Texas Instruments Inc and Macrovision Corp have signed up to a technology swap that makes it more difficult to copy video programming, which could lead to earlier release on cable television systems of Hollywood’s latest films. They said Macrovision’s video copy protection technology will be integrated into Texas Instruments’ line of video compression chips. With […]
Texas Instruments Inc and Macrovision Corp have signed up to a technology swap that makes it more difficult to copy video programming, which could lead to earlier release on cable television systems of Hollywood’s latest films. They said Macrovision’s video copy protection technology will be integrated into Texas Instruments’ line of video compression chips. With the new chip, makers of digital video systems will be able to protect against the unauthorised duplication of programme material. They said the Macrovision-based television encoder chips will be incorporated into products designed for digital video distribution, such as cable set top boxes, video compact disc players and digital video cassette recorders. The copy protection system is an enhanced version of Macrovision’s videocassette anti-copy technology that’s been used videocassettes since 1985. The technology will be integrated into Texas Instruments’ television encoder chip that converts a digital video signal to an analogue signal. Macrovision said under its licensing model, the copyright owner can decide to apply the copy protection process to a specific pay-per-view programme, video CD movie or digital video cassette release.