On Mon, Jan 26, 2009 at 5:11 PM, Bill McGonigle <[email protected]> wrote: > On 01/26/2009 04:43 PM, Thomas Charron wrote: >> No idea, but I know that DirecTV PC clients specifically require >> drivers which disallow framegrabbing, etc while the app is running. > > I wonder if this means they'll be restricted to folks running binary > blog x.org drivers.
The very open nature of Linux and all its friends make implementing copy restrictions of that sort... um... "challenging". The X11 protocol has framegrabbing built-in. So does the X.org X server, I believe. The kernel has similar provisions. The only way they have a hope in hell of doing anything is by locking up the binaries from womb to tomb. In essence, you'd have to run a binary-only Linux distribution, provided and controlled solely by NetFlix (or whoever). And the GPL has a few words to say on that. Needless to say, I'm not overly upset about this, but I guess some people are. One of the BSD's might be a better choice if one is looking to take control of the computer away from the computer's owner, but I'd say it's still a pretty weak idea, since even if you don't allow others access to "your" source, with most of the source readily available, it's going to make disassembly, shimming, etc., a lot easier. This is prolly the only area where close-source OSes like MS Windows and Apple Mac OS X have an advantage over open-source like Linux and BSD. Of course, that's a heck of a feature to sell to end-users: "Our product makes it easier for others to take control of your computer away from you!" -- Ben _______________________________________________ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
