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Canadian Public Radio Streaming Ogg Vorbis

d00dman writes "CBC Radio, Canada's major national public broadcaster is now streaming in ogg/vorbis. Recently CBC had switched from realmedia streams to windows media streams for their radio broadcasts. After receiving a plethora of complaints, suggesting ogg/vorbis as an alternative, CBC has begun a test ogg stream of the toronto stations. They boast in their ogg FAQ that they're encoding with oddcast and streaming with icecast."

24 of 224 comments (clear)

  1. Useful for less powerfull computers by funkycat · · Score: 5, Informative

    hopefully the cbc will completely change over to Ogg format. Its difficult for older computers (like the one my parents have) to play media cleanly through Windowsmediaplayer as its a resorce hog, and if they want to do anyhting else while listening it gets choppy.

  2. Other Ogg Vorbis streams by zoeblade · · Score: 4, Informative

    Cool, now it's up there with the classical station WCPE!

    Does anyone know of any other Ogg Vorbis streams? The only other one I know is a police scanner.

    1. Re:Other Ogg Vorbis streams by N+Monkey · · Score: 3, Informative

      Virgin Radio have been streaming Ogg Voribs for at long time and in much higher quality than their mp3 stream. www.virginradio.co.uk

      Just to make it easier to find, (because it wasn't immediately obvious to a dimwit like me :-) ) here is the page

    2. Re:Other Ogg Vorbis streams by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      The norwegian public broadcaster (NRK) sends all channels in WMF, mp3 and ogg. They have done so for a long time . To listen go to :

      http://www.nrk.no/lyd/

    3. Re:Other Ogg Vorbis streams by Sentry21 · · Score: 2, Informative

      There's a list on the icecast website.

      --Dan

  3. Let management know by wombatmobile · · Score: 5, Informative

    Happy about this?

    From CBC's Ogg FAQ:

    We're currently testing the streaming of Ogg Vorbis, an open, free audio codec. Please contact CBC Audience Relations if you have suggestions or comments.

  4. Virgin Radio does Vorbis too by Darren+Winsper · · Score: 4, Informative

    Virgin Radio have already been streaming Ogg Vorbis for ages, they even have a 160k stream: http://www.virginradio.co.uk/thestation/listen/

  5. The CBC kicks ass by Zork+the+Almighty · · Score: 5, Informative

    People in Canada always harp on the CBC because it receives public funding, but it really is the best news organization in the country and to top it off they actually innovate. They had a decent website back in 1998 (the earliest Wayback is from '99). They stream CBC radio and all of their TV news broadcasts for free, in multiple codecs. And if you want local news that isn't about a dog or a whale they might be your only option. Bravo CBC. They can take it from my cold, dead hands.

    --

    In Soviet America the banks rob you!
    1. Re:The CBC kicks ass by Zork+the+Almighty · · Score: 2, Informative

      I used to think the same way, but when I actually started watching CBC television my opinion changed dramatically. I lived with no cable for 3 years, and I found CBC to be better than Global, CTV, VI, and KVOS (Seattle) on average. Maybe you expect it to good all the time ? TV is mostly crap! The CBC is just a little less crap.

      Here are my suggestions for good programs on CBC Television:
      The Nature of Things (with David Suzuki)
      Da Vinci's Inquest
      The National (news broadcast)
      Just For Laughs Gags (hidden camera)
      The Fifth Estate (current affairs)
      The Passionate Eye (investigative journalism)
      ZeD (this is fucking whacked)
      The Simpsons (dependable, predictable entertainment)

      And for kids they actually show something half intelligent, instead of the Toys R' Us Chocobot Candy hour advertising blast. Try Arthur, Cyberchase, Zoboomafoo, and Mr. Dressup for starters, and maybe your preschooler will stop twitching.

      And on Saturday night they show two movies, a blockbuster movie and a classic movie. Pretty damn good.

      --

      In Soviet America the banks rob you!
  6. CBC's Windows media streams work with mplayer ... by pyropaul · · Score: 5, Informative

    Despite the parent article stating there were a plethora of complaints when the CBC switch from Real Media streams to windows media, they do, in fact, provide information on their site for unix users to access these streams.

    For the ogg streams, they only provide access to the stations in Toronto, rather than the local stations.

    Whichever format, though, I'm happy that I can listen to the CBC on the operating system of my choice. However, I think it is appropriate that a public service broadcaster use a format that is unencumbered and hence accessible to all.

  7. Re:typical Canadians by Graemee · · Score: 2, Informative

    AFAIK - Prositution is legal, but running a bawdy house or "pimping" is illegal.

  8. This has a bit of history behind it by ssclift · · Score: 4, Informative

    At the start of September the CBC switched exclusively to Windows Media 9. I fired off a few e-mails to hosts I'd corresponded with before, and to their news desk. I noted they were denying "universal access" to their internet radio (that's a good push-button word in Canada) because the latest codecs were not supported by Linux/Unix based media players. I strongly suspect I wasn't the only one, since it only took about a week for them to switch to WM7/MS-MPEG4 for their streams, which Xine and Mplayer seem to handle more reliably.

    On one of their promo-spots before the news they even explicitly said "even linux users" could listen on their internet streams. :-)

    The switch to testing Ogg was a little later, which runs against their stated "one-stream" policy. I also strongly suspect Akamai was behind the original switch. Akamai streams the CBC content and are a "Microsoft Partner" company in the venture. It sounds a bit to me like Akamai sold them a bill of goods in the name of cost cutting, and that the response was not what they expected. I'm quite sure listeners in Europe, where MS does not reign quite as supreme, were not pleased. I've had notes from friends over there asking how to stream WM7 on Linux.

    Then, three weeks ago, I submitted this story. (...but I'm not bitter...) :^)

    The CBC is not only great radio and television, it's also an organization full of really nice, really smart folks, and has been voted in the top 100 places to work in Canada.

  9. Re:Ogg & Andromeda by advocate_one · · Score: 3, Informative
    Basically, you need .m3u (audio/x-mpegurl) mapped to a player that can handle Ogg, most often Winamp

    Expect to see an "update" or "security fix" for Media Player that messes with the association to always make it point to WMP whenever you start windows or log in...

    --
    Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
  10. Re:typical Canadians by AchilleTalon · · Score: 3, Informative
    A little bit misleading.

    1. Same-sex marriage is not yet legalized a bill is still waiting to be wrote and voted. In the mean time court trials opened the road to this. But government may still forbid it.
    2. There is no such plan like rendering marijuana legal in Canada. Instead, there is a proposal to decriminalize it. Instead of being thrown in jail after a costly, long and complex trial, policemen will be fully entitled to just give you a ticket for possession of small quantities of marijuana for you own consumption. Traffic, growing and related activities will still be criminal.
    3. Ogg-Vorbis encoding/decoding is legal.
    4. Music sharing is legal.
    --
    Achille Talon
    Hop!
  11. Re:Does this mean.. by AchilleTalon · · Score: 2, Informative
    There is nothing to explain. Download Winamp and enjoy!

    For the picky ones: "A free (open) encoding algorithm."

    Usually, they don't know what is an algorithm, what is encoding, so, you end up saying: "Download Winamp and shut up!"

    --
    Achille Talon
    Hop!
  12. Re:It's nice to see..... by Clith · · Score: 3, Informative

    CBC Radio has always been ahead of the rest of CBC in terms of technology. They've been making one of my favorite radio science shows, Quirks and Quarks available in mp3 format for years. It's been available in Ogg since September 2002. I think they were broadcasting in stereo well before CBC Television, too.

    --
    [ReidNews]
  13. They could use 'Freedom Audio' by reality-bytes · · Score: 2, Informative

    CBC could use the Freedom Audio player on their website.

    Freedom Audio is a simple java web-page embedded player which can play OGG/Vorbis streams.

    It uses Javascript/Java 1.1 so it'll run with *most* browsers without needing to get the Sun Java VM.

    The player loads automatically and begins streaming with just one click so there is no need for a standalone player and the prospective listener doesn't even *need* to know that playback is using OGG/Vorbis format. (Although it would be nice if they did know.)

    --
    Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
  14. Re:typical Canadians by Idarubicin · · Score: 3, Informative

    It's a little over a year old, but this is still one of my favourite columns by an American looking at Canada. It's not just the weather that's cooler in Canada, by Samantha Bennett at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The best quote is probably

    "The Canadians are so quiet that you may have forgotten they're up there, but they've been busy doing some surprising things. It's like discovering that the mice you are dimly aware of in your attic have been building an espresso machine."
    Enjoy.
    --
    ~Idarubicin
  15. Re:Speex? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Actually, CBC Radio 1 broadcasts alot of music, especially Saturday afternoon's (1PM EST) Definitely Not the Opera, which is a fantastic show. Radio 2, which isn't up yet but hopefully will be, is virtually all music, except for the hourly news. Brave New Waves (Weekdays, 12AM EST) and CBC Radio 3 (a show, oddly; Saturdays 7:30PM-4:30?AM EST) stand out.

  16. Re:It's nice to see..... by AmX · · Score: 4, Informative

    Currently living in Canada, that's great to see. And as a French, I have to point out that Radio France public radios have been broadcasting in ogg for a little while now (that's 8 different radios).

  17. Re:typical Canadians by zx75 · · Score: 2, Informative

    "Soon-to-be-legal marijuana."

    Common misconception, legalizing marijuana is not on the table at the moment except for chronic pain/palliative care situations. The bill being discussed is decriminilization, which means that possessing small quantities of marijuana will no longer land you a criminal record. Instead it will be a $150 to $800 fine. So marijuana won't be legal, it'll just be a less serious offence.

    --
    This is not a sig.
  18. Re:typical Canadians by seestheday · · Score: 2, Informative
    you must be troll. and I shouldn't even be dignifying your post with a response, but your argument makes no sense. Marriage and making babies are two separate things. You can make babies and not be married. Or you could be married and not be able to make babies (i.e. one or both partners are infertile).

    So by your logic you shouldn't be able to get married if you're infertile??

    You can't marry your cat b/c your cat isn't human and doesn't have the same rights as humans. There are economic advantages to being recognized as married. Spousal benefits and widowers pensions etc. Your cat doesn't deserve or need those things, while a life partner (homosexual or heterosexual) does.

  19. Re:Mac Ogg Client? by ablair · · Score: 3, Informative

    There are tons of MacOS Ogg Vorbis players, here are some:

    Sourceforge Quicktime Components
    Play Ogg Vorbis file on QuickTime (including QT-based players, like iTunes). Note that this is still under development and may have bugs.
    http://qtcomponents.sourceforge.net/

    A Better QuickTime Ogg Vorbis Plugin
    Try this one if the Sourceforge one above dosen't work for your configuration.
    http://www.macosxhints.com/article .php?story=20021 103065300430

    MacAMP
    Like WinAMP or XMMS.
    http://www.macamp.com/

    Whamb
    Whamb player, haven't tried it.
    http://www.whamb.com/

    More Ogg Vorbis Software for MacOS X
    Here's a list from the Vorbis folks.
    http://www.vorbis.com/software.psp/

  20. Re:typical Canadians by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative
    #4 is funny, soley because it was the music industry itself that brought it about.
    1. Assume all blank media purchases will be used for piracy and lobby to have legislation passed.
    2. Institute a levy on all blank media to cover the piracy costs.
    3. Having a levy while simultaneously making media copying illegal would be a double standard since purchasers of the media have already "paid" for their crime.
    4. Music sharing becomes legal.
    5. Music industry: "Whoops!"