Sunday, January 30, 2005
The New York Times gets it, and so do I
The New York Times' Technology section has a great article (Registration Required) today about independent efforts to allow greater control of how the end user watches television programming. I was drawn to the article from a post at Slashdot, and this article touches on one of my initial reasons for starting this sparse blog.
Beyond discussing simply how to get the box built in the first place, I wanted to address right and wrong, the legal and illegal. I don't touch on it much because I am a physicist and not a lawyer. This article however gives an interesting roster of players moving forward:
MythTV: "perfectly legal"
TiVo and ReplayTV: corporate makers of PVR's
BitTorrent: the relevant technology for distributing TV programs after digital encoding
Videora: "a better way to find BitTorrent files on the Web" for $23
Federal Communications Commission: closer of barn doors, implementers of digital broadcast flags 1 Jul 2005 through 47 CFR 73.9002(b)
Television Digital Liberation Front of the Electronic Frontier Foundation: pre 1 Jul 2005 builders of HDTV recorders
I have been aware of the FCC's action for quite a while. The fund is empty right now, but I plan to to squirrel away $190 to buy at least one pcHDTV HD-3000 before the 1 Jul 2005 deadline. As a user of MythTV, I appreciate being able to watch TV throughout my home network. I don't distribute programs over the Internet or over DVD's or any such thing, and I resent limits being placed on my freedom to squeeze a program into a tiny format for my Palm Pilot. Or to watch a show on the plane, on the laptop. I have BitTorrent - for trying out new distributions of Linux, to see which is best for my laptop and desktop. Mandrake 10.1 Download (torrent, iso for 1 DVD) is my best choice. But I don't cheat. I don't rip DVDs and put them on my hard drive. I'm grateful that MythTV is "perfectly legal" and am glad to have it in my home.
Next weekend, Myth 0.17 is promised. Hope to update soon!
Beyond discussing simply how to get the box built in the first place, I wanted to address right and wrong, the legal and illegal. I don't touch on it much because I am a physicist and not a lawyer. This article however gives an interesting roster of players moving forward:
MythTV: "perfectly legal"
TiVo and ReplayTV: corporate makers of PVR's
BitTorrent: the relevant technology for distributing TV programs after digital encoding
Videora: "a better way to find BitTorrent files on the Web" for $23
Federal Communications Commission: closer of barn doors, implementers of digital broadcast flags 1 Jul 2005 through 47 CFR 73.9002(b)
Television Digital Liberation Front of the Electronic Frontier Foundation: pre 1 Jul 2005 builders of HDTV recorders
I have been aware of the FCC's action for quite a while. The fund is empty right now, but I plan to to squirrel away $190 to buy at least one pcHDTV HD-3000 before the 1 Jul 2005 deadline. As a user of MythTV, I appreciate being able to watch TV throughout my home network. I don't distribute programs over the Internet or over DVD's or any such thing, and I resent limits being placed on my freedom to squeeze a program into a tiny format for my Palm Pilot. Or to watch a show on the plane, on the laptop. I have BitTorrent - for trying out new distributions of Linux, to see which is best for my laptop and desktop. Mandrake 10.1 Download (torrent, iso for 1 DVD) is my best choice. But I don't cheat. I don't rip DVDs and put them on my hard drive. I'm grateful that MythTV is "perfectly legal" and am glad to have it in my home.
Next weekend, Myth 0.17 is promised. Hope to update soon!
