Daily News Brief: Creative Publicly Denounces Modder & Sparks Internet Backlash
Posted 03/31/08 at 03:28:16 PM | by Paul Lilly
Creative Publicly Chastises Modder
Modder Daniel_K recently drew the ire of Creative Labs, and he did so by writing soundcard drivers that many considered superior to Creative's own offerings. X-Fi and Audigy owners have long complained about Vista support, and Daniel_K's modified drivers addressed a number of common complaints. But Daniel_K also infringed upon Creative's intellectual property, "in effect, stealing our goods," said Phil O'Shaughness, VP Corporate Communications for Creative Labs Inc. in a public forum post. He went on tell Daniel_K to "cease all further unauthorized distribution of our technology and IP,," sparking 135 167 180 195 pages (and counting) of angry responses, negative internet attention, and at least one vendor willing to boycott the company's products. Hindsight anyone?
Vista Pretty in Pink
Mixing red with white will give you pink, and bundling Vista Home Premium with Windows Live OneCare will give you a pink box if you live in Japan. Could this be what CEO Steve Ballmer meant when he said "We're going to have to invest more than we ever have in consumer excitement. We're going to do more to highlight Windows."? Makes sense, as our first complaint with Vista has always been the color of the box. Wait, what?
TorrentSpy Closes Down
Another BitTorrent site fell by the wayside, this time on a semi-voluntary basis. In a message posted on all that's left of their website, TorrentSpy wrote they have "spent the last two years, and hundreds of thousands of dollars, defending the rights of our users and ourselves." TorrentSpy recently lost a two-year court battle with the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), ultimately adding to the decision to close down and joining several other now-defunct BitTorrent sites.
Linux Survives Pwn to Own Contest
A MacBook Air was the first to get bludgeoned in CanSecWest's Pwn to Own contest last week, and when the dust settled, only the Linux based notebook emerged unscathed. On the third and final day of the challenge, Shane Macaulay from Security Objectives exploited an Adobe Flash zero-day vulnerability, winning both the Vista notebook and a $5000 cash prize for his efforts. According to TippingPoint, several attendees did find bugs in the Linux OS, but most shied away from the work required to develop the exploited code.
R.I.P. Internet?
Mark Cuban, former avid blogger and current billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks, declared the internet dead. And boring. The comments came during the CTAM Summit's closing session, in which he proclaimed "The Internet's for old people," contradicting statements he made a decade ago that in ten year's time, the internet would have the necessary bandwidth to make it a superior portal for video programming. Translated for our NBA fan-based readership, Cuban is essentially saying the internet is as dead as the Dallas Mavericks chances of making the playoffs, and just as boring to watch with Dirk Nowitzky sidelined for the season. ZING!
Wii News
- Could the Nintendo Wii shortage soon be a thing of the past? According to analyst Michael Pacter at Wedbush Morgan, the answer depends on the strength of the dollar. Pacter argues a weak dollar in the U.S. caused Nintendo to ship excess Wiis to Europe where the console maker could take in a bigger profit. With demand in Europe subsiding, Pacter sees the Wii becoming more plentiful stateside later this year.
- Thanks to engineers David Bruemmer and Douglas Few, disarming bombs may have gotten a Wii bit easier. Seeking to improve control of the bomb- disarming Packbot, the engineering duo came up with a way to control the military robot with a Wii remote, which they claim offers much better control than the joypad typically used. Read more of what they've been up to here.
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Creative wants to control "Abandonware"
Submitted by bduckman on Fri, 2008-04-04 05:16
So, Creative chose not to update drivers for older equipment to work with a newer OS? Certainly their choice. An admittedly boneheaded decision, but how is this different from when XP first came out and we needed to buy new printers or new versions of software to maintain functionality?
Here's what I don't understand, if Creative has chosen NOT to update drivers of old equipment, haven't they basically abandoned that equipment? And if it's abandoned, why do they care what someone else does with it, aside from the burden of competing against themselves? Surely Creative has the programmer expertise, knowledge, and resources to write their own drivers, they simply have chosen not to do so. (Idiots.)
Meanwhile, here's my suggestion for Creative: offer a newer card with better features and better drivers at a better price. Us Techheads always want "better/faster," not "newer/shiney-er."
If Creative truly wants to make those older cards obsolete, then give us something so much better we'd all feel stupid keeping the old card.
Look! A distraction!
Submitted by Shalbatana on Wed, 2008-04-02 10:08
See what happens when one company corners the market?
I agree, the best path should have been for them to take his work and incorporate it into their own having him stopped in the process saying "we want to maintain one single distribution point for our customers".
IMO most companies (granted more the video card industry than sound) could care less about drivers. If the card has already sold there's no need to make it work fully. I've had a GFX card since Nov. (it was released last Sept), and no one can get the card to function properly unless they use 3rd party drivers. Even now Sapphire's drivers still don't work properly (AGP 2600XT). It's a shame. A total shame.
There's no time like the future.
Creative
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Tue, 2008-04-01 19:21
I'm not a programmer but I've had driver creation explained to me by friends that are programmers and it seems that it isn't that impossible for the community out there to build drivers that would add functionality to hardware that creative refuses to support. Now Creative cannot tell me that I cannot write a driver from the ground up for a piece of hardware that I bought. If I want to run an Audigy in Vista with my own drivers then Creative has no legal leg to stand on. And if Creative makes a program that disables the plug and play functionality of "MY" sound card that I bought and paid for, that makes my sound card invisible to Windows then Creative has a law suit. I recently upgraded to an Xfi from my Audigy 2 after I installed Vista SP1 because I thought I broke it somehow because I installed a second video card at the same time. If it wasn't me but Creative that broke the functionality of my sound card that was working just fine.. I'm going to be really mad and I will be the first to start a class action law suit. Basically that is what a virus does it disables capabilities of your pc. Creative a virus writing company?
Shuddup Cuban
Submitted by horzo on Tue, 2008-04-01 14:48
If you actually read more on Cuban's rant, his criticism of the Internet is based entirely on the assertion that it's not the ideal platform for media distribution...
"In effect, Cuban said, cable networks are “intranets,” which, by their nature, operate more efficiently than the Internet. Cable-system operators can control the quality of service they supply and the amount of bandwidth that developers can use. Plus, there is no friction in transporting services and data within their networks."
Or, in other words, "I want a distribution network that can be controlled by content providers in order to streamline the production and distribution of DRM-ed media so that assholes like me can make buckets and buckets of money."
Submitted by Pr0LifIC_onE on Tue, 2008-04-01 09:41
The Mavericks are soon to be sitting at home this playoff season. I think that reality is driving the poor old man, Mark Cuban, insane and senile...
Submitted by popstop785 on Tue, 2008-04-01 08:24
Did Mark Cuban just call me old?
Submitted by Keith E. Whisman on Tue, 2008-04-01 06:13
I don't see what the big problem is. The Xfi drivers are licensed and closed source. By reverse engineering or modifying Creatives licensed closed source driver software you are violating copy right law. I think Creative should have contacted him to apply his modifications to the drivers but thats me. Linux has software that allows you to build your own drivers and if he had just built his own drivers from the ground up I don't think Creative would have a leg to stand on.
I just bought an Xfi Extreme gamer and I really like it. If there is something out there that will make my purchase even better I want it. Creative should figure that out. It's not like Creative has alot of competition. Why would'nt Creative want it's customers to be happier with thier products. These are questions that should be asked of Creative but picking on them for protecting their licensed products is'nt write.And the pinko wrapping for Vista should sell great in SanFrancisco.
What set Creative off isn't
Submitted by Haipyng on Tue, 2008-04-01 10:34
What set Creative off isn't so much that he modified their drivers, it's that he modified their drivers for cards that they said wouldn't work on Vista. As it came out, they won't work because of a business decision to force upgrades on users.
Phil O'Shaughnessy, VP Corporate Communications said on their website: "If we choose to develop and provide host-based processing features with certain sound cards and not others, that is a business decision that only we have the right to make."
Basically they are forcing users to buy new cards. Their old cards (Audigy) are perfectly capable of working with Vista, Creative chooses not to let them work. This comes out on top of a long history of troubled driver releases, luke warm support, and customer gripes. The IP threat is just a way to put an end to it.
Creative is perfectly within it's rights to make such a business decision on what hardware to support, and when to enforce it's IP rights. There is a certain ethical question in there about Creative's responsibilities to their customers. Users have picked up on that and the backlash is the result. Creative is exercising their rights, and customers are exercising theirs; to choose other products.
As to whether it will have any real effect remains to be seen.
Poo Poo, Creative!
Submitted by Talcum X on Tue, 2008-04-01 04:58
You should have hired him, not fired at him.
**********
Every morning is the dawn of a new error.
Submitted by SpazzAttack on Mon, 2008-03-31 22:48
Creative's drivers have been crapware for a while now--even in 32-bit Windows XP Pro. I have had one of their X-FI Fatality sound cards since they were first released. The drivers for that card have been a source of BSODs since day one.
Three weeks ago, I switched to an HT Claro Omega Plus sound card and all my sound driver BSOD crashes have gone away with them. Oh yeah, and the sound quality is better to boot. The Claro dosent have all the whiz bang EAX 5.0 effects, but I haven't missed them in my gaming.
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