable. Imagine an RPG like this, like where a lot more of the scenery can change, you slash your sword along a wall, turn off the console, load it up again the next day and you'll still see a little mark on that same wall. More so, in an RPG like game, there would be even more interactivity, like where you can change entire landscapes with your "magical" powers. This is something that would be hard to do on a game console, even with an 8 gig HD which I doubt developers would want to be half full because of one game. I'm curious how expensive this technology would be though.
  • Oh yeah, what is that place where you could donate AOL cd's too? he he he I need URL

  • Virus-Orama! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by blueZhift ( 652272 )
    This sounds like a good way to spread viruses. Imagine all of those AOL CDR-ROMs lying around in your building's mail lobby being picked up and loaded with trojan horses say and then put back in the lobby all with friendly AOL logos already on them. Even if they had been originally shrink wrapped, most users who 'd be interested in signing up for AOL wouldn't think twice about sticking the CD into their PC and running it.
  • NOTE: This came from google news so it might not be the same

    Business Editors
    DCD Expo 2003

    SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 26, 2003--Optical Disc Corporation (ODC), a leader in optical disc mastering systems, today announced the introduction of its CDR-ROM(TM) disc. This revolutionary new product provides many new possibilities for digital content delivery, not previously possible.

    ODC's CDR-ROM (patents pending), combines CD-R and CD-ROM on the same disc using its advanced mastering technology. The CDR-ROM is a standard size 12 cm disc that provides a pre-recorded ROM area and a writable CD-R area on the same disc. Although the format has been published for years, available manufacturing technology has limited the ability to record on standard CD-R writers worldwide. ODC's advanced technology provides a breakthrough, allowing the writable portion of the CDR-ROM to be recorded by the content provider, or the end user on their own computer. Either area can be as large or as small as required by the application with a total capacity of up to 700 MB. The CDR-ROM conforms to all specifications of the industry Orange Book standards for hybrid discs and is compatible with standard CD-R writers worldwide.

    The ODC CDR-ROM, with its desktop CD-R writer compatibility, provides the ultimate in application flexibility. The CDR-ROM opens a world of opportunities for new applications such as, Anti Piracy/Copy Protection, Enhanced Data Security, Direct Marketing with mail-merge, and unlimited other software applications.

    "The major challenge in CDR-ROM disc manufacturing has been the requirement to produce a stamper with widely varying pit and groove geometries from the same master. This has proven very difficult to do with photoresist mastering, which is why this type of disc has not yet been readily available. ODC is uniquely capable of readily producing CDR-ROM masters, stamper and replicas because of the tremendous flexibility in ODC's Dye Polymer Mastering process," states Richard Wilkinson, President and CEO of Optical Disc Corporation. This capability has been demonstrated within the last year and is ready to be placed into pilot production. Major software companies and copy protection companies such as Macrovision Corporation (Nasdaq:MVSN) and Smarte Solutions have expressed a keen desire to develop applications for the CDR-ROM.

    ODC is now taking orders for the CDR-ROM, which is manufactured at ODC's headquarters facilities in Santa Fe Springs, California. ODC also plans to license the CDR-ROM technology to other manufacturers.

    For More Information

    Optical Disc Corporation is a leading and the world's only remaining independent supplier of mastering systems for CD, DVD, and other optical disc formats, and has been in the business for over 20 years. The company provides a complete line of high-quality optical disc mastering equipment to CD and DVD manufacturers worldwide. Optical Disc Corporation's corporate headquarters is located at 12150 Mora Drive, Santa Fe Springs, California 90670 USA; tel. +1.562.946.3050, fax +1.562.946.6030, http://www.optical-disc.com. ODC maintains regional sales and customer support facilities in Europe/Amsterdam, tel. +31.36.546.3095, fax. +31.36.546.3074; Asia-Pacific/Hong Kong, tel. +852.2541.1732, fax. 852.2541.1766.

  • If this does come to fruition in the marketplace, most likely the first company to make use of this would be M$. while they may not innovate on technology, they do innovate on ways to screw the consumer, and this is an excellent example.
    Say MS releases Windows 2004 next year.
    instead of sending out a regular CD like they usually do, they'll send out one of these CDs, which upon installation will write a small portion of information to the CD, with your computer's hardware info and specs on it. After that point, it might be restricted to installing ONLY on a computer with those specs, and additionally, only a limited # of times, at which point you would have to go and buy a new copy of windows...

  • Here's why it won't work (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Torgo's Pizza ( 547926 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:02PM (#5400656) Homepage Journal
    I can't get to the article because it's already /.ed, but even if this idea is good, it is out of touch with reality. The manufacturing process in creating a silver CD is pretty straight forward. You make a master CD, you press silver copies of it and voila! You've got a *cheap* mass produced CD.

    The problem with this idea is that you can't mass produce CDs like this with a writable area for the consumer. For one, it's a totally different process to make the media. It's also more expensive. Not only that, why should I use this monster? I can't erase what's already in the session. It's like using those preformatted Zip disks with that 50ways.exe and not being able to delete it. Oh, so I can store a few documents amongst the hundreds of megs of AOL crap on the CD. Talk about a autorun nightmare...

    You're also rising the cost of manufacturing disks. Eh, I guess you could burn the CD roms by hand, but that would take forever even on a mass produced scale. You end up looking like some pirate operation. Plus how do I know the CD hasn't be adulterated somehow? At least with a silver CD I know that if it's fake, they went to a lot of effort to get a facility to make it. Gold, Green, or Black CDs can be made by anyone.

    Eh, why bother? Just buy blank CDs. They're cheap enough and you know what you're getting. You're also putting only what you want on them.

  • CDR-ROM (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I think it is a great idea. You could have an OS boot, probe hardware, write optimizations to cd.
    Or save user specific information.
    This OS could be for a game or could be for some sort of appliance. Maybe game console, TIVO type thing.
    Not good at talking to large group forgive me.

  • I don't like the idea ... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Khalidz0r ( 607171 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:03PM (#5400665) Journal
    Wouldn't this idea make it possible for people to abuse AOL's name and give out the CD again (some way or another) with additional malecious programs. This would easily trick many people into installing them and then the blame would go into the CDR-ROM producer (AOL in this case).

    I always believed the inability to write over a distributed CD coming from a kind of trusted company is a good idea because it disallows such kinds of faking.

    Khalid

  • Overload.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by _marshall ( 71584 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:03PM (#5400668) Homepage
    So let me get this straight:

    We've come so far ahead in technology that we now have Recordable Read Only Memory!?

    Maybe I should invest in that frozen hell stock after all..

  • Not a bad idea! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by dasmegabyte ( 267018 ) <das@OHNOWHATSTHISdasmegabyte.org> on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:06PM (#5400692) Homepage Journal
    Tons of people in the computer lab I used to work in would keep AOL floppys to save stuff on, because even though they were totally unreliable they were abundant and free.

    This would be a really good idea for bands jsut starting out. Record a CD with three songs and leave the rest blank, give away free. People burn other stuff on the end, and hear your tracks first. Free advertising marketed to people who might actually dig your sound.

    Of course, you could do the same with recorded commercials...
  • I expect and anticipate (but not necessarily hope) that AOL will use this Technology, as will plenty of other companies. If the CDR-ROM manufactures have any business sense they'll bundle free CDR-ROM's with their writers that have advertising/free trials for other companies - especially ISP's. The resulting revenue will be very profitable for the manufacture.

    Maybe I shouldn't be telling the Slashdot community this! *quickly jumping on bandwagaon*

  • DRM Use (Score:4, Insightful)

    by 4/3PI*R^3 ( 102276 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:07PM (#5400708)
    1) Release CD of Music, Software, etc.
    2) Place in computer and run program
    3) Program reads BIOS, Hardware config, Windows GUI, etc.
    4) Program writes this data to CD-R portion
    5) Use CD on a different machine -- whoops data doesn't match calling "Piracy Police"

  • Evil CDR-ROMs (Score:5, Insightful)

    by frovingslosh ( 582462 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:08PM (#5400715)
    It may sound funny, but if AOL started sending out CD's like this I might just start keeping them around."

    Sure, I would grab lots of free AOL CDR-ROMs everytime I saw their display. Use them when I needed to archive away a modest amount of data. What good would that do AOL, to have a few geeks who know better than to use their "service" snarf up all their free media? Strikes me as the last thing they would want.

    The only people who are likely to use these are people who see them as yet another way to impose copy protection and further restrictions on the users. Install and write to the CDR-ROM. Information already written there? Opps, you need to buy another copy of the tax software to use on this computer. What, you say you bought a new computer? -- too bad, but another copy. You say you need to recover your tax data from 2 years ago and the 2 year old version is no longer sold in stores? Too bad, our copy protection prevents you from installing again.

  • Disk and Floppy-less Server! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Black Perl ( 12686 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:08PM (#5400718)
    This would be great to create a single purpose server (gateway, webserver, whatever). You can boot off of them AND have some permanent storage (for logs, config, etc)! You'd probably still want ramdisk swap and /tmp partition.

    I can think of all kinds of uses for such a CD.

  • I can see the hamfisated DRM attempts now (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Sabu mark ( 205793 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:08PM (#5400719)
    No doubt companies would try to use the feature for copy protection and/or DRM. Simply write some machine identifier to the disc, and then presto, your software can demand that the user 1) keep the disc in the drive and 2) only run it on the machine that corresponds to the locked-in identifier.

    Of course, for the competent user, this would be about as hard to defeat as the infamous "enhanced CD" scheme that you can defeat with a felt pen. But it would still be annoying and user-hostile. Although that seems to be a consciously decided marketing strategy for the Big Content conglomerates these days.
  • This is going to save our bacon up here in Canada. Our friendly idiots in power are determined to increase the tariffs on recordable media, in an altruistic effort to enrich Celine Dionne.

    The loophole, though, is that the tariffs don't apply to prerecorded media.

    I am quite willing to give up a few bytes of CDR space in the name of saving a buck per CD in purchasing costs.

  • Different demographics (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:09PM (#5400740)
    1) People who would use AOL.
    2) People who actually know how to burn a CD.

    You'd have more success packaging foie gras with Milwaukee's Best.

  • AOL cds? NOOOOOOO (Score:3, Funny)

    by DrStrange66 ( 654036 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:12PM (#5400760)
    If AOL used this technology getting by AOLS auto-run installation would not be worth getting to any files burned on them.

  • I have thought about this idea before... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by GoRK ( 10018 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:16PM (#5400798) Homepage Journal
    I have thought about this idea before, but it's a really half-baked idea. Here's why:

    Manufacutring cost:

    It's more expensive to produce a disc like this than it is to manufacture a blank CDR or a pressed CD-ROM. For any application where this type of thing would be required, it could easily be written during the manufacutring process onto a regular CDR. I would imagine that there is roughly an equivalent cost to producing one of these hybrid discs versus publishing on CD-R to begin with. In addition to this, think about all that would be involved with retooling a plant to be able to manufacture discs with a different ratio of CD-ROM to CD-R, not to mention the additional burdens it's going to place on testing equipment that will have to be able to verify both the pressed disc and the blank section.

    Reduced capacity:

    The CDR-ROM disk will have a reduced capacity compared to a normal pressed CD-ROM or a CD-R because no data will be able to be written at the point at which the two disc types meet. The reduction in capacity would be small, but prevalent.

    Drive compatibility problems:

    Secondly, the huge installed base of CDROM drives out there will not have good compatibility with this kind of a disc. Most drive firmware treats CD-R and CD-ROM media differently to achieve optimum read performance with different kinds of media. When you put this hybrid thing in your 50x cdrom you got three years ago, it's going to spin up to maximum thinking it's a pressed disc then read error all over the fucking place when it hits the CDR section. The onl thing to do is to fake the cdrom into thinking that the disc is a CD-R in its entirety, but then you don't get any of the advantages of having a pressed disc anyway, such as increased read speed without new drives that cater to this special format.

    Software compatibility problems:

    Due to the way ISO9660 works, the table of contents (including the TOC for the data on the pressed section) will likely have to be re-burned by any software that writes to the CD-R section of the disc. Thus, a faulty burn would render the entire disk unreadable by most systems.

    The only good application I can think of for this is for a console game system where you have the luxury of ensuring a uniform set of hardware capabilities between users, and the ability to break standards to accomplish this weird hybrid design stuff. A game could keep save data on the disc or extra game data or something while protecting the game data itself. The media, though, should be CDRW and not CD-R. For those of you who remember, think about the dreamcast's data format -- use some kind of DVD format for the "outer ring" of game data, and use CDRW for the inner ring of PC/CDROM compatibility. You could pop your Xbox2 game into your PC to download new levels or whatever. Unfortunately, internal storage, and fast network connections inside of future (and some present) game consoles would render this idea pretty pointless also.

    ~GoRK
    • Manufacutring cost
      How much more expensive? 1 cent per piece? 99 cents per piece? It'll be a very small additional cost. There is no retooling needed. Anyways, doesn't matter. Some folks interested in this are content providers hoping for DRM. Including software vendors using an installer that marks the CD so that the install is limited after the first time.

      Reduced capacity
      That's not a concern, either. I remember years ago getting Apple Dev Network CDs where Apple included bonus music on the data CDs (you didn't know this until you popped the data CD into your car player). I thought it was kinda cool and for a while would burn my CDs in mixed-mode...no real reason, just being spaztic. Anyways, I wasn't worried about reduced capacity then. I wouldn't be worried about it here. CDs are used for convenience, not space. Take a look at the next Reader Rabbit CD you buy for your kids (or yourself?). Even with AOL and other crap bundled onto it we're talking well under 30mb used. Anyone worried about the waste? If "The Learning Company" thought they could prevent even just some piracy by using 1 byte of that wasted 610mb of space for an additional 1 cent of cost...why not? The only why-not is they have to hope that most of their target audience has a CDR drive.

      Drive compatibility problems
      There is no issue here. No firmware problems. A driver update wouldn't even be necessary.

      Software compatibility problems
      Who ever said the entire disk is ISO9660? Yet another non-issue. There are many ways to mix discs. I guess you haven't tried it.

      The only good application I can think of ...
      If that's where your imagination on this topic ends, then I seriously doubt your opening sentence:
      I have thought about this idea before...

  • Great for hiding porn! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jonny Ringo ( 444580 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:16PM (#5400802)
    No one wants to touch an AOL cd. ewww.

  • Why? (Score:2)

    by Myuu ( 529245 )
    That would actually be a great idea for AOL, I remember back in the 6th grade I would just use AOL floppies to back up my info; everyone did. We were basically walking adverts for AOL.

  • Multisession (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Pupp3tM ( 182264 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:24PM (#5400878)
    Maybe it isn't the same because part of the CDR-ROM is actually cut, but isn't this the same idea in principle as is behind multisession CDRs? Can't write over the part that's already written, but you can write on the rest of the disc.

    --------------------

  • DVDR-ROM: Nifty commentaries? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by the_truk_stop ( 448393 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:30PM (#5400921)
    I would think that one of the best uses of a technology like this would be DVD movies with personalized commentaries.

    Then people like me could host "Mystery Science Theater"-esque parties where we make fun of the movie. Loads of laughs, and the memories would last indefinitely!

  • More info from the manufacturer... (Score:4, Informative)

    by GoRK ( 10018 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:33PM (#5400941) Homepage Journal
    More info can be found on the manufacturer's site here:

    http://www.optical-disc.com/CDR_ROM.htm [optical-disc.com]

    ~GoRK

  • A positive use... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by BHS_Turf ( 8387 )
    I have read most of the comments, and they all seem to tend toward the negative uses, so I am going to offer a counter-example. MoviX [sourceforge.net]. You could mass-produce a bootable cd that would be capable of playing any movie or mp3/ogg file(s) you happened to burn onto it.

    I wouldn't mind a spindle of these.

    -bhs
  • I'm seeing a lot of posts in this thread about how wonderful this would be for things like stand alone servers that can now store updates, etc, etc.

    I agree, there are some good uses here... but for many of the suggested apps, why can't I do this already? I believe it's called a multisession CD.

    I have a CD, I burn a copy and leave the disc open. Vola, I now have a disc I can continue to add data on to: be it maps, server configs, what have you.

    Granted this would mean the functionality for automatically saving a game to disc wouldn't be built into software sold on conventional pressed CD's, but for many of the idea's people are suggesting for these special discs this would work just fine... and be much cheaper.

  • What? (Score:2, Funny)

    by LordSkippy ( 140884 )
    You don't use the flood of AOL discs as a renewable source of drink coasters?

  • Sony Minidisc (Score:3, Interesting)

    by TheRaven64 ( 641858 ) on Thursday February 27, 2003 @06:46PM (#5401049) Journal

    Shortly after the MD was released, I recall reading about Sony's intention of releasing an MD-Data. This was to have come in three flavours:

    1. WORM - Standard Write Once Read Many-times format for data distribution.
    2. RW - 100% rewritable disks for replacing floppy disks
    3. Hybrid - These disks were mainly read-only, but with a re-writable section. The aim was that you would be able to store savegames on the disc the game came on.

    The MD-Data had a capacity of only 140MB, and I never actually saw one on sale.

  • Here we go (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TerryAtWork ( 598364 ) <research@aceretail.com> on Friday February 28, 2003 @07:51AM (#5404889)
    Pretty soon the DRM on the cd will check to see if it'll accept what you're writting to it.

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