Sling has announced their new media portal to compete with Hulu, YouTube and other sites today. And of course when we read news like this, we ask – how will people be able to download or record these video streams?
At-Large Recorder is already working with SlingPlayer 2.0, so that’s one option, but I suspect they will use a different technology (Flash?) for their media service. Once we get our beta invite and try it out, we’ll let you know what we discover.
As far as the service goes, here’s our take. The Clip-and-Sling idea is moronic – I sincerely doubt people will take the time to make clips of TV shows, and also people will be less than likely to watch them. Of course, people DO this already in YouTube, but the effort involved in this acts as a natural filter for presenting interesting things to viewers. if it’s too easy to make clips of TV shows, there will be a lot of noise. Also – being tied to the content owners may limit the flexibility of end-users to make compelling clips. We’ll have to see how the service evolves.
However – if they can provide LiveTV over the web, I can see that as being a game changer. And with the new SlingCatcher boxes coming out which let your TV become the viewing hardware for any Sling stream, we may finally get true IPTV. This will open the floodgates for other similar services, as nobody wants to be left behind.
Posts Tagged: capture
Download Videos from Sling.com
Article on Downloading Amazon VOD Videos
Technology often moves faster than the news! Here’s an example:
We were featured in an article done by Reuters on September 26, mentioning how Replay Media Catcher was able to download movies from Amazon’s new VOD (Video on Demand) service.
Apparently, Amazon was asked for comment, and shortly before the article hit the wires, they had updated their system, making Replay Media Catcher (for now anyway) unable to record. Other aspects in the article are still valid though, but Amazon was a particularly big part of the story.
Nevertheless, there are other ways to record from Amazon — we recommend WM Capture. As this is a real-time high-quality recorder that works by capturing videos directly off of your PC’s screen, there’s no way it can be blocked.
The other interesting thing is how the story got going in the first place, which we’re still trying to figure out. Stay tuned!
Recording the Olympics, Part II
Alex has looked into more of the technical details behind how NBC is streaming the Olympics, and has made an interesting discovery. Apparently the stream formats are different for live streams vs. pre-recorded streams. This means that you can make digital recordings of live events, and record from the screen for “rewind” or cached events. Below is his technical summary.
The Silverlight NBC Olympics server uses Windows Media Player for live streams and VP7 for prerecorded videos. VP7 is the format used by web sites like abc.com or fox.com and can provide very high quality (lossless) video compression including HD. The problem with this format is that it cannot be reliably streamed for longer periods of time like the live broadcasts. The math used to compress the video and the audio does not allow recovery when packets are lost which results in out of sync audio. Currently Windows Media Player is the only format that can do this. The live stream Olympics can be recorded with WM Recorder or Replay Media Catcher but the prerecorded clips can only be recorded with WM Capture.
New Applian Media Browser Toolbar
Today we have just released a cool gadget – the Free Applian Media Browser Toolbar. From within Internet Explorer or Firefox, you can stay notified when Applian product news and updates occur, quickly get access to tutorials and help with streaming media recording problems, as well as some handy gadgets including a search box, radio player, weather bug, email notifier and more.
The Applian Media Toolbar is free. Check it out here:
http://applian.com/toolbar/
Replay A/V 8 Released
The long awaited update to Replay A/V is here! Version 8 offers several usability enhancements, and offers unparalleled support for Flash (FLV) Videos from sites like YouTube, MySpace, Gogle Video and more. And it’s still the best way to record all your favorite radio shows.
– Resizeable window
– Fully integrated with Replay Converter
– Improved URL finder: more supported network cards and also finds downloaded videos from the browser cache
– YouTube, Google Video and customizations for other video download sites
– TV Tuner card and Webcam support
– New MediaPaks let you record all the popular shows in interest categories like Politics, Business or Technology with a single click.
– Custom MP3 tags
– new simplified interface
– Over 60 enhancements!
If you already own Replay A/V, you can learn more and upgrade for just $9.95 from here:
http://www.applian.com/replay-av/upgrade8.php
Check it out!