Microsoft admitted that it will honor a programmer’s requests to block the recording of programs on its Media Center PCs. And this isn’t some theoretical possibility… it looks like it happened. It seems some folks weren’t able to TiVo record American Gladiators and Medium last week. So News.com started asking questions.
Microsoft included technologies in Windows based on rules set forth by the (Federal Communications Commission),” a Microsoft spokeswoman wrote in an e-mail to CNET News.com. “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.”
As News.com noted, the rules are actually just proposals – therefore… not actual rules (kinda like when you ground little Johnny… but let him play XBox 20 minutes later). It isn’t clear why NBC threw up the “don’t record” flag for the shows (or if it was even done intentionally).
Update: NBC says it was a mistake.