Phil Schiller Claims Customers Aren't Asking for Built-In Blu-Ray Anymore

[Bokes]

It's just sad that Apple would rather push iTunes instead of providing the choice, when people who care about quality are not going to settle, it's a different market.[/QUOTE]


It makes sense they want to push iTunes vs anything else.
The sad fact is no matter how much we love Apple devices- they are responsible for the demise of high end, high quality media.
They killed CD's just when SACD was introduced to the market.
And now they are trying to convince joe six-pack to download vs the superior quality of Blu Ray.
People are lazy and will choose the easy way more times than not.
It's a shame getting off the couch and powering up a blu ray player is considered hard work these days.

 

[7709876]

I am fully aware of the poster's location. Do you not understand that the reach of US corporations is international? They would not be satisfied with laws that only apply in the US. They work with international organizations and governments to implement their control globally. In the European Union, the "Copyright Directive" is the applicable law, and it implements the WIPO copyright treaty. In reality, the Copyright Directive is MORE restrictive than the US's DMCA. Please read up on it and educate yourself before suggesting that I have "correct legal information" to hand out. I don't take it upon myself to tutor the world's inhabitants on the laws of their countries.

His original comment stated that MY post regarding legality of copying movies was "rubbish", so he was wrong in either venue - US or EU.

Thanks, but I'm not embarrassed at all. How 'bout you?

1. The EU Copyright Directive isn't binding across Europe and doesn't apply in the UK at all.
2. An EU Directive isn't a law.
3. The UK government is currently in the process of enacting legislation that will allow format shifting.
4. US laws don't apply outside the US no matter how much you might like to think so.
5. MPAA have zero power in the UK

Keep digging you are just making a fool of yourself. You cited the DMCA as the justification for his actions being illegal. Can I stress again the DMCA does not apply to anyone outside the US.

A link here to news on the proposals to legalise personal format shifting.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14372698

Even now no court in the UK would rule against someone making personal copies of material they had purchased.

You started shooting your mouth off about US law in a very arrogant manner. You didn't even have the sense to look at the guys location. You do not come off well from this.

 

[touchtone561]

my beloved Apple is now an e-retailer

Apple is an e-retailer, been that way since they dropped Computer from the business name.

CD/DVD/ BluRays are not obsolete - new ones are released every Tuesday @ Amazon, Target & Walmart. You can't say that about the other technology folks like to bundle with them as being historic. The RedBox brand is popping up everywhere for easy rentals. If you are one of the very few Apple boys that leaves his domicile and not afraid of others the kiosks are easy to use and very cheap.

Travelers will appreciate not having to buy 100 GB shared data plan to stream content - and iOS doesn't stream rentals anyway, it downloads first but streams Netflix very well. Digital copies are no where near the quality of BluRay.

Optical drives can go bad - so what. Batteries have had years of recalls, so do large capacity hard drives, we still use them. The day someone casually tosses me a 8GB flash drive, not expecting it back is the day optical discs are dead.

No need to reply if you disagree, everything has already been well stated by others previously, I just want to contribute to the mindshare.

 

[nuckinfutz]

It's just sad that Apple would rather push iTunes instead of providing the choice, when people who care about quality are not going to settle, it's a different market.

It makes sense they want to push iTunes vs anything else.
The sad fact is no matter how much we love Apple devices- they are responsible for the demise of high end, high quality media.
They killed CD's just when SACD was introduced to the market.
And now they are trying to convince joe six-pack to download vs the superior quality of Blu Ray.
People are lazy and will choose the easy way more times than not.
It's a shame getting off the couch and powering up a blu ray player is considered hard work these days.[/QUOTE]


You're not getting it.

 

[scoobydoo99]

That is as far as I got. US ≠ The World. Not that it matters, on physical media you can get away with doing as you like without anyone taking the film away from you if you break the petty EULA rules.

Agreed. I never commented on the legitimacy of the laws/treaties/directives or whatnot.I don't support the US attempting to enforce its will on the world, whether in digital rights or any other domain. As far as I'm concerned, the rest of the world should put a stop to it. But that's another discussion.

 

[7709876]

It makes sense they want to push iTunes vs anything else.
The sad fact is no matter how much we love Apple devices- they are responsible for the demise of high end, high quality media.
They killed CD's just when SACD was introduced to the market.
And now they are trying to convince joe six-pack to download vs the superior quality of Blu Ray.
People are lazy and will choose the easy way more times than not.
It's a shame getting off the couch and powering up a blu ray player is considered hard work these days.

This is bang on the money. Apple are not interested in what is best for their customers - they are interested in what is best for Apple.

I understand this and realise that Apple are just another big greedy company. I make a decision to buy Apple products if they offer what I want.

I have zero loyalty to Apple - rest assured they have zero loyalty to any of us.

 

[scoobydoo99]

...

Keep digging you are just making a fool of yourself. You cited the DMCA as the justification for his actions being illegal. Can I stress again the DMCA does not apply to anyone outside the US.

...
You started shooting your mouth off about US law in a very arrogant manner. You didn't even have the sense to look at the guys location. You do not come off well from this.

Like I said once already, of course I looked at his location. HE was calling my assertion rubbish based upon HIS location, instead of looking at MY location first. I clearly identified the law as "US".

I never said US laws applied outside the US, and I don't know why you'd assert that I'd "like to think so", considering that I already said I disagreed with them.

As far as MPAA having zero power outside the US, I think you underestimate the global alliances that they have formed to enforce their will on the world. Whether through laws, directives, treaties, or any other means, they generally get international cooperation and very similar, if not, identical legal rights around the world. Tell Kim Dotcom that the US has no power outside the US. Virginia issued an indictment based upon his routing of internet traffic through servers in the US, and New Zealand law enforcement dutifully served the warrant for copyright infringement , seized his property, and arrested him on US direction.

Is an individual citizen at risk of such measures for breaking encryption? Of course not (at least for now). My point was that the format of the content (physical disc or digital download) is irrelevant to the question of the legality of copying the data. It's illegal either way.

And finally, as for whether I "come off well" in an esoteric and rather boring legal discussion in a random and fairly obscure internet forum, I'm not particularly concerned. haha.

 

[twoodcc]

they at least need to support blu-ray playback on mac operating systems

 

[marzer]

In the long run most people that are into blu-ray (me personally) would have a nicer set up for viewing such content.

Hmm, that's what I thought. But apparently not.

 

[Xiroteus]

Hmm, that's what I thought. But apparently not.

I should say larger set up, I started out watching blu-rays on a 24" screen, 1920x1200, it looks perfect. I just sat much closer.

 

[iBug2]

They killed CD's just when SACD was introduced to the market.

Yeah, because if Apple didn't kill CD's, SACD would be the "new" audio format. Really? SACD was DOA as much as DVD-A. Those were niche things only people with 100k costing stereos would buy, because to my ears an SACD sounded exactly the same as a CD, and that was on a 15k rig. The only SACD's which sounded better were the ones which were remastered for SACD, and it was the new mastering making the difference, not the bitrate.

----------

If Apple doesn't want to include Blu Ray support in the OS or even in their machines, fine, but they should at least make it possible for 3rd parties to create a fully-functional alternative. Since HD audio requires kernel support, no one but Apple can make it work.

I'm not sure this is true. First of all, you can decode DTS-HD on OS X using the .dll from Power DVD on windows. (You can use them in VLC or mplayer with some voodoo). Second, the audio isn't the issue. To decode a Blu-Ray movie, you need to have the encryption key, which are at the moment being "broken" by any player which plays Blu-Ray content. That only means that nobody is paying the licence to get the decryption keys. And, you don't need to have DTS-HD audio to have a working Blu-Ray playback on OS X. Apple's own DVD Player never had DTS decoding either, so all our DTS tracked DVD's were played using the dolby track if we played them using DVD Player, which we were "ok" with. So I think people can live with the Core DTS track which is embedded in every DTS-HD track, which every player app can decode live on OS X. Not to mention, what's the point of having DTS-HD decoding on OS X if you cannot output that audio anyway? Apple does not put a 7.1 out on their macs, you'd need a separate hardware for it, which already would have to include a DTS-HD decoder in it anyway since you cannot output DTS-HD or True HD through optical for legal reasons I think, so the OS wouldn't have to decode the track in the first place. Until a 3rd party vendor actually produces a DTS-HD decoder soundcard for macs, this is all moot. It doesn't make sense on Windows without 3rd party hardware either unless you actually want to listen to a 7.1 DTS-HD track through stereo speakers or headphones.

If no Blu-Ray player software is available on OS X, I think it's because nobody wants to pay the licence fees to make such a player because it wouldn't sell. It wouldn't sell because not many people would buy external Blu-Ray drives for that.

 

[marzer]

they at least need to support blu-ray playback on mac operating systems

For all the arguements for Apple to just support BR, people do realize they would have to license it. Right?

Apple would have to charge additional $$ for OS upgrades. So some of you can enjoy BR playback? Not feasible for a $20 upgrade. No thanks!

Hence, leave it to 3d party solutions for those who want it. And save the cost for those who don't.

FTW - Windows 8 will not have BR or DVD in the standard install for the same reason:

"Globally, DVD sales have declined significantly year over year and Blu-ray on PCs is losing momentum as well. Watching broadcast TV on PCs, while incredibly important for some of you, has also declined steadily," Microsoft details, "These traditional media playback scenarios, optical media and broadcast TV, require a specialized set of decoders (and hardware) that cost a significant amount in royalties."

 

[iBug2]

FTW - Windows 8 will not have BR or DVD in the standard install for the same reason:

Does Windows 7 come with a native Blu Ray player?

 

[Xiroteus]

Does Windows 7 come with a native Blu Ray player?

Nothing, had to use Power DVD that came with the drive or system, I really dislike Power DVD.

I always have issues with it saying it needs to update and then I try and it never does, always wants you to upgrade, random other issues. I had to use ANY DVD HD to get it to play some films.

 

[marzer]

Does Windows 7 come with a native Blu Ray player?

Don't know. But the licensing is not a one time deal. Each implementation is a new license. So even if Window 7 has BR playback, Window 8 requires new licensing.

 

[agmaster]

Apparently many people haven't had the chance to have the "complete experience" BD offers. Things such as the new HD DTS and Dolby formats as well as it being much higher video quality than anything you could ever download, unless you wanted to download a 30-50GB file. I don't think BD drives in Macs are really useful because a BD player should go where it belongs, the home theater.

 

[AidenShaw]

look up HTPC

Apparently many people haven't had the chance to have the "complete experience" BD offers. Things such as the new HD DTS and Dolby formats as well as it being much higher video quality than anything you could ever download, unless you wanted to download a 30-50GB file. I don't think BD drives in Macs are really useful because a BD player should go where it belongs, the home theater.

Look back at all of the comments from people who want to use an Apple (like the Mini-Mac) as an HTPC.

I have a Core i7 mini-tower as an HTPC, with about 9 TB of videos on the home server. (All ISO copies of the original DVDs and BDs - no lossy translation, all of the extras intact.)

I have a BD player in my home theatre cabinet, but probably haven't inserted a BD disc in a year.

My PC mounts the ISO images, and sends the raw bitstream video and raw bitstream 7.1 HD audio to the AVR over the HDMI cable. The AVR takes the HDMI input, and sends the video to the monitor over the HDMI output to the monitor (doing any realtime format conversions needed).

The 8 channel HDMI audio is decoded and sent to the 6.1 speakers connected to the AVR. (7.1 to 6.1 is a simple blend of left-rear and right-rear to center-rear.)

But, that's easy with Windows - and hard with an Apple.

Why?

 

[MSM Hobbes]

Ahhh nostalgia. Macs 4 years ago were no more on the path of computer enlightenment than today. In fact when you see a 2008 Macbook in all of it's plastic glory it's easy to be reminded about a time when Apple "didn't" use materials like aluminum or spend on better battery technology.

If Apple delivers an HFS+ replacement I'll be for the most part happy. I am not perceiving any real limitation to OS X other than just quality of software which I think continues to improve at a more rapid rate.

I swear these forums are like a magnet for burnt out Geeks that wax on about the "good ole days" and the like.

I'm happy that that next iMac is going to be 8 lbs lighter. That means a less robust articulating arm for me. It means less bulk.

The design of all of these newest Macs are all about preparing for the near future where Intel will shrink from 22nm to 14nm with Broadwell. Everything becomes more power efficient and today's designs are very forward leaning ...unless you are stuck in the past like so many on these boards find themselves.

Funny. Too funny… yes you are.

"Burnt out geeks waxing on about the good ole days"?… lol. Tell ya something, the "good ole days" you are talking about are still here, and IMHO will be the Here for the next few years. Why punish a fair amount of Apple users, and remove items from a DESKTOP machine, for today's and the near tomorrow's needs (yes "needs", not just wants)?

Yes, I love the future - I'm an engineer - and am constantly amazed at what the latest / greatest tech can bring us, now and in the future. However, I am NOT one that wants to piss on the technology that is NEEDED for today's and the near tomorrow's users,,, just to get a thinner / lighter DESKTOP.

Honestly, yes, the new design is gorgeous… I do much like. But, as said before, IMHO, especially for a desktop, it should be more function, less form.

But ya know what, you and your ilk are the voices of the future, and only your voice matters. What in hades do us "old fuddy geeks" know? Our needs and requirements are evidently less important than your spouting of "its the future, so all else sucks, and henceforth and forever more is not needed!". :roll eyes:

PS: and btw, I'm fine w/ the ODD being outside attached to the machine… just find it interestingly funny that the same company that espoused the need for "clean" lines, no unnecessary cords, is forcing those that need these devices to be dangled to their cool looking desktops. On side note of all this - also count me as one that is not enamored w/ the cloud and/or iTunes… give me physical media for when I want that, and give me 'net access to the cloud and/or iTunes when I want that - don't force one to the detriment of the other. Isn't Apple about "choice"?

 

[Dmunjal]

Look back at all of the comments from people who want to use an Apple (like the Mini-Mac) as an HTPC.

I have a Core i7 mini-tower as an HTPC, with about 9 TB of videos on the home server. (All ISO copies of the original DVDs and BDs - no lossy translation, all of the extras intact.)

I have a BD player in my home theatre cabinet, but probably haven't inserted a BD disc in a year.

My PC mounts the ISO images, and sends the raw bitstream video and raw bitstream 7.1 HD audio to the AVR over the HDMI cable. The AVR takes the HDMI input, and sends the video to the monitor over the HDMI output to the monitor (doing any realtime format conversions needed).

The 8 channel HDMI audio is decoded and sent to the 6.1 speakers connected to the AVR. (7.1 to 6.1 is a simple blend of left-rear and right-rear to center-rear.)

But, that's easy with Windows - and hard with an Apple.

Why?

Could you do this with an JB ATV and Firecore? I do this with DVDs but haven't tried Blu-Ray without conversion.

 

[7709876]

Like I said once already, of course I looked at his location. HE was calling my assertion rubbish based upon HIS location, instead of looking at MY location first. I clearly identified the law as "US".

Hmm..

Rubbish, eh? LOL. You should do a little research before spewing complete nonsense.

Perhaps you are not familiar with the anti-circumvention provisions of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)? The MPAA doesn't need a EULA, they have laws on their side.

You may "happily" copy the content from your Blu Rays to your computer, you just won't be doing it legally. Circumventing the copy protection (which is required to COPY the content) is illegal. So, yes, you are a criminal if you do that. You do NOT own the movie, and you CANNOT do what you please with it. The law is very clear on these issues, and the MPAA is well protected. You purchased the right to view a COPY of the content, under very strict guidelines.

You have no more rights with a movie on a disc than with a movie purchased digitally. The only difference is that you can carry out your illegal activites more easily with a disc than with a downloaded file (assuming you purchased the file through a legal channel).

You are applying US law to a specific individual outside of the US.

I never said US laws applied outside the US, and I don't know why you'd assert that I'd "like to think so", considering that I already said I disagreed with them.

Your post quoted above suggests otherwise.

As far as MPAA having zero power outside the US, I think you underestimate the global alliances that they have formed to enforce their will on the world. Whether through laws, directives, treaties, or any other means, they generally get international cooperation and very similar, if not, identical legal rights around the world. Tell Kim Dotcom that the US has no power outside the US. Virginia issued an indictment based upon his routing of internet traffic through servers in the US, and New Zealand law enforcement dutifully served the warrant for copyright infringement , seized his property, and arrested him on US direction.

Is an individual citizen at risk of such measures for breaking encryption? Of course not (at least for now). My point was that the format of the content (physical disc or digital download) is irrelevant to the question of the legality of copying the data. It's illegal either way.

And finally, as for whether I "come off well" in an esoteric and rather boring legal discussion in a random and fairly obscure internet forum, I'm not particularly concerned. haha.

Keep digging. Kim Dotcom hasn't been convicted of anything. The US is trying to extradite him from NZ to stand trial for crimes alleged to have been committed in the US.

The FACT remains US law doesn't apply outside the US. You are coming across as VERY arrogant in this respect. US companies may lobby governments in other countries to enact laws to suit their interests. That doesn't change the fact that US laws don't apply outside the US.

There are 206 sovereign states in the world. Of those 206 sovereign states only 1 of them is subject to US law.

----------

Apparently many people haven't had the chance to have the "complete experience" BD offers. Things such as the new HD DTS and Dolby formats as well as it being much higher video quality than anything you could ever download, unless you wanted to download a 30-50GB file. I don't think BD drives in Macs are really useful because a BD player should go where it belongs, the home theater.

Even if that is the case surely you must see the point that people don't want to pay twice for the same media?

If someone wants to watch a Blu-Ray on their home cinema setup (whatever that may be) what if they want to watch the same movie on their Mac at some point? Should they be forced to buy the iTunes download in addition to the Blu-Ray?

 

[Tech198]

ok just to clear things up here.

Outside US its illegal..... Period......... Its only the individual that chooses circumvent this stuff..

I should know

I think the question is, why would you want to watch Blue-ray on a PC anyway..

PC users have to freedom of Blue-ray on their machines .. Mac users complain, just because they don't have access to a set-top player..... Well.... isn't that a solution ?

Wheres there argument ?

To the above post... yes. they should be forced, because its Apple..... Simple..... If you want a choice, use Windows.

 

[iBug2]

Look back at all of the comments from people who want to use an Apple (like the Mini-Mac) as an HTPC.

I have a Core i7 mini-tower as an HTPC, with about 9 TB of videos on the home server. (All ISO copies of the original DVDs and BDs - no lossy translation, all of the extras intact.)

I have a BD player in my home theatre cabinet, but probably haven't inserted a BD disc in a year.

My PC mounts the ISO images, and sends the raw bitstream video and raw bitstream 7.1 HD audio to the AVR over the HDMI cable. The AVR takes the HDMI input, and sends the video to the monitor over the HDMI output to the monitor (doing any realtime format conversions needed).

The 8 channel HDMI audio is decoded and sent to the 6.1 speakers connected to the AVR. (7.1 to 6.1 is a simple blend of left-rear and right-rear to center-rear.)

But, that's easy with Windows - and hard with an Apple.

Why?

As far as I know VLC sends encoded DTS through HDMI on OS X as well, so apart from the decoding the video on OS X, what you described can be done on a Mac as well, i.e. instead of mounting the Blu-Ray ISO, you open the ripped Blu-Ray .mkv file which gets rid of the AACS while ripping, so you don't need a Blu-Ray decoder, you can output the uncompressed Blu-Ray picture and audio through HDMI using VLC. The outputting part isn't what you can't do on a Mac. The decoding the video live part. For that you need an App which decrypts the AACS's, legally. And neither Apple nor a 3rd party has written such an app for OS X yet.

Because I'm basically doing the exact same thing you are doing, using VLC to play my ripped blu rays through HDMI from my Mac. And since you also "ripped" them to your hard drive (by ripped I don't mean compressed, but ripped as .ISO images, you may as well rip them to .mkv instead which takes pretty much the same amount of time), so doing what you do on a Mac is basically the same complexity and the only downside is that you don't get the Blu-Ray menus.

But I don't think that's what people want here. Not everyone has a movie server at home, mine is over 50TB's atm for example. People want to insert their Blu-Ray discs and want the app decode it live, without the ripping process.

 

[7709876]

ok just to clear things up here.

Outside US its illegal..... Period......... Its only the individual that chooses circumvent this stuff..

I should know

I think we are going off on a tangent here but that isn't the case. There are plenty of countries around the world that have more liberal copyright laws compared to the US.

There are counties where it is perfectly legal to "format shift" for personal use.

Please explain why you should know and why you clearly don't know.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Ahhh nostalgia. Macs 4 years ago were no more on the path of computer enlightenment than today. In fact when you see a 2008 Macbook in all of it's plastic glory it's easy to be reminded about a time when Apple "didn't" use materials like aluminum or spend on better battery technology.

What does aluminum have to do with anything??? I guess you didn't get the part about Apple making computers now for aesthetics rather than function, which is what REAL computer users want, not "thin" or "glassy" or "one piece". How about powerful? How about fast? How about the best darn computer in the industry rather than the thinnest?

BTW, my 2008 MBP was made from aluminum (back when "Pro" meant something as opposed to now where it means "toy"), not just one piece and as for batteries, it had a user accessible battery compartment so when my battery dies (as ALL batteries do), I can quickly replace it with a spare. You can't replace squat with current Macbooks. When your battery is done, so are you.

If Apple delivers an HFS+ replacement I'll be for the most part happy. I am

Why would they bother? That has nothing to do with aesthetics and aesthetic sensibility is clearly the reason Steve picked Tim to run Apple after him. Unfortunately, he lacks technological reasoning, so Apple is quickly turning into more of a fashionable tech company rather than a state-of-the-art one.

I swear these forums are like a magnet for burnt out Geeks that wax on about the "good ole days" and the like.

Sadly, it's not us that are burnt out. We are the ones pushing for faster better technology, not dragging performance numbers possible 5 years ago just to keep the case paper thin.

I'm happy that that next iMac is going to be 8 lbs lighter.

Yes, because you really need to keep a desktop light and "mobile"....

The design of all of these newest Macs are all about preparing for the near future where Intel will shrink from 22nm to 14nm with Broadwell. Everything becomes more power efficient and today's designs are very forward leaning ...unless you are stuck in the past like so many on these boards find themselves.

Smaller for chips means less heat per transistor, but it also means they can pack more transistors onto the same size chip to run faster, which is the primary goal. Thus, it doesn't necessarily mean it will run cooler overall. That would require sacrificing absolute power/speed. Would Intel choose a cooler chip that is slower and lets AMD pass them by or would they choose to keep temperature numbers the same and keep performance at a maximum? I guess if they were run by Tim Cook, they'd do as you suggest.

I'm sure they will offer cool running mobile chips, but they will always be noticeably slower than the desktop models. It's the same reason an iPad can't compete with a notebook and a notebook can't compete with a desktop for performance. Heat is your enemy and making cases thinner and smaller increases heat and thus requires using less power. If your ultimate goal is products like the iPod Nano, you're golden. Sadly, an iPod Nano won't replace my Macbook Pro.

 

[janstett]

And speaking of "the future"...............

The epic sci-fi thriller PROMETHEUS is also available today on DIGITAL HD™ for less than $15, arriving three weeks before Blu-ray,

"BOOM!"

http://www.businesswire.com/news/ho...entury-Fox Advances-Entertainment-Digital-HD™

Future, you say? Prometheus is old news, it was released on Blu-Ray weeks ago. Perhaps you are speaking of rental availability.

I've been enjoying it for weeks already and just last night watched it in glorious 3D when my internet service went down because of Sandy.

"Boom!", as they say.