AACS HD DVD Code

Even if you are not yet a consumer of high definition DVDs, you cannot fail to have noticed all the fuss the public dissemination of the code that cracks the copy protection on HD DVDs has made this week.

It is, apparently, illegal to own this code (in the USA, at least, possibly not in China or Russia) or to reveal it to anyone else, publish it in print, or via electronic means. That usually means you cannot blog about it or post it on your website. Diggers, Wired and Boing Boing readers, and users of Wikipedia will by now know all about what happens if you do.

This week thousands of Digg users repeatedly published the HD DVD 16-digit “hex code” in a kind of e-protest against the censoring of the very first Digg post that mentioned it. Wikipedia has repeatedly had to rip down articles that reveal the code, and countless blogs and websites face being served writs by the AACS Licensing Authority in breach of this US law.

A quick Google search reveals that almost one million sites are carrying the code at the time of writing; and that is only those sites pulled up by that particular search string on the specific Google data center my ISP connects me to when I use that search string. There are probably the same numbers again on other DCs and elsewhere in the world.

Interestingly, the top site in that search is well-respected techhead magazine Wired, closely followed by social bookmarking site and renowned rival of Digg, reddit.com. There are thousands of blogs in the list, Slashdot, Digg, which is much further down the list (they can only have their self censoring to blame for that), deli.icio.us, various hacker sites, and lots of spurious and dubious sites too numerous to mention.

The big one surely has to be that if you enter the hex code string (you would have to now it in advance to do so, of course) into the search box on the MPAA (Moving Picture Association of America) website, the string will appear in the results page, not surprisingly. So, duping the MPAA itself, the very body the hex code seeks to protect, into breaking the law. You can do the same thing with the Microsoft and Whitehouse sites,

Of course, the search does not bring up any MPAA pages containing the actual code, but what it does do, is publish a phrase that contains it:

“No pages that matched your query [hex code] were found.”

Of course, you all already know the code, it’s tattooed on this guy’s chest and shows up on a Photoshopped lottery ticket.

Sig Figs would not dream of breaking US law and revealing the HD DVD hex code here, but just in case you have really not been paying attention, it will not take you more than a few seconds to find it.

Now, my final point is…who cares? Most of us spend all day in front of screens working, surfing, Skyping, emailing etc (please fill in your own etc). Why do we also feel such a compelling urge to sit in front of yet another screen, high def or otherwise, for the purposes of rest and recreation? I suggest that the best response we could have to all the digital rights management garbage, anti-pirating shenanigans, hex codes, and whatever, would simply be to forget DVDs and mp3s, get out into the fresh air, make contact with people in the flesh, and do something active life-enhancing, or otherwise infinitely more positive than pirating and watching videos.

Will I take my own advice? It is unlikely, I’ll probably get hold of Spiderman 3 when it becomes available for legit download and watch it with my kids who will by then be desperate for popcorn and web action in front of the TV!