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Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter E. Thorpe who wrote (29789)	2/22/1998 9:00:00 AM
From: John Rieman	Respond to of 50808

You won't be able to tape PPV movies anymore. You may not be able to tape uncut/comercial free movies either. So much for recordability......................................... multichannel.com Encryption Deal Threatens Taping By LESLIE ELLIS & R. THOMAS UMSTEAD Hollywood studios and digital-content developers saw a huge barrier lifted last week, as five vendor companies agreed on a way to keep programming secure from would-be digital pirates. It is unclear how the deal will affect taping of home-video and pay-per-view movies, but Hollywood executives are hoping that the technology finally limits or puts a complete halt to the taping of PPV and premium movies. Last week, five members of the ad hoc Copy Protection Technical Working Group presented a proposal aimed at protecting digital video and audio content riding on and between personal computers, high-definition TVs, set-tops, digital VCRs and DVD (digital versatile disc) players. The companies included Hitachi Ltd., Intel Corp., Matsushita Electric Corp. of America, Sony Electronics Corp. and Toshiba Corp. Cable executives and studio executives applauded the agreement. "This is important to the industry, because we and the digital-TV-set guys couldn't build secure connections between digital set-tops and TVs until it got done," said Jerry Bennington, senior vice president of Internet technology for Cable Television Laboratories Inc. "It will be a major wake-up call for the rest of the industry," said Holly Leff-Pressman, vice president of pay television for Universal Pay TV. "The studio feels very strongly about anti-copying technology." For years, Hollywood has been asking for anti-copying technology in a digital environment, where the sound and picture quality is much better than it is in the current analog-distributed product. Sources close to the situation said Hollywood would push for very limited premium taping and no taping of PPV movies. While most cable operators contacted did not know how the deal would affect business, one who requested anonymity said any effort to limit taping could hurt business, particularly from the PPV side. "A lot of people I know like the option to tape the movie both from PPV and premium," he said. "Without that option, I don't know how many people might actually pay $4 for a movie." But one Hollywood executive said such technology could help PPV to obtain better windows. "One of the reasons why the studios have been able to manipulate videos is because people have been able to make copies from PPV," said the executive. "Anti-taping technology eliminates the excuse." At least one premium executive said limits on taping premium movies shouldn't hurt the business. "One of the advantages of a digital platform is that you're giving the consumer whatever movie they're in the mood for, so there's no reason to tape," said John Sie, chairman and CEO of Encore Media Group. Representatives from Home Box Office and Showtime Networks Inc. could not be reached for comment at press time. Cable engineers have said that the jumper cable that connects set-tops to TVs is looked upon as a security risk by studios, particularly in a digital and HDTV environment. That's because broadcasters' standard-definition television and HDTV signals could be passed through cable's digital set-tops to a digital decoder located inside the TV set. In that case, the innocuous, 36-inch piece of connecting cable becomes the equivalent of an open, cash-filled wallet -- pirates could connect a "sniffer," or interception device, and capture perfect copies of digital movies. Bennington said the vendors, as part of the CPTWG, have been working on a copy-protection scheme for over a year and, until now, the group was down to two proposals -- one championed by Sony, and the other by Intel. Bennington said the multivendor agreement applies to the connectors on either end of cables carrying digital audio and video signals. Bill Kircos, an Intel spokesman, said the consortium expects products to be available for PCs first, in the second half of this year. Bennington said the primary digital set-top players are also aware of the CPTWG's work, and, "We think that they can get products ready in time. "Now, the pressure's really on for the TV manufacturers to produce the other side of the plug," Bennington said. "They have longer production cycles than [set-top vendors] do -- they've got their Christmas stuff in the works already." Notably, last week's agreement is just a paper nod, and much work remains to be completed before the digital-security solution is finalized, executives said.