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British TV Station Offers Downloads

Posted by timothy on from the put-your-license-to-work dept.

Richard W.M. Jones writes "Remember how the British just love to download TV? Well, British terestrial TV channel five has announced that it will become the first to offer TV programmes to download legally. Except that they don't quite seem to get it yet. They are offering here some videos from this car programme which apparently didn't quite make it to air, for the princely sum of £1.50 (about $3), in DRM'd WMV 10 format (mplayer plays them fine). Still, it's a start, and it looks like they're just testing the water. Hopefully they won't take the lack of response as 'proof' that there's no demand. There's more about this at the BBC's website."

7 of 332 comments (clear)

  1. Codecs by XanC · · Score: 5, Informative
    Maybe your mplayer plays them fine. My 64-bit mplayer's offerings are a bit more basic.

    Let's get some open codecs!

  2. "They don't get it" by Dancin_Santa · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They are trying to sell ice to Eskimos! Sand to scorpions! Dentistry to Britons!

    Well, that last one doesn't really fit the theme of what I was getting at. Which was: You can't sell something to someone who can get it for themselves for free.

    1. Re:"They don't get it" by sp3tt · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That's not true.
      In fact, here in Sweden at least, many downloaders want to pay the author of the works they download. But they do not think the prices are reasonable, thus they download. And for a DVD which sold 200,000 copies, the director got 15,000SEK (less than 2,000 USD). Which is also a cause for downloading - not enough money goes to authors.

      Right now, there is actually a discussion between a director and "pirates" on Sweden's largest pro-"piracy" website. What they have reached is the points described above.
      The director has proposed to hold a seminar about the film industry's future and how it can use the internet. The seminar is currently being planned.

    2. Re:"They don't get it" by Troed · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You can't sell something to someone who can get it for themselves for free.

      Of course you can. I'd very much like to go to one central place for music, movie and tv-series downloads where I know the quality of the content and that I indeed support the ones producing it. I'll happily pay for such a service.

      Not everyone here on Slashdot is 14 and thinks free downloads are cool.

      --
      it's in my head
  3. Good quality by jg_elliott · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I downloaded one of the free clips (3 mins long) and it's a whopping 896K/sec up to 1539kbps/sec VBR at 768 x 432 with 96kbps WM audio. Even if the content isn't that great, the quality is damn good. Considering they could have passed us off with some crappy res, little real media file, this is a fantastic offering.
    Provided this isn't a total flop, hopefully it will lead the way for other networks to do the same which hopefully will lead to downloading whole programmes.
    I thought I read a while ago that the BBC (and possibly Channel 4) were going to open up their archives for watching clips/programmes online. Anyone know what happened to that?

  4. Swedish public service TV does this too by md8mart · · Score: 5, Interesting

    SVT open archive

    They are still working on some IP-issues; hence no sound on most of the clips. SVT has some 200 000 hours in their archive, dating back to 1896, of which some 10 percent is digitized.

    --
    Internet Speed test
  5. We've got this in Iceland by hugsa · · Score: 5, Informative

    We've actually been able to download shows and news for a few years here in Iceland, both from RUV (state owned), Stod 2 and Skjar 1, both not owned by the goverment.

    And here are the proofs:
    RUV online:
    RUV

    Stod 2 online:
    Stod 2 (their web is really really bad..brace yourself)

    Skjar 1 online:
    Skjar 1

    --
    hugbunadur.is