Microsoft Answers Vista DRM Critics' Claims

skepsis writes "Recently there have been some stories on Slashdot claiming that Vista would downgrade the quality of audio and video for every application in a machine where protected content was running. One of the stories painted a scary scenario where a 'medical IT worker who's using a medical imaging PC while listening to audio/video played back by the computer' would have his medical images 'deliberately degraded.' A post has been put up on the Vista team blog explaining exactly how the content protection works, and it turns out the medical IT staff and audio pros can relax. From the post: 'It's important to emphasize that while Windows Vista has the necessary infrastructure to support commercial content scenarios, this infrastructure is designed to minimize impact on other types of content and other activities on the same PC. For example, if a user were viewing medical imagery concurrently with playback of video which required image constraint, only the commercial video would be constrained -- not the medical image or other things on the user's desktop.'"

Re:No way!

[saltydogdesign]

Point of fact: the source for that claim was not Slashdot, but New Zealand computer scientist Peter Gutmann. See http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_c ost.html [auckland.ac.nz].

Re:So we should trust Microsoft?

[Original Replica]

The statistics in the IOM report, which were based on two large studies, suggest that medical errors are the eighth leading cause of death among Americans, with error-caused deaths each year in hospitals alone exceeding those from motor vehicle accidents (43,458), breast cancer (42,297), or AIDS (16,516). http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/2000/500_err.html [fda.gov]

Maybe they can't multi-task quite as well as they think.

The (unsurprising) conclusions

[drsmithy]

1. The original paper [auckland.ac.nz] was mostly FUD.

2. Vista only does what the copyright holders tell it to do.

3. If you don't want your life negatively impacted by DRM-encumbered content, don't buy it.

Re:Blissful ignorance no more

[MooUK]

I'm already doing this. Forced myself to use only linux for a couple weeks, ending two days ago. And with the exception of rebooting into windows temporarily and solely to play multiplayer games with my brother.

There are many things I prefer about it, too.

Re:Should we trust the medical system vendors?

[drsmithy]

"Hey guys, I know this computer is only supposed to be used to control the MRI machine, but let's throw our MP3 collections on it! ROCK OUT WITH YOUR COCK OUT!"

What happens at the MRI machine is a relatively small aspect of the "medical imaging" workflow.

Re:Translation needed

[JorDan Clock]

It supports all sorts of new DRM, specifically HDCP and similar methods that prevent or degrade playback for non-authorized devices. It's a poor attempt to close the analog hole, I guess.

Re:I don't understand this downgrading stuff

[WhiteWolf666]

Yes, there is one scenario under which you can watch premium content at full quality: If you have end-to-end HDCP encryption, meaning a monitor that support HDCP (extremely rare), a video card that supports HDCP (rare), an OS that supports HDCP (Vista), and playback software that supports HDCP.

If you are missing any elements of the above, Vista will not playback HD video at full res. Furthermore, XP will never have the ability to play HD-DVD and Blu-ray at full res.

So, in short, all you need to do is wait till the consumer Vista release, and purchase a Vista Ultimate system with a brand new monitor to replace the 23" LCD flat panel you bought last year. Don't forget the DVI-HDCP compliant cables, and the 5.1 digital speakers with HDCP support.

Love, Microsoft

Re:What About Hardware?

[jesboat]

See [[Wikipedia:Trusted Computing]] [wikipedia.org].

It's worth noting that much current hardware should be Vista-compatible, and is perfectly capable of running Linux. FOSS isn't fundamentally incompatible with Trusted Computing-- it's just incompatible with things which use Trusted Computing to secure against other things (e.g. using a Free OS with content which uses TC-based DRM. You'd have to pick either your ability to modify the OS or the content.)

Re:No way!

[drsmithy]

I do not think it would be right for Slashdot to neglect to report on the nice new "feature" of Windows Vista whereby Windows Vista downgrades the user experience if "protected" content is involved, do you?

Your whole premise is wrong. Vista doesn't "downgrade the user experience", it plays content at a lower quality, in lieu of not playing it at all. "Downgrading" suggests there is an actual alternative of a "full-quality experience" _without_ DRM-capable software and hardware, when realistically the only choices are a blank screen or copyright (/DMCA) violations.

Lunix is not Linux

[ClosedSource]

Since the processor used in the Commodore 64 was part of the 6502 family, it has no privilege levels. An OS that can't have a separate kernel space and user space can't be Linux. The GP is correct, you need a minimum of a 386 to run any version of Linux.

Re:Knaves and Crackers

[Antique Geekmeister]

It's called "Trusted Computing", and used to be called the Palladium project. It's led by Mr. LaMacchia, one of the authors of .NET. It's integral to the business plans for Vista.

TFA, unspun

[mgiuca]

OK let's go through this. To be clear: I'm not going to talk about whether MS were forced to implement this stuff or not (I think it's pretty clear that a) they were, but b) it's in their best interests to anyway, and they were probably part of the driving force behind it).

It's just sufficient for us to determine whether this is bad or not.

Sorry to have replied to so much of TFA... there was just a lot to comment on. It's hard to tell whether this was written by a program manager or a politician, with all the spin going on.

Over the holidays, a paper was distributed that raised questions about the content protection features in Windows Vista.

These guys were on holidays?

Associating usage policies with commercial content is not new to Windows Vista, or to the industry. In fact, much of the functionality discussed in the paper has been part of previous versions of Windows, and hasn't resulted in significant consumer problems - as evidenced by the widespread consumer use of digital media in Windows XP. For example:

• Standard definition DVD playback has required selective use of Macrovision ACP on analog television outputs since it was introduced in the 1990s. DVD playback on and in Windows has always supported this.
• The ability to restrict audio outputs (e.g., S/PDIF) for certain types of content has been available since Windows Millennium Edition (ME) and has been available in all subsequent versions of Windows.
• The Certified Output Protection Protocol (COPP) was released over 2 years ago for Windows XP, and provides applications with the ability to detect output types and enable certain protections on video outputs such as HDCP, CGMS-A, and Macrovision ACP.

So... what you're saying is, you've been doing this stuff all along without us knowing, which logically makes it OK to keep doing it.

Would it be ironic if I pointed out that making copies of digital media is not new to the content industry. In fact, at one time it was quite possible to make copies of your own data, and hasn't resulted in significant problems to their business models - as evidenced by the increasing sales of physical and downloadable content over the past decade. Therefore there is no reason to prevent it.

the content protection mechanisms do not make Windows Vista PCs less reliable than they would be otherwise -- if anything they will have the opposite effect, for example because they will lead to better driver quality control.

What? Are we just stabbing at straws here for a reason why they might have the opposite effect?

The paper implies that Microsoft decides which protections should be active at any given time. This is not the case. The content protection infrastructure in Windows Vista provides a range of à la carte options that allows applications playing back protected content to properly enable the protections required by the policies established for such content by the content owner or service provider. In this way, the PC functions the same as any other consumer electronics device.

In an unprecedented move, the people of the free world may now choose the manner in which their freedoms shall be crushed!

Will the Windows Vista content protection board robustness recommendations increase the cost of graphics cards and reduce the number of build options?

Everything was moving to be integrated on the one chip anyway...

1. No, STFU and stop limiting my options. 2. Answer the question about cost.

Will Windows Vista content protection features increase CPU resource consumption?

Yes. However, the use of additional CPU cycles is inevitable, as the PC provides consumers with additional functionality.

In other words, "Yes". I don't consider

Re:Knaves and Crackers

[Antique Geekmeister]

Microsoft has tried, repeatedly, to be a content manager through their Hotmail system, MSN, anWindows Media Player, and other tools. They want to be able to control out *other* software providers, and control media players, by managing the content encryption keys. It's the immediate and obvious use for "Trusted Computing".