8 ms·

I think they put reasonable barriers to piracy. They are of course possible to circumvent, as every other barrier in existence, but you can also scan or make ph

I think they put reasonable barriers to piracy. They are of course possible to circumvent, as every other barrier in existence, but you can also scan or make photocopies of a physical book. And this is actually a good thing. Mildly related: the other they I was watching something on Netflix on my phone and found something funny so I tried to take an screenshot to share with my friends, which quite frankly I think is fair use. It didn't work because it seems that although I paid for my phone, it's not really my phone.

hendrikrassmann 4y ago
To unlock that feature you have to buy a second phone.
thaumasiotes 4y ago
> It didn't work because it seems that although I paid for my phone, it's not really my phone. Root it.
- oblio 4y ago
  Not an option. Rooting the device voids the warranty. It's not a reasonable thing to ask the average person.
  - yywwbbn 4y ago
    > Rooting the device voids the warranty. I’m pretty sure it would depend on the country you’re in . Even if that’s actually the case in the US
    - Tijdreiziger 4y ago
      Even if it doesn’t void the warranty, it voids SafetyNet, so now Netflix and other apps might refuse to work. And even if it didn’t, it increases the attack surface. Random apps can ask for root, and the average user won’t know what it means. And even if you know the risks, now it’s much more of a hassle keeping your device up-to-date. So yes, rooting is theoretically a solution, but it’s not practical in the least.
      - f1refly 4y ago
        If Netflix refuses to offer their services on a device that you own, you're always free not to pay netflix and instead take your money and attention elsewhere.
        HeavyStorm 4y ago
        Just remember that that doesn't mean piracy.
        antifa 4y ago
        If there's no ethical company left to purchase goods from, then there's no ethical issue with piracy.
      - leidenfrost 4y ago
        And that's the problem with "owning your device entirely". Most people are not capable (or willing) to own their device to its full extent and take responsibility for it.
        afiori 4y ago
        The options are not limited to "A sanctified centralized authority controls and limits all my devices" and "I need to recompile the kernel by hand". For most people "owning their devices" means being allowed to meaningfully change OS (or even just modify it) without losing major functionalities.
      - BeFlatXIII 4y ago
        Is there a root method that falsely reports that SafetyNet is still intact?
      - aruggirello 4y ago
        It doesn't if you're using Magisk - which is the case 99% of the time. Magisk has been updated and passes SafetyNet under Android 12 too - no other means of rooting a modern phone is safe anyway.
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    Not having a warranty is, frankly, also a part of it being really your phone. "I want to be allowed to do whatever I want, but if I do something I regret, I get a refund" is not a coherent position to take.
    - BlueTemplar 4y ago
      Bullshit, warranties is the way to keep manufacturers honest : if it only has minimum legal manufacturer warranty, you know it's crap. And it should be illegal to void warranty for rooting.
      - afiori 4y ago
        My understanding is that (precedent aside) in the US the law clearly says that the manufacturer has to prove that you managed the product under warranty. That is those "warranty void" stickers are not enforceable (under that specific law) by themselves, they need to argue that the user actually damaged the product.
- amelius 4y ago
  How do you know the phone doesn't have multiple levels of root and you're only breaking the topmost one?
- jack_pp 4y ago
  I was thinking of doing that but then I don't think you can use netflix at all or if you make your way around that your banking app might not work etc
- kwhitefoot 4y ago
  Not practical if you want to use the phone for payments and identity services because a lot of those will refuse to work on a rooted device.
- matheusmoreira 4y ago
  Hardware remote attestation will end that soon. Every app will refuse to run on modified devices and it will be impossible to circumvent because it's in hardware.
andrepd 4y ago
Those user hostile features are what drive me to piracy. No way I'll pay money to have the privilege of installing spyware just so I can stream low-quality video to whatever device the provider deems worthy at that particular moment. I'll just go on 1337x and in 2 minutes I have an high quality mkv that I can play anywhere I want. I'd happily pay 5-10$ a pop for this, and for indie movies I do make the effort of seeing if there's a way of paying to watch it somewhere, even if I just pay and don't watch it there, and watch the pirated rip anyway.
- HeavyStorm 4y ago
  What a way to justify a crime. "I don't like how they act, so I don't comply with their rules". You pirate because you have no respect for law, because you are a entitled child or because you don't have enough money. Piracy isn't plain theft, but it's consuming a service without paying for it to its legimate owners. It's close, isn't it? Would you sneak into a amusement park? Not pay for dinner if you found it not to your liking or if the brand don't meet your standards? The reason you think piracy is ok is because you don't associate the crime with the victim.
  - Karunamon 4y ago
    No, it isn't close. The reason none of those things are comparable is because the service provider has lost something in the transaction in your example. Sneaking into an amusement park is theft of services, not paying for dinner after you consumed it is plain old theft. In both of those cases, the seller's resources were consumed. They have lost resources or effort. With digital items it isn't like that. I can make infinite copies at no harm, real or imagined, to the seller. What might make this more clear is the distinction between downloading a movie illicitly versus watching a friend's legit purchased copy with them. In both of these cases, the maker of the content was not compensated for a watch. The reason I think piracy (defined as personal copyright infringement) is okay is because: 1. It is generally a victimless "crime" (and even this is a misnomer, the act of downloading a movie is a civil, not criminal matter. It has more in common with driving over the speed limit than it does stealing.), and as so is morally neutral. 2. Statistics show that habitual pirates tend to be habitual purchasers as well, further complicating any concept of harm. 3. Copyright is a government granted monopoly, not some natural right, and its continued abuse and deadweight on our culture is not something that should be respected. 4. Even if the previous 3 points were all invalid, why should I have any respect for an entity that has none for me? Slavish adherence to the law is mere obedience, it is not noble or useful on its own.
garfieldnate 4y ago
I was shocked to find that this wouldn't even work on my desktop! You have to go to the browser settings and turn off hardware acceleration. If you rent an HD movie from Prime Video, you get a notice saying that your screen has to be compliant with some specific standard, and part of the standard is essentially baked-in DRM that prevents taking screenshots of the content. The device belongs to me, the content was streamed to me, the device has no business preventing me from taking a screenshot or recording video. Yet here we are, apparently DRM is baked into all of our screens now.
- vertis 4y ago
  Just wait till they make impossible to take a photo with your phone of your desktop screen.
  - yencabulator 4y ago
    Like they already made it impossible to make color photocopies of some content? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation
- BlueTemplar 4y ago
  "Why Rosyna Can't Take A Movie Screenshot" : https://web.archive.org/web/20170617174641/https://www.alexrad.me/discourse/why-rosyna-cant-take-a-movie-screenshot.html https://web.archive.org/web/20170617174641/https://www.alexr... And that's why it's important to boycott devices and software that allow DRM : Intel and Ryzen AMD CPUs, Windows 11 (requires a DRM chip), maybe Chrome/ium if it doesn't allow to easily disable DRM support, Steam...
  - account42 4y ago
    Boycotton all recent x86 CPUs is probably not reasonable for most people. More actionable is to make sure you control the software (most importantly, the OS) that runs on those CPUs so that their user-hostile features are not used for DRM.
HeavyStorm 4y ago
It is yourphone. As such, it has drm capable hardware, which let's you stream Netflix. Think of the alternative: you don't have protection. Who would license their media to Netflix?
- Ajedi32 4y ago
  Who wouldn't license their media to Netflix in a world without DRM? What are they going to do? Make a $100 million dollar movie and then only release it in theaters, just out of spite? That'd be leaving a lot of money on the table.
blue039 4y ago
Scanning and making copies of portions of a book used to be encouraged. In fact, it's how you collected information for book reports and research. It wasn't uncommon, for example, for me to print out entire journal articles or scan entire chapters at the University library. Now, they'd probably shoot my dog. I tried prime video once and the way it locked down my computer to guarantee so-called "rights" was stupid. I tried Netflix, same thing. I'm slowly but surely trending back to unabashed piracy because it's the only way I can own anything anymore - and that's sad. I will happily spend hard earned money as long as I can own something. At the very least I'd happily donate to my local library if they didn't spend time enforcing the will of some faceless multinational publisher. Shockingly, as I've gotten older I seem to own less and every year the apes we elect take more of my rights away.

hendrikrassmann 4y ago

To unlock that feature you have to buy a second phone.

thaumasiotes 4y ago

> It didn't work because it seems that although I paid for my phone, it's not really my phone. Root it.

oblio 4y ago
Not an option. Rooting the device voids the warranty. It's not a reasonable thing to ask the average person.
- yywwbbn 4y ago
  > Rooting the device voids the warranty. I’m pretty sure it would depend on the country you’re in . Even if that’s actually the case in the US
  - Tijdreiziger 4y ago
    Even if it doesn’t void the warranty, it voids SafetyNet, so now Netflix and other apps might refuse to work. And even if it didn’t, it increases the attack surface. Random apps can ask for root, and the average user won’t know what it means. And even if you know the risks, now it’s much more of a hassle keeping your device up-to-date. So yes, rooting is theoretically a solution, but it’s not practical in the least.
    - f1refly 4y ago
      If Netflix refuses to offer their services on a device that you own, you're always free not to pay netflix and instead take your money and attention elsewhere.
      - HeavyStorm 4y ago
        Just remember that that doesn't mean piracy.
        antifa 4y ago
        If there's no ethical company left to purchase goods from, then there's no ethical issue with piracy.
    - leidenfrost 4y ago
      And that's the problem with "owning your device entirely". Most people are not capable (or willing) to own their device to its full extent and take responsibility for it.
      - afiori 4y ago
        The options are not limited to "A sanctified centralized authority controls and limits all my devices" and "I need to recompile the kernel by hand". For most people "owning their devices" means being allowed to meaningfully change OS (or even just modify it) without losing major functionalities.
    - BeFlatXIII 4y ago
      Is there a root method that falsely reports that SafetyNet is still intact?
    - aruggirello 4y ago
      It doesn't if you're using Magisk - which is the case 99% of the time. Magisk has been updated and passes SafetyNet under Android 12 too - no other means of rooting a modern phone is safe anyway.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago
  Not having a warranty is, frankly, also a part of it being really your phone. "I want to be allowed to do whatever I want, but if I do something I regret, I get a refund" is not a coherent position to take.
  - BlueTemplar 4y ago
    Bullshit, warranties is the way to keep manufacturers honest : if it only has minimum legal manufacturer warranty, you know it's crap. And it should be illegal to void warranty for rooting.
    - afiori 4y ago
      My understanding is that (precedent aside) in the US the law clearly says that the manufacturer has to prove that you managed the product under warranty. That is those "warranty void" stickers are not enforceable (under that specific law) by themselves, they need to argue that the user actually damaged the product.
amelius 4y ago
How do you know the phone doesn't have multiple levels of root and you're only breaking the topmost one?
jack_pp 4y ago
I was thinking of doing that but then I don't think you can use netflix at all or if you make your way around that your banking app might not work etc
kwhitefoot 4y ago
Not practical if you want to use the phone for payments and identity services because a lot of those will refuse to work on a rooted device.
matheusmoreira 4y ago
Hardware remote attestation will end that soon. Every app will refuse to run on modified devices and it will be impossible to circumvent because it's in hardware.

andrepd 4y ago

Those user hostile features are what drive me to piracy. No way I'll pay money to have the privilege of installing spyware just so I can stream low-quality video to whatever device the provider deems worthy at that particular moment. I'll just go on 1337x and in 2 minutes I have an high quality mkv that I can play anywhere I want. I'd happily pay 5-10$ a pop for this, and for indie movies I do make the effort of seeing if there's a way of paying to watch it somewhere, even if I just pay and don't watch it there, and watch the pirated rip anyway.

HeavyStorm 4y ago
What a way to justify a crime. "I don't like how they act, so I don't comply with their rules". You pirate because you have no respect for law, because you are a entitled child or because you don't have enough money. Piracy isn't plain theft, but it's consuming a service without paying for it to its legimate owners. It's close, isn't it? Would you sneak into a amusement park? Not pay for dinner if you found it not to your liking or if the brand don't meet your standards? The reason you think piracy is ok is because you don't associate the crime with the victim.
- Karunamon 4y ago
  No, it isn't close. The reason none of those things are comparable is because the service provider has lost something in the transaction in your example. Sneaking into an amusement park is theft of services, not paying for dinner after you consumed it is plain old theft. In both of those cases, the seller's resources were consumed. They have lost resources or effort. With digital items it isn't like that. I can make infinite copies at no harm, real or imagined, to the seller. What might make this more clear is the distinction between downloading a movie illicitly versus watching a friend's legit purchased copy with them. In both of these cases, the maker of the content was not compensated for a watch. The reason I think piracy (defined as personal copyright infringement) is okay is because: 1. It is generally a victimless "crime" (and even this is a misnomer, the act of downloading a movie is a civil, not criminal matter. It has more in common with driving over the speed limit than it does stealing.), and as so is morally neutral. 2. Statistics show that habitual pirates tend to be habitual purchasers as well, further complicating any concept of harm. 3. Copyright is a government granted monopoly, not some natural right, and its continued abuse and deadweight on our culture is not something that should be respected. 4. Even if the previous 3 points were all invalid, why should I have any respect for an entity that has none for me? Slavish adherence to the law is mere obedience, it is not noble or useful on its own.

garfieldnate 4y ago

I was shocked to find that this wouldn't even work on my desktop! You have to go to the browser settings and turn off hardware acceleration. If you rent an HD movie from Prime Video, you get a notice saying that your screen has to be compliant with some specific standard, and part of the standard is essentially baked-in DRM that prevents taking screenshots of the content. The device belongs to me, the content was streamed to me, the device has no business preventing me from taking a screenshot or recording video. Yet here we are, apparently DRM is baked into all of our screens now.

vertis 4y ago
Just wait till they make impossible to take a photo with your phone of your desktop screen.
- yencabulator 4y ago
  Like they already made it impossible to make color photocopies of some content? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation
BlueTemplar 4y ago
"Why Rosyna Can't Take A Movie Screenshot" : https://web.archive.org/web/20170617174641/https://www.alexrad.me/discourse/why-rosyna-cant-take-a-movie-screenshot.html https://web.archive.org/web/20170617174641/https://www.alexr... And that's why it's important to boycott devices and software that allow DRM : Intel and Ryzen AMD CPUs, Windows 11 (requires a DRM chip), maybe Chrome/ium if it doesn't allow to easily disable DRM support, Steam...
- account42 4y ago
  Boycotton all recent x86 CPUs is probably not reasonable for most people. More actionable is to make sure you control the software (most importantly, the OS) that runs on those CPUs so that their user-hostile features are not used for DRM.

HeavyStorm 4y ago

It is yourphone. As such, it has drm capable hardware, which let's you stream Netflix. Think of the alternative: you don't have protection. Who would license their media to Netflix?

Ajedi32 4y ago
Who wouldn't license their media to Netflix in a world without DRM? What are they going to do? Make a $100 million dollar movie and then only release it in theaters, just out of spite? That'd be leaving a lot of money on the table.

blue039 4y ago

Scanning and making copies of portions of a book used to be encouraged. In fact, it's how you collected information for book reports and research. It wasn't uncommon, for example, for me to print out entire journal articles or scan entire chapters at the University library. Now, they'd probably shoot my dog. I tried prime video once and the way it locked down my computer to guarantee so-called "rights" was stupid. I tried Netflix, same thing. I'm slowly but surely trending back to unabashed piracy because it's the only way I can own anything anymore - and that's sad. I will happily spend hard earned money as long as I can own something. At the very least I'd happily donate to my local library if they didn't spend time enforcing the will of some faceless multinational publisher. Shockingly, as I've gotten older I seem to own less and every year the apes we elect take more of my rights away.