On Saturday 21 May 2005 13:03, Sid Boyce wrote:
The libdvdcss that comes with SuSE distros is crippled for legal reasons,
libdvdcss isn't included at all, I think you meant 'the xine/mplayer'
DVD decyption is illegal in Germany.
Er, no, DVD players are actually sold even in Germany :) What is illegal is to distribute a means to decrypt them without a license from the patent holder. It's more or less the same idea as the DMCA in the states. There is no law that I know of that specifically targets DVDs, it's a general patent/copyright thing It is possible to sell licensed DVD players though, and a few linux distributors have done so. I know TurboLinux did it, and I *think* Mandrake and Linspire have done it too
That's why you either have to build your own from downloaded sources or use the one from packman's site.
packman doesn't distribute the sources or binaries anymore, you have to get the sources from videolan, and then Packman has the framework that helps you build them once they're downloaded. There is a site in Brazil that has the precompiled stuff.