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How Hulu, NBC, and Other Sites Block Google TV
Shortly after the launch of Google TV, it became clear that several networks and services were blocking access. Reader padarjohn points out a blog post from Lauren Weinstein explaining the blocking mechanisms being used and wondering why it's being tolerated. "Imagine the protests that would ensue if Internet services arbitrarily blocked video only to Internet Explorer or Firefox browsers! Or if Hulu and the other networks decided they'd refuse to stream video to HP and Dell computers because those manufacturers hadn't made deals with the services to the latter's liking." Various workarounds are being used to get around the blocks.
Imagine the protests that would ensue if Internet services arbitrarily blocked video only to Internet Explorer or Firefox browsers! Or if Hulu and the other networks decided they'd refuse to stream video to HP and Dell computers because those manufacturers hadn't made deals with the services to the latter's liking.
You mean like country restrictions?
It would be nice to side with Google here, but they do exactly the same on YouTube. Apply restrictions that content producers require. This time they're just on the other side of the game, and get restricted themself.
Average Internet users don't give a fuck. They really don't. That's why there aren't any protests.
The more onerous restrictions legitimate services impose, the more people will be drawn towards services that don't impose such restrictions, like thepiratebay.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
...the same thing happened with Boxee and Hulu after Boxee supposedly had Hulu's blessing to integrate Hulu into Boxee. A little while later, Hulu Desktop was released. I guess the networks want people using their TVs to watch their on the actual TV channels.
From TFA: "Ironically, NBC -- one of the networks blocking Google TV -- offers a CNBC Google TV application for fans of its news channel."
... because of the generosity of Comcast ... streams just about everything to Google TV: ABC, NBC, Fox, all but CBS ... The ironic part is that the content seems to be provided by Hulu itself"
This seems to clearly be a case of one hand not knowing the other hand is doing.
From T[o]FA: "Google TV isn’t totally a lost cause
Wait... How many fucking hands do I have?
Sometimes I really wonder is these media companies are just run by pre-pubescent boys. Does someone have the invitee list to the CEOs' birthday parties?
I've been blocking certain sites and services for certain groups like forever. If you live in a specific Asian country you haven't been able to send email to me or any of my users for like ten years.
It's my website, and I allow or disallow you to see my content. Just like I allow or disallow people to enter my house. Why should things be different when you are Hulu, NBC or anybody/anything else? Within the bounds of law anybody has a right to discriminate.
My immediate thought was, isn't this more like blocking hot linking of images? Plenty of sites do that, it's not a bad thing at all.
"blocking hot linking of images" is primarily done to save bandwidth and to force people to view your page for whatever reason (most likely ad money). I would presume that the same Hulu ads would be streamed to you if you used Google TV so why care? It's the same bandwidth whether or not I use the website or Google TV. It's not like Hulu shows external ads on the pages its self.
BitTorrent technology is legal & open to all, then they wouldn`t have to worry about corporate a holes with little you know what syndrome blocking them.
Google should just make an advanced configuration settings page, and let users set whatever user-agent/etc they want there.
If users can edit all of the http request headers, then there will be no way for providers to filter by browser/etc. They just need to put in the headers for IE9 or whatever and they're done.
Google of course should not distribute anything with those settings to stay in the clear.
Don't worry - the average consumer is pretty smart and they'll get their smart next-door-neighbor's kid to set them up.
About the only way studios could block this would be to put keys/certificates on boxes that they want to provide content to. That will last about as long as HDCP...
'saving bandwidth' is not the term I would use. I call it 'stealing bandwidth and services'.
Hulu has every right to dictate how you may use their content. Being liberal in what they allow would be smart, since more viewers means more eyeballs for their advertisers, but at the end of the day it is their right and no-one else's.
Seems odd that CNBC would be an "early adopter" and NBC would be actively sandbagging the same project.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/458030-Google_TV_Tunes_To_Turner_HBO_CNBC_Netflix_And_Others.php
When I first heard hulu (and others) were blocking GoogleTV, I immediately imagined they were going off the user-agent string. Of course, what else could they really use? But I'm told they began blocking GoogleTV even though people were changing their user-agent string to MSIE strings. How the hell do they do it?
Your typical GoogleTV appliance will be behind a NAT gateway, and it will make relatively ordinary web requests. It's not like they're using os fingerprinting or something. The networks can't come back and scan your device. That doesn't make sense. So how would they that? Is it something in the streaming protocol (flash)? It's mysterious to me.
Imagine if you weren't allowed to use roads because a bus company complained about your driving 3 times. --skunkpussy
I completely agree with you.
Blocking content from people using certain browsers might be bad business, but I don't see any reason why the law should deign to notice. Your property, your equipment, your configuration, your rights.
"There's companies that are just so cool that you just can't even deal with it," - Bill Gates, about Google
If there's no content there to see, I guess Google can leave NBC, ABC, CBS, and other networks out of their search index. I'm sure the networks' advertisers will understand.
There's always FilmOn.com, and plenty of other sites that allow "free tv" with recording capabilities.
Owners of a content distribution channel for content are attempting to exercise their right to control how that channel is accessed, albeit in a stupid and pointless way! Horror!
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
They have the right but that doesn't mean that we have to like it.
The reality is that TV used to be free. You put up an antenna and got TV for free. The networks made money by showing commercials. What consumers want is a return to that type of system. We do not want to pay $100 plus dollars for two hundred channels of which we watch 5. This is going to be the new reality and the Networks need to get a grip on it. The Cable TV model is passing. My mother in law lives near Dallas and gets all her TV OVA again. She gets like 30 channels and all the networks for free.
Where I live that isn't an option which is too bad so my wife and I are probably just going to drop Cable and watch Hulu. The one channel we really want is CBS for Big Bang Theory but we are willing to stop watching that to save a thousand plus dollars a year.
If the other networks want to not have us watch that is their business or lack of.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Google can't complain about this until they stop the ridculous blocking of YouTube content on certain devices. I have an Android phone and around 1 in 3 videos I try to view on YouTube have a "not available on mobiles" error message.
I would guess that this is a 'security' option given to video uploaders. But why? Why allow someone to watch a video on their desktop or laptop, but not on their mobile? Much is made of having YouTube "built in" to mobiles, so why hold back progress by making the mobile world off-limits for certain content?
Since when is blocking one specific Asian country being a racist asshole? You don't even know which country, or why.
If Hulu would block anything but IE that's fine by me. They have the right to do so. I for one wouldn't let a shortshigted biggot like you in my house and I have every right to do so.
If they did they would lose a lot of subscribers. And all those former subscribers would find another way to view the same content. Who is losing what?
Let's assume that Shell would only sell petrol to Ford trucks. Exactly how long would it take for them to go bust? Most petrol stations are francises. If you force the fancisee to lose two-thirds of his turnover he would gladly change sides and go with another brand. Exit market-share, and a couple of months later exit Shell America.
Should Goverment step in and force Shell to sell to all brands? Would you like to live in a nanny-state where goverment dictates who to sell to, or who not to sell to? And since your goverment dictates who to admit to websites and shops, it's a small step for that goverment to dictate who may enter your house.
Slippery slope indeed.
Google would have a better case to make if they had not threatened to block their content for facebook just yesterday. http://goo.gl/WyBJM (slashdot.org)
The more onerous restrictions legitimate services impose, the more people will be drawn towards services that don't impose such restrictions, like thepiratebay.
Yes, when will corporations realize that information services are not scarcity driven, but are plentitude driven? The more shows that you provide, the more customers you will attract.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
They have the right but that doesn't mean that we have to like it. The reality is that TV used to be free. You put up an antenna and got TV for free. The networks made money by showing commercials.
If they block you they are not showing their commercials to you, and they are losing money. That is what you should be telling them. Companies need money, rejecting customers is losing money, or at the very least leaving money (that they could earn) to a competitor.
You don't want goverment stepping in, you want corporate greed winning from stupid RIAA/MPAA-inspired blocks.
You block asia?
No, he said that he is blocking "a specific Asian country".
Fine, be a racist asshole
How do you know he was doing it to be racist? Perhaps there were significant problems almost exclusively associated with usage/abuse from a particular country that would justify blocking it.
Bottom line is that I don't even know if I'm playing Devil's advocate here, because there isn't really enough info in the original to determine if he's being a racist dick or not. And nor is there enough info to point the finger and yell "racist!"- every time someone does so on Slashdot when there is a hint of by-area blocking just makes them sound like the boy that cried wolf.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
Hmm.. well Google ultimately (at the moment) has the most control.
What they did with the Facebook address book is interesting - they said "you either play nice, or we won't" - and that's a VERY interesting corporate precedent they've established.
It basically translates into a simple "quid pro quo" - or perhaps even better "we only have to play nice, when others do".
What I'd like to see Google announce tomorrow -- ..
Okay NBC, Hulu, etc. our new policy: we won't index sites which decide to arbitrarily support devices due to "incompatible business models"
and poof - from one moment to the next there will be a big black smoking crater where those websites once were in the google index.
I don't see why Google.com should be expected to maintain a compatibility database for sites, and return different results so they don't accidentally send Google TV viewers to NBC, Hulu, etc. it's probably easier for them to just drop those offending sites until they "work out their technical difficulties".
Alternatively Google can just put up big red warning messages adjacent to search results that basically say "this site is broken, it may not work correctly" as sort of a warning that "you either fix it, or we'll drop you in 30 days" or something like that.
"I will shit on the towel of anybody who pee's in the pool."
But not within normal business sense, unless you are the RIAA and like pissing on potential customers.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Uh, guy? This is Slashdot.
We know you're blocking China, and we know it's under the guise of spam. Which is hilarious, given that the US produces so much more spam than China. :p
Nobody gives a rat's ass about you! Whereas people care about Hulu. Sure Hulu, can discriminate if they want - NYTimes does, for example. It's within their rights and go for it. However don't be surprised when people start ignoring you.
The reason people don't want google stripping video from their sties, is because they provide the videos for free so people go to their sites. Google TV is basically just hijacking content. Content is not free. No one is entitled to snatch content from sites, unless they are allowing download of the content. And let me tell you, nobody is doing that. While Google TV is banned, it gives people a reason to visit these sites.
Since when is blocking one specific Asian country being a racist asshole? You don't even know which country, or why.
Enlighten us, then? I'm tending towards the GP's appraisal of your specific blocking as a racist action (if not a sign of racism as such), but I'm willing to be educated. (That said: only blocking "one specific country" is actually not an argument in your favor, IMO, quite the opposite.)
Would you like to live in a nanny-state where goverment dictates who to sell to, or who not to sell to? And since your goverment dictates who to admit to websites and shops, it's a small step for that goverment to dictate who may enter your house.
You know, any merit that your points may have is really going out the window as soon as you start throwing around terms like "nanny-state" (a meaningless term used by right-wingers when they run out of actual arguments) and constructing ridiculously unrealistic slippery slopes. Yeah, it's a small step for the government to dictate who may enter your house, indeed! It's also a small step for the government to clone Adolf Hitler, have him gay-marry Lenin's zombie corpse, and create a pinko commie fascist dictatorship.
I'm not sure if you're just yakking on because you enjoy listening to yourself (or reading your own comments) or whether you're genuinely trying to convince people who read your comments of your position, but if it's the latter, you really need to try a different approach.
If Hulu would block anything but IE that's fine by me. They have the right to do so. I for one wouldn't let a shortshigted biggot like you in my house and I have every right to do so.
It's not about rights - it's about intelligence and shooting yourself in the foot.
Let's assume that Shell would only sell petrol to Ford trucks. Exactly how long would it take for them to go bust? Most petrol stations are francises. If you force the fancisee to lose two-thirds of his turnover he would gladly change sides and go with another brand. Exit market-share, and a couple of months later exit Shell America.
Demonstrably false. There are plenty of after market resellers for Ford products. They don't sell stuff for Chevy or Chrysler, yet the managed to stay in business. Can Shell switch to be a gas company that only sells to Fords. Sure they can. It'd be a much less profitable business through.
Should Goverment step in and force Shell to sell to all brands? Would you like to live in a nanny-state where goverment dictates who to sell to, or who not to sell to? And since your goverment dictates who to admit to websites and shops, it's a small step for that goverment to dictate who may enter your house.
Slippery slope indeed.
Hey, HEY! This is 'merica here! We're already socialist to a large degree. The government dictates to us all the time. I highly doubt that Shell could say "We're selling to only Ford cars" and get away with it here. Try opening a shop that sells to only whites or only men or only smokers or only blondes. You can't! The government is already involved.
Oh I fully believe you should be able to and you should suffer what you may in the free market place for choosing that business model but alas my "free society" government disagrees with me and should I attempt to exercise my rights to discriminate I will be tossed into jail at the point of a gun.
I'm willing to bet it isn't Hulu's choice to do this at all. Their content providers are afraid of people switching to internet tv because their business model doesn't make as much money there. They are afraid of losing more eyeballs from broadcast tv to internet tv, that's all.
You say that facetiously, like it's not a big deal, but as the article points out, how long before this spreads to differentiating between what browser you're using?
I can easily imagine a scenario where a company like Hulu might start making exclusive distribution deals with someone like Microsoft. If you're not using Internet Explorer, you'll get a message that says something like, "We're sorry, but this program is only available to users using Internet Explorer 10. Click here to download the latest version..." Sure, you can edit the User Agent string, but most people won't bother. Users using Linux, Macs, etc. can outright be blocked based on the Adobe ID just as GoogleTV users are being blocked now from the shows as the article points out.
I agree with the the article. Some new legal framework needs to be set up so that discrimination based on platform like this is not legal. I know that it sounds harsh, but as long as it's legal and companies are willing and able to extort other companies for lucrative exclusive contracts, this is going to be extremely ugly.
Is that meant to be ironic? This was standard practice until a few years ago and I still come across it from time to time.
It makes little sense to me to waste so much hot air and lobbying effort to regulate what ISPs can and cannot do if non-ISP parties can accomplish the same evil means.
Hulu, Apple, Google Android, TV networks, Microsoft. It's hard to think of a player in the net market who is not trying to restrict unfettered access to any and all apps and uses. I don't understand why people get so worked up if an ISP wants to throttle competitor's video, but they easily accept that Apple's Itunes store wants to refuse competing apps from getting to the Iphone. Aren't they nearly identical issues?
In many cases, the vendors are using fights against malware to get their toe in the door to regulate content. We must remember that neutrality is like free speech. Popular speech doesn't need protection, the most hated speech does.
Since language is all important in today's politics, I suggest that Network Neutrality is a misnomer. It suggests that it is an issue only for network providers. A more appropriate term would be Freedom of Internet and in the purest form it would forbid any party from inhibiting what anybody else does on the Internet, good or evil. I'm pretty sure that non of us want total Freedom of Internet any more than we want total Free Speech. But the debate would be best served by starting with total freedom as a starting point, then carefully carving out the exceptions we want to make.
I can easily imagine the past, when any number of websites decided that they needed to detect your browser, and then essentially tell you to fuck off if you weren't using internet explorer.
Or did you think that was abolished when version 2.0 of the Web was rolled out?
I've been blocking certain sites and services for certain groups like forever. If you live in a specific Asian country you haven't been able to send email to me or any of my users for like ten years.
And we see that this is the second part of the Great Firewall; making sysadmins around the world block China. And all they had to do was spam and hack a little. It was a win/win scenario.
Just as much as anybody has a right to criticize and express an opinion.
You can choose to ignore them, but those are your clients you are ignoring.
Google's Market Cap is currently at $199.88 Billion dollars. ABC is $86.45 Billion, CBS is $39.7 Million, and NBC is for all practical purposes a part of GE so they're not a target.
You could well see a Google takeover of ABC and CBS. That would be interesting.
Because we effectively had that for years and all that happened was stagnation in the browser market. I remember when I first moved over to Firefox back before it was Firefox and it was a challenge at times getting things done because so many sites were hardwired to only work with IE. Sure they didn't formally block other browsers, but they might as well have given that they'd use tricks which were wholly unusable on other browsers and they'd use plug ins which weren't available beyond Windows.
Demonstrably false. There are plenty of after market resellers for Ford products. They don't sell stuff for Chevy or Chrysler, yet the managed to stay in business. Can Shell switch to be a gas company that only sells to Fords. Sure they can. It'd be a much less profitable business through.
No, the GP is correct. Shell stations sell something that is useful in any brand of vehicle whereas the aftermarket resellers sell things which are designed for use specifically in Ford products as in they could sell them to owners of other makes of vehicle, but they wouldn't fit.
In generic legal terms an agreement is formed when one party makes an offer and the other party accepts the offer. (IANAL and do not live in America, but to the best of my knowledge this part of law is fairly generic). If Shell doesn't offer to sell gas to Chrysler-owners there's no way to complete on any agreement. Which is a good thing. Otherwise you could walk into your neighborhood grocery and demand them to sell you a pound of beef. If it's not on offer you cannot buy it, period. If an offer is conditional and you do not accept and fulfill the conditions you cannot buy it, another period.
Same goes for Hulu.
But, vote with your wallet and take your business elsewhere. If sufficient numbers do, they will see the light. (or more acurately, miss the stink of money..)
Probably because he is racist. People with issues related to bigotry like to couch it in ways like the GGP does in order to legitimize it. But he's blocking emails on a blanket basis for his users and I doubt very much that the country in question is really spamming any more than other countries.
This is the sort of thinking which leads Latinos in the US to be arrested more often following traffic stops than white folks. Despite similar rates of compliance with police instructions.
It's my website, and I allow or disallow you to see my content. Just like I allow or disallow people to enter my house. Why should things be different when you are Hulu, NBC or anybody/anything else? Within the bounds of law anybody has a right to discriminate.
This is missing the point. Who cares what they have a legal right to do? A billionaire has the legal right to buy up all the farmland in Africa and salt the ground so nothing will grow. That doesn't mean people can't express their displeasure, refrain from doing business with that person or advocate changing the law so that they don't have that legal right anymore.
Perhaps like hot-linking. But I think the real thread is as to a motivation that also generates such concepts as "electricity as a luxury items" and opposition to its general availability. This is historical, say pre- 1960's and not some more recent greenie thing. Hmm, well I could make the relationship, but the concepts are more subtle. At least in my area of the US, the defense of scarcity for electricity got really pretty nasty, up the point that the Bonneville Power Administration was online and the creepy-crawlers had lost that particular battle.
But the simple idea of scarcity goes back to "the hatred of goods". The usual cite is to how merchants who had inventory, scarce and sold dearly, hated it when new stock came in on the sailing ships of the day.
Hmm, looking around for my source (probably Smith or Ricardo or someone like that), and having pushed back all the way to B.C., I came across this:
http://samvak.tripod.com/scarcity.html
which was not too bad.
I was particularly amused to find that I had heard of him with respect to his psych publications.
Sure, you have the right to do that, but you're still an asshole for doing it. Just because you have a right to do something doesn't mean that you're free from criticism.
I see. Hulu says you can't play their content on Google TV... nor an iPhone... UNLESS you pay them for it. Hulu Plus. But the very same content can be had for free if I happen to have my laptop with me. So, is their plan to slowly pick and choose who they want to have to pay? I predict Hulu Plus for Google TV any day now.
God, I hate Flash.
"Imagine the protests that would ensue if Internet services arbitrarily blocked video only to Internet Explorer or Firefox browsers!"
Er, I can probably name half a dozen sites that do just that, and a lot worse. Anyone remember the Olympics where only Silverlight (and hence Windows) could be used to view the online streaming video? Or ITV Player which only worked on Silverlight (and was later changed to Flash because they were losing viewers left, right and center)? Or BBC iPlayer that can't download to Linux machines without hacks (and can't play online without Flash)?
This happens all day, every day. The difference is that nobody bothers to notice - it's a self-fulfilling prophecy - if you only want people with IE to watch your streams, only people with IE will watch your streams. If that fits into your business model, it's good, if it doesn't, that's bad. But, hell, that's happened since the first day that there was more than one option to display content.
For a generic video site, it's an incredibly stupid business decision to limit yourself to one possible type of viewing apparatus. For some particular content providers, that's *exactly* what you want. It's nothing new at all.
Isn't that what silverlight was about? Isn't that what iTunes is about? It's not like this is new. Heck up in Canada every one blocks us.
They lost my eyeballs about 4 years ago, because I was a poor college kid at the time.
Now that I could get cable or something I don't. I can't start up any show when i want like netflix, cable still has commercials, even after I would pay them ~80/month for the service(streaming only netflix is like $10/month btw with no commercials).
Free internet TV with ads? sure sign me up, even track my via a cooking for only your site, and let me rate your ads so you can show me the ones that I'm most likely to care about. Then offer me a $10/month or something to get rid of the ads and I might just pay you for that, if I can watch everything on my 37" 1080p computer monitor in the living room.
All of the above was encrypted with a Quad ROT-13 method. Unauthorized decryption is in violation of the DMCA.
It's my website, and I allow or disallow you to see my content. Just like I allow or disallow people to enter my house. Why should things be different when you are Hulu, NBC or anybody/anything else? Within the bounds of law anybody has a right to discriminate
Because I can bust out the rabbit ears, or get cable or satellite, and see it just fine. There's no relation to 'law', it's just a giant pissing match. In fact, I can get various stuff from the BBC in Canada on TV, but if I try to watch it on the web(exactly the same stuff), it's region blocked.
Uh what?
Om, nomnomnom...
Is the Earth infinite?
No.
Hence things are scarce. Not a difficult thing to comprehend, and arguing scarcity is not a real concept just makes you (and Dr. Sam Vaknin) look idiotic. Even databits, although cheap, are not infinite since their existence relies upon electricity to create them, electricity typically comes from coal (also scarce), and millions of men to dig the ditches and lay the cables (labor is scarce). The argument that things are now "free" is ridiculous.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
>>>It's my website, and I allow or disallow you to see my content.
Careful. Senator Rand Paul was called a racist when he made the same argument. Don't be surprised if, in the near future, you will no longer be allowed to limit who sees the free portions of your website. i.e. You'd no longer be able to block "a specific Asian country" as you do now, because of Congressional or Judicial action.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
>>>Where I live antenna isn't an option which is too bad
I find it odd that you live someplace where Cable and High Speed Internet Lines have been run, but over-the-air television is not available. What is your ZIPcode? Try here: http://www.tvfool.com/ Or here: http://www.google.com/search?q=cm4228hd
Have you thought about getting limited cable?
It's about $20/month for the first 20 channels.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
>>>they don't have that legal right anymore.
Laws can be changed, but rights are Natural and can never be revoked. If you disagree, remember what happened to those men who were placed on trial after they tried to revoke the right to life for certain undesirable Germans, Poles, et cetera. And here in the US we had to pay Reparations to japanese Americans after we had deprived them of their liberty and property. Even though the action was legal in the 1940s (per order of the Supreme Court), it was still unethical and violated their natural, innate rights.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
>>>gas company that only sells to Fords. It'd be a much less profitable business through.
Yes but in THIS case, ABC, NBC, etc decided that it is MORE profitable to protect the TV screen for broadcast and cable usage only, as these services pay ~10 times more money than internet-based Hulu does. It is a perfectly logical decision to make, if you want to maximize your bottom line.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
>>>Probably because he is racist.
I've had a lot of people say the same about me: "You're probably a racist." It doesn't make it true. Neither do I think the web-owner blocking that certain Asian country (N.Korea perhaps) is racist. His motives are likely due to other motivations, such as ending spam.
BTW I think when someone automatically pulls-out words like "racist" or "uncle tom" or "nazi", they merely demonstrate their low IQ level. If you have an argument, then make an argument. Don't devolve to 5-year-old level of shouting pointless, meaningless words.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Thanks, thats what I was thinking too.
>>>they are losing money.
Only if you are a Nielsen Ratings household. Otherwise your viewer or non-viewership is not measured and is not a loss for NBC, FOX, etc.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Just like I allow or disallow people to enter my house
I think the store analogy is better that the house one. Indeed, talking about businesses, I hope there are laws that ban barring stores to a fraction of the population.
If a store is open, it is open to all.
Did you forget that Hulu was a joint venture between NBC and FOX, with ABC joining them at some later point? Their owners are their content providers.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Fine. I'd use the cyber-attack excuse and never mention anything else.
"I was attacked they took down my site, I wiped everything as a precaution, and my blocklist is updated to reflect previous attack sources. I cannot take the risk of my site being used as a weapon against our national infrastructure."
If a site belongs to the owner, it doesn't belong to anyone else. They should not want access to it, end of story.
Freedom of the Internet must include freedom of one's own website. The argument that users "want stuff" is absurd. Let them vote with their wallets (not so effective for the obvious majority, self included, who want everything free!).
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Who is talking about natural rights here? I thought we were talking about copyright.
The major networks seem to be backing away from putting TV shows on the Internet. Last year, 90% of broadcast shows appeared on line, at least for a while. This year, not so much. Episodes go up and down on no clear schedule, and the lag between broadcast and online availability has increased. "The CW" just doubled their commercial density for their online episodes. (Right around that time, their broadcast market share fell below Univision.)
The producer of "Modern Family" wants that show offline. He's whining because he thinks more people would watch it from a broadcast source if they couldn't get it over the Internet. (Probably not; CBS tried that with "Gossip Girl", and it didn't help broadcast ratings.) His problem is that pay and clout in Hollywood is tied to broadcast ratings. Downloads, even with ads, don't count.
Block ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS and HULU from all google search results. Close down all youtube channels related to those stations, then terminate any ad contracts you have with those networks. Google>them, lets see them try to take on Google.
We need our dinosaur asteroid for our dinosaur business models. Does anyone actually watch any TV live anymore? Hell I don't even watch the news live I pause the DVR so I can skip commercials. All my TV episodes that I wish to watch I download. Whats a CD again? Last movie I saw in the theater was, gulp, Star Wars ep1... Gee I wonder why I stopped going to the movies.... Yes lets all eat mutton chops, ride in our horse/buggies, and make sure to blow the candles out before you go to bed...
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So other than it is "plug and play" I'm not seeing much difference.
That's the big difference. As of 2010, the major PC makers still haven't solved the problems of marketing a media center PC to the masses. These include plug-and-play usability, case aesthetics, and especially price: a name-brand slim PC with discrete video will run you at least $500, compared to a PS3 or Xbox 360 at $300, and a nettop with Windows 7 Home Premium costs $300, compared to a Roku DVP or Apple TV at $100. If you're interested in discussing the details of why HTPCs haven't been taking off, feel free to read and comment on an article that I'm working on.
And Net Neutrality, in whatever stated form it currently exists, would effect this how? Punish Hulu, NBC and others who are blocking Google? Ignore it since it's presumably only 1 service of Google being blocked and not ALL of Google.
Is this a prime example of what N.N. would quash and make the playing field even for media content delivery? I honestly don't know what N.N. would do at this point, and who exactly it would benefit. I hope it's me, and the choice of media availability, but my faith in all Corporations big or small is a bit lacking these days.
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My cellphone ... my desktop ... I have root on both.
There are plenty of computing products made for home use where the end user doesn't have root access, developer access, or even access comparable to "Unknown sources" on most Android handsets. These devices, which Slashdot users have come to call "appliances", include a Google TV box, Roku DVP, Apple TV box, Xbox 360 console, PLAYSTATION 3 console, or Wii console.
Your videogame console is borderline personal computer, moreso if you have cracked it.
In fact, I place the line between "personal computer" and "appliance" precisely at the point where one would "get a bash or python prompt". For example, a Wii console is an appliance until you jailbreak it with Smash Stack + BootMii Installer; it becomes a personal computer only once it has the Homebrew Channel. But on these set-top boxes, the lack of officially supported prosumer tools combined with firmware updates explicitly to close the holes used to jailbreak shows the intent of manufacturers to make appliances rather than personal computers.
No, they don't mean like country restrictions.
This is inside the same legal domain.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Okay so you're right and it's not free. $5/month would cover electricity costs, and ads should cover production costs. Instead of the $100/month cable packages they want us to buy in addition to ads. I'd gladly be willing to pay $50/month for a streaming service with a wide selection and no ads. (or maybe one ad at the start of the show/movie if it doesn't interrupt in the middle). Netflix at $10/month is a steal but their selection isn't as large as I'd like it to be, I'd gladly pay 5x more for 5x the selection.
explain to me the differeance between a mini-itx atom running windows 7 hooked up to my TV and the googleTV(arm? and linux?) hooked up to my TV.
The difference is that Google is a brand name. Ordinarily, one makes a choice to build or buy a PC, but the small form factor appears to be far more build than buy. Joe Average can't just walk into a Best Buy store and come out with a "mini-itx atom running windows 7". On the other hand, Joe Average can walk into a store and buy a television monitor with Google TV or a set-top box with Google TV.
Both are computers, both have an OS, both use chrome, both have flash 10.1, both are hooked up to my TV.
The difference is what Android OS calls "Unknown sources". Your PC lets you add third-party repositories of applications; does Google TV?
Only if you are a Nielsen Ratings household.
Advertising networks and advertising-supported web sites track your web use whether Nielsen is tracking your TV use or not.
TV used to be free. You put up an antenna and got TV for free. The networks made money by showing commercials. What consumers want is a return to that type of system.
Good. Move the big three networks to cable and give OTA users 20 channels of infomercials 24/7 minus a 3-hour E/I block on Saturday morning.
The one channel we really want is CBS for Big Bang Theory
For everything but sports and other obligatorily live programs, you can subscribe to Netflix and get entire seasons of TV on DVD.
almost every dvd* that come into the house, gets the longest track ripped and encoded to h264
Your heuristic can be defeated. The studio could direct the mastering house to include a low-bitrate dummy title that consists of nothing but a still frame of a C with a circle around it for 10% longer than the feature. Or use multi-angle, put this still frame in the main angle, and have the menu system switch to an alternate angle.
But, vote with your wallet and take your business elsewhere.
Other than Hulu or Netflix, which service streams professionally produced dramatic or comedic television series?
If you're writing widget for Yahoo Connected TV, you're blocked from Youtube, because they require cookie authentication, which YCTV MediaPlayer doesn't support
Google, how does your own medicine tastes like?
Seems odd that CNBC would be an "early adopter" and NBC would be actively sandbagging the same project.
Just because CNBC is owned by NBC Universal doesn't mean it's NBC any more than The Weather Channel is NBC. The Consumer News and Business Channel isn't the National Broadcasting Company, and its advertising rate structure isn't at all the same because its demographics aren't.
Flash is not a fucking video format, its a programming language (actionscript), and you can embed video. the programming language has routines to detect the hardware and operating system it runs on. Only level 1 lamers use user-agents - the code itself can check the OS and refuse to stream on a non approved system.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
"Google can't complain about this ..."
Google isn't! Google are saying: Hey, its their site, they can do what they want.
Its the USERS who are complaining.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
" ''You mean like country restrictions?''
There's a huge difference between the two, though. The country restrictions are there due to copyright law."
There is no huge difference. The rights holders don't want to show some clips to other countries. Just as they don't want to show some material to certain devices.
The have the right under the law to chose who they want to license it to.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I'm using the future right now, I have a 65" Mitsubishi DLP TV with a super gaming computer hooked up to it via HDMI. I can play games like Bad Company 2 in stereo-3D. Its completely awesome, and then when I'm done I can watch hulu or netflix or whatever on my big TV in full screen mode. I use a USB extension cord so I can interact with it from across the room without getting that crappy mouse responsiveness problem you get with wireless (likewise so that the 3d sync isn't interfered with)
Just as a FYI, those sony and samsung 3D TVs you see on display every absolutely suck compared to DLP 3D. Go to RC Willy and try out their 3D TV demos if you haven't already.
Also technically GoogleTV is a computer, as is your Sega Genesis and your Xbox and your toaster...
Businesses have the right to refuse service to anyone for any reason. I don't see how a website refusing service is any different.
That's right. I don't have to serve black people in my restaurant if I don't want to. It's my food and no-one else's.
considering the well documented pissing match between hulu and boxee how did big companies like google, logitech and sony not work out a deal with the networks to secure this content for google tv before bringing this thing to market.
They have pretty much nailed the coffin closed on google tv almost before it began with this cluster f*ck, even if something gets worked out who in their right mind is going to spend $300 on a revue and hope that hulu or who ever doesn't get pissed and block it again.
I honestly can't imagine how after the example with boxee and hulu on (or the lack there of =p) my and everyone else's android smrt phone. would have proceeded to market with this before nailing down hulu and others on a agreement to allow access to google tv devices.
idiots... someone (some people) should probably be quite nervous and polishing their resumes at all the google, logitech and sony cause someone/some people are going to get fired...
actually I am happy to see you, however that is in fact a banana in my pocket.
I find it odd that you live someplace where Cable and High Speed Internet Lines have been run, but over-the-air television is not available
I don't know the GPs situation, but its pretty hard to put an anything more elaborate up than a rabbit ears in most apartments and condos.
> Why should things be different when you are Hulu, NBC or anybody/anything else? Within the bounds of law anybody has a right to discriminate.
I'm not sure they're within those bounds, but I'll leave that up to Google's lawyers.
And while I understand spam blocking, this isn't really the same thing. This is competitor blocking. It'd be more like if you blocked all that spam, then sent your users your own spam.
Finally, though I understand why you'd block China* wholesale, I wonder what you'll do if someday a friend of yours (or one of your users) moves over there and you wonder why they never respond to your emails any more.
* I'm 99% sure you're blocking China, with most of the 1% uncertainty leaning towards Russia.
Am I the only one who's still satisfied with using a PC as a media-center hub for entertainment? I bet you for less than $160 you can get all the parts needed to create a PC that is powerful enough to display HD movies to a TV and hold 500gb of info. Add an extra $50 and you have a 2tb+ hard drive. It'll play DVD's, maybe bluray if you get lucky, hulu, netflix, veoh, youtube, and all of those gray area sites that you've been wanting to connect to your TV. If you have an xbox or a ps3 you can do some minor adjustments to get access to almost any video service on the net. If you like your pc and want to deal with things wirelessly, HD wireless streaming exists now so in my opinion, instead of worrying about apple, google, or panasonic about whether or not they will keep their features or continuously support their product, ask yourself if it would be better to build your own media center than to rely on others?
[2cents was added to the pile]
What I really don't get is why would you allow desktop streaming but not an appliance if the idea is to protect your your IP and keep your traditional business model ( ad revenu ). It's much easier to rip a feed from a desktop / laptop / HTPC / whatever than from a locked appliance !
Yes Rand Paul who is perfectly fine with businesses having a "no blacks, no jews" policy. Call a spade a spade, for once. He IS a racist.
As far as I'm concerned Google brought this on themselves, & they mislead their customers as well. They pitched something that on paper sounded like it was a major leap forward, but didn't do the work of hammering it out with the content providers. Apple TV may be a much more modest system, but at least it does everything it promised or was implied to do. The further you follow gTV you see that you need to have a certain provider for some features, large amounts of content are blocked, etc.
Basically they talk as if they are disrupters; a kind of technological savior. But it's all hubris based on thinking their advertising business plan can kill anyone else's. gTV & all the carier restrictions on Android prove that Google is not trustworthy. In this case they look like impetulent children biting the hand that feeds them. The real victim is Google's customers.
Not who's (who is, who has, etc.). :P
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
This tactic only works when people are willing to say, "no thanks".
That's not going to happen in large numbers any time soon. People will continue to pay $100+/mo to their cable providers because that's just what everyone knows.
What I'd love to see is Google taking on this fight, full force. I'm sure the collective technical talents of a place like Google could make locking down streaming content SO difficult for the networks as to be totally infeasible. Their device would be known as the simple box you can hook up, legally, and never pay for cable again. If they could do that, you'd have a disrupting technology that would change the face of how we do business with our content providers... ala Napster.
Perhaps the answer is to launch the GoogleTV app store, open it to developers, and make it unruly. Let people develop apps and updates for those apps that would allow thousands of capable people to stay ahead of the networks. Maybe that puts them in lawsuit territory, I don't know... but I'm sure the brains at Google could solve this in a brilliant, unstopable way if they really decided to.
I foresee "browser" apps that come preloaded with bookmarks to streaming content... with random useragent strings out of a pool that all mimic common browser and platform combinations.
Or if Hulu would not be accessable outside of USA ...
Forgive me...was that "imagine" line sarcasm? HBO only lets you view content using internet explorer (as do many others), Hulu blocks linux browsers (even though they work, and have worked, they just suddenly threw a check in there and claimed "compatibility issues" one day), and so on...
Not really anymore. I am in a cable only location. Once I drop cable the networks will know that I am no longer watching by that method. They will see that I am watching by Hulu.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Google could make the GTV box identical to a regular PC as far as the internet is concerned. Only their servers would be given permissions to identify an account being accessed through a GTV box. This would of course mean you would have to sign in to use GTV but this could be made mostly transparent. Upon visiting a website, if that site wishes to display content formatted specifically for GTV, then they simply access a public API and find out from Google themselves.
To get OTA where I live and get four major networks would take a 30 foot tower.
It is possible but not a small undertaking.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
What I really don't get is why would you allow desktop streaming but not an appliance if the idea is to protect your your IP and keep your traditional business model ( ad revenu ).
I can make a few guesses: The contracts between Hulu and the copyright owners were negotiated before these set-top appliances became common. And the demographics and advertising rate structures of PC video streaming differ from those of the set-top appliances.
Actually Comcast has lost a lot of viewers this quarter. Scary thing is that their profits have increased!
So are extracting more money from fewer people.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
This is a television device that is bypassing local network stations.
This hurts your local stations.
This is also why you see the same companies NOT blocking some Cable content channels, like CNBC, as the local affliates don't only broadcast NBC, not CNBC.
There are also legal issues with this, just like Directv and satelittle providers have had to deal with.
There are also the local Cable companies that have a stake in the advertising revenue that they miss out on as well.
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What needs to happen are some regulations that create standards for Internet access to broadcast content, that still allows your local stations and cable companies to insert their advertising, instead of only getting national advertising revenue.
If your local ABC could get their local adversting spots inserted in the 'ad' stops, this would be far less of an issue legally and financially.
Google knows better, and could have been a key player in getting some standards and regulations for local cable/broadcast companies into the game with national content. Instead they thought they could get away with shoving this on a TV because they are Google?
google tv and apple tv are not going to be long lived devices anyways. tv makers are adding such ability as part of the tv. not to mention geeks have been doing this for years with media center pcs connected to there tv. without the worry of google hulu etc all fighting over who gets what. but it is yet another reason net nurtruly has to happon.
Crying "racist" is the new boogie man of leftwingers. It is the "go to" card to play when one cannot find a good reason to refute something. It is the same as crying "terrorism" when there is no terrorism involved, which many on the right seem to do.
In fact, calling someone a "racist" is the pat answer to someone calling another a "terrorist" ... and visa versa. It is this intellectual dishonesty in political discussions that drives me crazy. It is right up there with Godwins Law. It serves no purpose except end debate.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
The reason people (us) are not outraged as right now is that TV doesn't matter much anymore. Just keep you filthy paws off our internet freedom. The rest is marginal. And Google is "evil" enough as it is right now... Cheers, Richard
Yeah dude, they have the right--it's just dumb.
> Just like I allow or disallow people to enter my house
Just as you are rude, I can rudely and loudly point out your rudeness. =) No one said otherwise, d00d. *wazzzup*
Contracts and private property can be used as an alternative to copyright, but how effectively can the requirements be passed down the chain (i.e. a clause in the contract with the retailer might say that they have to impose certain clauses on purchasers)?
How would you legally get ahold of Iron Man 2 without agreeing to purchase contracts with a theater/DVD retailer, et cetera?
Maybe if it's a leak in the supply chain, you wouldn't be responsible but the content producer could hammer the leaker
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
The more I look into this kind of issues, the harder it becomes to not consider them like a bug in the capitalist/free trade system. I am not sure this makes me a communist but hey.. It is hard to think about copyright as something that helps spread and disseminate culture anymore
Copyright is the opposite of free trade. It's a direct affront to real property rights - an attempt at social engineering by creating non-tangible property under Law.
That's a form of socialism, so it's hard to imagine your being a communist for opposing creeping socialism.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I thought this economical system was supposed to transform individual greed into overall progress, but the more I look into it, the more broken it appears to me...
That's the general idea: by optimizing your own benefit, the optimal societal benefit arises as an emergent phenomenon. You may want to think of the economy as a large distributed algorithm. What it computes is prices and an allocation of resources which (supposedly) optimizes how well off the economic agents are.
The problem is that the system is self-contained---money can not only buy you resources you either want for their own sake ("consumer goods") or which you use to transform other resources into consumer goods ("capital"), money can also buy you changes to the system ("brib^Wlobbying").
The latter part is, as I understand it, much of what Public Choice Theory is about---how a collection of people make collective decisions. In USA, this tends to happen by the campaign contribution mechanism---the extent to which your opinion is considered is the degree to which you contribute to politicians' campaigns.
The more I look into this kind of issues, the harder it becomes to not consider them like a bug in the capitalist/free trade system.
It is in every agent's rational self-interest to rig the game in that agent's favor. Internet service providers being given local monopolies seems to fit this. Media industry influencing the FCC seems to fit it as well.
In the case of Copyrights, the idea is actually to overcome a shortcoming in free trade capitalism: if there's tremendously high fixed costs to creating a song (or book, or piece of software, or [...]) but copying the first instance is practically free and is possible by everybody who holds an instance, the agent which produces the first copy will have a barrier to entry, in that he will have to pay costs the others won't. The rational response is to provide less of the good in question than what is socially beneficial.
The remedy is the granting of a temporary monopoly, such that the maker will have monopoly rent as an incentive to create, and society will eventually be able to consume the creation in the "right" amount once the price closes in on the cost of the one additional copy.
For a more in-depth analysis, see Liebowitz: http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/IntellectualProperty.html
I think currently, special interests (MPAA, RIAA, BSA) has overstated the public benefit of more new stuff vs. the public benefit of being able to use the old stuff for free---i.e. at the electricity and bandwidth cost of copying (which is close to 0 but is still positive).
That's the longwinded way of saying "I agree, copyrights are a bug [but they don't have to be]." See also Michele Boldrin's Against Intellectual Property (http://www.micheleboldrin.com/research/aim.html) and his conversation with EconTalk's Russ Roberts (http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2009/05/boldrin_on_inte.html)
Hope this helps :-)
Reading comprehension fail (coming from you though, that's not a surprise).
"Probably because he is a racist" is not the same thing as "He is probably a racist."
Imagine if you wanted to watch Hulu on your PS3. When you navigate to the site, a page pops up notifying you that you are not allowed to view the content due to the device you are using to view said content. Oh wait, that's what happens now...
Hulu blocks PS3 (at least the last time I checked) from viewing the content because they want you to pay extra for services to view Hulu on your TV. While a simple reverse proxy takes care of the issue, they are still blocking content based on the device you are using to view their content.
Are why I won't be subscribing for Hulu Plus. I currently use netflix streaming and love it. I was extremely excited to see Hulu coming to the 360, but they are going to charge for it and keep the ads. This makes netflix better in my opinion, even if content is limited. Someone else will come along and beat Hulu at what they do, and they'll become sub-par or disappear.
Arguing with an engineer is like wrestling a pig in mud. Soon, you realize the pig is dirty, and he likes it.