One upon a time in a galaxy far, far away, most consumer products were expected to work "off the shelf" and didn't require frequent "firmware updates" to do so. With the new generation of HD DVD and Blu-ray video players, however, this is the norm: firmware updates are to be expected because the players are constantly evolving and are built around a DRM scheme (AACS) that can be "updated" in the event that a hack is found. Blu-ray goes one step further and adds another layer of anti-copy technology known as BD+, but the latter is only now starting to be used. As it turns out, it appears that it's causing problems for many honest customers.

Case in point: two new Blu-ray titles that have just been released—Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer and The Day After Tomorrow. Both of these titles have been reported to exhibit various degrees of failure on some Blu-ray players. Some refuse to play until after an interminable two-minute delay, others skip randomly making watching the movie futile, and then there is this gem:



Thank you, DRM. Image courtesy Engadget.

How nice of Fox to include a link to their web site in this helpful and friendly message! Unfortunately for the owners of the player in question, the second-generation Samsung BD-P1200, there is no new firmware to download for the player. Visiting the URL listed above—which after a maze of redirects and confusing menus finally does get you to Samsung's BD-P1200 firmware page—will give you no satisfaction. The latest firmware listed there is the same 1.0 version that shipped with the player. The same fate is in store for owners of LG's first-generation dual-format BH100 player.

Owners of the most popular Blu-ray disc player, Sony's PlayStation 3, are able to view both movies without issue, as long as they have updated their unit with the latest firmware version, 1.93. The Sony S1 and various Panasonic models can play the movie, but have the aforementioned slow load time issue. Samsung's older BD-1000 will play the movie but will skip uncontrollably.

So what is the issue with these titles? Both make use of advanced features that utilize BD-J, the Java virtual machine that is part of the Blu-ray spec. Silver Surfer uses BD-J to add a more dubious "feature"—the BD+ copy protection that is layered on top of Blu-ray discs' existing AACS copy protection. While some have claimed that it is BD-J that is at fault and not BD+, the latter requires the former to operate (it runs in a Java virtual machine), and a quick perusal of what BD+ actually does indicates that it is quite likely the culprit. BD+ is being rushed out to titles only shortly after the spec was finalized, partly in response to hackers cracking the protection on AACS earlier this year. This wouldn't be the first time that extra layers of copy protection have harmed legitimate consumers: earlier this year Sony had to recall 20 DVD titles protected with ARccOS that caused problems on some DVD players.

When Paramount recently announced that they were switching to HD DVD releases, one of the reasons a spokesperson gave Ars was that the Blu-ray spec was not "market-ready." Perhaps this is the sort of thing he meant.

Fox's position is that the problem is entirely the fault of the player manufacturers. Steve Feldstein, Fox senior VP of marketing communications, told Video Business that "consumers should lobby their hardware manufacturers to release firmware upgrades post haste" and that "the title was well-reviewed and playing well on updated players."

This is small consolation for those folks with players that haven't been updated and those that can't be updated. Perhaps I'm just old and curmudgeonly, but it seems crazy to me that one should ever have to worry about applying firmware updates to a standalone movie player. Many of these players don't have Ethernet ports, as the Blu-ray spec doesn't require them. Updating the firmware on these units involves downloading an .ISO from the web site, unpacking it, burning it onto a CD-R or CD-RW, putting the disc in the player, rebooting, following the prompts, and hoping that all goes well.

I don't know, maybe I'll just go out to see a movie tonight instead.