Supplementary Material

Technology: Level 2

The Technology of Music

TA225

Block 3 Reader

Copyright © 2004 The Open University SUP 66876 5

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Contents
1 Introduction 4

2 Chapter 5 Activity 33 4

3 Chapter 5 Activity 36 6

4 Chapter 5 Activity 47 8

4.1 Document 1: ‘Extreme lawsuits’ 9

4.2 Document 2: ‘For your ears only’ 12

4.3 Document 3: ‘Europe’s regulatory gridlock’ 15

4.4 Document 4: ‘Fort TV’ 17

Answers to self-assessment activities 20

Acknowledgements 20

BLOCK 3 READER 3
1 Introduction
This Reader booklet contains a number of article reprints that are linked to the
Reading activities in the main block text. The articles have been chosen to give
you further information or a different perspective on a topic, and/or to keep you
up-to-date with current developments in the music technology field. This is
particularly so in relation to the legal aspects of copyright where the situation is
continually changing.
The articles form part of the assessable material for the course and you may be
asked questions relating to the ideas and concepts introduced in any of them.
However, any assessment will only be of an overall nature unless an extract or
any necessary details are included in the question. When reading them, therefore,
you should make notes about overall ideas or points that the articles mention,
rather than concentrating on the detail. To give you an idea of the sort of
assessment questions that may be asked, one or more of the articles may have an
associated self-assessment activity either at the end or in the main text.

2 Chapter 5 Activity 33
‘When Caruso went foggy and started sweating’
An article by Michael Scott Rohan from the August 2002 issue of Gramophone
magazine about the problems that are already being experienced with the storage
and ageing of CDs.

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BLOCK 3 READER 5
3 Chapter 5 Activity 36
‘Ward Marston’
Andrew Farach-Colton interviews Ward Marston about his experiences of audio
restoration in an article from the February 2003 issue of Gramophone magazine.

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BLOCK 3 READER 7
4 Chapter 5 Activity 47
This reading activity contains reprints of four documents that appeared in the
May 2003 issue of IEEE Spectrum magazine. You should read all four articles
and attempt the self-assessment activites associated with them before returning to
the main text.
Brief introductions to each of the documents follow with an explanation of any
terms in the document which you may not have met and which are important to
your understanding of the document.

4.1 Document 1: ‘Extreme lawsuits’

This is an article by R Anthony Reese, an American writer, which describes how
digital technologies can control the way we use equipment and why individuals
and companies that attempt to circumvent these controls can become open to
prosecution. It cites several cases, not all of which appertain to copyrighted
material, and explains how the judgement was achieved. It is particularly useful
for you to have an understanding of the seminal case of Sony Corp. versus
Universal City Studios regarding the manufacture and sale of video recorders
(VCRs) as this is often quoted in copyright infringement cases.

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BLOCK 3 READER 9
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ACTIVITY 1 (SELF-ASSESSMENT)

State whether the court found for Sony Corp. or for Universal Studios and
make a summary of the verdict.

BLOCK 3 READER 11
4.2 Document 2: ‘For your ears only’
This article by Michael Jay Geier opens by considering the technological changes
that have occurred since the compact disc was first marketed in the mid-1980s. It
then explains how the Red Book standard for CDs restricts the various attempts
of the music industry to implement ways of preventing copies being made.
Several copy prevention systems are outlined.

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BLOCK 3 READER 13
 ACTIVITY 2 (SELF-ASSESSMENT)

(a) Describe the apparently perfect copy protection solution that is within the
Red Book framework.
(b) What is a major problem with this solution?

4.3 Document 3: ‘Europe’s regulatory gridlock’

In this article John Blau describes the situation in Europe at the beginning of
2003. The then 15 member states had to agree a common policy and, as you will
read, this takes time. In the interim some members are employing the simple
expedient, first used with analogue tapes, of levying a tax on recording equipment
and media.

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BLOCK 3 READER 15
 ACTIVITY 3 (SELF-ASSESSMENT)

Describe generally how Europe’s ‘New copyright directive’ (as at 2003)

differs from the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 which, for
example, requires manufacturers of VCRs to install copy control technology to
prevent unauthorised copying. There is no need to name individual members of
the European Union.

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4.4 Document 4: ‘Fort TV’
Digital radio broadcasting technologies may be a concern to the music industry in
the future as, potentially, high quality copies could be made off-air. Currently the
use of low bit-rates coupled with compressed digital audio data, discussed in
Chapter 4 of this Block, appears not to be troubling the music industry at the
moment. However, in this article Brian Smith gives an insight into the discussions
that have taken place between the music industry, manufacturers and legal experts
about ways to prevent redistribution of broadcast material, particularly on the
Internet, without inhibiting the rights of the legitimate consumer. Note, this is a
technically challenging article that you may find difficult to fully understand. If
so, do not worry about the detail of the techniques it describes, just make sure you
have a good grasp of the concepts and ideas mentioned.

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BLOCK 3 READER 19
 ACTIVITY 4 (SELF-ASSESSMENT)

What is the ‘analogue hole’ and what is being done to fill it?

Answers to self-assessment activities

Activity 1
The court found in favour of Sony Corp. Whilst buyers of VCRs may themselves
infringe copyright the most significant use of a VCR is as a time-shift device
whereby TV programmes are recorded, watched later and erased. This was
deemed to be non-infringing of copyright laws.

Activity 2
(a) Deliberate errors are added to the CD master. These errors are corrected by a
CD player’s error correction circuits but computer CD-ROM drives find them
difficult to resolve and so prevent them successfully reading the audio data.
(b) This method may shorten the life of CDs because accumulated dirt and
scratches may cause too many additional errors and cause the player to skip
tracks or be unable to play the CD.

Activity 3
In the US the Digital Millennium Copyright Act sought to impose technical
solutions before there was any industry consensus, and this led to many lawsuits
and protests. European Union countries generally use taxes on sales of recording
materials and equipment to compensate copyright holders. The new copyright
directive however, leaves the decision as to whether copyright holders should be
compensated or not to individual member countries.

Activity 4
All protection systems deal only with digital forms, currently no analogue outputs
are protected, leading to there being a gap or hole in the protection strategies
known as the analogue hole. This means that copies of a record can always be
made by converting the audio data to analogue form and then re-digitising it. At
the time of writing the Analogue Reconversion Discussion Group has been
established but there is no assurance of an outcome nor yet a timetable for
completion.

Acknowledgements
Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following sources for permission to

reproduce material within this booklet.

Rohan, M.S. (2002) ‘When Caruso went foggy and started sweating’,

Gramophone Magazine, August 2002, Haymarket Magazines Ltd.

Farach-Colton, A. (2003) ‘Ward Marston’, Gramophone Magazine, February

2003, Haymarket Magazines Ltd.

Reese, R.A. ‘Extreme Lawsuits’, Geier, M.J., ‘For your ears only’, Smith, B.,

‘Fort TV’, Blau, J., ‘Europe's regulatory gridlock’, © 2003 IEEE. Reprinted, with

permission, from IEEE Spectrum, May 2003.

Printed in the United Kingdom by Lithmark Limited.