Slashdot Mirror
Classic TV for Free Download
way2trivial writes to tell us the New York Times is reporting that Warner Brothers will have over 100 classic TV shows available for free download with a 1-2 minutes of commercials per episode. From the article: "There is a catch. To use the technology, viewers will have to agree to participate in a special file-sharing network. This approach helps AOL reduce the cost of distributing-high quality video files by passing portions of the video files from one user's computer to another. AOL says that since it will control the network, it can protect users from the sorts of viruses and spyware that infect other peer-to-peer systems."
The media are slowly awakening to the possibilities offered by p2p technologies. Finally. ...it's a start.
When I saw the word classic, I assumed the black-and-white hits of yesteryear, but this is going to include things that I would still consider somewhat recent like Babylon 5 and Growing Pains.
Then again, maybe that just means I'm getting old.
Sounds pretty decent so far. I just hope I don't have to install some P.O.S. viewer to see this stuff.
I agree with everything you said, but one of the best aspects of this from a slashdotter's POV is that it whittles away at the filesharing == evil stigma. I think this is a big plus for business, for users, and for the future of the internet. Hopefully it will accelerate broadband penetration as well.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
It's just so nice to see a media corporation recognize that legit uses of peer-to-peer exist. The fact that they're actually using it is even better.
Bad statistics always irk me. Yet a recent survey by the Points North Group of 1,098 Internet users found that 28 percent said they wanted to watch regular television shows on their PC's or laptops, Mr. Storck said. Yea, and in a recent phone interview, 100% of the participants have a phone line. I'd be much more interested in the number of television viewers who'd prefer to switch to watching shows on their computers if they could.
The service, called In2TV, will be free, supported by advertising, and will start early next year. More than 4,800 episodes will be made available online in the first year.
Programs on In2TV will have one to two minutes of commercials for each half-hour episode, compared with eight minutes in a standard broadcast. The Internet commercials cannot be skipped.
The article is extremely light on technical details, saying only that it "will use peer-to-peer file-sharing technology to get the video data to viewers." This, along with the commercials which cannot be skipped, suggests a custom client will be required to view the content, which probably means alternative OS users will not be supported. Regardless of how tentative it is, I Personally think it's a great first move at bringing old content online. Considering this is a free service, I guess we can't really complain, and it will be exciting to see what happens when their protocol is decrypted so we can stream the content to our player (or file) of choice.
In related news, Firefox 1.07 would crash on loading TFA, but 1.5RC2 doesn't seem to have a problem with it.
A steaming cup of soykaf would be real wiz right now.
Yes, finally! My only concern now is that they will destroy this by putting DRM, etc. They're going to want to prevent people from skipping the commercials. Lets hope they trust the honor system (and the viewers follow said system) instead of making the downloads useless by
Personally, I would gladly pay to download the few shows I like to watch. We only get ultrabasic cable, so I can't watch channels like Comedy Central anyways. A reasonable ($1-$5) per-download fee or a season subscription fee would be a great model for those who prefer to watch TV when they want to. For prices at the low end of the spectrum I would even be willing to tolerate ads.
isomerica.net | Foonetic IRC
AOL says that since it will control the network, it can protect users from the sorts of viruses and spyware that infect other peer-to-peer systems.
Sounds like a challenge to me.
AOL is using file-sharing technology from Kontiki, a Silicon Valley company providing a similar system to the ambitious Internet video program of the BBC.
That's odd, I remember Kontiki working off of caching, which means that part of the copyrighted video would be actually stored on client's computers.
From:
http://www.kontiki.com/technology/index.html
The Kontiki Delivery Grid dynamically optimizes delivery from many PCs and media servers by caching content at the very edge of the network. This creates network efficiency gains of 10 to 25 times over traditional approaches.
It also brings legality into question for other distribution mechanisms, I would think. If Kontiki is legal, how would caching a bittorrent for an episode of "Lost" be any different?
IANAL, but I'm very interested in this, because while I understand that the producers of Lost grant only ABC distribution rights, then obviously it's not the mechanism, but the individual violation that is at fault. In other words, the success of Kontiki would basically ensure that Bittorrent would continue to be a legal distribution method, even if the content being distributed itself was not. Right?
While I'm not aware of any specific attacks on Bittorrent's legality, I know that it has been questioned before. We just had some legal cases with Grokster and others that even now have on their webpages that there is such a thing as "unauthorized peer-to-peer services". If Bittorrent is one of these, then why is Kontiki be considered not one?
Why is this a deterrent? You're not buying content, so why should you keep it forever? If you like it and want it forever, buy the DVD sets.
:)
Possibly, in the future, they'll have a link at the end of a certain episode saying "To see the rest of this season, click here to order the full season." This isn't a bad idea actually. Get someone hooked on the first half of the season, and charge them for the latter half. It's something the drug dealers have done for eternity
Proprietary file format? (can't edit out commercials in Virtualdub)
And slashdot types wonder why media companies aren't falling all over themselves to cater to them. A company offers you FREE content in exchange for including ads in it. The FIRST thing you want to do is edit out the ads.
Want it without ads? Buy it.
Content costs money to create, particularly movies/TV. If you've never been involved in TV (let alone Movie) quality production, you might be surprise at how hard it can be. Despite the hype, you can't make a decent show with a DV Cam and a Powerbook.
If you want the content you like to be delivered to you in the format you want, you have to provide some kind of economic benefit back to those that produce it.
Proprietary file format? (can't edit out commercials in Virtualdub)
Probably so, but I think AOL realizes that it will be impossible to completely prevent some determined pirate from editing out the commercials. Rather, they are relying on a principle that Apple uncovered -- that if you make things simple and reliable, most people would rather get a quick legitimate copy from a reliable source than an iffy bootleg which may be bad quality and may not even be what it purports to be. The average person will reason, why risk stiff criminal penalties for an illegal download when you can get it for free, or rather, just for watching a few commercials? (Surely we don't think it's coincidental that the carrot and the stick are being shown to us at the same time, do we?)
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
But I DO have a problem with having to use their client to view it. I watch video in basically 2 places. On my linux computer. And on my TV by way of a computer hooked to it. Now, the problem is that it is very hard to display video to a tv. Really only programs that are full screen and have taken this into account are capable of navigating and displaying video in such a way. I want 1 program to do this. Be it sageTV, a Windows Media Center Edition, MythTV, etc. The LAST thing I want to do is open up iTunes for my iTunes protected media, (and unless something has changed I don't know about, it doesn't display on a TV worth squat), or this Time Warner client to watch their media.
Granted, I have a very poor quality TV. But even if I update to a nice, fresh one, I should only have to have 1 program running to access my media. Each protection scheme should supply some pre-compiled library that each media player can then integrate to decode the data or to do whatever is required.
I honestly think that distribution of video media over computers will be hamstrung until providers consider how the way they make their media available will work with a Home Entertainment Center PC.
I do security
When TV began, distribution channels were very limited. New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, our biggest markets, had 7 channels. Most other places got a lot less.
Cable TV started in the sixties. In 1970, when I signed up for cable TV service (TelePrompTer) in West Palm Beach, we got 12 stations - one of which was a rotating camera showing ads and a thermometer. I don't think I got anything that couldn't be plucked off the air.
Living in the Philadelphia suburbs in the mid-70s, cable TV began to bring additional channels like HBO (it was only programmed in the evenings) and CNN. For programmers, and advertisers, there were additional venues.
Try to get a new cable channel on now. Even with a hundred or more slots, there isn't room for anything new. Or, if a channel does somehow get on, it is relegated to such bad 'real estate' that no one sees it.
If AOL is successful, it will open up new channels and, more importantly, change the economics of distribution.
In the old days, the broadcast networks paid to have local stations carry them. That era is ending (and has already ended for most stations). In addition, the networks allowed local affiliates to sell a few commercials within the local shows.
If the AOL experiment works, and distribution costs are reasonable, AOL can sell the local and national ads itself, in any way it wishes, and eliminate the middleman.
Most local stations understand this... well, I hope they understand this. They will have to adapt their business model when they are no longer used by others as distributors, getting free or discounted shows to fill their broadcast day.
Over the past decade, local news programming has increased. Under this scenario there will probably be even more local programming.
I don't know what this means for those channels that don't do anything but play shows from syndicators or networks. This such a radical switch. Can they change? Many are physically incapable of even producing programs in-house.
Don't dwell on the specific programs AOL is rolling out on the Internet. The titles are unimportant, because if this move is at all successful, more valuable programming will follow. It's much easier to experiment with Welcome Back Kotter, which has little value at the moment.
Unfortunately, there are corollaries to Gresham's Law that come into play here. Will the addition of all these new distribution channels drive down the quality of TV? Stay tuned.
Because even bullshit costs a hellava lot more money when produced by professionals. Consider, say, Mission to Mars, which is my standard example of Worst Movie Ever. However, lets ignore the wooden acting, bland direction and painful script for now. All the actors are in focus. They all have competently applied make up. The picture isn't grainy. You can't see any plywood poking out from behind the fairely extensive sets. The costumes look realistic. The audio is fine: you can hear the actors' lines without the music, sound effects, or ambiant noise drowning them out. There's a score. The custom 3-d modelling is competent. You can't see bits of camera equipment or sound booms in the frame, and so on. Sadly the same can't be said for many things put together with a DV and a bootleg copy of Final Cut. Just to to reach a minimal production threshhold costs money: professionals aren't cheap.
Anyhoo, I suspect that your idea of what's crap may not exactly match up with what's mine, or others', raising the question of which 60% gets cut. I suspect that a lot of crap is actually responsible for some of the highest profits in the industry, so the exec's wouldn't exactly be saving billions in any case.
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
I'd love to watch the ones that originally aired on these shows.