[78-L] A word of warning concerning playback of Warner "Big Band" set Re: They are practically Giving away the Vitaphone DVD set!

[Michael Biel]

I brought this exact thing up last week, although not in the message you
reprinted.  I found it would not play in the Sony drive in my computer
nor in my Discmaker copier (which we use to duplicate Leah's
documentary), but would play in a Magnavox recorder, and a Philips
player.  I did not test it in my Ilo or LiteOn recorders because I do
not trust them anyway.   They obviously do not want them being ripped in
computers, and this might affect how a stand-alone recorder's drive see
them, but it makes no sense to purposefully disable their playback in a
recorder, since it is the recorder you would use to take the signal from
a player!!    Actually, the copier's play-only input drive did read the
disc but said it was RCC protected and would not proceed.  So that is
the answer of the other question about what would happen if you do get
it to play in a computer.


Frankly it would be a pain for some people if they can't play it in
their computer because that is some people's entertainment center.  The
RCC copy protection should be enough to protect ripping by most ordinary
people, so why did they have to go the extra step.  In the past there
have been threats by the disc authorities to demand trademark removal
from discs that have things that restrict PLAYING, such as when the CD
authority threatened Columbia when they put in some programs that
damaged computers that merely played certain CDs a few years ago.  Note
that these discs contain a DVD "Download" trademark.  This must have
some allowance for how these discs act. 



Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com  


  -------- Original Message --------

 From: "Martin Fisher" <wmfisher at mtsu.edu>

 
 Just a note concerning the playability of this set.
 
 The back of the box is flagged with this statement, verbatim.
 
 "This disc is expected to play back in DVD video "play only" devices,
and 
 may ot play back in other DVD devices, including recorders and PC
drives."
 
 So far, disc 1 plays back in a Coby and Toshiba DVD player and Plextor
DVD 
 PC drive. Other PC DVD drives come up as not recognizing the region
code. 
 I also have a Sony DVD recorder that will not load the discs.
 
 Martin
 
 ----- Original Message ----- 
 From: "Michael Biel" <mbiel at mbiel.com>
 To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
 Sent: Friday, December 11, 2009 9:31 PM
 Subject: Re: [78-L] They are practically Giving away the Vitaphone DVD
set!
 
 
 > From: "Steve Shapiro" <steveshapiro1 at juno.com>
 >> When you order the 6 dvd set, a code comes up which says MOD.
 >> The company says that MOD dvds are not mass-produced, but Made On
Demand.
 >> I presume this is each time someone orders such items.
 >
 > Yes, this was discussed when the Warner Archive series was first
 > introduced back a year or two ago. I mentioned in my discussions here
 > that these are DVD-Rs but are nicely printed so that you wouldn't
 > notice. It is designed to allow for items of limited interest without
 > having to warehouse quantities or distribute them to stores. This is
 > similar to what Greenwood Press is doing for some of its
discographies,
 > and what the Smithsonian does with the Folkways and Cook recordings.
 >
 >> Perhaps our business is keeping someone in job./steve
 >
 > That is a nice thought in this economy, and I am happy to support
this
 > end of the commercial disc business because it is giving the company
a
 > clear denotation of what materials ARE of interest. Each sale here is
a
 > definite sale, while sending them to stores can often result in
returns
 > from the store. If films like these sell well enough to support their
 > production, hopefully more will be released. I have a feeling that
this
 > set is partially a result of the interest in the Jazz Singer box,
both
 > in sales and in word of mouth/internet.
 >
 > Mike Biel mbiel at mbiel.com