Mailinglist Archive: opensuse (6210 mails)

[Randall R Schulz <rschulz@xxxxxxxxx>]

Ken, Basil,

On Sunday 16 October 2005 04:43, Ken Schneider wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-10-16 at 17:04 +1000, Basil Chupin wrote:
> > How is it possible in this year 2005 for an installed piece of
> > software in SuSE to be crippleware so that it is not able to play
> > DVDs?
>
> ...
>
> Search on the packman site (found using google) for libdvdcss and you
> will find instructions for installing it.

Not for the past few months.

To wit (from <http://packman.links2linux.org/?action=122>):

-==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==-
"Description:

"Now, the new copyright in germany is coming into force, it's no longer 
allowed to provide tools to breake technical protections.

"Therefore we can no longer provide libdvdcss, sorry."
-==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==-


Don't be fooled by the RPM linked from that page. It includes only the 
".spec" file.

The link to the project's home page is still good: 
<http://developers.videolan.org/libdvdcss/index.html>.


Now, I don't support software patents, but there's at least a little 
irony in this (from the libdvdcss home page):

-==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==-
"Features

 ...

    * Freedom. libdvdcss is released under the General Public License, 
ensuring it will stay free, and used only for free software products."
-==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==-

The authors seem to want the protection of the legal system while not 
wanting to abide by the laws that deem their software illegal in so 
many countries...


> --
> Ken Schneider


Randall Schulz