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Friday, November 21, 2008
Wired reports that Apple has caved to Hollywood and added restrictive copy protection to MacBooks. The DRM scheme prevents MacBook owners from watching copyrighted content when the computer is connected to a display that is not authorized.
Movie studios are scared stiff of allowing anyone to watch video on a device that could used to make and distribute copies, giving them the false impression that they need to dictate where, when and how a customer is allowed to watch a movie or TV show. Unfortunately for the honest, law-abiding customer a device that could be used to make and distribute copies is pretty much any computer with a hard drive or television hooked up to a recorder all devices with perfectly legal applications.
The copy protection scheme shipping with new MacBooks prevents content purchased from the iTunes Store from playing if the laptop is hooked up to an output device that is not approved. These unapproved output devices include many recent televisions and external monitors.When one attempts to watch an iTunes movie or TV show on their unapproved TV they see the following message instead:
This movie cannot be displayed because a display that is not authorized to play protected movies is connected.
I knew there was a reason I hate Apple products. This is just one more nail.