Apple users are willing to take a large amount of abuse from the mothership. They will forgive Apple for just about every problem, heck, they will even sing the praises of Apple for the pain they go through. I should know… I’m a hardcore Apple user.
The Macintosh rumor site MacOSRumors.com is reporting that the next version of Mac OS X will employ a BitTorrent driven iTunes. The story is probably buried under online advertising, so you’ll have to work to read it… You know, close the pop-up window, now close the hover window, and it’s next to the 10 Google ads. Hmmm, knowing them it’s probably under 3 more pop up advertisements.
This is just a rumor and Apple rumors are rarely correct, but this particular item is very interesting and near and dear to me. At Technology Evangelist we have dabbled in distributing high definition videos online via bit torrent and have even highlighted a key application called Democracy Player. Lets make the assumption that this rumor is true (just go with it for now) and that Apple will be releasing a torrent engine in the Mac OS X 10.5 version of iTunes. What does this mean and why?
Yesterday I posted on Democracy player, and right now it’s Technology Evangelist’s preferred player for techies. As we stated, it’s a wee bit buggy and not for everyone yet, so how can you watch our HDTV content if you’re not an uber-geek?
I ran across an application recently that will change the world. I see massive media networks like NBC, CBC, BBC and others all stand by and watch as their business models are blown to bits. Everything we know about television, radio and media in general will be re-imagined. As Jeff Jarvis recently posted quoting Rupert Murdoch, "A new generation of media consumers has risen demanding content delivered when they want it, how they want it, and very much as they want it." I’m throwing my hat in the ring and screaming to the world "it’s time, the revolution is here!" So what is this hot app? What will change the world?? What could make such a huge dent in the traditional media universe??? It’s simple — Democracy.
As I complete the editing of our next episode of "The Innovators" I thought it would be fun to mention some of the nifty little things that we do inside of each video as it’s posted. Since the next video will have a lot of URLs in it, I think you’ll find these tips handy. Please note that the following applies to our "Watch Now" clip only and not to the clips you would download via iTunes or any other RSS feed we may have.
Progressive Start
Our Watch Now clip is authored in such a way that it should start playing immediately if you have a 1Mbps or greater connection to our server. This means no buffering time, no waiting, nothing. If you only have a 56k connection or slower broadband connection to the net, that’s OK, you’ll just have to wait a bit longer. Unlike traditional streaming media, you’ll still be able to watch in full quality no matter what your connection speed.
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Chapter Marks
In the lower right hand corner of the player you’ll see a nifty drop down with a title in it. This drop down lists the chapters that are available for playback. If you have not yet downloaded a chapter yet, it will not show up in this list, only items you’re able to view will be in here. This is nice if you want to jump to a specific point in the video.
URL banners
You may have noticed that we place the URL of different web sites in the video feed. Not only are they handy to reference, but they are clickable too. For reasons beyond my comprehension, Apple decided to not change your cursor to a pointing hand when you’re hovering over a link, so the only way to know that you can click on it is if I tell you. Well, any time you see a black bar with a URL in it, you can click on it (and sometimes you can click on the name banners too).
Full Screen
I’ll be posting an experimental full-screen mode for users that don’t have QuickTime Pro. Once again Apple baffles the mind and decided to not allow full-screen playback unless the viewer purchases QuickTime Pro, or if the author puts special tags in their media to force the player full screen. Needless to say, we’ll have the special tags. I’ll be doing this with the 480p content, so make sure your box is able to play 480p h.264 video, otherwise it may stutter a bit.
Syndication
You can view any of our HD feeds right inside of your favorite video syndication software, such as Apple iTunes. Simply browse for our feeds directly in iTunes, or subscribe to our feed manually from this page. We offer feeds in 480p, 720p, 1080p, Video iPod, Sony PSP, MP3 and AAC formats. We’ll even be posting torrent feeds soon giving you access to the all new Democracy Player.
I’m about done editing our next episode, but as I have mentioned before it takes a very long time to compress the content. As soon as I have a majority of the video ready, I’ll post her online to help curb your HD addiction. Hope everyone enjoys these nifty tips!
I have had MANY comments asking why we chose QuickTime to distribute "The Innovators" when we could have used Flash, Windows Media, etc. I have also had a few questions on why we chose HDV to shoot in as opposed to DVCPRO HD and whatnot. Lets start first with the equipment.
I have been asked many times what the best laptop is. My answer is
actually not a laptop at all, rather, a TabletPC. Being a huge fan of
Apple Computer, this surprises many, but Apple has no product that can begin
to compare to the Fujitsu 4020 TabNote.
Microsoft?¢?Ǩ?Ñ¢s Xbox 360 and Sony?¢?Ǩ?Ñ¢s Playstation 3 are about more than just games. A lot more. I just recently got my Xbox 360 and have been playing around with some fun stuff involving media downloads. This whole experience makes me think about the future of television.
