“Digital Television (DTV) is an advanced broadcasting technology that will transform your television viewing experience. DTV enables broadcasters to offer television with better picture and sound quality. It can also offer multiple programming choices, called multicasting, and interactive capabilities.” – from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Digital Television site.

Digital television (DTV) was (still is?) supposed to be the next big thing – right? The goal was to both improve the quality of broadcast television and free up radio spectrum (which the FCC will likely auction off, and the funds will then vanish into whatever politically defined boondoggle is perceived as “crucial” at the time, but I digress).

The problem is that DTV isn’t flawless and, indeed, arguably it is not even on a par with traditional analog television. Early adopters have discovered that nearby aircraft and other radio frequency sources cause serious reception and interference problems. But wait, there’s more.

You probably thought the issue of the broadcast flag, that marker that was to be included in broadcast signals to indicate that a program was not to be recorded, was dead and gone. Not so.

The broadcast flag was supposed to deliver what was euphemistically called “content protection” for television (more accurately it was Digital Rights Management or DRM). And the FCC, bowing deeply to pressure from Big Media, mandated that all DTV tuners monitor transmissions for the broadcast flag and block certain functions, such as the ability to record.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) commented: “When it comes to digital recording, it would be Hollywood’s DRM way or the highway. Want to burn that recording digitally to a DVD to save hard drive space? Sorry, the DRM lock-box won’t allow it. How about sending it over your home network to another TV? Not unless you rip out your existing network and replace it with DRMd routers.”

The EFF challenged the FCC in 2005, and a court ruled that the FCC “lacked authority to regulate what happens inside your TV or computer once it has received a broadcast signal.”

So, the whole idea was thrown out . . . sort of. It turns out that with the rollout of DTV, one broadcaster, NBC, is using the broadcast flag and, one small company’s products are obeying it. The small company? Microsoft.

Yep, it turns out that if you try to record a DTV program using Windows Media Center and the broadcast flag is set, the system will refuse to record! Not only does this means you can’t record a flagged show, you can’t even pause it while you go make a sandwich or answer yet another call from a telemarketer.

According to c|net Microsoft defends Vista Media Center’s behavior thusly: “Microsoft included technologies in Windows based on rules set forth by the FCC. As part of these regulations, Windows Media Center fully adheres to the flags used by broadcasters and content owners to determine how their content is distributed and consumed.”

Really? So, despite the fact that there are actually no “rules” or “regulations” to be obeyed, by law Microsoft has complied. In other words, Microsoft has sided with broadcasters to enforce the Big Media’s DRM requirements!

This is a clear case of Microsoft conspiring with Big Media to do what Big Media wants regardless of whether consumers object or not.

The arrogance of this defies belief. Big Media’s plan is to absolutely control how we consume music, movies, books and any other copyrighted material, no matter how inconvenient or unfair the controls are. The goal is to extract as much money from us as they can for each and every use of each and every media item, and Microsoft is making it clear who it is aligned with.

What is intriguing is that Microsoft looks to have painted itself into a corner. I’d guess the company won’t disable broadcast flag compliance, which means the Windows Media Center product line will wither. This will not only provide market leverage for other DTV recorder vendors that ignore the flag but will help reinforce the argument that open source products have the advantage where control and functionality are issues.

So, what will happen if Microsoft does abandon broadcast flag compliance? I’m betting that’s not a real question because I don’t think the company will. RIP Media Center.