Maybe return it and state the EULA as the reason?
Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
211–220 of 234 posts
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#212film someone else pushing "agree"? seems like an obvious elegant solution
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#213RED has always had all sorts of BS licensing gobbleygook. When the first RED cameras finally became available, the software absolute shit. They had all sorts of stuff in their license agreements about not reverse engineering, not redistributing, et cetera. I had to figure out many parts of their software and make wrappers and separate tools so that queues could be started and run without monitoring, because their sof…
> Honestly, though, the quality of their codecs suck. The color information just isn't there. You can watch Netflix and immediately tell which things were shot on RED, because they'll be grainy (which they think is a feature) and will lack nuanced color. This is all just false. Their codes allow you to record actual RAW data from the sensor in 16 bits. All the color nuance is there. RED cameras are crazy expensive an…
Bullshit. The Arri Alexa is the gold standard, the RED the cheap alternative.
You can immediately see if it was shot with a good camera or a RED.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#214RED has always had all sorts of BS licensing gobbleygook. When the first RED cameras finally became available, the software absolute shit. They had all sorts of stuff in their license agreements about not reverse engineering, not redistributing, et cetera. I had to figure out many parts of their software and make wrappers and separate tools so that queues could be started and run without monitoring, because their sof…
> Honestly, though, the quality of their codecs suck. The color information just isn't there. You can watch Netflix and immediately tell which things were shot on RED, because they'll be grainy (which they think is a feature) and will lack nuanced color. This is all just false. Their codes allow you to record actual RAW data from the sensor in 16 bits. All the color nuance is there. RED cameras are crazy expensive an…
The fact that the raw is 16bits says nothing about image quality.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
You expressly agree to give the video to 3rd parties and copyright holders. They provide them to 3rd parties and get paid. The third parties with take a few frames and will run through AI and categorize the film for the ad networks. Rights holders will check content against hashes. Law enforcement will have a handy copy available. Which makes friends and business opportunities.
The video these cameras capture is tens of gigabytes of data. I think you can expect about an hour worth of video on 1TB. It’s completely impractical to think they’re taking your video from the camera itself. It’s also likely to be useless footage for anyone but the person creating the content. Keep in mind the video will still need to be edited for color, adding or removing sound, and cropped. Then spliced into a fi…
They reserve the right to pull video content and other data from your computers as well.
That could include edited scenes, scripts, emails, zoom calls, etc, etc.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#216IANAL but I read "information about .... content" as metadata, not the data itself. Also, based on the size of the videos that thing must make, I don't see any feasible way they could or would exfiltrate the video content you're shooting.
I agree. They are unlikely to be intentionally exfiltrating entire videos. However, should the software crash, it's reasonable to assume a crash dumb of some kind could be sent. The crash dumb could include portions of memory, which would naturally include data from in progress frames or raw sensor data.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#217Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's absurd. If you buy something in a store you may never have visited the website of the manufacturer. It's not fit for purpose if you need to agree to a new contract, the terms of which were not disclosed to you before you made the purchase, before you can use it for its intended purpose.
The courts have repeatedly held that being past that point in an installer is evidence of consent, so take it up with them, I guess
He's not past that point; he hasn't accepted the new terms yet. Did you read the OP?
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#218Earlier quoted context omitted.
The video these cameras capture is tens of gigabytes of data. I think you can expect about an hour worth of video on 1TB. It’s completely impractical to think they’re taking your video from the camera itself. It’s also likely to be useless footage for anyone but the person creating the content. Keep in mind the video will still need to be edited for color, adding or removing sound, and cropped. Then spliced into a fi…
They reserve the right to pull video content and other data from your computers as well. That could include edited scenes, scripts, emails, zoom calls, etc, etc.
The EULA does not suggest that they do, unless you’re referring to something else.
> You agree that RED and its affiliates may collect, maintain, process, transmit, and use technical, diagnostic, usage and related information, including but not limited to information about your RED Camera, Camera Module, computer, system and application software, usage, content, and peripherals.
It specifies “information about…”
It also just doesn’t even make sense for RED to want any of those things. We’re talking about a company that makes money on cameras and overpriced peripherals.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#219RED can use all of your footage... If you consider your footage indistinguishable from "technical, diagnostic, usage and related information".
Which would be a bit of a self own on your cinematography skills. In which case I suspect nobody would want to steal your footage.
Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?
#220Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Works as you expect it to" is not the same thing as "fit for purpose". The purpose of a hammer is (mostly) an objective fact. Your expectations of what the hammer can do, on the other hand, may or may not be reasonable. (Though in this case I think it's perfectly reasonable to claim that the camera is not fit for purpose if the EULA terms were not clearly disclosed before the purchase was made.)
> "Works as you expect it to" is not the same thing as "fit for purpose" For the purposes of that comment, I meant them to be equivalent ...under the presumption that a typical person knows what a hammer does. (I was avoiding the legalese)
Yeah. But I guess the distinction is quite relevant with things more complex than a hammer.
For example, you are not legally entitled to return a camera because you thought it could shoot in 3D and it couldn't, unless the advertising falsely claimed that. The seller might accept a return, but they're not obliged to.
The EULA thing is sort of on the edge of that. Many (most?) devices come with EULAs these days. So you could make an argument that the buyer can't reasonably expect there to not be additional terms that they must accept before using it. I don't really find that argument very compelling, though, if the terms are not available to the buyer at the point of sale.