Intel To Release Next-Gen BIOS Code Under CPL 224
An anonymous reader writes "Intel said today that it plans to release the 'Foundation code' of its next-generation firmware technology -- a successor to the PC BIOS -- under the Common Public License (CPL), an open source license, later this year. More than 20 years old, the BIOS (Basic Input-Output System) is the oldest software technology in PC platforms. Intel says its firmware Foundation code, a result of a project codenamed Tiano, 'provides that the successor to the BIOS will be based on up-to-date software technology.' The Foundation code is designed to be extended with new features and services, such as improved platform manageability, serviceability, and administrative interfaces which are too complex to implement in the old BIOS environment, according to Intel."
CPL (Score:5, Insightful)
DRM (Score:1, Insightful)
This technology is more commonly known as Digital Rights Management.
Microsoft Support? (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if this is going to be like Microsoft's "support" for Java...
Open bios code wont do you any good. (Score:5, Insightful)
OpenBoot? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems to me like a bad case of "Not Invented Here" syndrome.
Sounds good.... but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Like the original intent of cookies and the actuality of spyware use...
Re:An ode to DRM FUD (Score:4, Insightful)
I do have confidence in the Open Source hacker army, though, and that if there's a way, they'll figure it out.
One of the best ways, (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Not again... (Score:4, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Credibility for Intel (Score:1, Insightful)
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/muglia_win
Re:Great! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:An ode to DRM FUD (Score:5, Insightful)
If it works that way it'll also prevent a DRMd PC from sharing data with those linux servers becoming all so common nowadays. Works both ways.
In the end all depends on who ends up worse off.
Re:Not really (Score:3, Insightful)
Assembly Anyone? (Score:1, Insightful)
Riiiiiiiiiiight!
Are there any REAL Assembler programmers left who are willing to work for Intel??? That's the REAL question!
Re:OpenBoot? (Score:5, Insightful)
What's wrong with it? No DRM support (thus, no Microsoft support) and it wasn't invented by Intel. (Thus, no Intel support) It is, however, a far superior system, and yet another reason to get a Mac. (YARTGAM)
Get our minds right first and last. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:An ode to DRM FUD (Score:3, Insightful)
Err, that just meant that the end user wouldn't be paying directly for the hardware, just indirectly. Someone will still be writing a check to Intel for all of their components. I can't see how Intel would look on that other than favorably. That would actually mean that more hardware would get sold because boxes wouldn't be multi-purposed.
Free Programmers? (Score:4, Insightful)
More Secure? (Score:5, Insightful)
[sarcasm] Yeah, there were real virus problems w/ BIOS back when it was non-flashable. Those pesky viruses would pop my BIOS chip out and install a new one before I knew it.[/sarcasm]
Extra or additional drivers and code functions can be stored on the hard drive and accessed there.
Seems like this would increase the vulnerability of the BIOS.
Other than this problem and maybe not being able to control some of the OEM preboot (an odd word when you think of it) "features" (DRM, etc.), this doesn't sound too bad of a plan. Sounds like we're on the way to having the OS run off a FLASH disk or some type of firmware. It'd be ironic if, because of advanced DRM technology, we have to go back to the oldest mod trick - yank out the old chip and solder in the new, as was once done to upgrade BIOS.
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:4, Insightful)
Not all DRM is bad, or broken, or required. We have rights, after all, and management of their digital representations is necessary in our increasingly digital environment. But an inaccurate model of our rights, and our transactions within them, will deny those rights. And that will further undermine the model. Leaving us with a world even less inhabitable than now, when these technologies are pursued with exactly the opposite values. So we must be careful how we begin, or it will be a lost cause from the start.
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you have far too much faith in these systems and a fundamental misunderstanding of what copyright is meant to protect. First, already in combination with laws like the DMCA, DRM is used to deny fair use rights--to state the most obvious example, but by far not the most important. Second, you fail to realize that the purpose of copyright is to encourage progress, not protect 'creations.'
This is because American copyright, as envisioned by the Framers, rejects any moral or property protections and relies instead on a way of viewing creative progress as what I would call a 'collaboration' between generations. Each subsequent generation must have free access to the previous generations' works in order to build upon them. It is thus an essential function of any rational society or system to not impede progress by essentially granting a single generation full control to lock out future generations.
But of course, copyright doesn't allow this anyways, as I spent the last paragraph stating, because it misunderstands that copyright is a protection of some sort of inherent 'right' in the act of creation rather than a protection of progress through balanced public and private rights. In actuality, the more dangerous effect of DRM is that copyright itself becomes obsolete in a DRM-capable world. Companies need only decide what allowances they want to give to consumers through technology, and the balancing effect of the law dissappears.
so much for preview (Score:3, Insightful)
Should be:
"But of course, copyright doesn't allow this anyways, as I spent the last paragraph stating, because that would misunderstand copyright to be a protection of some sort of inherent 'right' in the act of creation rather than a protection of progress through balanced public and private rights."
Sorry!
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:5, Insightful)
I oppose DRM because I believe in the right to private property (namely my computer). Nothing to do with copyright violation.
Re:Not really (Score:5, Insightful)
Ironically, Congress is forcing auto makers to reveal their "precious precious IP" because your average mechanic can't read the chips in your car. Basically auto makers were trying to get you to take your car into the dealer to get an oil change. Congress stepped up and said "that's unfair trade practice".
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:5, Insightful)
No, in such a case, you won't be able to easily share music you create, or a free software program you write to the world unless you get certified by (who? BSA?) whoever for huge amounts of cash to become a "trusted" provider. Or convince your users, if they have an option, to turn off the security setting that Microsoft, anti-virus companies, mainstream press and all others say is wrong to do, will result in worms and viruses, and will no longer be supported by the OEM.
I am not saying this is what will happen. I am saying it depends on what will, and how much monopolies [microsoft.com] and cartels [riaa.org] can get away with.
Re:An ode to DRM FUD (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course untill the **AA's use there bought congress critters to pass a law stating that anyone who uses a DRM free machine is violating the law.
Re:Credibility for Intel (Score:4, Insightful)
It is a trick. They are publishing the source code, but that source code is USELESS.
If I know that I can always depend on my computer to do what I tell it to and not what Intel/Microsoft/Belken tell it to do, I will go that route.
Then you need to make sure NEVER to let this crap touch your computer! This system is EXACTLY designed to make it impossible to control your own computer. If you change so much as a single instruction then the Trust chip generates a different hash value. With a different hash value the Trust chip cannot decrypt anything. Ultimately you may be denied any internet access at all.
I had decided on AMD. I'm now considering Intel as an option.
Unfortunately AMD is on board with this crap as well. So are Motorola, Transmeta, and even ARM. There's really no good-guys to turn to at this point, but if you want to boycott someone then Intel definitely tops the list. AMD is just following along because they will up and die if the next version of Windows refuses to run on an AMD chip.
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Re:An ode to DRM FUD (Score:2, Insightful)
In fact, that's why people are opposed to MS DRM in particular - they dislike losing their property rights, and especially dislike losing them in the name of corporate profit!
Re:Microsoft Support? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's more like Microsoft support for Palladium.
As a matter of fact this *is* Microsoft support for Palladium.
Central elements of the system were designed by Microsoft + Intel + the rest of the Trusted Computing Group. This new "Foundation code" *is* the Palladium replacement for BIOS. It is the Trusted Computing foundation.
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It's worse than that. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:2, Insightful)
> wishes, which is hardly an essential function of any society or
> system.
If it's not an essential function, then why do the Music and Movie industries want it on every computer?
Re:Get our minds right first and last. (Score:1, Insightful)
Nothing you say can change this fact. And the conviction was upheld on appeal, only the penalties were turned into a pat on the behind by that meat puppet Bush who is the lackey/lap dog for powerful international interests.
Why should they change? Their behavior has never been punished before. In fact the more laws they break the more money they make. Why change? They have not changed and will not change until they eventually fail because _everyone_ is tired of their bull shit and just refuses to do any business with anyone even remotely connected to anything to do with Microsoft.
Re:Not really (Score:3, Insightful)
Good security is well known. The techniques and procedures studied by thousands of expert math and cypher experts.
Now, the private key does have to remain private... this is the secret _you_ keep. This is a secret that _can_ be kept, with safes and locks and armed guards and attack dogs and mine fields and phospate hand gernades and tanks and air craft.
What DRM is trying to do is have a private key that _you_ do not have. _You_ the owner of the computer and all the bits on it are having a secret kept from you.
You have the machine in your own house. Nobody is around to guard against you opening your own computer up and hooking an O-scope to it, or reading out ROM's. Nobody to destroy the computer when the secret key is discovered.
The only thing is a law called the DMCA that says you do not own your own computer. And can go to jail if you illegally modify your own machine to access the bits that you actually own on the machine.
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Sorry, you have failed to enter the correct password. Please stay seated and remain calm. The police are on the way.
Re:Good point but... (Score:3, Insightful)
With a similar campaigning from same sources depicting "untrusted" content as inherently evil (e.g. pirated music, child pornography, worms and viruses, etc.) you could, with some time and effort, turn ignorant general public against it. Note that most applications/content that you purchase and use will be trusted - MS Office, TurboTax, most commercial games, RIAA/MPAA content, etc. What will not be trusted is viruses, worms, "illegal" music, porn, and free software (or other free legitimate content) the authors of which have no resources to obtain the "trusted" certification.
This type of classification of free software, shareable music and other similar content with very bad things like child pornography, works to a great advantage of technology giants like Microsoft and media cartels like RIAA and MPAA. You can see where this is going and where they'd like to take it. With enough time, resources and scare tactics, they could even lobby for a piece of legislation outlawing "untrusted" content. I can imagine how this could happen, not that it definitely will.