I have a friend who recently bought video editing software (Power Director 5) and a DVD burner so he could transfer his VHS library to DVDs. He was able to capture the video to the computer, dump it into a timeline, and even create an MPEG-2, but when it came time to burn, I would only burn the copyright notice.
I find it fascinating that the video editing software has detection code that recognizes a copyright screen. Since the fair-use of copying a video depends entirely on the ownership of the video, and since the software has no way of determining ownership, it seems quite presumptuous that their software should try to stop you at all. Certainly, I never saw "Prevents you from making copies of your own stuff" on the "features" list.
On a related note, my father-in-law, John, bought an MP3 player recently. He tried to copy his music from his hard drive to his media player. The media player just displayed "Permission Denied" and would not play. Turns out he had ripped his CDs with Windows Media Player which, by default, enables a "copy protection" feature. Since defaults are *supposed* to reflect the most commonly desired behavior, one must wonder who, at Microsoft, thinks users don't want to be able to copy their own music to their own player. Oh but wait...I'm assuming they care primarily about the user...my mistake.
All this invariably brings me back to software created by users, for users: open source. :-) Sure, it can be rough around the edges, but it doesn't decide for you which rights you should have.
We have very fancy rigs in the new classrooms in the new engineering building: the Kelley Engineering Center (or KEC for short.) Each "command center" for all the media devices (computer, overhead, DVD player, etc.) has a touchscreen to control turning devices on, playing, switching devices, etc. Someone was thinking when designing this system because there is a "Hide" button so the teacher can blank the screen temporarily to write on the whiteboard without being illuminated by the projector. I imagine, the same designer was trying to be helpful when he added the little note at the bottom of the blank screen: "To show image, press 'Hide' again." Now that's real intuitive! :-P
Well, it's been a while since I blogged, and this new year, I resolved to resolve not to resolve to resolve to write in my blog every day. But, I hope to post a little more frequently than before.
So, happy new year. I hope the Christmas season was meaningful and rejuvenating for you. And remember to get your taxes done early this year so you can get your refund faster. ;-)
Oh yes, if anyone has suggestions on how I can keep doing this blog thing without feeling like I'm talking into some sort of black hole of the Internet, I'm all ears. After all, what fun is a one-way conversation.