Micro-managed copies
By Paul Sweeting -- Video Business, 11/4/2005
NOV. 4 | While studios are hedging their bets and computer makers are threatening to switch sides in the high-definition format battle, the one company that has remained steadfast in its purposes throughout has been Microsoft.
That’s not unqualified good news for others with a stake in the outcome, including the studios.
Until recently, the Windows maker maintained official neutrality between Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD.
Its principal goal was to promote the adoption of two technologies that it helped develop: the AACS copy-protection system and iHD, the interactive engine it designed with input from Disney and based on Microsoft’s own XML markup language.
Now that the Blu-ray camp has decided to adopt the BD-Java interactive engine developed primarily by Sun Microsystems, as well as additional copy-protection measures on top of AACS, Microsoft has come down forcefully on the side of HD DVD.
It was in part prodding by Microsoft that induced Hewlett-Packard to threaten to defect from the Blu-ray camp unless the Blu-Men agreed to adopt iHD.
Microsoft is hardly the only company in the fray to be angling for adoption of its own technology, of course. Much of the Blu-ray development process itself was an effort to create new proprietary technology that would be owned and controlled by its developers.
But Microsoft’s ambitions go well beyond the optical-disc formats at the heart of the Blu-ray vs. HD DVD battle. For Gates & Co., HD DVD is simply one piece in a broader strategy to colonize the living room and further insinuate its technology into the consumer electronics business.
Before anyone accuses me of anti-Redmond conspiracy mongering, let me say it’s a perfectly reasonable strategy for Microsoft to have. The personal-computer software business is no longer providing Microsoft the kind of growth it saw in the past, and so it’s looking for new markets. But it does give Microsoft different priorities than those of the studios or hardware makers.
A glaring example of the disconnect involves Microsoft’s near-fanatical insistence on so-called mandatory managed copy.
Microsoft’s ultimate goal is a fully networked home entertainment environment using AACS--or other Microsoft technologies that interoperate with it--to manage and secure content as it moves from device to device. But the content must be permitted to move.
So Microsoft has insisted that managed copy using AACS be made mandatory for all content released on HD DVD and has persuaded H-P to insist on the same for Blu-ray.
Even though details still are lacking on how copies would be managed, Microsoft is demanding that studios commit to something they may not even have the authority to provide.
Permitting movies to be ripped from discs for other uses likely would raise issues with the creative and production guilds, profit participants, music rights holders and others with a claim on studio revenue streams, none of which has been provided for in existing contracts.
Moreover, by making ripping mandatory, distributors who don’t control all rights could effectively be locked out of the format--by virtue of a policy established by nominal competitors acting in concert. That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Those rights issues are not Microsoft’s problem, of course. But such things can happen when you let someone else set your priorities.
CORRECTION: In last week’s column, I incorrectly reported the results of a vote on iHD and BD-Java by the Blu-ray Disc Assn. board. A BDA technical task force on interactivity originally voted 7-to-5 in favor of iHD, with two abstentions. When the issue came before the BDA board, there was a 10-4 vote in favor of BD-J, with two abstentions.
Some readers also challenged my suggestion that the flip-flop was the result of vote trading, insisting instead that it resulted from more detailed information being presented on the technical merits of each system. I stand by my interpretation but should have acknowledged the dispute.
