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Battlestar Galactica Available for Download

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the free-starbucks dept.

blankgm writes "The SciFi channel has made Episode '33' (Season 1 Episode 1) of Battlestar Galactica available for free, uncut and commercial free, online at SciFi.com. Also available are deleted scenes from the series. Is this a ploy by the SciFi channel to grow a viewer base as well as loyalty, or an extremely bold move since the series isn't even out on DVD yet? Hopefully it's both. In either case, I believe this is unprecedented, especially since season 1 hasn't even concluded here in the states. Bravo SciFi. Keep 'em coming!"

14 of 357 comments (clear)

  1. For download? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Looks awfully like streaming to me...

    1. Re:For download? by chronicon · · Score: 5, Informative
      If you hate RealPlayer for the ads, get the "crap-free" BBC version. This blog entry has the details.

      Or just jump over to the BBC now and get it:

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/audiohelp_install.shtml

      Available for Linux, Mac, Solaris, and Windows. Enjoy ad-free RealPlayer today! ;-)

    2. Re:For download? by Minna+Kirai · · Score: 5, Informative

      Perhaps I'm confused, but it's my understanding that it's NOT specifically illegal to record, and trade, television shows, provided that no money changes hands.

      Yes, you are confused. It's not specifically illegal, but dipping babies in vats of liquid mercury isn't specifically illegal either. One is a kind of copyright infringement, and the other is a kind of murder, and those two things are illegal.

      Whether you earn money directly is irrelevant, theoretically. (Exchanging cash money isn't really a factor for many definitions of criminality- besides prostitution). Practically, the exchange of money creates further legal jeopardy, because it leaves an undeniable trail of evidence, and the appearance of greed will make a jury less sympathetic to you.

      Even recording for your own use is a copyright infringement, except that it has been found to be a permissible Fair Use. However, if you watch it more than once, that's illegal again.

      and sharing recordings (which is akin to recording a show on your VCR and letting a friend borrow/copy the tape).

      Lending a VHS tape to a friend is illegal too, although it's such a minor offense that no one would bother to press charges. Because it's a slow process of physical transmission, you are unable to commit nearly as many illegal acts as a megabit P2P operation can. Digital data transmission renders the infringement fast enough to endanger the TV-advertising revenue model.

  2. direct link by castlec · · Score: 5, Informative

    the show

    --
    When I tell an object to delete this, am I killing it or telling it to kill me?
  3. Re:This rules by haluness · · Score: 4, Informative

    mplayer -dumpstream STREAM_URL

  4. Re:33 or 1 by calibanDNS · · Score: 4, Informative

    The first regular episode of the new series is titled '33'. Every time the fleet, lead by the Galactica, makes a faster than light jump to get away from the Cylons, the Cylons show up 33 minutes later forcing another FTL jump. The episode deals with the extreme stress that this puts the crew under.

  5. Already covered. by zmarty · · Score: 3, Informative

    Oh come on guys... Don't you read the older news before you post ? http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/24/155722 8&tid=214&tid=1

    --
    If you can't find a way, make one!
  6. Easiest and Best way by hardcoredreamer · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you're on windows, Real Alternative and MPC Media Player Classic will do the job without having to install evil realplayer.

    --
    I know a guy named Sig.
  7. Re:Not so good if you're completely new... by MindStalker · · Score: 4, Informative

    Mini-Series Spoiler ALERT!!!!!

    Basically all you need to know is that the cylons are religious and believe that its their god given destiny to destroy man for his wicked ways. After the first war they made a treaty to leave eachother alone (the humans didn't realize that it was a religious war and thought the cylons just wanted their freedom.. they still don't understand this). The hot chick the guy keeps dreaming about was one of the new cylons who are perfect human replicas. She worked with him in the defense ministry as a spy and suduced him into giving her access to many secrets. She obtained secret codes that could be used to shut down any defenses. This is how the cylons made their attack and were so successful and they nuked every major city in several different human controlled worlds.
    Battlestar Galactica was a large carrier ship from the first war, as was in the process of a decommisioning celebration when the attack happend. It was the only one that survived as it had resisting having any new computer components especially any networks installed on it, as was the protocol in the first war. So the deactivating codes didn't work on it. So it and an enterage of other ships that had come for the celebration are the only surviving military group left and humanities only hope.

  8. Re:A better idea by ThisNukes4u · · Score: 3, Informative

    That would be pretty difficult, as bittorrent sends data to the downloader in whatever order it feels like, so it would be pretty inapporpriate for streaming.

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    thisnukes4u.net
  9. Re:This rules by ralphclark · · Score: 4, Informative

    yeah I tried:

    mplayer -dumpstream 'pnm://rx-wes-sea138.rbn.com/farm/*/usanet/usanet/ g2demand/scifi/battlestar/33/33.rm'

    it dumped the file OK, and viewing the header it appears to be of the right type but I can't even get realplayer to play it, nor mplayer, kaffeine etc.

    Anybody know why?

  10. too late.. by TheHawke · · Score: 3, Informative

    I already got a copy off of the usenet feeds that is 1000X better than the joke of a media format that they call real.

    --
    First rule of holes; When in one, stop digging.
  11. Does not play on linux by mattr · · Score: 3, Informative
    If someone succeeds please post about it!

    mplayer couldn't read it, and the url has an asterisk in it, anyway it wants realplayer.

    Well I tried my old copy of Helix Player 0.4.0 and it gave an error (can't handle type x-pn-imagemap), so I updated the rpm to the latest 1.0.2 Gold. That didn't work, it said it was available only in RealPlayer not HelixPlayer. Okay, I buckle under and install the linux RealPlayer rpm 10.0.2 Gold. Same problem! I google and it seems that they have been waiting since October for Real to give them some information which is why they didn't get it into the code, and it has now been postponed?!?!

    So nobody involved in the website or production uses linux, and no slashdot people have viewed it on linux? Or is there a secret I don't know about (hope so).

    I would really like to view it as an open format file as I neither wish to use pay to use windows in a cafe, nor view it with what I perceive as a lossy protocol over an international connection. This is the broadband age, and bittorrent or a fiber (like I finally got) beats rtsp! Just give me the file! In the end we are done in by a clickable menu? Sheesh!

    Can somebody record it to a file and post it?

    1. Re:Does not play on linux by rgammon_real · · Score: 4, Informative

      Hey guys, The image map plugin wasn't helix-ified in time for RealPlayer 10.0.0. It was available with RealPlayer 8/9a for linux, one option is to download RP8/RP9a for linux, and point it at the url: pnm://rx-wes-sea138.rbn.com/farm/*/usanet/usanet/g 2demand/scifi/battlestar/33/33.rm The image map stuff is now helixified... I'll try to get something going for tomorrow's bleeding edge nightly build, which will show up on http://forms.helixcommunity.org/helix/builds/ under current.

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