Companies Withdraw Blu-ray Rippers Following DVDFab Lawsuit

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This is bad news for those of us that like to make legal back-ups of our legally purchased movies.

Following legal action against the company behind the DVDFab ripping software, two other companies - one of which is already designated a 'rogue site' by the USTR - have announced their immediate withdrawal from the Blu-ray ripping software market. DVDFab, meanwhile, remains defiant.
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I wonder if the U.S.'s pending relinquishing of its remaining control of the interwebz will make it harder for U.S. courts to seize or shut-down the domains of companies like this in the future (assuming said domains are not, foolishly, hosted on U.S. based hardware)?

I'm kind of curious on this point, as I'm not sure what legal mechanisms are currently used to do shut-down and seize orders at the present time. Obviously, U.S. based assets and websites are easy. But some of DVDFab's sites, according to what I've read, were .jp, so I'm not sure what jurisdictional tool the courts used to shut them down.
 
As long as AnyDVD sticks around (and since its a foreign owned company it likely will) I can continue to rip my collection for myself. Its a shame that fair use doesn't mean anything any longer.

What the media companies need to do is what the recording companies allow Amazon to do with music. If you buy a physical disk CD you automatically get a digital version you can download.
 
The can do whatever they want, but the internet will continue as if nothing happened. Won't stop ripping movies. Worse yet, you're making it unwelcoming for a US business to start up. Businesses have gotten so big that anything that completes against them is bad. Like dealerships in NJ with Tesla.
 
So... lets see if they make criminals out of anyone who already ahs ripping software. (Wouldn't surprise me if the tried).
 
You can use this free program to rip whatever you like: http://makemkv.com/

Then use HandBrake to convert your file or make it smaller.

Or just download the ripped movie from a torrent site and screw them
 
BBA said:
So... lets see if they make criminals out of anyone who already ahs ripping software. (Wouldn't surprise me if the tried).
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Theoretically, I'm guessing they already have. You're in possession of a tool defined by the courts as having a sole purpose in violation of the DCMA. If you use it, that's another criminal act.
Now, given the numbers, there is no way in hell they'd ever take action on that. Going after the provider is the only cost-effective tool, as they see it. Same as them taking down Kim.idiot and his Mega franchise, and ignoring the gazillion downloaders who used the site.
 
They should cry tears of joy that there are even people still willing to purchase content on physical media. The last time I bought content on a physical disc was in the 20th century.
 
T1125P said:
You can use this free program to rip whatever you like: http://makemkv.com/

Then use HandBrake to convert your file or make it smaller.

Or just download the ripped movie from a torrent site and screw them
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I had a funny one last night. Family member (in the USA) though that so long as they downloaded rips off foreign websites that it was legal.
 
www.dvdfab.com is now www.dvdfab.cn and seems to be alive and doing well. As of yesterday or today the program is now named "BluFab"

If I bought the DVD and want to RIP it to play on my portable device or make backup copies to play on my computer and as long as I don't distribute the content to others I don't see this as a legal issue at all.

DvdFab seems to have come up with the best and most complete one step program on the market...I see no reason to buy a movie twice just so I can watch is on my own personal devices.:mad:
 
My thought is that the MPAA is butthurt that their UltraViolet service has not gained any traction, so they're going after the people who make it possible to maintain your own digital library. I think last I looked the conversion rate of a Blu-ray purchase to UltraViolet is in the single digits. Probably one of the factors that is keeping Blu-ray movie prices up :rolleyes:.
 
My typical movie watching habits:

1) Receive DVD/Bluray from Netflix
2) Rip it with MakeMKV
3) Compress as desired with handbrake (to line up with the device - ipad, phone, computer)
4) Send the disk back to Netflix
5) Watch the compressed/uncompressed movie on the device of my choosing at a time of my choosing
6) Delete the movie file because those things are big yo

But I'm a criminal - and they are taking away my fair use tools :rolleyes:

Such BS - they want us all to become full on pirates I guess...
 
Tuthmose said:
I wonder if the U.S.'s pending relinquishing of its remaining control of the interwebz will make it harder for U.S. courts to seize or shut-down the domains of companies like this in the future (assuming said domains are not, foolishly, hosted on U.S. based hardware)?

I'm kind of curious on this point, as I'm not sure what legal mechanisms are currently used to do shut-down and seize orders at the present time. Obviously, U.S. based assets and websites are easy. But some of DVDFab's sites, according to what I've read, were .jp, so I'm not sure what jurisdictional tool the courts used to shut them down.
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My guess would be the tool is DMCA. I hope this bs changes. A person I know had to take down his findings from his 3d vision blog. I don't remember it in detail but the movie industry wasn't thrilled with his tutorial and he had to take it down.

On the other hand, I just checked and this particular instance is hosted in the US. Why would he host anything over there is beyond me.
 
dgz said:
My guess would be the tool is DMCA.
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That's just it - the DMCA is an American law. It, and court cases based upon it, aren’t worth squat in other nations. From what I know, American companies like Verisign control .com, .net, and .org, among others. So, foreign-based company or not, your domain can be seized by the U.S. gub'mint if it is those domains.

But I read that DVDFab lost a couple of .jp websites. How did that happen? I’m assuming those weren’t hosted in the U.S. nor are national domains like. .jp managed by U.S. companies, although I guess that could be an invalid assumption. Does the U.S. have some sort of agreement with Japan on such issues? Does its control of some elements of the internet give it the power to yank a such a foreign domain (I didn’t think it did)? Inquiring minds want to know . . .
 
While I am all for being able to make back up copies..

I haven't bought or rented a disk based movie in at least 2 years.
 
I tend to refuse to watch any major movie that isn't directly from (physical disk, or a lossless rip). Anything less, I consider a waste of time. Streaming only stuff goes to the back of my list.
 
so its illegal to make copies of a dvd or blu-ray you own? :rolleyes:


I could see it being a problem if your copying a dvd or blu-ray and selling copies for profit, like some shade tree guys do.

Every movie I own take the disk rip it to my computer for a digital copy. Sometimes I will compress it if I'm not to concerned with it being perfect quality. I have over 100 blu-rays and they all sit on my shelf never to be touched again. It is easier and faster to just stream it from my computer. I can use the search features to find exactly the movie I want in under 10 seconds. It also makes my movies available to me anywhere I go.

I personally don't see a problem of downloading a torrent for a movie you already own either.

Media industry is drunk, and needs to go home.
 
Tuthmose said:
That's just it - the DMCA is an American law. It, and court cases based upon it, aren’t worth squat in other nations. From what I know, American companies like Verisign control .com, .net, and .org, among others. So, foreign-based company or not, your domain can be seized by the U.S. gub'mint if it is those domains.

But I read that DVDFab lost a couple of .jp websites. How did that happen? I’m assuming those weren’t hosted in the U.S. nor are national domains like. .jp managed by U.S. companies, although I guess that could be an invalid assumption. Does the U.S. have some sort of agreement with Japan on such issues? Does its control of some elements of the internet give it the power to yank a such a foreign domain (I didn’t think it did)? Inquiring minds want to know . . .
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I am not sure but trade agreements are a thing. Also, a couple of jobs ago my boss and a few bigger fish paid a special police department good money to "visit" some of their enemies - well known pirates. The raid went through. I always assumed the money came from outside.

But money might be all of it. US is a powerful country and it often imposes its will on other countries even without trade agreements. Lets not play naive here - this happens all the time.
 
They are shooting themselves in the foot. If I can't rip my own Blu-ray/DVD, I'll go torrent the bitch. It's increasing piracy because they want users to buy a copy for physical and use their usually sub-par streaming service to control the digital media. They don't want you to have a digital copy that you can copy & distribute as you want. But, I've never copied my digital rips to give to someone else. I'll loan out a DVD or Blu-ray, though.

They are pulling the leash tighter and tighter so they can have full control over stuff, but it's making people find other means to get their products which leave them with less profit in the end.
 
weuntouchable said:
As long as AnyDVD sticks around (and since its a foreign owned company it likely will) I can continue to rip my collection for myself. Its a shame that fair use doesn't mean anything any longer.

What the media companies need to do is what the recording companies allow Amazon to do with music. If you buy a physical disk CD you automatically get a digital version you can download.
Click to expand...

Fair Use is still in play, the problem is we have blanket restrictions on breaking encryption. This isnt a copyright case, its really a DMCA encryption case.
 
dgz said:
I am not sure but trade agreements are a thing. Also, a couple of jobs ago my boss and a few bigger fish paid a special police department good money to "visit" some of their enemies - well known pirates. The raid went through. I always assumed the money came from outside.

But money might be all of it. US is a powerful country and it often imposes its will on other countries even without trade agreements. Lets not play naive here - this happens all the time.
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Understood - we leveraged Russia not so long ago in a similar case: Get rid of site such-n-such, or we might not be able to see our way through to sign that trade deal . . .

In a case with this media coverage and court involvement, I'd expect that there'd be some "legitimate" looking channel. Japan is, despite the crony-capitalist-driven corruption for which they are notorious, a nation that maintains at least the appearance of the rule of law. The political-scientist in me is just curious what card the U.S. played to get this done. If, as you suggest, it was all hidden money and back-room shenanigans, that's worth knowing too . . .
 
Honestly if they do this I just wont even bother with blu rays. Sometimes I question if it was even worth getting a player for my HTPC. The need to use anydvd over priced software driving by ridiculous royalties etc.... I am tired of the draconian controls on blu ray. I don't even buy them because of this and I will probably stop renting them if any of my software breaks. Its becoming a matter of principle.
 
hopefully all these guys will just give their shit away for free / make it open source and walk away.
 
It would really suck if all these tools went away. The others night for the first time in years I pop in a blu ray to watch from the disk (usually there all played off my server) . I was so mad that I had to sit through 10 previews to watch the movie that I bought. Bunch of crap that I can't buy something and use it for personal use how ever I see fit.
 
Makeroflostsouls said:
It would really suck if all these tools went away. The others night for the first time in years I pop in a blu ray to watch from the disk (usually there all played off my server) . I was so mad that I had to sit through 10 previews to watch the movie that I bought. Bunch of crap that I can't buy something and use it for personal use how ever I see fit.
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Or the FBI/Interpol warnings, anti-piracy commercial... Um, I BOUGHT the Blu-ray, I'm not the one you should be warning. I have no idea why they think they can punish those that BUY the thing instead of pirates. They treat the customers like the pirates. Pretty shitty if you ask me... Yet, I still buy Blu-ray's...
 
Why rip movies when you could join the cloud. Just a cheap monthly fee of Amazon Prime. Oh that's right, nobody likes to pay out their ass.
 
Thank you Blufab. It's like they want our kids to scratch the shit out of our discs so that we have to repeatedly repurchase them.
 
Nevermind, neither DVDfab or Blufab work anymore. I think it's a blanket ban on operation if you are in the US. Never upgraded DVDfab past v8, but it no longer recognizes discs. Installed the new Blufab 9, doesn't work either.
 
Tbh i dont give a fck if they consider it to be illegal. I always make a copy of mostly all of my physical purchases movies games or music. They call it illegal I do not. It is that simple.

There is of course the law but there is also common sense plus money the buyer pays. So fck such "laws".
 
Not sure about how this helps the media companies. They're giving me less incentive to buy their product. If I can't rip it to my media server, why would I buy it?
 
Also... so its OK for the NSA to break the encryption on SSL & VPNs and smartphone encryption services etc. without obtaining a warrant (or getting a warrant from a secret court without third party oversight)... but companies can't sell decryption software for DVD's and Blu Rays so people can make a backup of a disk they paid for? Sounds about right coming from this country :rolleyes:
 
pbassjunk said:
Nevermind, neither DVDfab or Blufab work anymore. I think it's a blanket ban on operation if you are in the US. Never upgraded DVDfab past v8, but it no longer recognizes discs. Installed the new Blufab 9, doesn't work either.
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I noticed this also. I inadvertently let dvdfab update to the latest version a couple weeks ago found out the hard way. I am glad a good downloaded version from a month back still in my downloads. I uninstalled that latest version and installed the older version.
Going to need to update to something eventually though.
You are saying that the blufab from the .cn site does not even work?
 
If I had more hard drives, I'd rip my entire collection to .mkv. Nothing beats custom software playback.
 
I actually popped a BRD in the other day (Had to wipe the dust off the player) and was quickly reminded how damn annoying it is to have to site through the damn trailers that won't let you bypass them. My second thought was "I need to get this damn disc ripped".
 
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