Free-to-Air TV and Radio?

ChiaBen asks: "I was visiting a friend recently who has a Free-to-air satellite receiver. It allows him to pick up any free satellite TV and radio programs, along with many pay-to-view (requires a payment, of course) programs. Nokia has a receiver, and I'd like to know if else is making similar hardware. It seems interesting, but before I drop a few hundred bones on one, I'd like to know what everyone has to say about it?"

Comments

There are MANY companies making these receivers.

[Anonymous Coward]

pansat
viewsat
fortec

many more.

try www.al7bar.tk for more info

posted anon for personal reasons :-)

Re:free to air tv and radio, if you steal it!

[jonaskoelker]

I object to you using the word 'steal'

When I cook spaghetti, I do object if someone else eats it, because then I cannot eat it. His action hurts me exactly as much as it benefits him; only one of us can eat the spaghetti, so the question is, which? The smallest distinction between us is enough to tip the ethical balance.

(Why software should not have owners, RMS, http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-free.html)

(paraphrase of the next paragraph of the same text) When someone views a TV broadcast, it doesn't hurt anyone else (but see also below)--it doesn't take away their ability to view (or not view) the same program.

Also, we shouldn't encourage paying for viewing proprietry broadcasts, since we then reward the people who take away our freedom.

I'm sorry that the closest-to-neutral term I can come up with is 'unlawful [action]'--some people might misconstrue that one is saying that because it's against the law, it's wrong. This is not true: the law doesn't define what is right and wrong; what is right and wrong defines--or at least should define--the law, which is a mere instrument to achieve justice. Of course, it's only succeeds some of the time (I suggest you view "The Devil's Advocate"--of course without rewarding anyone for taking away your freedom to copy it--or, if you can, recall the first and last ~10 minutes).

RMS objects to the word `content' on http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html (I avoid using the word--I use the words data and/or information instead--but I don't feel strongly about its use).

I object to the term `protect': the information being broadcast isn't hurt from being viewed, and neither is the broadcaster. True, they may be unable to make money by their current business model, but as a--to some extent--advocate of the free market, I don't give a damn; if they can only make money by unjustly opressing their customers, they shouldn't be able to make money.

Also, no, the law doesn't define what's just/right/ethically accetable; au contraire, what is right, just and ethically acceptable defines what the laws is (or at least that's the way it ought to be), as I already mentioned.

---

You'll probably think I'm some sort of RMS/GNU/FSF/GCC/TLA fanboy, and to some extent rightly so--I do agree with most (but not all[1]) of RMS's values and conclusions. You, ebooher, will probably get your opinion of me lowered due to me being such a nitpicker, and I'll probably get modded -1 for some reason, but I think these points have to be made.

Footnotes:

1. I'm disagree with his conclusions in `why GNU su doesn't support the `wheel' group' (http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html _node/coreutils_149.html)--I think that wheel has an ethically legitimate use: to make sure that if anyone exploits a program running as `nobody', they can't become root. I haven't made up my mind as to whether exercising control over the machines you own (specifically over your users except yourself) is wrong, but that is--for the purpose of my counterargument--irrelevant: any ethically legitimate uses of anything shouldn't be prevented, and thus one shouldn't do blanket prevention of some object that has at least one legitimate use.

Specifically, I think it's ok for su to support wheel. RMS doesn't.

Re:I do not do this.

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a huge difference in picking a signal out of the air and inserting a splitter into a cable to recieve a signal. It's the difference between listening in on a conversation at a table next to you at a restaurant and tapping someone's phone. There's also a difference in encoding and decrypting. Encoding is essentially a method of converting from one format to another, or encapsulating one format within another. Encrypting uses a key and is specifically for the purpose of preventing unauthorized interception of the signal. Morally and, in most cases, legally, there is nothing wrong with receiving and decoding signals transmitted over the air (whether from a terrestial transmitter or from a sattelite transmitter.) There are, however, both moral and legal issues with tapping into a wired signal or decrypting a signal without authorization.