4 ms·

Can you actually call this encryption? I think the term which is still in use today for (cryptographically) encrypted TV channels, at least in the UK, "scrambli

by rob74 4y ago

Can you actually call this encryption? I think the term which is still in use today for (cryptographically) encrypted TV channels, at least in the UK, "scrambling", is the most appropriate here - in that you could still mostly see what was going on on the screen. I fondly remember HBO's first attempt at "encryption" in Romania in the nineties, which was a simple and cheap analog filter. Needless to say that it was pirated almost instantly...

TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
HBO did the same thing early 80s in the USA. My father removed or added some filter device from a cable box OUTSIDE OUR HOUSE (big green box on the lawn) and we had HBO free.
- phire 4y ago
  That was something different and much, much simpler. The pay-tv channels would be broadcast unscrabled, unencrypted to the whole cable network. But they would install notch filters at every subscriber's house to prevent the frequencies of the paid channels from actually entering their house. When you actually paid for HBO, they would send a tech around to your house to remove the corresponding notch filter.
  - iso1631 4y ago
    > When you actually paid for HBO, they would send a tech around to your house to remove the corresponding notch filter. Or just paid the cable guy $50 cash
- 13of40 4y ago
  When I bought my first house, I got Comcast cable internet and they guy had to put a filter on to block the TV and just let the internet signal through. Or at least he would have, but he couldn't find one in his truck. Years later, I got around to plugging my TV into it and found that I had full access to all of the non-paid channels, and I'd missed out on half an adult lifetime of free television. Can't say I missed it, though.
- ok123456 4y ago
  When I first got a cable modem around 2000, the tech installed another line where it terminated and didn't bother to put any of the line filters on. So on that drop I got all the premium channels.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
> Can you actually call this encryption? It uses encryption to achieve a goal. The word 'encryption' gets used loosely, as both a purpose and a technique. More strictly, the early and main use of communication encryption is confidentiality, to communicate between two endpoints so an eavesdropper can't listen. Pay-per-view, DRM schemes and other content 'protection' systems are about controlling the behaviour of the recipient. That's a fundamentally different trust and psychology model. One of the aims is to give something without giving it, to create a rental system out of a distribution system, and so be able to resell the same content over and over to the same customer. However I noticed that the content creators have devised a foolproof and cunning new method of doing this. A friend gave me a USB stick with a bunch of box-sets to watch. I was very excited, and when Saturday night came around I inserted the memory stick and sat down to enjoy my pirated entertainment... About halfway through the second episode the new DRM kicked in. I realised that I'd already watched this entire box set, and then remembered how shit it was. By making it such low quality dystopian Hollywood grist they'd created something so utterly bloody forgettable that my overloaded, aging brain was tricked into watching it again, thus bypassing the need for any DRM.
- daniel-cussen 4y ago
  Just stop watching video altogether.
  - nonrandomstring 4y ago
    I don't hear many people say that. But you know what, I did do that many years ago. After coming back from travelling to living in an apartment with no TV (before video on computers was really a thing). Result was: I slept like a baby. Pure speculation based on n=1 anecdata, but I reckon video screws with our sleep - it's so rich and gives us too much to process later.
    - egypturnash 4y ago
      There are other factors that affect your sleep; I watch very little TV and currently lay awake trying to get to sleep for a good while most nights. The biggest factor in “getting to sleep easily”, in my experience, is “did you actually exert yourself today”. When I was taking pole dance classes it was super easy to get to sleep. Other things could and did make it harder but in the absence of anything unusual going on, sleep came very easily.

by rob74 4y ago

TedDoesntTalk 4y ago

HBO did the same thing early 80s in the USA. My father removed or added some filter device from a cable box OUTSIDE OUR HOUSE (big green box on the lawn) and we had HBO free.

phire 4y ago
That was something different and much, much simpler. The pay-tv channels would be broadcast unscrabled, unencrypted to the whole cable network. But they would install notch filters at every subscriber's house to prevent the frequencies of the paid channels from actually entering their house. When you actually paid for HBO, they would send a tech around to your house to remove the corresponding notch filter.
- iso1631 4y ago
  > When you actually paid for HBO, they would send a tech around to your house to remove the corresponding notch filter. Or just paid the cable guy $50 cash
13of40 4y ago
When I bought my first house, I got Comcast cable internet and they guy had to put a filter on to block the TV and just let the internet signal through. Or at least he would have, but he couldn't find one in his truck. Years later, I got around to plugging my TV into it and found that I had full access to all of the non-paid channels, and I'd missed out on half an adult lifetime of free television. Can't say I missed it, though.
ok123456 4y ago
When I first got a cable modem around 2000, the tech installed another line where it terminated and didn't bother to put any of the line filters on. So on that drop I got all the premium channels.

nonrandomstring 4y ago

> Can you actually call this encryption? It uses encryption to achieve a goal. The word 'encryption' gets used loosely, as both a purpose and a technique. More strictly, the early and main use of communication encryption is confidentiality, to communicate between two endpoints so an eavesdropper can't listen. Pay-per-view, DRM schemes and other content 'protection' systems are about controlling the behaviour of the recipient. That's a fundamentally different trust and psychology model. One of the aims is to give something without giving it, to create a rental system out of a distribution system, and so be able to resell the same content over and over to the same customer. However I noticed that the content creators have devised a foolproof and cunning new method of doing this. A friend gave me a USB stick with a bunch of box-sets to watch. I was very excited, and when Saturday night came around I inserted the memory stick and sat down to enjoy my pirated entertainment... About halfway through the second episode the new DRM kicked in. I realised that I'd already watched this entire box set, and then remembered how shit it was. By making it such low quality dystopian Hollywood grist they'd created something so utterly bloody forgettable that my overloaded, aging brain was tricked into watching it again, thus bypassing the need for any DRM.

daniel-cussen 4y ago
Just stop watching video altogether.
- nonrandomstring 4y ago
  I don't hear many people say that. But you know what, I did do that many years ago. After coming back from travelling to living in an apartment with no TV (before video on computers was really a thing). Result was: I slept like a baby. Pure speculation based on n=1 anecdata, but I reckon video screws with our sleep - it's so rich and gives us too much to process later.
  - egypturnash 4y ago
    There are other factors that affect your sleep; I watch very little TV and currently lay awake trying to get to sleep for a good while most nights. The biggest factor in “getting to sleep easily”, in my experience, is “did you actually exert yourself today”. When I was taking pole dance classes it was super easy to get to sleep. Other things could and did make it harder but in the absence of anything unusual going on, sleep came very easily.