Z - Importing into iTunes / Playing on your PC

[ratsprayer]

the clones would be programmed to not get sick at all, thats one of their many benefits.  humans arent perfect, so these clones would be über-human.  

of course, this just writes itself as one of those strange twilight zone episodes where the clones might eventually rebel and do strange things, maybe gwen stefani covers?

anyway people, it would be nothing but interesting.

[EC]

Umm, I hate to burst your bubble, but it doesn't seem very likely that they can make perfect replicas of humans who would be disease and illness free.  I mean, that just doesn't seem like a possibiltity.  I'm sorry to single you out and shoot your theory down, but, you know, it's just not realistic, ratsprayer.  I mean, come ON.

:)

[ratsprayer]

Umm, I hate to burst your bubble, but it doesn't seem very likely that they can make perfect replicas of humans who would be disease and illness free.  I mean, that just doesn't seem like a possibiltity.  I'm sorry to single you out and shoot your theory down, but, you know, it's just not realistic, ratsprayer.  I mean, come ON.

:)

all right fine!  free mp3s of the album it is.  having clones would just double the number of people to blame for this mess anyway.  

[realdeal]

Bought the terrific Z and installed the hideous SONY software on my pc. The computer collapsed after a few days. Just a coincidence? Is a cd worth $1,500?

pc for ya....go mac.

[LaurieBlue]

http://media.www.dailyiowan.com/media/paper599/news/2005/12/15/Metro/No.Protection.From.Fans.Wrath-1128432.shtml?sourcedomain=www.dailyiowan.com&MIIHost=media.collegepublisher.com

No protection from fans' wrath
By: Charlie Moran - The Daily Iowan
Issue date: 12/15/05 Section: Metro
Article Tools: Page 1 of 1

My Morning Jacket's newest album, Z, has become a lightning rod for fans, but not because it marks a casual withdrawal from the alt-country stage or because Radiohead's producer may have cut back on singer Jim James' distinctive reverb.

Since its October release, the band has received a flood of complaints from fans because - as are dozens of other new releases this year - Z is copy-protected. Software loaded on the disc limits users from burning more than three copies, playing the songs in iTunes, or, most grievously, transferring them to an iPod.

Since 2003, the band's parent label, Sony BMG, has led the industry's new fight against "casual piracy," with similar protection measures on more than 300 titles in the United States. But for a band such as My Morning Jacket - which has barely sold more than 60,000 copies of its new album - copy protection might not be protecting what matters most: the goodwill of fans.

Brooklyn McInroy, who has listened to the Kentucky quintet for two years, had fully intended to buy Z on its release date until she learned that it was copy-protected.

"I went on Amazon.com to check out some of the reviews for the CD, " she said, "and, when I read that it was all crazy copyright-protected ... I decided to skip it."

Listeners of the UI's student-run radio station, KRUI, will no longer be able to hear artists who have protected CDs because of a new unofficial policy barring them from the station's library.

"We don't want to alienate our audience, so we're going to have to pull them," said Marcelo Mena, the station's music director.

Along with Z, only two other CDs have been removed, Imogen Heap's Speak For Yourself and Kings of Leon's Aha Shake Heartbreak, both under the Sony BMG umbrella.

"It's a huge pain in the ass to operate with them," said Mena, who cannot use copy-protected discs on his pre-recorded show because the software prevents him from ripping the songs to a hard drive. For the same reason, these discs impede the station's efforts to fully digitize its music library.

My Morning Jacket's bass player, Tom Blankenship (Tommy Two-Tone), says he felt misled when - two months before Z's release - Sony BMG informed the band about the copy protection.

"I don't know if they knew everything about it," he said in a telephone interview with The Daily Iowan. "We were told there would be no problem getting it on an iPod."

In response to the influx of e-mails from fans, his band and others, such as the Foo Fighters and Dave Matthews Band, have posted links on their websites to copy-protection workarounds that allow fans to transfer music to their iPods.

Blankenship said the members of My Morning Jacket were unhappy with the protection, but Sony BMG would not release the album without it.

In November, computer-security experts discovered that 4 million Sony BMG CDs with a different copy-protection system, XCP, had secretly installed software on their owners' PCs, making them vulnerable to hacker attacks. After several lawsuits and the emergence of Trojan-horse viruses designed to exploit the software, the New York City record label recalled the discs.

Last week, Sony BMG released a patch that addressed a lesser security vulnerability in MediaMax, and experts maintain that the software is still not secure.

Thomas Hesse, the head of Sony BMG's global digital business, responded to criticism of copy-protection measures on Dec. 9, saying, "Copyright infringement is a huge issue for the recording industry, as a whole, and that's where we came from originally." The company plans to "diligently re-evaluate" its protection schemes for the future.

Sony BMG has included the same copy-protection measures found on Z in more than 20 million CDs, and it has not yet scrapped its plans to implement protection in every new release next year.

"It's made a lot of consumers mad," Blankenship said. "And they have every right to be."

E-mail DI reporter Charlie Moran at:
charlie-moran@uiowa.edu

[Michael]

As asked earlier, does this affect the UK/Euro version? I bought it earlier today and there's no mention of copy protection anywhere on the packaging.

[CC]

As asked earlier, does this affect the UK/Euro version? I bought it earlier today and there's no mention of copy protection anywhere on the packaging.

I don't think so, no.

[tomEisenbraun]

and now does everybody see why the record got pushed back? it's funny how quick we forgot about that happening, but i would more than bet that this was part of the deal, if not the source of it.

and Tracy, I think you have an apt quote for this one (you know, all caps and the whole shebang...)

[mbradley14]

I understand that the band didn't know about the copy protection snafu. I hope they'll understand that, because of the difficulties and frustrations and the possible compromising of a $1,500 computer, I've simply decided to listen to other people's music.

[what a load of crap]

I understand that the band didn't know about the copy protection snafu. I hope they'll understand that, because of the difficulties and frustrations and the possible compromising of a $1,500 computer, I've simply decided to listen to other people's music.

What, you don't listen to music that isn't digitized?  What a load of crap.  You'll steer clear of a great band because of this??  

And the radio station above, what a load of shit!  They didn't spend five minutes to work around this?  what the hell is this world coming to....a radio station won't play a great band because the format of the media doesn't fit their tastes?  So they play no vinyl, or cassettes, or any other medium other than digitized CD's???   Jesus Christ, what lazy asses!

[marcopolo]

I own 2 pc's and was unable to get the album to play at all on either one.  When I insert the cd I receive a message:

 "... components could not be installed.  Contact customer support."

After attempting and failing to fix using pc fixes previously posted, I went old school.  I pulled out an old analog cd recorder and proceeded to copy the cd.  I then inserted the copied cd into my pc which saw 10 unlabeled tracks.  From there I ripped these 10 tracks into mp3's, then used Windows Media Player to search online for the tags.  Worked like a charm.

For those of you who don't have an old-school cd recorder, my guess is you can do the same thing by plugging a standard cd player into the audio input jacks of your pc.  From there you can copy the cd on to the hard drive (or another disc), then rip the tracks as mp3's on to your pc.  From there, use WMP or the CDDB database to tag the files.  

It's pathetic that we have to do this to listen to music we PAID FOR, but the alternative is not hearing this fantastic album on your pc or ipod.  

As for MMJ and their Management, cheers.  They've been extremely kind in dealing with me and their fans on this issue.  I can't say enough to their personal integrity.  You've got a fan for life.

As for Sony/BMG - keep up your idiotic approach to business.  The more you fight the changing landscape of the music industry, the faster you'll bury yourselves.  R.I.P.

[tsk1122]

Does anyone know what address we can send in our Z cd, to exchange for one without all the piracy protection crap on it?

Thanks.

Tim

[ragofrmct]

http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=154811

Here is a link for removing the SunnComm copy protection software from your computer.
In yesterdays USA Today there was an article that claimed SunnComm had posted an uninstall program themselves, but I couldn't find it on their website.

Thanks Bilbo!! I spent about 2 hours trying to figure this out using the Princeton link, and using your link I was able to finally get this to work.  what a pain in the ass though.  After uninstalling the mediamax I ripped to windows media player, burned a cd, and Itunes was able to read it.  Thanks for the help!!

[EInar]

Holding the shift putton down while i inserted the disc worked for me. I am using Creative Media Source software for ripping the tracks.

[LaurieBlue]

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/963aaecc-7bb1-11da-ab8e-0000779e2340.html

Sony BMG settles suits over 'flawed' music CDs
By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson in London
Published: January 2 2006 17:11 |
Last updated: January 2 2006 17:11

Sony BMG has put the biggest of its legal challenges behind it.

 
The music company has settled a series of class-action lawsuits stemming from its use of software that was intended to prevent illegal copying of its CDs but left customers' computers vulnerable to viruses and other attacks.

Ending a year in which it has been shaken by bad publicity surrounding the digital rights management software, the music company offered free music downloads and agreed to stop making CDs with the offending XCP or MediaMax software.

The company also agreed to bring in an independent auditor to confirm to customers it has not and will not use their personal data.

Sony BMG produced 4.7m CDs containing the software, of which nearly 3m were sold. It will pay an undisclosed amount for the recall of affected discs, and will also bear the cost of compensating members of the class-action suits.

Consumers who bought any of the 52 titles with XCP software will receive replacement copies and the choice of two compensation packages: a cash payment of $7.50 and one free album download; or three free album downloads. Users of the MediaMax software will receive a free download.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs welcomed the settlement, which the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital free-speech advocacy group, said would "provide significant benefits for consumers who bought the flawed CDs".

The copy protection problem emerged after a security researcher revealed on his blog that a Sony BMG CD had installed a "rootkit" – tools used by hackers to disguise their presence – on his computer.

[tsk1122]

Consumers who bought any of the 52 titles with XCP software will receive replacement copies and the choice of two compensation packages: a cash payment of $7.50 and one free album download; or three free album downloads. Users of the MediaMax software will receive a free download.


So how do we go about getting these downloads?

[Anonymous Jones]

If you have been infected by the malware contained in the 'Z' CD like me.

1. run 'cmd /k sc query $sys$aries' DOES NOT expose the malware.

2. EAC will NOT bypass the malware.

3. Sadly, there is nothing you can do to bypass the malware once you have been infected.

There is a simple fix:
1. paste the following link into your IE address bar http://www.sunncomm.com/support/tools/uninstall3.asp and accept the ActiveX control... let it run.  Restart.

2. Hold Shift when you put the 'Z' CD into your machine.

3. USe EAC (Exact Audio Copy) to rip.  You can download at: http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/eac-0.95b3.exe

If the drive does not recognize the CD, there are tons of blogs on this.  Chances are you don't have the correct ASPI installed... you'll need to figure this one out for yourselves.

4. Copy to IPOD
---------------------------------------------------

My Editorial:
Good and Bad

Bad:
I was heartbroken taking the evildoer's antidote.  Usually I find the cures off of blogs where smart people manage to communicate that they have creatively solved the problem.  In this case, Suncomm created the perfect malware.

The venom that spewed from the helpless masses (even miss-directed at the band... who was helpless too BTW) was painful to read.

Good:
The internet has finally come to a good place!   You don't need to find a cure on the 'dark side' of the internet.  MASSIVE shared public opinion and outcry saved the day.  It's amazing how many people can be affected by public opinion in the web.  We got the manufacturer to post the fix... howabout that!  THANKS!

[Patrick Lang]

So any word on when we'll see Z without XCP on store shelves?  I cannot morally buy it until I find it without XCP, and I have not heard it yet because of this.  I won't buy through iTunes, MSN, because I won't support Sony until they release this CD without XCP.

I don't know if its been mentioned yet or not, but the rootkit portion of XCP is being removed by the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool, see: http://blogs.technet.com/antimalware/archive/2005/11/12/414299.aspx

This does not remove the actual XCP filter driver that munges the audio rips, you still need to go elsewhere to uninstall it and rip into MP3/etc.

[Randy Hunter]

I didn't know anything about this until tonight. I bought the CD two days ago and today imported to my iPod and was able to play the tracks with no problem......................UNTIL tonight when trying to import songs from OTHER discs iTunes kept giving me random "could not import - unknown error" on a several tracks. The topic of Sony spyware was mentioned on a tech support thread elsewhere.

I used the suncomm remove tool and then was able to import all those CDs with no trouble.
WHAT THE HELL?!?

I purchased this album and want to use the computer I own to put the songs on the iPod I own. I was never presented with any consent screen or License Agreement for the suncomm software. If I sneaked into the Suncomm corporate offices [or cracked their network security] and installed software on their computers I WOULD BE THROWN IN FEDERAL PRISON.

What a pisser of a way to screw up an otherwise insanely great album.

[Enzo]

If you have been infected by the malware contained in the 'Z' CD like me.

1. run 'cmd /k sc query $sys$aries' DOES NOT expose the malware.

2. EAC will NOT bypass the malware.

3. Sadly, there is nothing you can do to bypass the malware once you have been infected.

There is a simple fix:
1. paste the following link into your IE address bar http://www.sunncomm.com/support/tools/uninstall3.asp and accept the ActiveX control... let it run.  Restart.

2. Hold Shift when you put the 'Z' CD into your machine.

3. USe EAC (Exact Audio Copy) to rip.  You can download at: http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/eac-0.95b3.exe

If the drive does not recognize the CD, there are tons of blogs on this.  Chances are you don't have the correct ASPI installed... you'll need to figure this one out for yourselves.

4. Copy to IPOD
---------------------------------------------------

Used steps 1 & 2 from the simple fix section, then substituted Media Player for step 3.
Worked perfectly.
Thanks!