Sam Zhang's Blog - All Comments

re: Streaming == Content Protection? (Part 2)

Peter Mounce — Wed, 28 May 2008 07:16:30 GMT

Once it's on the web, it's open-source. If a person really wants to rip video content, they can set up a screen-recorder and "watch" the video, recording it and the sound. That will bypass the securing-the-content-access and -delivery part.

As it turns out in real life, one still has to do that when delivering media, but it's mainly an exercise in keeping the lawyers happy, as opposed to actually being an effective deterrent to a determined, technically-literate person. Same as DRM, and geo-blocking. Publishers need to be able to say that they have taken steps to prevent ripping and illegal distribution.

It would save everyone a lot of effort if fair-use rights would be promoted and upheld!

re: Streaming == Content Protection? (Part 1)

Ricardo Oneda — Sat, 24 May 2008 17:51:44 GMT

Hi Sam, I agree with you. Although saving streaming media is not so easy, that does not mean it is impossible. As you said, there're some tools that can download streaming formats for some time, but I think most people don't know them, so they think it is more secure than progressive download. It's a false security sensation.

Streaming == Content Protection? (Part 2)

Sam Zhang's Blog — Fri, 23 May 2008 22:32:36 GMT

So in part one , I talked about technically how streaming and content protection works and why they're

re: Streaming == Content Protection? (Part 1)

samzhang — Fri, 23 May 2008 19:28:16 GMT

Hi Ricardo, thanks for your comments. Yes, it is a lot easier to save media files from a web server today. My point is that even in streaming case there's nothing preventing a "full featured" streaming client to save the content either. All it needs to do is to re-assemble the pieces from the streaming formats back to the file format. In my view, the reason why this kind of tool is not so easy to find today is just because of the fact that most video sites are still using progessive download. If there's a day when streaming becomes really popular on the web, I bet downloading streaming content is just going to be as easy as downloading web contents today. Actually tools that can do download with streaming protocols (even proprietary ones) like MMS or RTSP have been around for a long time. Streaming is not a content protection mechanism in any way. Thanks again for your feedback.

re: Streaming == Content Protection? (Part 1)

Ricardo Oneda — Fri, 23 May 2008 11:59:51 GMT

Hi Sam, I think people link streaming with content protection because is not so easy to save streaming as in progressive download, where a simple "save target as" download and save the file to the hard disk.

re: Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together

bills — Thu, 08 May 2008 21:36:18 GMT

woohoo, welcome to blogs.iis.net, sam! It is great to see another developer blog. I look forward to reading lots of cool media posts from you in the future ;)

Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together

Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together — Wed, 07 May 2008 03:37:46 GMT

Pingback from Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together

Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together

Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together — Wed, 07 May 2008 03:26:58 GMT

Pingback from Web Playlist and Bit-rate Throttling - Working together