Hawk’s Babble-Log

A DVD UPO is a User Prohibited Operation, as set by the disc authors.

When I buy a DVD, I buy it for the movie. I buy it because I like the movie and want to watch it again. UPO’s help to ruin this experience.

My Sony DVD player is programmed to prevent certain actions, as commanded by the DVD. I disagree with this philosophy. I bought the DVD player, and I bought the DVD movie, so why do I not have control? It seems the studios do not want me to have control. It may be that they consider that *they* still own my movie.

The studios also seem *extremly* paranoid about other people stealing their movies. If there were a way to prevent theft, it would have been implimented by now, don’t you think? Security is a relative thing. Absolute security (what the studios want) is unattainable. I don’t think they realize this.

Anyway, back to my UPOs. I put in a disc that I own, into a DVD player that I own, and I have to wait for the FBI notice to time out. I can’t hit Chapter Skip forward. I can’t fast-forward. I can’t skip to the menu. I can’t even pause or stop. These are UPOs. I, the *owner*, am not allowed to do this on my own DVD player, with my own DVD.

Okay, so I wait for the FBI notice to time out. Now I get the stuido’s logo, or insignia, or whatever. I can’t skip it. It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve seen it. I have to sit there and wait for it to time out. I can’t do anything except wait.

Actually, that’s not exactly true. I can turn the DVD player off. But this does not bypass the UPOs.

Okay, so I wait for the studio’s logo screen (or whatever it is) to flash by on it’s own. Now I’m usually able to get to the menu. And if there are any previews, I can skip ‘em and head straight to the menu.

A friend of mine has some DVD ripping software which strips out these UPOs. I love it! Studios, are you reading? I friggin’ LOVE stripping out your UPOs! Now I am not stopped from getting to my movie, the one I bought and paid for with my good money.

And the sudios wonder why people rip their movies? I guess they’re just dense. Oh well!