SlySoft p0wns BD+ Blu-ray DRM, HD-DVD Securing Future

Well that lasted long, the impenetrable copy-protection for Blu-ray media, BD+, has been cracked by the SlySoft crew and copying/ripping/backing-up/whatevering your Blu-ray media is now fully supported by the software.

What I thought was interesting were some of the notes in the Changelog:

• Note to Twentieth Century Fox: As you can see, BD+ didn’t offer you any advanced security, it just annoyed some of your customers with older players. So could you please cut this crap and start publishing your titles on HD DVD? There are thousands of people willing to give you money.
• Note to people considering to invest in HD media: Please buy HD DVD instead of Blu-ray. HD DVD is much more consumer friendly (e.g., no region coding, AACS not mandatory). Don’t give your money to people, who throw your fair-use rights out of the window.

I didn’t realize there was any sort of stink over HD formats with regards to HD-DVD being more open… I thought they all equally sucked ass with respect to consumer usage.

I don’t think it matters anymore as HD-DVD, with it’s $99 Toshiba A2 and A3 HD-DVD player, blew the doors off HD-DVD player sales which will translate rather quickly into HD-DVD demand. All of this activity on the HD-DVD front while Sony sits around, twidling it’s thumbs, “dropping it’s prices” to $400 and wondering why people aren’t snatching up players like free donuts from Krispy Kreme.

I got a chance to talk to a long-time contributor who was one of the folks that picked up a HD-DVD player this weekend, and why he did it was the price point was low enough at $99 to simply shrug off and add to his shopping cart as he walked through Costco.

You don’t just add a $400 piece of A/V equipment while you walk through Costco, but you do with a $99 piece of equipment.

Unfortunately Sony is stuck in their thinking that creating amazing players with phenomenal feature sets is the answer… Joe Walmart doesn’t give a shit about TrueHD and Dolby Ballsack Surround… Joe Walmart likely doesn’t have any other speakers besides the ones on the TV. Unfortunately this inability to look past the high end is probably going to either kill of Blu-ray, or relegate it to the top-end A/V enthusiasts.

We know where the studios will go… they will go to whatever format has the most player support and demand because normalizing it’s production costs to 1 platform and pushing down reproduction costs of movies into the range where their $40 price point goes from being “recouping costs” to “ass raping our customers”.

Am I bitter? God no, $30 for a DVD that costs $0.70 to make is fantastic… I can’t wait for it to happen with HD media too. Oh yea, and consumers pirate content because they are bored.