³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Trust On-demand Syndication Consultation
Post categories: ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Trust,ÌýiPlayer
| 15:23 UK time, Monday, 31 May 2010
In all the excitement about the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ iPlayer beta last week some readers may have missed a couple of things.
The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Trust published the conclusions of its review of the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s on-demand services, including the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ iPlayer. Here's an extract:
The review, conducted two years after the launch of on-demand services, found that the iPlayer has performed in line with its usage expectations, has effectively promoted 'niche' or less well-known programmes, appeals well to its target younger audiences, and represents good value for money.
You can find the Trust's statement here.
The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Trust also began a about the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Executive's proposed approach to on demand and syndication. There are more details including the full management proposals. Here's an extract from those propoals:
An alternative potential solution would be to allow third parties to build their own delivery mechanisms for iPlayer - so called 'self-build'. This would mean variants of iPlayer built on different underlying technologies controlled by third parties and not the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳. The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ believes that self-build would compromise the ability of the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ to ensure quality, especially around upgrading of the products.There would also be a significant cost to the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ to comply self-build activity and subsequent upgrade. The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ will still work with third parties to adapt standard versions where appropriate, but ownership should remain with the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳. Where it is more cost-efficient to take advantage of third parties' technical resource, the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ will do so.
If you want to contribute you can do so. The consultation ends on July 21st.
Nick Reynolds is Social Media Executive, ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Online.
Comment number 1.
At 2nd Jun 2010, John_from_Hendon wrote:"An alternative potential solution would be to allow third parties to build their own delivery mechanisms for iPlayer"
Hmm... so the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ will undertake to provide delivery mechanisms for all possible hardware and operating systems? - this is unrealistic and economically unsound.
The walled garden delivery philosophy that the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ is proposing is in my view well established to be fundamentally unsound. Why should the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ force licence players to have the latest 'feature rich' version of iPlayer when many users are, and were, perfectly content with a minimal version?
The closing down of the open source Linux version demonstrates the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s true view of only providing a very narrow product to it licence payers and this is wrong as a basis for delivery for a number of reasons. The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ should permit anyone and everyone to design and build their own player and let the market choose how many 'features' it wants, otherwise the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ will become just another Facebook or iPhone commercial business. This will considerably lessen the value and reach of broadband delivery to licence payers and generally turn off the viewers who will go elsewhere for their broadband viewing.
Furthermore can the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ afford to continue to develop its software for all operating system equally? I recall other close systems sponsored by the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ such as the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Computer and the Domesday book project. If you can't remember them, look them up - they too were based on the walled garden approach and the led nowhere wasting all the effort and in the end producing nothing of lasting value. This sadly has been the norm for ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ technology projects, but there is no reason for this to remain the case.
The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ should make its iPlayer server interfaces public and open source so that developers can be encourage to build the best and most innovative display mechanisms at no cost to the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳. This will maximise the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ coverage and minimise the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s cost.
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Comment number 2.
At 11th Feb 2011, U14781767 wrote:All this user's posts have been removed.Why?
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Comment number 3.
At 3rd Mar 2011, huntingtonpaper wrote:I intend to agree with you on this comment"The closing down of the open source Linux version demonstrates the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s true view of only providing a very narrow product to it licence payers and this is wrong as a basis for delivery for a number of reasons The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ should permit anyone and everyone to design and build their own player and let the market choose how many 'features' it wants, otherwise the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ will become just another Facebook or iPhone commercial business. This will considerably lessen the value and reach of broadband delivery to licence payers and generally turn off the viewers who will go elsewhere for their broadband viewing."
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