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BBC Trial of TV Show Download Service
Little Hamster writes "Five thousand households with broadband access has been selected for a trial of the BBC's new interactive Media Player. The trial will run from September to December, and users can 'time shift' and download selected BBC TV shows, radio programmes, regional programming and feature films. After seven days, the content will be automatically deleted from the user's computers. BBC will use this trial to iron out any outstanding rights issues and resolve teething difficulties with the technology ahead of a full launch next year." The BBC Press Office has a release about this as well.
But I don't think they'll beat products like the Nebula because they are so easy to use, and no DRM
My Dad uses it often to record shows and burn them to DVD
very reliable
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Dang. This is just a beta to 5000 homes. BTW, anyone notice this:
Laser disc This early forerunner to the DVD used giant 12-inch discs and was a conspicious flop.
That's like saying that oversized cassette cartriges were failures. Yeah, no one used them at home, but Laser Disks are still used at the industrial level to store master digital recordings of movies. Without laser disk technology, we'd probably still be splicing film!
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Agreed, I thought the most interesting deveolopment was that they were allowing downloads of feature films (which presumably they've liscenced to show on the TV channels as well.) That's a step forward if anything.
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Although this does raise the question of why the content is deleted at all. Since the license payers have already paid for it to be produced, why can they not do whatever they want with the content?
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Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Automatically deleted from user's computers? That would make me a bit uncomfortable. Why would I want someone poking around MY computer deleting stuff, even if it is authorized? Computers, especially systems running Windows should not be open to others for manipulation (IMAO). Then, there's the issue of Linux. Will there be a special BBC account set up, or should users just hand over their root password?
I don't know. It's just too much control over private property by a governmental/corporate entity. That's trouble. However, the people of Britian are used to being watched constantly anyway. There's cameras everywhere on that island! King Arthur would be disgusted!
Well, that's just my initial reaction. I'm too lazy to read the article right now.
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I often read Americans saying they had to turn on subtitles to understand parts of The Office. As an English person I've always wanted to know which parts/characters Americans find hard to understand. Or is it just the slang terms used?
From an English person's point of view, the accents are fairly standard mid-England/London accents. But then, having driven round rural Georgia, I know we are two countries divided by a common language.
Heck, we in the US are one country divided by a common language. I moved to northern California from the midwest a couple of years ago. There are many large but distinct ethnic groups here all with their own version of English.
For weeks when I first arrived (and sometimes even now) I had to have my wife translate what people were saying to me. She's from here originally and so grew up understanding the different dialects.
Those first few weeks were like visiting a foreign country with only a high school level understanding of the language.
Where have you been?
The UK TV licence fee is regularly moaned about on Slashdot!
For info:
In the UK you need to have a licence for each address which has a TV receiver (you can have dozens of sets in the same house and one licence if you want*)
FWIW I'm happy to pay it for TV free from adverts disrupting the shows and with greater freedom to express ideas without worrying about business withdrawing advertising revenue. And don't worry about the 'tax' aspects meaning state direction - the Beeb regularly clashes with the government of the day - as both main parties seem to complain about it, it must be reasonably neutral. (BTW I have no connection with the BBC)
Others may dislike the licence on philosophical / political / dogmatic grounds (esp if they like watching the commercial channels more) - I accept that I have to subsidise, through higher prices, the advertising 'industry' and through them the other channels.
* actually there are some restrictions (eg multiple independent occupancy of a house split into flats) but the principle holds for most cases
I have also had no trouble understanding the accents in the new season of Doctor Who (friends have taped and sent me the first few eps... God bless my multi-format VHS machine), but I think it's worth noting that Rose's (possibly Billie Piper's, but she may be affecting an accent for the character) accent is more odd to me than anything I recall from The Office. She seems to have difficulty with both of the "th" sounds, replacing them with either "v" or "f". Heh. I find it funny how most folks from the US are totally unable to imitate an English accent well, and how most folks from the UK and Ireland are unable to imitate any US accent well. Gwyneth Paltrow is one (rare) example of a USian who can do a decent English accent. Bob Hoskins is an example of an English person who can do a decent US accent. I remember thinking it was weird (and not a good sign) that an English actor had been cast in the role of the gumshoe detective in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, but when I was watching the film, I forgot about it and didn't even notice he wasn't a United Statesian. Hoskins does a pretty good generic US accent.
But the true master of accents in the English language is Tracey Ullman. That woman is a genius. She is English, and can do various English accents, plus a decent Australian accent, and a whole bunch of American accents. She can do a Jewish New York accent and an Italian New York accent better than I could ever do (and I have Jewish family in the New York metro area!). The two are different, and both are pretty darn good. She can do a Southern accent and a Texas accent and nail both. If I try to do a Southern US accent and a Texas accent, I end up doing the same mixed Southeastern-Texas accent that misses important aspects of both. It doesn't sound right even to my own ear, much less to people from those regions. And I lived 31 years in the USA, have family in Texas and had a best friend from the South (plus my sister lives in South Carolina now). I am in awe of Tracey Ullman.
When I went to visit a friend in England in 1986, there was a moment when my friend's family and I were waiting to get a table at a popular (and fancy) restaurant. Another man waiting for a table heard my accent and struck up a conversation with me. It was really embarassing, because my friend had to "translate," even though we were both speaking English. This fellow, in addition to having an accent that made it difficult for me to recognize words I know, used terms I'd never heard before. For example, his joke that I might order a "chip buttie" at the fancy restaurant was totally lost on me. My friend had to explain that a "chip buttie" is basically a french fry sandwich. An explained joke is never as funny, but I did my best to show amusement, because on an intellectual level, it was humorous. Still, the embarassment of having to have the joke "translated," plus the fact of it coming to me as an explained joke and not a "fresh" one kinda killed the humor. "Divided by a common language," indeed.
"It is nice to know that the computer understands the problem. But I would like to understand it too." --Eugene Wigner
NRK, the Norwegian government-run TV already offer high-quality streams of every single show they produce, including newscasts, for free. It's an excellent service; if I miss a show, I'll just watch it online. How the BBC claims that this is revolutionary I cannot understand. http://www.nrk.no/
Lalala
As a person who has emigrated from England to Australia - I have learned to appreciate the BBC even more.
Before I left I would have died in a ditch to protect the BBC's freedoms but having seen what continual government interference has done to the Australian equivalent (the ABC) I have really come to marvel at what a great job the BBC does with its limited resources.
Especially now they've brought back Dr Who...
I know that to our American readers the idea of a "television tax" being used to pay for adverisment free channels smells like "big government" in reality it means there is a genuine free press in England. Every commercially owned channel unfortunately is influenced by the owners (and why shouldn't it be really - Rupert Murdoch doesn't want to get reamed out by Sky News so he isn't).
The problem is that every owner has pretty much the same party affiliation in America so evry news channel is pro-Republican and certain "Anti-Republican" news is either not reported or not emphasised. If Clinto had lied to congress to start a war that caused the death of over 1000 American troops you can be darn sure it would not be ignored by the television news the way it has been over the last few years
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