[ubuntu-uk] Petition against BBC iplayer

[Terence Simpson]

Jason Liquorish wrote:
> After seeing a lot of posts about getting media from sites such as 
> bbc.co.uk <http://bbc.co.uk> working I saw this on the Nottingham LUGs 
> mailing list:
>
> Hi all,
>   The BBC iPlayer - which provides access to BBC programming for up to
>
> 30 days after it's aired - will be released as a Windows only
> application, including DRM facilities to restrict users rights, for at
> least the first 2 years of the service.
>
> The Open Source Consortium is running a campaign against the release of
>
> the Windows only iPlayer product - including a formal complaint to the
> EU on the issue.
>
> To show your support for this issue, please take a moment to sign this
> petition:
>   
> http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/iplayer/
>
> and show your support to the OSC by posting us a message (via the
> Contact Us area of the website), or joining the OSC:
>   
> http://www.opensourceconsortium.org/
>
> Please feel free to forward this message to any groups or mailing lists
> that may be interested in our campaign.
>
> Thanks!
> -- 
> Jason Liquorish - Bassetts
> OpenPGP Key - http://www.dropshock.com/jason.gpg
>
> http://blog.dropshock.com 
Have you read the press release on this[1]?
It seems that the BBC are not developing the iPlayer for just Windows.
 From the press release:
"We are committed to making it as easy as possible to use BBC iPlayer. 
Developing a version for Apple Macs and Microsoft Vista is absolutely on 
our critical path."

Although they still seem to be totally ignoring the whole Open Source 
community and <opinion>probably have no plans to release a *NIX 
version.</opinion>

Without even asking the BBC I can already tell their what response would be:
"Blah blah blah... We are committed to opening our services to the 
widest range of people... Blah blah... We have to respect the rights of 
the publishers of their media... Blah blah... Currently there is no way 
of accessing DRM "protected" media on Linux... Blah... We are currently 
working on this.. Blah... Thanks for your comments.... BLAH"
(end rant)


[1] 
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2007/06_june/27/iplayer.shtml>


Terence