AACS Final License Goes Online

[admin]

One of our insiders has let us know that the AACS Final Adopter Agreement went discreetly online on June 5, without any fanfare or announcement. AACS (Advanced Access Content System) is the content protection scheme for Blu-ray, just like CSS is for DVD. It has been operating on an interim license agreement since inception, and a final agreement was long overdue.

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=2849

The main things you need to know about this are that the Image Constraint Token will be introduced and this will limit analog output (component) to 540p - Blu-ray movies with ICT will be labeled as such on the packaging.

Then starting in 2011, new Blu-ray players manufacturered will only be able to output through analog at SD interlaced resolution. And then in 2014, no Blu-ray players are allowed to have analog video outputs.

There is also something called a Digital Only Token, which will prohibit discs from being outputted through analog - but this will only be used mainly for non commercial titles (for example, Academy preview discs in a fruitless aim to stop piracy).

Is it me or are the Blu-ray people a bit too paranoid about this piracy thing?

The other bit of news is that Managed Copy, the function which allows users to make copies of the movie under controlled conditions set by studios, has survived the specifications. However, it is purely optional and no studio will take advantage of this unless forced to do so by the consumer (perhaps due to market pressure as digital downloads and streaming become ever more popular).

[drfsupercenter]

Well, people can still just rip the disc... I don't see how removing analog output would really stop the hardcore pirates.

I think it's just like CSS to DVD - it stops the casual user from using Nero or something to copy a disc... but anybody who's hell-bent on copying it will find a way and do so anyway. Which is why I find just about any content protection stupid these days... it's just a waste of space on the disc...

[admin]

The latest changes are all about closing the analog hole, basically preventing people from recording Blu-ray movies through component output to a DVD recorder or something. I've never known anybody that bothers to record Blu-ray to SD through analog output, not when it's so easy to obtain the DVD version (legally, or otherwise) instead. As I said before, these are very paranoid folks.

[drfsupercenter]

Well yeah... I mean, there are always workarounds for everything. I tried recording some HD-DVD clips through the analog hole from my Xbox 360, and my DVD recorder stopped after it detected a sort of Macrovision (literally, instantly after I hit "record")
Which woul djust mean you'd need a Macrovision stabilizer... not really worth it.

And like I was saying... with so many new computers coming with Blu-Ray drives (my laptop I get for college will hopefully have one), it would be just as easy, if not EASIER, for someone to use ripping software and get a copy that way.

[Budreaux]

This has been being done for quire some time now.
BR is jsut as easy, if not easier, than DVDs when it comes to ripping to harddrive.
I've been redoing my entire DVD collection to BR then converting to 1.5gb MP4 files for my HTPC. The quality is amazing, even better than watching a DVD, but not quite as good as the actual BR, but damn close. Gotta love Netflix.

[drfsupercenter]

Software upscaling is amazing sometimes.

I just need to find some sort of player with such a powerful GPU that it can upscale using Lanczos filtering and some temporal smoothers in realtime... It would blow away any of the competitors.

But yeah. Most software now will rip DVDs, BR, and HD-DVD all in one. Who uses the analog hole? If you use Blu-Ray, you must care about quality, and if you care about quality, why would you use analog? LOL