This Wired article Let the web games begin
. Working at the world service on Friday I recieved a call from a guy in Denmark quite upset he couldnt hear the BBC world service news online. Anyway I quickly realised from others that we were blanking all programmes which could be classed as breaking copyright with NBC. Now this is only my own view, not of the BBC but I can not believe NBC own the rights to all internet broadcasts from inside the Olympic village, how on earth did some a deal get done without anyone questioning it? So in actual fact – if there was an act of terroism in the olympic village (i really hope there wont be), the bbc realisticly could not use video or audio from the olympics online (my own thoughts not the BBC). Even though its a news story not a sports story. This is something else, i think you'd agree?
Anyhow, we (the bbc) officially replied with this official page on Friday lunchtime.
The whole debate over is it technically possible to restrict Internet broadcasts within specific geographic boundaries?
is a difficult one, as the internet is not about geographic boundaries and it makes regional seperation questionable. Proxys are very common just like web scraping…
Moving away from Proxys to Bit torrent just like in the wired article. I've already noticed postings of the Olympic Opening Ceremony in Athens, only problem is its not live. And theres some serious demand for live webcasting! Sure some enterprising person with bandwidth and linux video capturing working will setup a proxy and start the cat and mouse game of blacklists and proxies. *Smile* let the games begin indeed…
