[MPlayer-users] RatDVD support?

[Rich Felker]

On Wed, Nov 30, 2005 at 09:21:19PM -0600, Kichigai Mentat wrote:
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> On Nov 30, 2005, at 20.01, some guy wrote:
> 
> >Hello,
> >
> >I tried to check the archive and I hope I'm not asking
> >something that's already been discussed.  Will mplayer
> >support the RatDVD format soon?
> >
> >Thanks
> I'm not sure that MPlayer will support RatDVD any time soon. There  
> really isn't much demand for it, as far as I can tell. It's kind of  
> obscure. Then there are the following major reasons (Taken from the  
> Wikipedia):
> 
> * Closed-source nature (Although the creator has stated that it will  
> be released at some point in the future)
> * Not being a standardized format.
> * Being available only for the Microsoft Windows operating system;  
> dependent on Microsoft DirectShow
> 
> MPlayer was originally developed as a Linux video player, and I think  
> it's unlikely that they're about to include any Windows-only, non- 
> standard, closed source video format.

Huh?????????
When has that stopped us in the past?

> It pretty much goes against  
> everything that was in mind when MPlayer was created (Open source,  
> standards supporting, Linux media player).

No it doesn't. What we stand for is breaking their monopolies,
cracking open their secrets and bringing closed stuff out into the
open where anyone can play it.

HOWEVER, and this is the big reason RatDVD is not on anyone's list of
priorities to support: Things get added to MPlayer as there is demand.
There's essentially no demand for RatDVD support since this format is
only used by idiots, i.e. people making low-quality DVD warez to share
over the net. Anyone trying to make good copies (either for
filesharing purposes or for their own backup/archival purposes) will
do careful, manually-tuned encoding to make a peak quality copy with
minimum size. RatDVD is about click-and-go, i.e. it's the idiot's
solution to DVD warez. It results in larger files and lower quality
than you'll get with a proper DVDrip, so no one serious is interested
in using it and whatever you find as a RatDVD file on BT or whatever
warez system you use, you can find better copies as a plain mpeg4 avi
file...

Rich