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Media
Information > Media DVD Coverage 
Archive
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DVD NEWS DIGEST
1.
Spy Kids 3: Game Over Walt Disney Home Entertainment The new write-once discs can store up to 8.5 gigabytes of data, or about 4 hours of DVD-quality movies, twice the capacity of regular blank DVDs. This means capacities for computer-burned DVDs are catching up with prerecorded movie DVDs, many of which are already dual-layer. The new technology is sure to appeal to those who back up or copy movie DVDs, since they often have to reduce image quality or remove special features to fit a copied movie onto a single-layer disc. With a dual-layer drive, an exact copy on a single disc should be possible. The two layers of the new discs are accessed from the same side — there is no need to flip the disc over to record to the second layer. Instead, a laser beam shines through the first layer to record on the second. The drives will be able to burn regular write-once and rewritable DVDs and CDs as well. March
24 - TVBarn: Fans Await C-Span's First Season on DVD “I can’t wait to get my hands on this DVD. I’m going to play it with my Surround Sound on my 35 inch flat screen. It will be just like being at the House of Representatives as the votes come fast and furious! I’m talking about Yea and Nea! This is so cool!” said one young fan. The first season of C-SPAN premiered in 1979 with then-Representative Al Gore, a leading proponent of TV coverage, giving one of the first televised speeches in the House. The DVD set also includes behind the scenes commentary as the fixed cameras in the House focus on various representatives. March 18 - BBC News: Piracy Threat to DVDs For every copy-protection system introduced, DVD pirates have found a way around it. Since DVDs contain digital copies of films, studios ensure that the discs are loaded with more copy protection systems than any other medium in history. To prevent the data being copied, it's divided into blocks on the DVD. Each block is then encrypted using the content scrambling system, or CSS. The keys to decrypt each block are stored on a hidden area of the DVD, so copying a file to a computer or another disc leaves the keys behind. As a result, the film won't be playable. Then there's regional playback control, which prevents DVDs bought in one part of the world being played in another - where the film may still be in cinemas. All blank DVDs have a unique number called a media ID stamped on them, and if you copy a film onto one, it's encrypted in such a way that only this ID will decrypt the recording. But if you try to make a copy onto a new disc, it simply won't play because the new disc's ID is different - and so unable to decrypt the contents. DVDs would seem to be safe from piracy. Not so. Today's cheap but powerful home computers make CSS encryption easy to overcome, and programs which break the CSS code in less than a second are available online. Will DVD piracy kill the film industry? The music industry is adapting to the threat from pirated CDs by trying to introduce copy protection - a move which seems doomed to failure, given the ease with which DVD security has been overcome. end
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