** Vic <lug@???> [2008-06-16 14:18]:
> > Am I alone in finding these online catchup TV services a complete
> > failuer?
>
> I don't know about "complete failure", but they do seem to be of somewhat
> marginal usefulness.
The wording was intended to imply that this was from a personal view
point, and to see how many others shared it. Arguably it could have been
clearer :)
> > I
> > recorded the third on the basis I could catch the second on iPlayer only
> > to find that the second episode was only kept for 7 days
>
> To be fair, that is mentioned...
It is, although not in the (admittedly time limited) TV ads, so it
wasn't until after the recording that I found out. Had I realised in
time I could have downloaded it and had some time in which to watch
beyond the 7 days (as I understand it), but only on a Windows box.
> > With all the DRM issues there is no practical way of
> > actually viewing the programmes on a TV
>
> What I do is to download the DRM-free stream by pretending to be an
> iPhone. I then play it back through my laptop (sshfs *rocks*), which has a
> TV-out connection. Voila! Instant sea-of-macroblocks :-(
Sadly I am, once more, laptop-less. My old Dell is an old story, but my
'new' Compaq has recently been taken out of action by virtue of the
hinge siezing up and breaking the bezel. I've not found the time to see
if I can repair it yet. It was only a 1GHz machine anyway iirc, so may
have been a bit under powered without a stripped down OS. A bad
comparison perhaps, but the 'family' PC running Windows XP Pro with
around 768M memory is largely incapably of playing even the tiny YouTube
videos without major frame drops.
> I really don't get the fuss over DRM/copyright protection; anyone that
> actually wants to keep this stuff is not going to be satisfied with the
> super-low quality that is available. I see this more akin to the freebie
> low-bitrate MP3 teasers you find, with the paid-for version supplying
> better quality. So it is with iPlayer & friends - anyone who wants to keep
> the stuff is going to buy the DVD.
Well for me the big DRM issue is that it prevents me from watching where
an how I want to. I can't download and then watch it on my TV as it
would require burning a DVD. Streaming to the TV would require some sort
of box at the TV end to receive, or runnig cables through walls to get
to it (and rushing back into another room to pause or etc.). Something
I'd be interested in playing with, but I don't have the time or spare
kit/funds to do so at the moment.
DRM also prevents me from watching legal DVDs on one of our other TVs.
Since it doesn't have a SCART socket I have to use the arial. The DVD
player doesn't have an arial out, so I decided to run it through an old
VCR to convert the SCART to UHF/arial. Unfortunately this would allow
you to record the DVD, so this has been blocked (well pre-DRM, so would
that make it ARM?!). DRM has also stopped me purchasing some legal DVDs
since they are not available in region 2. I've managed to multi-region a
DVD player now, so I'll have to see if I can still get the DVDs I'm
after.
Oddly, as an 'average' {?!) 'person in the street' DRM is pushing me
towards piracy. I am having to work around the technology simply to be
able to purchase and watch DVDs that I want to/have purhased quite
legally!!
** end quote [Vic]
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