[mythtv-users] Seattle Comcast firewire not working as of today -- 5C?

Steve Adeff adeffs at gmail.com
Tue Oct 25 17:34:29 EDT 2005


On Tuesday 25 October 2005 16:30, Andy Alsup wrote:
> Correct, none of the digital channels work, including the locals.  The
> locals is an obvious problem, but I think even some or most of the
> digital chanels should be open too.  I think what we really need is
> full disclosure of what will be protected, and what won't.  My best
> leverage may be that I can say, well, it worked up until now.  If it
> had never worked, I would have a hard time getting past the first
> layer I think.
>
> As I read the FCC rules, it doesn't seem to say anything about 5C
> being required, only that content protection is supposed to be limited
> to certain content types:
>
> The "LEGAL document" containing these rules is Code of Federal
> Regulations Title 47, Chapter I, Subchapter C, Part 76, specifically
> §76.1904, paragraph (b)(1):
>
> (1) Commercial audiovisual content shall not be encoded so as to
> prevent or limit copying thereof except as follows:
>
> (i) To prevent or limit copying of video-on-demand or pay-per-view
> transmissions, subject to the requirements of paragraph (b)(2) of this
> section; and

ok, so they're allowed to use 5C on Video-on-Demand and PPV. I can live with 
that.

>
> (ii) To prevent or limit copying, other than first generation of
> copies, of pay television transmissions, non-premium subscription
> television, and free conditional access delivery transmissions; and

here it seems like they are allowed to prevent anything futher than single 
copying of any other channel they provide that one pays for. what confuses me 
is the non-premium and free conditional access delivery parts.

> (2) With respect to any commercial audiovisual content delivered or
> transmitted in form of a video-on-demand or pay-per-view transmission,
> a covered entity shall not encode such content so as to prevent a
> covered product, without further authorization, from pausing such
> content up to 90 minutes from initial transmission by the covered
> entity (e.g., frame-by-frame, minute-by-minute, megabyte by megabyte).

this just basically says they can't prevent a proper 5C device from doing time 
shifting within a 90minute window.

> So, I'm no lawyer, but I think this means that requiring 5C compliant
> devices in order to record content that isn't protected is not
> allowed.

true. but the question is, what is considered "protected". We know OTA is 
required to be openly available, but it sounds like anything you have to pay 
for is considered protected under the law, meaning they can 5C protect the 
rest of the channels.

Steve


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