BBC iPlayer must become neutral – Available for Macs and Linux
By Dave Parrack
The BBC iPlayer was approved by regulators on the grounds of complete platform neutrality, something that has yet to be fulfilled. Now watchdogs are telling the BBC it must offer the iPlayer to all potential users. At the moment both downloadable and streaming content is only available to Microsoft Windows users, and not Apple Mac or Linux users.
The BBC iPlayer, an Internet service allowing people to download or stream BBC programmes up to seven days after they air, was launched in July and immediately provoked controversy by only giving access to people using Windows based systems. At the time, over 16,000 people signed an online petition to force the corporation to give non-Windows system users a chance to use the service too.
The problem comes because the BBC are using Microsoft DRM (Digital Rights Management) to control the downloading and watching of their programmes, and this is not compatible or licensed to work on Macs or Linux. Once downloaded, each BBC programme expires after 30 days and is copyright protected not to play on any other computer.
“A download service for Mac and Linux users is not 100% definite and would depend on cost.”
“We need to get the streaming service up and look at the ratio of consumption between the services and then we need to look long and hard at whether we build a download service for Mac and Linux.”
“It comes down to cost per person and reach at the end of the day.”
The problem is that this completely goes against the BBC Trust’s original terms of approval for the iPlayer, which was required to offer complete platform neutrality across downloads, streaming video and cable. The BBC are now changing the goalposts and going up against their own regulator, which has the backing of the British government.
The problem the BBC faces is having to be available to all license fee payers, even though less than 3% of computer users in the UK have Apple Macs. Linux users are thought to number even less, so it is a tiny minority who are being excluded from the service.
I’m all for open rights on services such as this, but it’s such a tiny amount of consumers being affected does it warrant the cost and productivity that would be required to solve the problem?
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October 16th, 2007
“I’m all for open rights on services such as this, but it’s such a tiny amount of consumers being affected does it warrant the cost and productivity that would be required to solve the problem?”
Yes it does. It is not important how many people are affected. The writer of the article says it clearly: “I’m all for open rights…” There are principles here. Publicly funded organizations such as the BBC simply should not be using or promoting “single source” software. Nor is there any excuse for hiring a foreign company (MS) to do the work of developing a suitable DRM. I’m sure there are plenty of competent non-foreign programmers.
October 16th, 2007
[...] BBC iPlayer must become neutral – Available for Macs and Linux » This Summary is from an article posted at TECH.BLORGE.com on Tuesday, October 16, 2007 This [...]
November 23rd, 2007
it doesn’t even work on all windows platforms either.
can’t get it to work with xp x64