[-empyre-] content encryption

[adam <adam@xs4all.nl>]

Hi,

Sorry again...I have just relocated to Latvia so its been a bit on again
off again with the internet connection.

I was wondering if perhaps I could steer part of the discussion towards
Open Codecs?

So far also we (r a d i o q u a l i a) havent discussed any of our own
work (which I understand is part of the intention of inviting us to the
forum?). So I wanted to just touch on a project we have done called 'Free
Radio Linux' (its no longer streaming live).

for a kick off, I wrote this some time ago (published in the "Art and
Communication" text published by RIXC.

<snip>
To stream files live over the internet, the files first have to be encoded
into an appropriate streaming format. This is done with the various
encoding tools (softwares). In simple terms, an audio signal, for example
a
microphone plugged into a computer, is converted by the encoding software
into a continuous data 'stream' over the internet. This conversion
involves compressing the data, which will reduce its quality and file
size, and converting the data into the technology providers (usually)
proprietary streaming format. Codecs are the algorithms that encode and
decode (or COmpress and DECompress) the audio or visual for delivery over
the internet, and are the core technology of streaming media.


What's the problem?
Problem 1 : Content Encryption
Most audio and video content on the web is encoded by proprietary codecs.

This means that almost all content encoded for artistic, cultural or
independent media purposes is encrypted. Encrypted in the sense that the
content has been converted to a closed file format which can only be
'decrypted' by media players that have the requisite licensed algorithms
(codecs). Hence the owners of these algorithms (Thompson and Fraunhofer,
Microsoft, Real Networks etc) own the key to the content. It is not a
public key, it.s a closed proprietary key. You, the content producer,
cannot unlock your encrypted file (content) unless you do so with the
appropriate media player software. These player softwares are usually
created by the software house that owns the codec, or by a
third party who licence the key (codec) to unlock (decode) and play your
file.

</snip>

This is the situation with codecs at present. There are open codecs
available too, which makes life a bit more interesting. However
distribution mechanisms for these technologies are limited and the option
to install the codecs is often beyond the technical know-how of most
users, even with help pages.

Anyways, we did a project which addresed this issue (amongst other issues)
called 'Free Radio Linux' (http://www.radioqualia.net/freeradiolinux). The
project used Ogg Vorbis, a free (as in 'media') codec and we found,
surprisingly that there were _plenty_ of people that went to the trouble
of installing the codec. In short, we crashed three streaming servers in
the first two days because of the demand of the ogg stream (well beyond
what we were expecting).

The project also, was a sly ribbing to Open Source (lets not get so holy
about it ;-) ), and also it highlighted what I think is a very interesting
co-relation - the idealogical intersection, and parallal aims of Free
Software and Free Radio. It seems to me there is more to this alliance
than meets the ear and eye...at the core is the thought that both
movements utilise technolgy as a focus for pursuing freedom of
information.


Anyways, thats my 2 santimi for now.

adam



Adam Hyde

r a d i o q u a l i a
http://www.radioqualia.net

The Streaming Suitcase
Streaming Media Consultant

Free as in 'media'

phone : + 371 938 6752 (Latvia)
email to sms : eseter@sms.lmt.lv