I love the BBC, I use to hate the idea we pay a TV licence fee. But we get so much good for such a nice price. Also dont get me started on Community vs… Anyway, I'm a little ignoyed that I missed the last AIGA meeting. But I've only just heard about the BBC iMP through these blogs. And I'm kind of shocked there using Microsoft Windows media with DRM! Oh my… This isnt what Greg dyke was talking about surely? By the way you get some odd results looking for posts in this area. However I do hope at the same time someone works on a 14day EPG for Freeview.
I’m hacking it…
I was reading pvrblog.com, for the review of snapstream 3. As the review on slashdot wasnt all that I feel. Been thinking of turning my linux box into a dual boot with snapstream, then again I've been thinking of mythTV too but nothing about it yet. However I'm also interested in the new replayTV stream option which I spotted in Xbox media centre, by the way I got the March release which is even smoother. Anyway was reading about that too while looking for my old entry about live streaming to the xbox all that time ago.
When I spotted me hack, youhack we all hack. Which linked to mehack. I started scanning, and I thought to myself this guy knows what he's talking about, this blog is going on my feeds. I mean come on first post – xbox media center is the best there is, i'm already hearing that… then I see the second and third posts, overclocking megadrives and turning your archos into a rockbox, and I'm left thinking, there bring linux to the ipod? Anyhow I was well impressed and started thinking, I need to do more hardware hacking… Maybe follow the lead of some of my students who bought the Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks. I need to check out the ton of links which I have passed over to write this entry.
Oh man, forget the new media2go, gonna find a cheap Archos and load up this nice open firmware. Hello! what the heck – DVArchive, Virtual ReplayTV for your PC. I so need to get my hands on a cheap ReplayTV box if they work over here in the UK. Going to wait out on getting a Freeview PVR box now.
Another way of getting answers
After pocketpcnow found the developer blogs for the PocketPC team. He's found out Microsoft are now hosting live chat sessions to talk about the PocketPC platform. Interesting Microsoft are using Ical for there events now. And looking at the information, its not only pocketpcs but smartphones too…
Nokia does your Life and blogs
Dear friend of mine (SarahK), has been working on Lifeblog. Now theres little information on this service at the moment except a mention on the feature and a sneak preview on BBC. Maybe this Nokia turning on its heels about people generated content? Who knows, but I douht it unfortually. Will be interested to see it working though, wonder if Nokia are going to run somekind of service or will it link into another social network or blogging service? Still think SonyEricsson may have the upper hand with there camera come phones and the services which will come with it, look out Kodak, there after your digital market.
Talking of which techdirt has some great pieces regarding the above in different ways. First up SonyEricsson and my Kodak comment, the lines are blending. Kodak are sueing Sony? Enough said about this for now. The other one is good and bad news for sarahk, better interfaces needed for mobile phones. How on earth can they patent touchscreen mobiles? Hello you not seen the Ericsson T380? all of 4 years ago? And theres been plenty of others. I'm shaking my head just thinking of it.
If: the lights go out, were pretty much fcuk’ed…
Yeah its official were fcuked. Most of the power supply in England will come from northern europe or/and russia by 2010, says the BBC docu-drama. Been reading up about this anyway before the programme and I seriously thought we might be ok. However were not, wind power needs backup, which leads to gas. Coal burning is too much money because you need to put huge expensive filters on the pipes. To quote It would be like putting a level3 catylistic converter on a clapped out car.
. While Nuclear power stations are being shutdown more and more, and could take as long as 15 years to turn back on. More facts here. Once again, we need to do something about it now, but people are too focused on other issues, kind of reminds me of the lack of media coverage to the EUCD. Even though IF
was on BBC2, it was well advertised, on at primetime 9pm and had a good talk afterwards chaired by paxman. If only this was true of other issues…
Too little, too late: EUCD passed
EU backs tighter rules on piracy. Its all too late… Here are some more stories. Anti-piracy directive could expose consumers
Can you believe this all went through without much media coverage? All the web finds nothing. Yahoo news. Altavista news. Shame on you searchlores.
Thank god for slashdot. and ip justice.
I saw this while browsing – European Union Copyright Directive lecture. and this is great – Why America’s Mistake is Europe’s Future. Can you trust your computer? by Richard Stallman. Lawrence Lessig's comments. And finally spiked-online has a debate in the same area, while I was reading Lawrence again…
Some more fall out later after the date. EU Tightens Copyright Laws
A way not to do digital mixing
Following on from my blog about taking advantage of digital for what it is not copying vinyl mixing. And more material for a nice long write about digital mixing.
Hercules Audio – DJ Console Portable DJ Mix Controller & Multi-Channel Audio. Cheap but still the same vinyl forumula. Except maybe the midi in and out could be used for something decent later on with good software. The pure digital opticial and coaxial SPDIF in and out also helps quite alot to keep it ahead of the standard dj mixers. However, if I ever see this piece of crap ever again it will be far too soon. Blame NTK for my rant today
Topping up the TV
Seems channels such as E4, UKTV and Discovery will be coming back to Freeview sooner than expected in the form of TopUpTV. I would say eight pounds a month isnt too bad for 10 extra channels. However I would prefer to pay something like one pound per channel. Basicly the channel line up is E4, UKTV Gold, Discovery, Cartoon network, Discover H&L, TCM, UKTV food, Bloomberg, Boomerang and UKTV style. So a real mix bag of channels. I'm only interested in E4 and the Discoverys. Anyway there doing a trial run soon, so I may consider it, would be better if I had the twinview PVR box really.
Xbox mediacentre another look…
Kevins been chipping his xbox today, some guy at the local computer fair which is really nice to know as I now know where to send people. Costs 60 pounds chip and install, includes rom i believe but cant see why the guy would bother taking the risk. Anyway, kev dropped me a ftp site with the latest xbmc. And I started doing more research into xbmc.
There seems to be a new looking skin not based on windows media centre as its got copyright issues. However the alternative looks pretty good too, its based on the dell media centre.
The xbmc team have finally put a load of screenshots online too. Which brings up lots of questions for me. Where can I download that project mayhem skin? I didnt know xbmc can copy and manage files?
Good to see the imdb and it looks like cddb feature works well. Theres an on screen keyboard for the xbmc? Does a usb keyboard also work, as that would be really cool. Thank goodness shoutcast streaming is still supported, any chance of icecast streaming? Super large icons for all sections, very nice… Not sure what this is, too short for a movie and too long for trailers
. I'm wondering if xbmc allows for natrual categories like years, timing, etc? Could be right? There must be somekind of plugin arctecture, my weather? I'm hoping this will mean a return of xmltv listings and some new cutting edge features like streaming from xbox to xbox using xbconnect. Its also good to see new visual effects, as groom was kind of boring, plus theres a competition for more visualization. Screensavers? and this is stupid nuts.
On a whole its all too much to take in… I cant wait to see what happens next…
By the way theres a poll for what should be the default skin.
Ok I've installed xbmc and it does pretty much eveything seen in the preview and more…
First thing, the web front end is now working, its really shabby but it works. You can browse through the shares and click on the piece of media you want and the xbmc will play it a couple of seconds later. You can also pause and stop. I dont see anyway to setup a playlist but there is a skip forward and back button. Ideal skipping adverts while watching Hollyoaks from the sofa with my tabletpc on my lap.
So anyway that works well, even though I have yet to try it on my ipaq or smartphone. Imagine with port forwarding I could control xbmc from any where I can get the Internet. Home automation is almost there.
Screensaver works well, also has the option to auto shutdown after a set period. Visuals not too good, same as xbmp. Weather works but not too amazing, can wait to see what other webservice clients they build, or if its easy enough for me to build one. Can just imagine RSS readers, etc. Anyway the other thing which is also very interesting is the intergration of imdb, cddb, etc. You can look up films, tv shows, tunes and games. Then use them for thumbnails on folders as well as files. Theres also a auto scan option which will scan and create thumbnails and info for all folders and files under the current folder. Trust me it takes a while to do. The keyboard feature is also very cool, it allows you to rename files, search through files, etc. I tried out the usb keyboard and it didnt work, which was a shame.
The thing which i find really amazing is the natrual categories. Basicly when you add metadata to your files and folders via the scan option you can then look at all media through a selection of categories. Genres, Actors, Year, Title in the movie section and Albums, Artist, Genres, Top100, Songs in the Tune section. And flicking between the filesystems and categories is so easy, i cant help but do it. Makes me want to put all my movies on a couple of Huge RAID arrays rather than CD. With the right kind of money… Anyway that aside, I'm going to start using xbmc more now because its more stable than it use to be and the features are so rich and useful. Thumbs up from me…
disagreement [Digital mixing != Vinyl mixing]
In brief I'm talking about moving digital mixing into a mininorty report style gestural interfaces…
Checking out MICHEL WAISVISZ again. He's one of the pioneers of digital live music, and the human interfaces he uses are so adaptable to digital mixing. He runs Steim. The OIK project will be of interest to all.
See the problem is that vinyl djs is going in one direction while digital mixing could easily go another, but people keep on cloning vinyl djs aka final scratch and the others. The pictures on this site will easily give you an idea of where digital mixing could should go. As mentioned before the key is a beat. Atomixmp3's beat-aware engine is a step forward. Add a hardware midi or ethernet connection with a internet protocal like soap, xmpp or sip and your well away.
Going to add sections to my writing digital mixing. Will be using parts of First STEIM Touch manifestation in 1998 by steim and this question and answer with Waisvisz. No one seems to be talking about multiple layered mixing using 2 laptops or 2 versions of atomixmp3. Also the greater aspects of aggeragation within digital mixing. I also outlined a real example of digital mixing which I'm calling wireless mixing. Maybe blocky might be interested in doing a night based around these real examples? Till I write the piece or do a night…enjoy the pictures.
