BoingBoing – December 6, 2007:
“This is the most extreme example I’ve seen yet of tech companies crippling data devices in order to please Hollywood: Western Digital is disabling sharing of any avi, divx, mp3, mpeg, and many other files on its network connected devices; due to unverifiable media license authentication’. Just wondering — who needs a 1 Terabyte network-connected hard drive that is prohibited from serving most media files? Perhaps somebody with 220 million pages of .txt files they need to share?”
A complete list of unauthorized files can be found here. Western Digital claims they have to block such files from being shared “due to unverifiable media license authentication.” To put it in human-speak: Those files might be copyrighted, and for some reason, Western Digital has set itself up as the copyright judge, jury, and executioner of your hard drive and data!
Slashdot points out that there are ways around this. Sure. There always are. But that’s not the point. The point is that hard drive manufacturers should never make any assumptions about my data. It’s my hard drive and it’s my data and I should always be allowed to access it.
WD HAS TO BE THE MOST IRRESPONSIBLE COMPANY EVER TO PUT OUT A PRODUCT. I’M KEEPING THIS SHORT. I BOUGHT AN EXTERNAL DRIVE FROM WD AND STORED ALL MY PICTURES AND VIDEOS ON THERE THEN FOUR MONTHS DOWN THE LINE IT FAILS AND I END UP LOSING ALL MY PICS AND VIDS. NOT EVEN A RECOVERING AGENCY WAS ABLE TO RETAIN MY DATA. I CALLED WD AND THEY REPLACED IT WITH A NEWER VERSION AFTER I THREATEN THEM TO SPREAD THE WORD. THEY SEND ME ANOTHER ONE AND COME TO FIND OUT, IT FAILS TO RUN AFTER 2 WEEKS!!! THEY HAS GARBAGE PRODUCTS. I HAVE HAD A SEAGATE EXTERNAL FOR ALMOST 5 YEARS NOW AND IT’S STILL GOING AND GOING AND GOING. MY ADVISE…..DON’T BUY A WESTERN DIGITAL DRIVE UNLESS YOU DON’T MIND LOSING YOUR DATA.
Ah, kammerades, gottdamerung on joo! Do ass vee say, yoo arrr slaves!!!!!!!