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Streaming March Madness On Linux?
neersign writes "March Madness is here and NCAA.com is streaming all of the games over the internet for free. The downside is they are using Microsoft technologies to do so. The standard player lists Windows XP/Vista, IE6, and WMP 9 as the base requirements. The High Quality Video Player requires Silverlight 2. So my question is: how would a Linux user be able to work around these requirements and watch the games?"
Call them a bunch of faggots for using Microsoft technology. Publicly. Declare whatever it is they're showing to be boring (wtf is march madness?) and take your dollars elsewhere--or to a campaign against them.
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search deadspin, you'll find my site ;)
Yahoo typically streams NCAA basketball games, and I've had success with opening the videos with Totem using GStreamer codecs (from the "bad" and "ugly" set, though).
Then you would be watching sports which would make you not a Linux user.
*computer explodes from the incongruity*
it's my understanding that moonlight is supposed to fill that gap.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/05/15/moonlight-release-puts-Silverlight-on-Linux_1.html
get your faggot linux the fuck off our game. you fucking homos should just die and we'd hear no more of you or your faggot linux. go suck a dick.
For the record, the next time you enjoy your Tivo, your using linux. Hope you like the taste of cock meat.
Download VirtualBox
http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
Install a version of Windows XP. If you don't have one find a torrent... cough cough blackxp cough.
Watch March Madness on Windows on Linux.
For the record, I don't watch sports, so I don't know that it work. That said, I have watched Netflix (uses Silverlight) on a licensed Windows in Virtualbox on Ubuntu.
CAPS LOCK: ITS LIKE THE CRUISE CONTROL FOR AWESOME
What is this 'bas-ket ball' you speak of?
Given the fact that this is Sports, I suspect you'll find that using a closed, proprietary technology was spec'ed as a business requirement for this. The streams are probably wrapped in some kind of DRM, which is something that (as a practical matter) you'll only get by going with a single-vendor solution.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Just watch it on TV. And tell them you are forced to do that because you cannot watch the games your non-Windows computer, your smartphone, your Playstation etc.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
You just posted to /., you used Linux
I was able to watch the games online last year using the mediaplayerconnectivity plugin for firefox and vlc. I tried this year, but they block all non-IE browsers from accessing the video streams. I was able to get past this check by using the UserAgentSwitcher plugin, but now it won't let me get to the streams because I don't have windows media player.
The entire point to doing this is because CBS' coverage rotates amongst all the games unless you're in the major market of one of the teams and in that case you only get that game.
The bottom line is their coverage sucks. The solution to this is to watch online. Thus, we're back at the problem presented in the summary.
Kinda off topic but in Atlanta the CBS affiliate has activated OTA digital channel 46-2 as NCAA CBS. Sadly quality is only 480i (the game on 46-1 is in 1080i) but it's there to watch. I'm wondering if NCAA CBS is a national addition to the OTA Digital lineup?
"The Adobe Updater must update itself before it can check for updates. Would you like to update the Adobe Updater now?"
...needs some sort of user player spoofer plug in?
Oh hooray, we're back to the the "my $SERVICE_PROVIDER doesn't give me what I want, when I want it, for the price I want to pay for it and in the format I desire, so breaking the law by contravening the DRM is absolutely justified" school of thought.
Does Silverlight not work in Linux? The streams run & look great in Mac OSX in both Firefox & Safari.
Where are the mod points when I need them. Thanks Molochi, you just doubled my Tournament coverage. My 768k internet just doesn't stream well, but my 12ft antenna picks up High Quality Basketball. The second channel is in 480i, but that is mostly because if they wanted two HD feeds they would have to turn down the bitrate and that would annoying the 99% of people watching the main channel.
If you can put up with a bit of a delay, download the games you want to see later from the usenet (posted in HD 720p, mkv), and watch them on the system of your choice at your leisure. That's what I'm going to do. To h-e-double-hockysticks with the NCAA if they want to kowtow to Microsludge
I'd say try it at least, not bullet proof but works most of the time.
I have to use it to access my local bank's website which doesn't work with FF :(
Please be sure you're not part of the quiet minority: http://www.cbssports.com/login?xurl=/help/askmmod&p_next_page=ask.php
I'd be curious to hear how well it works.
Their Silverlight 2 support's in alpha now, targeting beta in May and final in September.
http://www.mono-project.com/MoonlightRoadmap
Less than 11 months until the Vancouver WInter Olympics in Silverlight! I'm sure they'd appreciate any help in their Hackathon:
http://www.mono-project.com/Moonlight2Hacking
My video compression blog
I'm no big fan of basketball, so its no big deal to me. If they wanted to stream this to everyone on the internet, they would have done so. Either someone was being an incompetent boob when they did this, or they went out of their way to be a pain in the ass. Certainly mickeysoft would have been cheerful to cut you off (they go far far out of their way to do this at every opportunity). In a case like this, when its streaming entertainment, its only really annoying (but you won't die). When the US department of disaster services or whatever immediately after the disaster in New Orleans, keeping to mickeysofts locked-in, us-only formats meant people did die. For that, its a pity that mickeysoft and the US government were not held criminally responsible.
Complain to the FTC en-masse so they force Microsoft to make a version of Silverlight for Linux?
Seems to me that Microsoft have just won the desktop war, for the next ten years, thanks to more shitty proprietary format lock-in.
I know, why don't you use Windows - I hear Silverlight and other Microsoft applications tend to work pretty well with that particular OS
Buy a copy of Windows, ya cheap-skate!
Get virtualbox (free) and install Windows Beta 7 (free) & Silverlight - job done.
Cheating, I guess - but it'll work.
FYI - Hardware acceleration only appears to work with 32-bit guest OS's at the present time.
For the benefit of the 90-odd percent of Internet users *not* in the US, wtf is "March Madness" and NCAA.com? The site is slashdotted, or broken, or something.
Mega March Madness has all games on direct tv and some bars are likely to have it.
Well, a company named Real Networks ships a fully supported Linux player and you see the feedback they get. I don't know if they can DRM on Linux, on OS X and Symbian they can.
He will probably accept 10s of MS patents in process, have a Mono framework but he will likely watch it with that Moonlight thingie. It is not evil right?
MS missed a huge opportunity by not shipping official Silverlight 2 to Linux and PPC/OS X right from Microsoft.com. Some could really believe they have changed their 1990s model. If they have managed to ship a 64bit player for Linux before Adobe did, imagine the feedback they would get.
They spend their money and power to bribe the low ethics ''sports'' admins and suits instead. It is the 1990s for you, ''Watch it with our exclusive (insert dead dotcom codec) technology!''. H264 and MPEG4 SP and even simple http streaming took over, it is only MS not admitting it. Even Real moved to AAC (plus) and some variant of h264 in rv10.
Works fine on my dad's Intel Imac with Silverlight on Safari. I imagine it would work fine with Moonlight under Ubuntu, but I am not near my machine to test it or poke around with it.
Your Linux trolling is redolent of teh fail. Stay with sports fans trying to look down on people for having active sex lives, that part's funny.
Complain, complain, complain. File bug reports people.
I also refuse to install silverlight, because I do not want Microsoft gaining control of Internet multimedia. Flash is acceptable because it isn't developed by a rival OS manufacturer who has a history of shady tactics.
For me, it's not about demanding free software, it's about refusing to adopt technology that is under the control of an enemy.
You're just encouraging them.
Turn on the TV. This is one of those annoying Linux questions. Here's another, Q: I can't get "Y" to work on Linux?, A: boot into windows or OSX. This has been another addition of basic Linux problem solving.
http://pyromania.cs.columbia.edu/~spotter/ncaa/ncaa.cgi
Try Justin.TV Sports. That's how many expats get sports from their home countries while away. It's also a great resource for getting sports (and other programming) not generally available in your own country.
This works on Macs (Intel and Power). I thought it worked on Linux with the latest Flash plugin, but I've had one Linux user tell me that it didn't. (Then again, I don't know what version of Flash he was using.) Please give it a try and report back what happens on Linux. I'd like to know for sure myself.
that states "express written consent of the NCAA and the -insert major network here-" thanks to lock-ins, black-outs, exclusivity rights, and licensing agreements, and the crushing monopoly the NCAA maintains on their franchise, what led anyone to expect they would allow people to watch the game in any other format but one of the most coontrolled and restrictive? if this were PBS it might be news for nerds on some level, but this highlights a greater problem with monopolistic entertainment industries.
Good people go to bed earlier.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10200699-93.html
hah probably using a router in your house that uses some form of unix.
All you need is an antenna and a TV-tuner, and you can receive many games free over the air via local CBS affiliates. (No $h17light required) In many cities, the local CBS affiliates are running additional subchannels (rescan if you don't see 'em) to carry additional simultaneous games.
If you have digital cable, your cable company may be providing NCAA feeds too.
You can install a some virtual ware (Sun's VirtualBox or VMWare), install a MS client and then stream the content. It's how I get radio at work.
Of course, this is why Mono's support of the .NET APIs in general, and Moonlight in particular, is bad for Linux: it is encouraging services to deploy Windows-specific technologies under the guise that it's actually "cross platform".
If a publisher tests its Silverlight app on Moonlight, then how is it not cross-platform?
but they should stick to implementing Free APIs, like Qt and GTK+.
What makes an API itself non-free, as opposed to its implementation?
A better suggestion is to take that $125 installation fee and $80 for the month and pay off your bar tab at the local sports bar :) The games are more fun there than hunched over a Linux laptop...
It'd be a pity to be a freshman or sophomore in college and not be able to watch your own school's team because you're too young to get into a bar. I haven't seen a lot of sports bars with family rooms.
the only thing you can do other than jail someone is free them
But isn't that a true statement? So far as I can tell, "in jail" is a binary state: you either are, or you aren't. I mean, unless you add in the possibility of death.
As for force, most of the time it is the only alternative to discussion (I'm speaking of personal, face-to-face violence by the way; I'm ignoring disputes between nations for the purposes of this thread).
When someone acts violently towards you, or someone in the same room as you, you have only three basic options: run away or ignore the problem, use logic and reason to talk the aggressor down, or force him to stop.
-Running away isn't always possible.
-Ignoring violence committed against other people is even more anti-social than committing the violence in the first place. (hence Burke's famous quote: "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing")
-Some people aren't willing to listen to logic and reason.
That leaves force. It's not the solution to every problem, but some problems require it. Anytime you call the police because someone's acting violent, you're asking them to stop him, using force if necessary -- lethal force if necessary -- on your behalf. The police cannot always be there though; would you really be willing to sit there, waiting for the police to arrive to stop a murder when you could do it yourself, because "violence is wrong"?
Convert FLACs to a portable format with FlacSquisher
For anyone who wants to watch the games go here and get the firefox user agent switcher https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/59
Then go here and get the moonlight add-on which a plugin for silverlight implementation. Then go to tools>user agent switcher> and select windows internet explorer 7 and go watch some MARCH MADNESS!!!
...with Ogg Vorbis and Theora to heavily compete with Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight. Multi-platform and seamless compatibility is key and the likes of Adobe and Microsoft are not going to focus on that goal over other goals. HTML 5 with Ogg Vorbis and Theora would be the true open standard to streaming audio and video over the Internet versus the corporate gorillas who don't care about open standards (or the need to protect such standards).