Or, to look at it another way, there is likely to be a big demand in France for DVDs that do not include copy protection.

C'est la vie.

Looks like another Fox news distorted article designed to bash the EU.
It reads differently in European media.

and here

John

Thanks John.

craftech, the story jimmy_w linked to said nothing bad about the EU. which article are you talking about?
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Let me quote:

"France, along with other EU countries including Germany and Spain, has laws guaranteeing the right of consumers to copy recordings they have purchased for private use."

Fox has spent a great deal of time making distorted statements about the EU (in it's US division anyway) for quite some time. Their EU media, of course, do not.

John

I actually have a music cd (commercial and legal) of a well known artist which I cannot even play off a cd or dvd drive in a computer...now how absurd (and illegal?) is that?

I think copy protection is stupid and futile. If someone wants to pirate a DVD en masse, it is not difficult to crack. I want the ability to easily backup my DVDs, because they do get damaged over time.

I would like the ability to make a backup of my car or boat they too get damaged over time;)

Jimmy

That is the most straightforward story imaginable. I can't detect any bias at all. It simply reports on a court ruling. The only opinions or "shaded" adjectives I can find are:

... part of an unprecedented ruling ...
The word unprecedented may or may not be factual. You'd have to be a copyright lawyer to know whether anything like this has happened before in France, and whether this is really a big departure from previous rulings. The author of the article does cite a source who isn't quoted directly as using the word "unprecedented," but does say "I think this is the first judgment in Europe going in this direction," which more or less defines the word.

The ruling could be a major setback for the DVD (search) industry
This is obviously an opinion, and is the only such opinion or shading I can find.

I read the article three times, looking for any other bias or bashing. Not even a hint.

As to copy protection, the music, video, and software industries certainly have major problems with copying, and there is no doubt that the digital age has made this problem worse than it used to be. The problem is that most of the DRM implemented seems to me to have overtones of authoritarian governments who decide where their citizens can and cannot travel, who they can associate with, how much money they are allowed to make, etc. This analogy is not perfect, but the feelings stirred inside of me are very similar.

In order to "detect bias" in Fox news reports you need to do some additional research to find out the details it invariably leaves out.
"A French appeals court has ruled that movie companies must remove the copy protection from DVDs, and castigated them for inadequately labeling copy-protected movies.

The Paris court reversed an earlier ruling in favor of Le Studio Canal and Films Alain Sarde against consumer group UFC-Que Chosir, reports Afterdawn. The lobby group took up the case of a DVD owner who discovered he was unable to make a copy of the David Lynch movie Mulholland Drive to play on a video recorder. This violated the basic rights the DVD owner had to make copies in a family context, the court ruled.

The court also ruled that the labeling was inadequate.

{{{A higher appeals court may yet overrule the decision, and rights holders may decide to invoke the European Copyright Directive in France, which outlaws machinery that enables such 'circumvention' of locked media."}}}

Source: The Register - UK

John

"I actually have a music cd (commercial and legal) of a well known artist which I cannot even play off a cd or dvd drive in a computer...now how absurd (and illegal?) is that?"

I would tell you how to defeat it with a Sharpie pen, but that would make me a federal criminal. You can find the answer by google.

Steve Mann

Well, there's a a couple solutions to this (depending on the law).

1) the studios hand out copies of a DVD dupliating app (like DVD XCopy) that only allows origionals to be copied. Tell people they can make a personal copy by using this program. That would cost ~$1.2billion for france alone (61.1million people @ $20 a pop for software). People (in genreal) are lazy and would rather make their own copy legally then go out & search for one.

2) say "ok, you CAN make copies but the law doesn't specify it must be on a specific format. If he had a DVD -RW he could of made a backup on his own, legally. Not our fault he doesn't own one."

3) stop selling DVD's in france (and other countries with simular laws) until eigther a) the laws change or b) a new copy protection is figured out that lets people make a backup. It sounds stupid, but it's what networks wanted to do with HDTV in the US. :)

4) use a simular "tracking" system that is being used on Oscar screeners. Then hollywood can track who leaks DVD's. It's not a violation of privacy if you must agree to put up with this to enjoy the DVD (it's done with software all the time)

Those solutions are all pretty stupid, and if the law was such a major concern it should of been brought up years ago.

[Quote]
"France, along with other EU countries including Germany and Spain, has laws guaranteeing the right of consumers to copy recordings they have purchased for private use."

Fox has spent a great deal of time making distorted statements about the EU (in it's US division anyway) for quite some time. Their EU media, of course, do not.
John
[/Quote]

John, your're absolutely right.

I don't know about Spain but for Germany the Fox statement is nonsense as it leaves out about 99% of the truth.

True, we have laws guaranteeing the right of customers to copy recordings in very very small quantities for private use among close friends and within the familiy only.
However these laws have just recently basically been destroyed by another law in favor of copy protection. The new law says you are never allowed to break any copy protection scheme by any means when it is announced on the box of the product so that you could have seen it when you purchased the product.
I guess this is the same in all EU countries and the intention of the French court was just to make sure the labelling "Copy protected" is clearly visible.

Anyway, you can imagine that all CDs and DVDs in Germany now carry copy protection thereby preventing any legal copies. Even worse: since there is no copy protection for Audio CDs except using a damaged file structure most new Audio CDs in Germany don't play back on PCs, DVDs or Car Stereos any more!
Computer magazines in Germany aren't even allowed to discuss methods of breaking copy protection or give links to programs that do.

So you can see the reality is just the other way round as this Fox article pretends.

re: Fox this Fox that...

It's an AP story geniuses. ;o)

If you are a Fox viewer then you know what I am talking about. I watch and read 5 different news media outlets including Fox to ascertain the closest proximity to the truth one can get in the United States. Result: Often the BBC has more factual information about American news than we do. More examples of EU bashing by Fox:
From the February 8 edition of FOX News' Special Report with Brit Hume. White House correspondent James Rosen:
ROSEN: "Speaking to one of France's leading left-wing political science academies, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged old Europe to put aside the old differences over Iraq."

First of all, the "left wing" Science Academy he was referring to was the Institute of Political Science. Paul Bremmer belongs to it along with many former French Prime Ministers (the reason he referred to it as "left wing"). Secondly Rice didn't use the term "old Europe". Rosen added that in.

(4/27/04) O'Reilly falsely claimed "they've lost billions of dollars in France according to 'The Paris Business Review'" due to an American boycott he advocated of French imports.

There IS NO " Paris Business Review" by the way.

(6/10/04)O'Reilly told a caller on his radio show, "We [the United States] have a trade deficit with everybody, because everybody wants our stuff, and we're not wild about snails" -- indicating that he doesn't know the definition of "trade deficit" and implying that the United States runs a trade surplus with France.

In fact, in the first four months of 2004, the United States had a $3 billion trade deficit with France.


Other statements by O'Reilly:
"Socialistic" French, Germans, and Canadian governments tax at 80 percent." A lie

"Canadian, British, and French media are "government-controlled," but Italian media is free." Another lie.

July 29: political analyst Dick Morris claimed that "it's been proven that French President Jacques Chirac and Russian President Vladimir Putin got personal bribes from the oil-for-food program. What could you have done as president to persuade them to dump Saddam Hussein, their benefactor?"

December 3 : John Gibson "All of those oil vouchers going to members of the P-5 [the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council] -- Russia, China, France -- in a clear attempt ... to bribe the Security Council so the United States could not get the votes it wanted for the war."
Hannity (same day) " this is one of the biggest humanitarian scandals in the history of the world. We have our corrupt French partners, our corrupt Russian partners." The day before, Hannity falsely implicated German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder in the scandal. Hannity and Watts both reiterated the falsehood.

Dec 6. O'Reilly: "We know that France, Russia, and China on the Security Council were getting bribed by Saddam. Everybody knows that at this point."

Nov 30: HUNT: "For three decades allegations have been made regarding French President Jacques Chirac's business relationships -- about whether he sought and took bribes. Now close business associates of Mr. Chirac are said in the CIA's Duelfer Report to have received millions of dollars worth of oil vouchers from Saddam Hussein.
So how high does political corruption in France really go?" This statement preceded the introduction of a questionable guest brought there to imply that the French government was corrupt.

By the way:
The Duelfer Report named Patrick Maugein, the chairman of the oil firm Soco International who has ties to Chirac, as the recipient of illicit oil vouchers from Saddam, but the report does not allege that Chirac himself took bribes or made political decisions as a result of Hussein's apparent efforts to bribe his associates, or even that Chirac was aware of those efforts.

Nov 21: O'Reilly: "But, by pointing overseas for validation, I mean that's ridiculous. People overseas don't respect American rule of law. They don't know what perjury is. They don't care what perjury is. They don't care what campaign finance violations are. They don't care what pardons are for money. They don't care. You know, in France, if you have four mistresses they like you better. All right? So, I mean that's just where they're coming from."

October 28: O'Reilly referring to Clinton:
"particularly with the French, because he had a mistress and all the people loved him. They love that mistress stuff over there."


Do you want me to go on?

John

What does all that have to do with an AP story run on a news outlet?
Jimmy

The AP story was distorted.
" The ruling could be a major setback for the DVD (search) industry, which places lock software on disks as part of its battle against illegal copying — cited for millions of dollars in losses each year."

Given Fox's history any follow up they do on the air or in print WRITTEN by them will further distort the truth. Examples above.

Omitted:

"A request for damages and interest by UFC-Que Choisir against Studio Canal was refused by the court however but the case was not about money for UFC-Que Choisir. The association is delighted with the ruling. But for the delegate general of the Video Producers’ Association, Jean-Yves Mirski, the decision is "worrisome" at least. Not having had the time to analyze the decision in detail, the VPA has not yet decided whether to appeal the decision to a higher court (the Court of Cassation). But this is far from out of the question.
In any case, according to Jean-Yves Mirski, this judicial turn of events "directly contradicts the European Copyright Directive."

" A higher appeals court may yet overrule the decision, and rights holders may decide to invoke the European Copyright Directive in France, which outlaws machinery that enables such 'circumvention' of locked media"

Source: 01.Net.

John

By omission. Given what Fox viewers are fed on a regular basis that is all they need.

editing your posts a day later doesn't change anything. ditto for linking to an article written in french that you incorrectly assume no one will be able to understand. whatever fox is, stop watching it, since you seem to be irritated by it so much. and your pathetic example of how you stay informed shows no real-world experience. how about subscriptions? ever heard of those? magazines, newspapers, journals, daily's weekly's monthly's bimonthly's? your statements imply someone is forcing you to watch tv. who? you got no radio? no internet radio? you can't log on to some forum in india or elsewhere to ask some user directly what's happening around the world?
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No content was edited a day later Marquat. The link to the original French article was a mistake. The English Translation was supposed to be linked to.
You state you don't know what Fox is and that explains why you do not know why I am objecting to reading it THERE.
For me to criticize Fox means I have to watch it or read it along with the others or I have no right to criticize it. I find them to be the most distorted of all American major media outlets. The same AP article appeared in many other media outlets. It was as I pointed out - a distortion by omission. There are NO far reaching implications by that decision. For Fox viewers, it just adds another notch in their belt against the EU and particularly France. I find the entire effort in the United States by the media to bash France and the EU an insult.
Look at the title of the thread to see what effect it has:
"Don't sell your DVD's in France... Yet"
And where did you get the impression I watch all of this on TV? Most of it I read on international and domestic news websites, along with TV.

"you have yet to show what facts were omitted that would prove the article was misleading."

What's wrong with you? I quoted the information that was omitted above.

John

Thanks Steve! I'll have to look it up....so that at least I can listen to it off my Ipod...

Which takes me to my next question..If we are not allowed to copy our music cd onto a computer, all of us carrying an ipods/mp3 player are quite happily proclaiming our guilt? (well, you know what I mean...)

Actually the Serial Copy Management System has been criticized by many artists who claim they cannot even copy their own stuff on devices which employ this system.

John

I find the entire effort in the United States by the media to bash France and the EU an insult.

Where in the article did they bash the EU?
Why are you trying to poke holes in this John
I don't believe they omitted or embelished the story.
This has nothing to do with O'rielly, or Sean Hannity. Its an AP story like the one's you read on every other news outlet. BTW the news media in EU is not exactly pro american.

Jimmy

"I don't believe they omitted or embelished the story"
========
You managed to title the thread "Don't sell your DVD's in France... Yet" based upon that story, didn't you?
---------------

I find the entire effort in the United States by the media to bash France and the EU an insult.
----
BTW the news media in EU is not exactly pro american.

===============
Most of that is within the last 4 years as a result of our government (and the news media) bashing them for being smarter than we were when it came to Iraq. The insulting comments by Donald Rumsfeld and the negative commentaries in our media against Europe and particularly France bred anti US government sentiment there. They have been very good at separating the American people from their complaints about the current US government. I respect them for that. It is more than many Americans are capable of I am sorry to say. And that is as a result of what we view in the media, particularly Fox News.

John