Having taken into consideration all sides of the iPlayer DRM debate, can I suggest a compromise:
1. The existing iPlayer goes ahead as the BBC has developed; 2. The BBC also identifies what TV and radio content is can release without DRM and provides other any other services that wish to host/distribute the content with clean (but with DOGing) copies to these services on the proviso that they are not sold or advertised within. 3. After a period of two years the BBC reviews both schemes and continues with both, one or neither. I'm calling the second scheme the BBC iFreeplayer scheme. It would comprise of: a) a registration process that provides a legal agreement between a distribution scheme and the BBC; b) an EPG API feed listing the programmes on the iFreeplayer system with a cross-scheme unique ID; c) access to high quality source files which can be changed in resolution and have compression systems applied to them by each distributor; each distributor should take only one copy of the source to keep BBC bandwidth to a minimum; The BBC would then identify which of it's own programmes that it owns sufficient rights to, or can obtain the appropriate additional rights out of a small budget. This would comprise of: a) All of BBC News 24 (already streamed online); b) News and current affairs on BBC One, Two and Four; c) All of BBC World; d) BBC self-made programmes such as Children's, Education, Science etc e) CBeebies and CBBC as these cannot be carried on the iPlayer [DRM bit] as it requires the user to be over 18 f) Promotional puff programmes such as "Doctor Who Confidential" Each distributor will be required to provide access to the programme using a pre-published URL (using the program UID as a parameter). Example distribution schemes may be: 1) break into 10 minute segments and post on YouTube - access via list of URLs 2) upload to Google Video - access via URL or EMBED 3) compress using DivX and provide to the net using BitTorrent - access via a link to a .torrent file 4) change to quarter-screen resolution, compress to MP4 format for video iPod - access via a .torrent file but it could be any other scheme that anyone wishes to devise. -- Brian Butterworth www.ukfree.tv
