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Topic: Transformers to premiere on cable pay-per-view, same day as box office?!

Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 06-24-2007 12:33 PM

I hope you're wrong about the day-and-date thing. The studios all say, now, that they support the video window.

But I remember, not too many years ago, when the head of Disney said they would NEVER cheapen their classic animated films by releaseing them on video. Their plan was to bring them back every seven to ten years "for a whole new generation to enjoy" in the theatres.

I think that plan lasted for one "classic" reissue (Pinocchio) and when it flopped, it was full-speed ahead to get all the oldies onto tape.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-24-2007 12:49 PM

quote: Mike Williams
All I am saying is give it a few years. Where there is a will, there is a way. When a hack is out there and laptop hardware catches up to meet the requirements - and it will, the studios will really have to be diligent.

The current security standard with digital cinema will not stay stuck in its current condition.

And given the concerns of the notebook computer market, it will be a very long time before you have anything like enterprise level RAID performance coming out of the hard drives in a notebook. Factors like battery life are major considerations.

quote: Mike Williams
I like the industry the way it is and has been. I just see some huge changes taking place soon because of all this... mainly films being released day and date.

If movies get released in theaters and on home video at the same time it will kill the movie theater business. And once the movie theater business is killed that will in turn kill off much of the movie business itself.

As an all straight-to-video industry the movie studios would be no better than any pay cable operation like HBO. Their production budgets would shrink dramatically since they would just be making everything for TV. Sales of movies would go to shit.

If Hollywood really wants to cut its own throat financially, releasing movies in theaters and on video at the same time would be a good way to do it.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 06-24-2007 02:07 PM

Fact: Studios don't care about piracy, even though they'd like you to think they did.

Evidence: They still send out bunches of screener DVDs, don't they?

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Louis Bornwasser
Film God

Posts: 4441
From: prospect ky usa
Registered: Mar 2005

posted 06-24-2007 06:07 PM

You don't have to worry about piracy if day and date happens. No camera needed; just buy one on your way out & copy it. Louis

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Joel N. Weber II
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 115
From: Somerville, MA, USA
Registered: Dec 2005

posted 06-25-2007 12:16 PM

I'm not sure if the quality of the copies floating around on the Internet is necessarily all that bad.

I've heard that one of the copies of Sicko floating around on bittorrent is a bit more than 4GB. That might make it higher quality than some movies that have been released on single layer DVDs that might have longer runtimes and/or special features. Also, I didn't hear what compression scheme was used for that copy; the compression scheme used on DVDs is certainly optomized for cheap consumer players with tiny processors and not for making the most use of the available bandwidth.

DVDish quality is obviously not as good as theaters, but on the other hand, it seems to be good enough for an awful lot of consumers.

When DVDs first came out, I think the perception was that the encyrption on DVDs was going to be just as effective as people are now claiming D-cinema's encryption is. Unless someone can point to careful reviews of D-cinema's encryption by well-known cryptographers who were told the details, I think it's best to assume it's a big unknown.

Downsizing the huge files may not need to be something that needs to happen in real time. There may be viable schemes for defeating the watermarking that may turn out to not be especially difficult. Without being told the details of how these algorithms work, we don't really know.

The ``gssapi'' authentication method in the ssh protocol had some significant flaws that went unnoticed for about two years, and that's a publicly documented protocol (which has since been replaced with a different authentication method that's a little more thorough). The D-cinema encryption/watermarking spec has likely not been reviewed as carefully.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-25-2007 02:04 PM

quote: Joel N. Weber II
I've heard that one of the copies of Sicko floating around on bittorrent is a bit more than 4GB. That might make it higher quality than some movies that have been released on single layer DVDs that might have longer runtimes and/or special features.

Doubtful.

A lot more work goes into the video authoring of a retail DVD than any pre-release screener disc regardless of whether it is single or dual layered and whether it has a lot of features on it or not. Pre-release screener DVDs typically have at best mediocre audio and video quality.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
DVDish quality is obviously not as good as theaters, but on the other hand, it seems to be good enough for an awful lot of consumers.

And that underscores my point of why it is retarded for anyone to even bother with trying to hijack and crack any d-cinema hard disc virtual print. Why fart with something as complicated and risky to handle such as a d-cinema virtual print when a screener DVD is so much easier, faster and safer to duplicate?

quote: Joel N. Weber II
When DVDs first came out, I think the perception was that the encyrption on DVDs was going to be just as effective as people are now claiming D-cinema's encryption is. Unless someone can point to careful reviews of D-cinema's encryption by well-known cryptographers who were told the details, I think it's best to assume it's a big unknown.

It sounds like you're making some broad assumptions based on what is unknown to you.

There's a lot of details stated (and other details left unstated) in the DCI white papers. The encryption and activation systems are quite advanced and a lot more complicated than anything casual computer users find in any mainstream software, including any of the new HD-disc video formats. The keys work uniquely with each virtual print and projection system. The only likely way I see the system being "broken" is by someone doing it from inside the movie industry.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
Downsizing the huge files may not need to be something that needs to happen in real time. There may be viable schemes for defeating the watermarking that may turn out to not be especially difficult. Without being told the details of how these algorithms work, we don't really know.

Again, that sounds like another guess. And then there's the repeated guess that the video content can merely be duplicated and resized using standard computer hardware when the truth is that content is too impractical, complicated and just plain incompatible with any mainstream hardware. Given the modest goals in file sizes and quality for uploading, it doesn't make any sense to go after anything other than those screener DVDs.

I'd like to make another point. This is fundamentally a pro movie theaters forum. Anyone advocating movie piracy and regarding the criminals who upload movies on the Internet as heroes of sorts is working directly against the interests of many who participate here. Lots of movie theater employees and other people employed in the movie industry participate in this forum. Anyone wanting to promote piracy should not be surprised by all the flames he may get in response.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 06-25-2007 03:42 PM

quote: Bobby Henderson
Pre-release screener DVDs typically have at best mediocre audio and video quality.

And how do you know this?

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-25-2007 04:13 PM

I've seen a few of them. Bootleg DVDs from screener discs are popular with soldiers over in Iraq. They're widely available there. Some troops will bring some of those discs back stateside when they finish a tour of duty.

The quality with those discs is not all that great. One of my close friends had a bootleg copy of The Last Samurai and ended up replacing it with a legit retail version with much better video quality.

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Christopher Meredith
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 126
From: Jackson, MS, USA
Registered: Apr 2006

posted 06-25-2007 05:02 PM

quote: Bobby Henderson
This is fundamentally a pro movie theaters forum. Anyone advocating movie piracy and regarding the criminals who upload movies on the Internet as heroes of sorts is working directly against the interests of many who participate here. Lots of movie theater employees and other people employed in the movie industry participate in this forum. Anyone wanting to promote piracy should not be surprised by all the flames he may get in response.

Could you explain how someone saying that they think it will be possible to "pirate" a movie from a D-cinema source one day is in any way, shape or form, the same as suppoting or promoting piracy?

Maybe you could explain how departing from the party line (Ahhh! The sky is falling! Pirates are costing us billions of dollars!) is advocating piracy?

The simple fact is that (and this is all I've been trying to say all along) so-called piracy happens, is common, usually produces a very good quality (by an average person's standards) copy, and is really not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of the motion picture industry. Do not worry. The studios will be around for a very long time, pumping billions and billions of dollars into 3rd and 4th rate sequels for years to come. True film fans need not panic...

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-25-2007 05:11 PM

quote: Christopher Meredith
Could you explain how someone saying that they think it will be possible to "pirate" a movie from a D-cinema source one day is in any way, shape or form, the same as suppoting or promoting piracy?

Because the tone I am getting in some of those claims of how fast the pirates are going to break d-cinema encryption sounds a little hopeful or even boastful in nature. There is no shortage of ninnies out there who believe black hat crackers are cool.

It also reminds me of the small group of people who believe no copy protection should be put on anything at all and that any copyrighted work should be free to copy anywhere all the time. They often use the slant of how fast copy protection schemes are broken as an argument of not bothering with such systems at all. Of course, I doubt any of the people who believe that nonsense are getting through their lives without collecting a paycheck from their day jobs. But they expect the content creators to work for free.

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Christopher Meredith
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 126
From: Jackson, MS, USA
Registered: Apr 2006

posted 06-25-2007 05:17 PM

I don't interpret the comments that way, though I am an open-source advocate and did personally rejoice when encryption schemes (such as DVD-CSS) have been broken and protocols (iTunes) reverse engineered. Of course, in these contexts, the issue is fair use, not ease of copyright violation.

I beleive the tone of the previous comments on the encryption schemes is simply that they do not last all that long (which is wny there are new ones always around the corner) and that those used on D-cinema data is no different.

And it would be good of you to recognize that in many cases, those who undertake to crack such standards are not always mean, evil people who think no one should make money off their work. If a safe-maker unveils a new vault which he claims is impenetrable, there would be many people who would like to take him up on the challenege, and not because they don't think the owner has a right to what's inside.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 06-25-2007 05:41 PM

quote: Christopher Meredith
If a safe-maker unveils a new vault which he claims is impenetrable, there would be many people who would like to take him up on the challenege, and not because they don't think the owner has a right to what's inside.

You're comparing apples to oranges. Cracking open a vault is one thing. Taking the money from it is something completely different.

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David Stambaugh
Film God

Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002

posted 06-25-2007 05:59 PM

quote: Christopher Meredith
Of course, in these contexts, the issue is fair use, not ease of copyright violation.

Of course! Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more! [Wink]

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Joel N. Weber II
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 115
From: Somerville, MA, USA
Registered: Dec 2005

posted 06-25-2007 08:52 PM

quote: Bobby Henderson
And that underscores my point of why it is retarded for anyone to even bother with trying to hijack and crack any d-cinema hard disc virtual print. Why fart with something as complicated and risky to handle such as a d-cinema virtual print when a screener DVD is so much easier, faster and safer to duplicate?

Are screener DVDs always available by the opening date of a movie, for every single movie?

Another question that might be worth asking is ``if screeners go away, will illegal movie distribution stop?'' It's possible that the disappearance of screeners might simply motivate those who distribute illegal copies to do some extra work to find some alternate source.

quote: Bobby Henderson
There's a lot of details stated (and other details left unstated) in the DCI white papers. The encryption and activation systems are quite advanced and a lot more complicated than anything casual computer users find in any mainstream software, including any of the new HD-disc video formats. The keys work uniquely with each virtual print and projection system. The only likely way I see the system being "broken" is by someone doing it from inside the movie industry.

Complicated encryption systems can still have subtle flaws, and typically all a cracker has to do is find one such flaw and the rest of the system falls apart.

And the well-respected cryptographers generally say that when you keep the details of your encryption system secret, you have a system that's less secure than something where the details are public. The only secrets should be the keys themselves.

In a well-designed system, if one D-cinema decoder manages to fall into the wrong hands, it may be possible to simply never provide movies to that individual decoder box in the future. If there's something wrong with the design of the crypto system, that stolen box might be used to discover a flaw that would allow playing back a movie without being given a key.

quote: Bobby Henderson

I'd like to make another point. This is fundamentally a pro movie theaters forum. Anyone advocating movie piracy and regarding the criminals who upload movies on the Internet as heroes of sorts is working directly against the interests of many who participate here. Lots of movie theater employees and other people employed in the movie industry participate in this forum. Anyone wanting to promote piracy should not be surprised by all the flames he may get in response.

I believe all I have been doing is expressing skepticism that the security technology is necessarily as good as the marketing hype says it is.

I had thought that this is also a forum that tries to promote an accurate understanding of the technology. Are you going to be arguing that people shouldn't post questions about which brand of platter works best and why, and that we should switch to only posting scans of trade show handouts from the platter manufacturers that talk about how flawless the platters are? Or that people who think a movie sucked shouldn't post to the film handler's movie reviews forum? Or that people who go to a presentation that sucked shouldn't name the multiplex they attended when they describe the problems?

quote: Christopher Meredith

I beleive the tone of the previous comments on the encryption schemes is simply that they do not last all that long (which is wny there are new ones always around the corner) and that those used on D-cinema data is no different.

Good encryption schemes last quite a long time. Wikipedia says that SSL version 3 came out in 1996. There's probably been a bit of evolution since then, especially in the implications of the US export laws allowing strong encryption, but the evolution of SSL/TLS (the encryption behind https URLs, among other things) has probably been pretty slow in the last several years. AES support was probably added many years ago. I'm not sure what hash algorithms are being used with TLS these days; people have expressed concerns about the md5 and sha1 algorithms that were used for a while. On the other hand, the number of certificate authorities trusted by browsers (dozens) and the authentication procedures of those certificate authorities (an attacker just has to exploit the weakest one) probably makes certificate verification the weakest part of the system.

Though actually, the user interface and clueless users, as well as the general insecurity of a typical PC, probably render that somewhat moot anyway.

quote:
If a safe-maker unveils a new vault which he claims is impenetrable,

I don't think there's really any such thing. Safes tend to be built with estimates of how long it will take someone to destructively break into them.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-25-2007 11:25 PM

quote: Joel N. Weber II
Are screener DVDs always available by the opening date of a movie, for every single movie?

They are often available weeks ahead of the theatrical release. This especially goes for major event releases. This is yet another reason why they are actually a much more highly prized item than some overkill protected d-cinema virtual print.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
Another question that might be worth asking is ``if screeners go away, will illegal movie distribution stop?''

It will sure make a lot of mass production piracy outfits in communist China unhappy.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
Complicated encryption systems can still have subtle flaws, and typically all a cracker has to do is find one such flaw and the rest of the system falls apart.

And, again, that is a broadly worded assumption the encryption system with DCI compliant d-cinema is deeply flawed.

I would much rather hear some arguments about the DCI system based on some actual technical facts from real working knowledge rather than simple pedestrian conjecture that anyone can pontificate.

If there are some deep rooted flaws in the system then let's hear some damned specifics about it. The broad "what if" crap is just a bunch of bullshit. Joel, if you actually know something that is specifically flawed about the DCI system then let's hear it already.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
I believe all I have been doing is expressing skepticism that the security technology is necessarily as good as the marketing hype says it is.

Care to provide any specific knowledge to back up that broad assumption? Exactly how do you know the DCI system is not as good as the so-called marketing hype says it is? What's your specific proof? If you're going to attack something, try attacking it from a specific known problem about the system. If you can't manage to do that then it just sounds like you're spit-balling. You're just attacking copy protection schemes in general just because it's copy protection and coming off like you're in favor of broad piracy against copyrighted content.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
I had thought that this is also a forum that tries to promote an accurate understanding of the technology.

This is a forum about technical matters concerning commercial movie theaters. That is this forum's main mission. The advocacy of Internet movie piracy is an attack against Film Done Right. It is an attack against commercial movie theaters and an attack against the people who make their living working in commercial movie theaters.

So, basically yes, if anyone wants to try to claim that piracy is great, he will get his ass flamed here. Poster beware.

quote: Joel N. Weber II
I don't think there's really any such thing. Safes tend to be built with estimates of how long it will take someone to destructively break into them.

So Joel, by that argument can we suffice it to say that if some burglar kicks in your front door, beats the dogshit out of you and then steals all your belongings, you would say that you had it coming since things like door locks are merely made to be broken?

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