On 6/12/07, Dave Crossland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
It appears widely understood that DRM is not acceptable to the audience. Except inside the BBC, alas.
Meh. The BBC will just waste a lot of money on DRM, just as they once wasted money on LaserDisc - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_Domesday_Project Everyone will think it's really a bit rubbish, and just continue to share BBC content over BitTorrent as they do already. The BBC will realise that this is actually the optimal solution and just continue with their blind eye treatment. I've tried Joost, which is close enough to what the iPlayer will be, and ran off in horror. This is supposed to be the 'easy' way of doing it, but compare and contrast: 1. Hang around on Twitter for a few hours and bother one of your trendy Web 2.0 friends to give you an invite code to go and download a fairly large application. Install said application. Have it give you cryptic error message about how you are behind a firewall and can't use Joost. Spend half an hour on website trying to find out how to solve problem. Give up. 2. Go on to BitTorrent website of choice. Login. Find the programme you want to watch. Click 'download'. Azureus boots up and starts downloading show. Wait. Once it's finished, right click on it and choose 'Open'. Click 'play' and watch. In terms of usability, I far prefer user experience two. (Of course, it's just an academic exercise. We're nice boys and girls, we don't infringe copyright. Ever.) It works on any platform most of the time. Now, the speed may be rubbish for the download. But once you've got it, you've got it forever and you can back it up on to DVD. Then when you're a bit short of something to watch, you can browse through your archive and pull up something interesting to re-watch. Of course, the BBC could just not bother with the iPlayer - send a few quid under-the-table to the UKNova kids to beef up their servers (stick it under, um, R&D funding) and spend the rest on commissioning better programmes, and we'd all pretty much be happy. But that would require someone to actually use their brain. It's far easier to outsource your thinking to Microsoft, whose answer to pretty much everything is "Windows Media Player". I wonder why. The argument for us for the iPlayer is a bit like the argument for God. Of course, none of us are going to [believe in/use] [God/the iPlayer], we're not that stupid. But the ignorant proletariat out there needs a [comfort blanket/DRM application]. We can't deny them that, regardless of your boorish, high-faultin' academic-y arguments about it's [nonexistence/utter silliness]. If the iPlayer works, hopefully, all it'll do is distract the bureaucrats and legal types away from what everyone is doing on BitTorrent. That is it's criteria for success - how well it keeps the BBC hierarchy from noticing reality. -- Tom Morris http://tom.opiumfield.com/blog/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
