[FAQs]
MPAA FAQ on Broadcast Flag

The MPAA published a FAQ on the broadcast flag. Our detailed comments below.

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[FAQs]
Policy group not a CPTWG sub-group?

Several CPTWG participants indicated at CPTWG's June 5 meeting that the "parallel group" or "policy group" is "not a sub-group of CPTWG" or "not part of CPTWG". In a May 8 message, however, BPDG co-chair Bob Perry directed that two journalists (Bloomberg's Katherine R. Lewis and National Journal's Drew Clark) be removed from both the BPDG mailing list and the "policy group" mailing list because of a CPTWG policy against participation by members of the press.

LMI, which operates both mailing lists, complied with that request, so that journalists have continued to be excluded from discussions of both groups.

We've sought clarification on why CPTWG policies would apply to the "policy group" if the "policy group" is no part of CPTWG.

[FAQs]
Broadcast flag is not a watermark

Some recent press coverage of BPDG refers to the BPDG proposal as recommending a "watermark" in digital TV broadcasts. This is a misperception of the nature of the broadcast flag. (There is a distinct proposal called the "broadcast watermark" which was not discussed extensively within BPDG and is not part of the BPDG's published recommendations.)

A watermark is commingled directly with the signal it marks, and thereby alters the signal (ideally, in an imperceptible way). By contrast, the broadcast flag exists side-by-side with video content it marks.

If you're looking for terms to describe the broadcast flag, rather than "watermark", you might try "bit", "indicator", "flag", "descriptor", "tag", "header field", or "notice". But using "watermark" is sure to sow confusion, especially because watermark proposals distinct from BPDG do exist. Watermarking is likely to be a big issue soon in a public forum near you -- but not as a part of BPDG's proposal.

[FAQs]
Misconceptions about BPDG
An article by John Dvorak seems to contain a misconception: that the result of BPDG's work will be the obsolescence of current digital TV receivers. Dvorak writes that

[i]t appears that the new copy-protection schemes being dreamed up by Hollywood will make every single HDTV set sold to date obsolete. And buyers of new sets are not being told about this situation in a dubious attempt to dump very expensive inventory. I'm sure those of you who spent $5,000 to $10,000 for what may become an albatross are going to love reading this.

What happened was that the Hollywood folks, who are just freaked over the possibility that we'll be copying HDTV movies, have promoted copy protection that requires the decode circuit to be built into the display, not into the set-top box. This requires the set-top box to send a signal to a connector that new HDTV sets will have. If you're thinking of buying an HDTV, don't, unless it has this connector and circuit-whenever they are finalized.

Our impression is that Dvorak has got the situation backwards. Old equipment will continue to work. This is because BPDG isn't planning to encrypt broadcasts at all -- merely to cause them to include a "broadcast flag", and to obtain legislation forcing all manufacturers to comply with its rules.

The result of this would be that old equipment would be better and more useful than new equipment. Not only would it work properly, but it wouldn't have been crippled by having to comply with the Compliance and Robustness Rules. This is to say that old equipment would be more functional, not less functional, than new equipment.

[FAQs]
Alphabet soup
"BPDG wants the FCC to mandate DRM for ATSC DTB receivers..."

In the body of this article, you'll find expansions for about 80 of the most common acronyms we use in discussions about this issue. (The acronyms expanded include every acronym which appears in the BPDG's Draft Compliance and Robustness Rules, among others.)

Of course, this isn't enough to appreciate the context behind these acronyms. For example, knowing that PCMCIA stands for Personal Computer Memory Card International Association gives no clue that the Association in question published a standard for tiny removable cards used in laptops. Hearing that 8/VSB means "8-level vestigial side band" explains nothing about 8/VSB's role in digital television broadcasting (er, that's "DTB" for the initiated).

We hope to supplement this soon with a fuller glossary giving explanations, not just acronym expansions. In the meantime, here's hoping that the list below will provide some comfort to those swimming in the acronym soup.

Please let me know if you have any questions or comments -- or other things you'd like to see defined or expanded.

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[FAQs]
What is Table A?
Many of the practical consequences of the BPDG proposal for consumers (and for competition in the marketplace) lie in a yet-to-be-written appendix to the specification. This appendix, called "Table A", enumerates the kinds of digital outputs which are allowed on devices which can receive digital TV signals.

The idea is that a device which receives a TV program with the Broadcast Flag set is not allowed to output the content of that program in digital form, except via a technology specifically mentioned on Table A.

This raises three questions: first, why should this be so? (What's wrong with letting device manufacturers choose for themselves what kinds of outputs their devices will have? If consumers want a particular kind of output, why shouldn't they have it? Why should legislation determine the capabilities of future digital televisions?) Second, what technologies will be permitted? Third, how is that decision going to be made? MORE...

[Rants]
What is the BPDG?
In the year 2006 all over-the-air television will be digital. This is pretty hot stuff: crystal-clear pictures, ear-popping audio and interactive features for days. But as the technologists give, the studios take away.

The Broadcast Protection Discussion Group is an obscure group of Hollywood studios and technology companies that are negotiating a "consensus" for any gadget or code that can touch the studios' product. Once they're done, they want to go to Washington and ask Congress and/or the FCC to give their "standard" the force of law.

So what? Well, this is a radical departure from the way it's usually done. Usually, bright nerds invent something cool and the entertainment industry has a nervous breakdown and runs around telling everyone that the sky is falling (Marconi got sued over the radio, Sony got sued over the VCR, and it took a near miracle to get movies out of the studios' vaults and onto television). People pick up on the tech and all the interesting ways that it can be used as a creative tool, and gradually the entertainment industry realizes that a new day has dawned and gets its act together, starts shipping product for the new media, and takes home yet another squillion dollars.

This time around, the entertainment industry wants to take away all that sloppy, inefficient fooling around where technology companies try out lots of different approaches, where garage inventors go from obscurity to posterity under a hail of customers, where you and I get to invent amazing new uses for our stuff that a bunch of engineers in a board-room never would've thought of in a million years. This time around, everything not forbidden is mandatory. MORE...