4 Oh Dear

Any companies that want to take on iTunes and the use of DRM for purchase of legal video downloads will need to perform well to be in a with a chance. Unfortunately for Channel 4, there is no chance of it's online TV service coming close to threatening even the most unreliable of services since it is, probably, the most unreliable of services.



For example, the only TV show I can imagine myself watching on the channel is The IT Crowd. When it first started being made available on 4oD, I couldn't get the video to play inside the 4oD player, so I had to find the video file on my Hard Drive and play it from there straight into Windows Media Player.

Unfortunately, Channel 4 have stopped me from doing that and now force me to do it from the web page itself. So, I load up the software and after some coaxing (which involves downloading the video then starting up a streaming video only to have to copy the URL to the stream and paste that into Windows Media Player), it plays and I get to have my weekly TV giggle.

That was last week. This week, I'm playing it in the web based player and it says "Oh no! You naughty little man! You need to be playing this in the web based player!". I am. It's wrong. I'm right. I don't get to watch my video.

I'm still unable to watch it. It's free, so all it's really cost me is the time it takes to connect, download and try to kick it off.

But if I had to compare that with the smooth runnings of the iTunes experience, it should be clear to everyone except a Channel 4 executive that 4oD is utterly useless.

When it comes to iTunes, I just pick my Song/Video/Movie/TV Show and play it. I'm fully legal and yet the whole DRM issue doesn't show its head at all. It's transparent. Sure, I'd rather it wasn't there at all, but it's Ok because it causes me no trouble whatsoever whereas this Microsoft-based DRM means that I can't run it on my preferred platform (Mac OS X) and even under Windows, it won't run because it isn't sure of what software I'm using to run it.

Like, hello?

No TV, Thank You

Since moving, I've come across people looking at me like I have three heads as they exclaim, "You don't have a telly!?"

Don't get me wrong, there are TV shows I love (like Doctor Who and, ermm, Doctor Who) so I'm not trying to make a religious 'I am more righteous than you' statement, I just want to try and live a simple life and cutting out wasteful source of 'noise' can only be a good thing and anything I really want to watch can wait until it comes out on DVD.

I must admit to coming home and wishing, from time to time, that I had a telly, but once I put on some music I start to relax in a way that feels oddly deeper and more fulfilling than when in front of a telly.

Think about those hours that human evolution has brought us to, hours of switching off our brains as crap pours into them from the glowing boxes in the corners of our living rooms. Is that a good thing?

When I want news, entertainment, music or anything, I can listen to the radio or pocasts while doing something else, or I can interact with content of my choosing on the internet. By reducing the number of channels through which rubbish can travel, I can cut the amount of rabbish and make fuller use of the channels I am keeping open.

All I want is a simple life.

:-)