[LINK] Vista and Do Not Record broadcast flags

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

Besides poor quality, surely this will kill MS Vista stone dead?

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Vista is Honoring the ‘Do Not Record’ Broadcast Flag

By: Dan Morrill 
http://www.windowsdailynews.com/2008/05/19/vista-is-honoring-the-do-not-
record-broadcast-flag/

Time shifting is an honored tradition, being able to record TV shows is 
something that makes time shifting something that you want to do, 
unfortunately reports are coming in that NBC has started using the 
broadcast flag, and Vista is obeying it. 

This screen cap is coming from justinjas, a blogger who was trying to 
record “American Gladiator” using his Vista PC. If this had been a regular 
old TV to Tape, he would not have had this problem, but since he was using 
Vista, the setting that NBC used “no allowed recording” kept him from time 
shifing his Television show to a time that he could have sat down and 
watched it. 

The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) chimes in with

"Had consumers not stood up against the FCC’S mandatory flag rule three 
years ago, alternatives like MythTV would no longer be available. Back 
then, the FCC tried to force tech companies (and open source developers) 
to obey the entertainment industry’s remote TV control. A coalition of 
librarians, public interest organizations, and consumer groups 
successfully challenged the FCC’s jurisdiction to impose such a broad 
regulation in Federal court. After the rightsholders lost in court, they 
spent millions lobbying Congress to pass a law forcing receivers to obey 
their command. Your letters and calls stopped that bill." Source: EFF 

There is no regulation that requires the honor of the broadcast flag right 
now, however it has been built into Vista, and Vista is quietly honoring 
the do not record flag. 

If anything else is going to kill off any kind of adoption of Vista, this 
kind of story is going to have a deep influence on if people buy the 
product. 

With viable alternatives, the resurgent Apple Computers, and Linux, the 
idea that Vista is doing this is going to hurt in the longer run. 

This also hurts NBC for using it, while this might be a trial balloon to 
see who gets upset on this issue, in preparation for more legal 
enforcement, the loss of time shifting will be a significant loss for 
everyone who records TV. Any system that honors the flag, from DVR’s to 
your PC, means you can not record for later use. 
--

Cheers people
Stephen Loosley
Victoria Australia