News written by Petteri Pyyny (May, 2003)

Nullsoft, the subsdiary of media giant AOL TimeWarner and the author of hyper-popular media player, WinAMP, managed to anger its parent company, once again, this week.

Nullsoft released an instant messaging/trusted-party file-sharing application called WASTE on their website on Wednesday, but after a huge amount of press coverage, labeling the tool as "secure P2P software", etc, Nullsoft's parent company AOL decided to pull the plug. Now the download page simply states that "unauthorized copy of Nullsoft's copyrighted software was briefly posted on this website. ... If you downloaded or otherwise obtained a copy of the Software, you acquired no lawful rights to the Software and must destroy any and all copies of the Software, including by deleting it from your computer. Any license that you may believe you acquired with the Software is void, revoked and terminated."

The request for pulling back the licenses and usage rights might be much more complicated than it sounds, since the code was released under GPL license which states that "parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance."

Out of the many so-called DeCSS court cases going on at the moment, one of the oldest ones is now heading to California Supreme Court. The case between DVD-CCA (association that licenses CSS encryption mechanism to DVD manufacturers) and California resident Andrew Bunner relates to the fact that Bunner distributed DeCSS code on his website.

DVD-CCA sued hundreds of people in late 1999, including Mr. Bunner, for disclosing "trade secrets". Among those who were sued originally, were guys who printed DeCSS code on T-shirts, caps, etc. Earlier this year, U.S. Supreme Court upheld California Supreme Court's decision that one of the other people sued by DVD-CCA, Matthew Pavlovich, can't be sued in California because he is actually a Texas resident.

In Mr. Bunner's case, lower court granted a preliminary injunction that prevented him from distributing the code. However, appeals court held this decision and now the case is headed to California Supreme Court. The court date is set to tomorrow, 29th of May.

Source: EFF

During the last couple of years, most countries that have strong presence on the Net, have seen broadband connections to get more and more popular and the main reason, it has been claimed, is the enormous popularity of P2P networks.

So, P2P has managed to turn dial-up users to broadband users and ISPs should be more than happy to see such transform. But now broadband ISPs all around the world, specially in Europe, are complaining that P2P traffic is costing them too much and claim that almost 60 per cent of all bandwidth is used for file-swapping.

According to British CacheLogic, the global cost of P2P networks for ISPs will top £828M (€1148M, $1356M) this year and will triple in 2004. Various ISPs have considered of taking measures for restricting users' download habits, but a prime example from the UK, by cableco ntl, has shown that it might not be a very smart move (ntl imposed a 1GB/day limit for its cablemodem connections and thousands of users left the service immediately, taking also their digital cable TV accounts to competitors as well). Now some tech companies are trying to invent ways to prioritize the traffic -- if the file-trading is done within the ISP's network, the cost for the ISP is minimal compared to intercontinental network connection costs.

In very unsurprising move, Microsoft is already preparing its huge counter-attack against Apple's extremely popular online music service, iTunes.

Microsoft is tweaking its DRM system, included in its Windows Media platform, to support time-limited music tracks (and most likely, video files) also on portable devices. Current WM platform supports this feature on standard PCs, making services such as Pressplay possible, where users download tracks and can listen them as long as their subscription to the originating service is alive. The problem so far has been the fact that users want to transfer these tracks to their portable audio devices, car players, etc. With iTunes' rather flexible licensing/DRM system, this is possible, but not with Windows Media -based services.

To fix this problem, Microsoft is developing a system for portable audio devices, stand-alone players and car players to handle time-limited DRM systems, check the subscription status from the Net, etc. With its marketing muscle, it is most likely that there will be several equipment manufacturers who will implement this technology in their upcoming products. But the main problem is: are consumers willing to "rent" music rather than owning it..

Sharman Networks, the owner of the P2P application Kazaa claimed today that its application is soon going to take its spot as "Net's most popular program ever".

Sharman's claims are based on Download.com's figures, where the #1 spot currently belongs to AOL's instant messaging program, ICQ. ICQ has -- as of midday today in East coast -- currently 229,363,307 downloads and Kazaa has now 229,150,955 downloads. Kazaa is currently been downloaded over 300,000 times a day from Download.com, whereas ICQ is downloaded only 50,000 times a day (ICQ is just much, MUCH older application).

The claims are all fine and nice and obviously highlight that Kazaa has been an enormous success, despite its flaws and problems (broken downloads, fake files, etc). But basing such claims only on Download.com's figures is simply ridiculous -- AFAIK, AOL's WinAMP has an existing userbase of over 250M, Macromedia claims that appx. 90 percent of world's browsers have their Flash application installed (and believe me, there are more browsers installed than P2P tools in this world), WinZIP is one of the tools that everybody downloads and installs immediately after installing Windows, etc. So, to put Sharman's hype in perspective: Kazaa is soon (if not already, haven't checked the figures on Download.com yet) the most popular software download at Download.com.

RealNetworks has extended its streaming video reach by adding bunch of new contect providers in its roster. The biggest name definately is Playboy, which has signed up as OpenPass content provider.

OpenPass providers offer individual video "channels", utilizing Real's billing and delivery technology, but aren't part of Real's streaming content package, RealOne SuperPass, that costs $9.99 a month and provides access to various sport events and major TV networks' news broadcasts. Playboy's offering, Playboy TV Club, will cost $24.95 a month and joining to Real's SuperPass is not required.

Microsoft and Real are locked in never-ending fight to claim the #1 spot in digital multimedia technology. Both companies have added more and more content providers to their "teams" that use solely either RealVideo or Windows Media as a delivery platform.

Source: News.com

According to "sources familiar with the situation", i.e. rumours, CD/DVD burning software manufacturer Roxio is near a deal to buy the online music subscription service, Pressplay, from Sony and Vivendi.

Same rumours indicate that the deal would be worth appx. $30M. Roxio has tried to break into new market segments during the last year or so, by buying the legendary Napster brand and offering online music subscription service Pressplay to its customers. If deal really happens, it would very likely mean that Pressplay would be rebranded as Napster in near future.

Source: CNet

Today the much anticipated court room drama between major movie studios, represented by the MPAA, and 321 Studios, the developers of the DVD-Video backup tools such as DVD X Copy and XPRESS, began in San Fransisco.

Movie studios are seeking a summary judgement against the 321Studios, claiming that its products violate the controversial DMCA law by circumventing the copy protection found on most DVD-Video discs. 321Studios claims that their software allows users only copy the originals, but doesn't allow making new copies from copies (which is true, in some sense, since their tools wont allow copying copies that have been made with their tools -- but allows copying copies made with other tools) and therefor only serves as a legitimate backup tool for owners of DVD movies. Studios counter-argue this claiming that it doesn't matter whether the user owns the original or not or what happens to the copy -- according to studios, the DMCA law explicitly says that all copy-protection circumvention tools are illegal.

The Recording Industry Association of America has admitted to sending at least two dozen DMCA case-and-desist letters last week to people who were sharing nothing illegal. RIAA claims the responsibility on a temporary worker, who was behind all the erroneous notices.

Probably the weirdest notice was sent to Speakeasy, the ISP providing services to Amigascene.org - a site ran by Amiga enthusiasts, consisting of nothing but legal, community created software and media. RIAA informed Speakeasy, that Amigascene.org's FTP site "offers approximately 0 sound files for download. Many of these files contain recordings owned by our member companies, including songs by such artists as Creed."

These kinds of mistakes are possible because RIAA doesn't require its "copyright enforcers", such as MediaForce, to actually listen to the infringing material before sending a cease-and-desist order.

Source:
News.com

World's largest record company, Universal Music Group (part of French media giant Vivendi) has sued other media giant, German Bertelsmann, claiming that Bertelsmann aided Napster in copyright infringements by funding the start-up.

Universal joins in the case with group of music publishers who originally sued Bertelsmann for the same reason in February, this year. Universal Music Group is seeking for $150,000 per illegally distributed song -- the maximum amount the controversial DMCA law allows.

Well, for consumer point of view, it is finally nice to see equal-sized opponents in the ring, instead of the usual scenario during the last couple of year: in one corner, a poor student in his worn jeans and in one corner, a multi-billion dollar media giant. But as usual, the only ones winning in this case, however it ends up, are American lawyers..

Source: AtNewYork.com

On2 Technologies have released a latest version of their video codec, called VP6. VP6 is, according to On2, 40% better in terms of video quality than its predecessor VP5.

On2 became famous (well at least in digital video scene) in last year, when they donated their older video codec, VP3, to Xiph.org (the organization that controls various audio/video projects, most notably Ogg Vorbis). Xiph.org is implementing the VP3 in its multimedia solution, dubbed as Ogg Theora.

It remains to be seen, when the first independent video quality tests appear, how well VP6 can compete with the latest breed of MPEG-4 encoders, such as XviD.

More information:

On2 Technologies press release
InternetNews.com

A federal appeals court has extended the 14-day deadline for Verizon to give up its subscriber's personal details to RIAA. The 14-day limit was set by a district court at the end of April.

Appeals court is expected to make its own decision by end of this month whether Verizon should comply with the district court order and hand out the data immediately to RIAA or whether it can wait for the full hearing of appeals court that is scheduled to begin at 16th of September, this year.

The case is about a subscriber of Verizon (Verizon is one of the biggest American ISPs) that RIAA claims has distributed illegal music over the P2P networks. RIAA sued Verizon because it didn't provide RIAA the subscribers details. Verizon claims that RIAA has to first sue the "John Doe" anonymously and if the court decides that "John Doe"'s personal details should be told to RIAA, Verizon would then comply. District court ruled in April that Verizon must provide the details to RIAA, whether the RIAA can prove that the subscriber has violated law or not, without a court order.

Source: News.com

Microsoft announced today that its next operating system versions will support all major recordable DVD formats. Previously company has only supported DVD+RW which is supported by DVD+RW Alliance and partially the DVD-RAM format. The announcement means that upcoming Windows versions will have built-in DVD burning support for DVD-R and DVD-RW.

The move can be seen as a victory for the DVD Forum which has supported the DVD-R/RW/RAM formats and fought strongly against the DVD+R/RW camp. The DVD+RW Alliance is looking very much like a loser in the DVD format war, as its major supporters, Sony and most notably Philips, have introduced (and in Sony's case, are already selling) multiformat drives that support also the "minus" formats.

Source: Yahoo! / Microsoft press release

Microsoft announced today that there's a critical security hole in its Windows Media Player products. The bug would allow attackers to "hijack" user's computer. Bug is available in WMP 7.1 and WMP 8.0, also known as Windows Media Player for XP.

The problem doesn't exist in WMP9 or in the older WMP versions, such as the good olde WMP 6.4 that is almost legendary among the videophiles. The malicious code can be masquerated to look like a WMP7/8 skin and when downloaded and installed, it executes itself and can do virtually anything the code's programmer wants it to do on user's computer.

Microsoft has released a patch for the problem. The bug was found by a Finnish security firm, Online Solutions, in March and it submitted its findings to Microsoft on 14th of March.

More information:

InternetNews.com
Microsoft security bulletin and patch

Shortly after the first public release of DVD X Copy XPRESS, the fast transcoding tool for backing up DVDs to DVD-/+Rs, 321 Studios have released a minor bug fix update to the tool.

The new version, DVD X Copy XPRESS v2.0.1 has these changes:

• Reading has been improved and should fix the titleset reading error
• The Widescreen/Fullscreen selection works as intended
• Minor graphical updates have been made
• Better handling of reading and writing errors

The sales figures for Apple's recently launched online music store are almost unbelievable for many in the industry and according to Apple, this is just the beginning.

Apple launched its online music store, iTunes, a week ago and already claims whopping one million sold audio tracks. Each track costs $0.99 (except when user buys a full album) and tracks can be burned on CD, transferred to Apple's own portable audio player, iPod (which itself is already a culture icon), and the store has a selection of over 200,000 tracks. And to put the sales figures into perspective -- the service is only available for Mac users. No Windows, no Linux -- only Macs allowed.

Only complaints seem to relate to the fact that the service is almost too easy to use -- you wont even notice when you've already shopped audio tracks worth of tens of dollars. Apple also reported that it has sold over 20,000 iPod portable audio players over the last weekend in the U.S. and has received over 110,000 orders for the player.

It seriously looks like Apple has finally figured out something that record labels just couldn't understand -- offer a legal, relatively cheap way to purchase (virtually) unrestricted digital audio tracks from a massive audio catalog and you have a winner.

RIAA has settled lawsuits that it filed against group of university students in April. Students have agreed to pay between $12k and $17k each to RIAA for copyright violations.

The payments will be split over three years. The lawsuits would have amounted (in theory) to total of $100M. Despite settling their cases, none of the students admitted of being guilty.

Source: News.com

Time to announce one of those "magic numbers" again. Jsut checked our software download counters and they indicate that we served our 10,000,000th software download yesterday. The counter includes all software downloads ever made from our site, during the four years that we've existed.

To put this into perspective, it was 7 months and 3 weeks ago (in September, 2002), when we announced that we had served 5M software downloads. So, we're soon getting to a point where we serve over million software downloads every single month :-)

Anyway, I just wanted to thank you, our users, for making this possible.

-Petteri Pyyny
AfterDawn.com