Saorview Connect

donegal.

if people want services that are available for free they should pay for them ?

corm500

donegal. wrote: »

if people want services that are available for free they should pay for them ?

Gerry Wicklow

donegal. wrote: »

if people want services that are available for free they should pay for them ?

Sadly many people do. Blissfully unaware that a once off purchase of a new box would be far less than a years sub.

Johnboy1951

Originally Posted by Johnboy1951 View Post
... I would think it is in each individual channels interest to have their EPG available wherever their channel can be received.

Thurston? wrote: »

They're only FTA here at all because either they wanted to be freely available in their home territory without any kind of card scheme, or they're crap that's not worth encrypting.

It hardly matters why, only that there is an expanded market for their advertisers, so it would be in their interests to have their EPG available in the full reception area.

Thurston?

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

It hardly matters why, only that there is an expanded market for their advertisers, so it would be in their interests to have their EPG available in the full reception area.

They're not really supposed to be broadcasting in the expanded area at all though, are they?

Maybe Saorview should demand the EPG as payment for their territory being invaded?

It's really hard to come up with consistent for/against arguments for any of this, as it's a strange situation to be in if you can offer features that both enhance & undermine your product.

Former Former

donegal. wrote: »

if people want services that are available for free they should pay for them ?

It's not available for free. That's the whole point.

peking97

Could we, perhaps, invoke the Peace Process on the grounds that British citizens down south should have full official access to UK TV services(with full EPG:)) and reciprocally, Irish up north should have full official access to Saorview?:)
Anything's worth a try!

The Cush

peking97 wrote: »

Could we, perhaps, invoke the Peace Process on the grounds that British citizens down south should have full official access to UK TV services(with full EPG:)) and reciprocally, Irish up north should have full official access to Saorview?:)
Anything's worth a try!

That boat sailed back in 2010 when the two governments signed an MoU on these issues. There's a whole big thread on it since that time.

lsjmhar

Will there be any Saorview Connect TVs? That way a freesat box could be connected with hdmi for dual role back facility and 7 day epg.

peking97

The Cush wrote: »

That boat sailed back in 2010 when the two governments signed an MoU on these issues. There's a whole big thread on it since that time.

Oh sorry! Didn't realize that.:o

Gerry Wicklow

lsjmhar wrote: »

Will there be any Saorview Connect TVs? That way a freesat box could be connected with hdmi for dual role back facility and 7 day epg.

Probably black & white with no remote.:P

byte

The Cush wrote: »

Discussed here on the forum earlier this year, the new Walker and Nordmende range of combi TVs (Vestel?) have a combined epg, with the FTA sat channels starting at 300. If they can do it why can't EKT?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=102912544

I'd imagine, and am open to correction, it's because the Saorview channels will be running on Metaphor software with all the new features, whereas the satellite channels will have to operate outside that.

STB.

Former Former wrote: »

It's not available for free. That's the whole point.

The stations are free to air. Streams and data as neither Sky nor Freesat encrypt their epg data. Most E2 boxes grab the data OTA from Openepg.

Sky 7 day Openepg is easily loaded from one TP, parsed and passed to a .dat file stored on a STB's memory or USB device. Freesat use Huffman tables which are just as easily collected with the requisite software from their data TP.

Saying hope you dont mind the encroachment whilst also saying we are not giving you the data, shows no consistency.

Dave..M

Finally caught up on this thread after stepping away for a week or so, talk about highs and lows. I know expectations were mixed and generally on the low side but really what a complete bummer. Who and what is this box aimed at, hopelessly off the mark. Someone asked whether it would automatically retune & order sat channels and whilst I didn't see a response I think we also know the answer to that. I don't watch much linear TV anymore as it is but for what I do it'll be Freesat all the way for me now (with the TV tuner for the missus faircity!)

Former Former

STB. wrote: »

The stations are free to air. Streams and data as neither Sky nor Freesat encrypt their epg data. Most E2 boxes grab the data OTA from Openepg.

Sky 7 day Openepg is easily loaded from one TP, parsed and passed to a .dat file stored on a STB's memory or USB device. Freesat use Huffman tables which are just as easily collected with the requisite software from their data TP.

Saying hope you dont mind the encroachment whilst also saying we are not giving you the data, shows no consistency.

That's all true, and none of it matters.

STB.

Former Former wrote: »

That's all true, and none of it matters.

Go on....

Former Former

STB. wrote: »

Go on....

I'm not sure what else there is to say.

lsjmhar

If I have Humax hdr 1100s box does role back service work? Looking at videos on YouTube it accesses BBCiplayer to role back. If this is no longer available through geoblocking does 7 day role back service work? Just wondering about having this box.with new Sorview connect box to have both Irish and British FTA.

decor58

lsjmhar wrote:

If I have Humax hdr 1100s box does role back service work? Looking at videos on YouTube it accesses BBCiplayer to role back. If this is no longer available through geoblocking does 7 day role back service work? Just wondering about having this box.with new Sorview connect box to have both Irish and British FTA.

The ITV service worked here up to midsummer, a software update finished that. The BBC programme restart doesn't work here either and some of the sport items on the red button won't work over the Internet.

ITV2

ITV Hub still works on Ch903 for me, but on the app it dead like the other bbc/c4/c5 ones.

STB.

Former Former wrote: »

I'm not sure what else there is to say.

I'm not a mindreader. Thats why I asked you to expand on why you think that way.

Former Former

STB. wrote: »

I'm not a mindreader. Thats why I asked you to expand on why you think that way.

I don't think that way. It's the reality, whether I think it or not, whether you want to accept it or not.

You don't need to read my mind. You only need to scroll up, but I'll save you the hassle:

It's not nearly as simple as that. Licensing the EPG to Ireland basically says yes, we are now officially broadcasting into Ireland and that creates all sorts of issues. So you've TV3 paying for the Irish rights to Coronation St, and suddenly Saorview are advertising a product that completely undermines the value of those rights. Saorview would be hauled in front of the courts faster than you can say ex parte injunction.

It can't happen. People need to re-adjust their expectations of what Saorview is and what it can realistically provide.

Johnboy1951

Maybe someone with some knowledge in this area could explain to me what the situation is regarding the extended programme guides for the various channels that are broadcasting FTA on the Astra satellite/s.

While I can well understand how Freesat have a say on their own software presentation of those guides, and can demand a licence fee for its use, I do not understand what the situation is regarding the actual data from each channel.

I am aware that both Freesat and Sky produce their own EPG displays using this data, so my question about exclusive use earlier should be ignored (was not thinking clearly at the time).

It appears there is something to prevent me/my company/whoever from producing my own software EPG including all this data ..... but I have no idea what that might be (or if it really exists).

If there is no impediment to displaying the data, provided the Freesat or Sky EPGs are not used, then what is to prevent RTÉ from having a full 7 day EPG for satellite in their 'connect' box?

As I said I know nothing of the legal situation surrounding this data (probably obvious from the above), so hopefully someone with such knowledge can throw some light on the situation.

[I would expect RTÉ to have to get permission from the various channels it decided to list in its 'connect' box to use the data, but would not expect that to upset those channels as they would be reaching a market with a new entrant and thus increasing their exposure. Maybe that permission is not even needed?]

STB.

A good question Johnboy. Radiotimes data was taken over by a company who initially provided it for free. Its now a commercial entity.

Freesat isnt the only show in town when it comes to epg data. There are online versions and providers.

EPG data is not illegal to download for personal use.

The thing is if you implement a rythec solution you'd be hardcoding something and well then youre into a grey area and would need constant attention. Setting up a dedicated server would be a no no from a national broadcasters/platforms perspective.

@Former former. The rights of TV3 are already undermined when you've stations encroaching on you're market. They probably realised that when they signed the rights agreements though. Protecting EPG data is not going to lessen the impact. Tv3 have long come to their own conclusions on the commercial realities of competing in Ireland (although they resent having not getting a slice of the licence fee pie because they are commercial) . They are already on pay TV platforms that combine these stations anyway. They dont care where their viewers come from.

Like I said before theres an elephant in the room and its not epg data.

Capt'n Midnight

STB. wrote: »

A good question Johnboy. Radiotimes data was taken over by a company who initially provided it for free. Its now a commercial entity.

TVbrowser.org was great while it had the BBC EPG online. Reminders, suggestions and more importantly it hid all the stuff you didn't want to see, declutterd your TV schedule.

You can get the data for $25 a year from http://www.schedulesdirect.org/

SKY have a different EPG to Freesat.
Old SKY boxes export the EPG out the serial port. You'd have to grab it and parse it though.

You can recover the Freesat EPG from a Humax Foxsat HDR

Enigma add on's will pull it from the interwebs if you are running a Linux box.

Or you can continue to pay SKY/Virgin/Eir/Vodafone/etc for a single EPG and a single remote.

Former Former

STB. wrote: »

A good question Johnboy. Radiotimes data was taken over by a company who initially provided it for free. Its now a commercial entity.

Freesat isnt the only show in town when it comes to epg data. There are online versions and providers.

EPG data is not illegal to download for personal use.

The thing is if you implement a rythec solution you'd be hardcoding something and well then youre into a grey area and would need constant attention. Setting up a dedicated server would be a no no from a national broadcasters/platforms perspective.

@Former former. The rights of TV3 are already undermined when you've stations encroaching on you're market. They probably realised that when they signed the rights agreements though. Protecting EPG data is not going to lessen the impact. Tv3 have long come to their own conclusions on the commercial realities of competing in Ireland (although they resent having not getting a slice of the licence fee pie because they are commercial) . They are already on pay TV platforms that combine these stations anyway. They dont care where their viewers come from.

Like I said before theres an elephant in the room and its not epg data.

Again, I don't disagree with any of this.

But there is an unbridgable gap between what a private citizen can legally do with information that is freely available and what a commercial entity can do for profit in a regulated industry. That's the fundamental problem here.

So while it's a pity that we can't get a Saorview box with a Freesat EPG and features, it's not Saorview's fault and there's simply nothing they can do about it.

STB.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

TVbrowser.org was great while it had the BBC EPG online. Reminders, suggestions and more importantly it hid all the stuff you didn't want to see, declutterd your TV schedule.

You can get the data for $25 a year from http://www.schedulesdirect.org/

SKY have a different EPG to Freesat.
Old SKY boxes export the EPG out the serial port. You'd have to grab it and parse it though.

You can recover the Freesat EPG from a Humax Foxsat HDR

Enigma add on's will pull it from the interwebs if you are running a Linux box.

Or you can continue to pay SKY/Virgin/Eir/Vodafone/etc for a single EPG and a single remote.

Yes thanks Capt.

Sky use Openepg. Its up on a DVB-S TP @11778 V 27500. Its already implemented and collected by the epg collector on E2 boxes over the air.

Freesat epg is compressed in Huffman tables and reverse engineered years ago.

The last is the online scrapers such as rytec.

All you need is enough memory to store the data on a continuous basis. Was an issue years ago when boxes simply hadnt got enough memory and required storing to external memory like a USB.

Rolling out an official box would require no grey areas at all and a dedicated server. 2RN would have been better off researching that rather than unfortnately employing a consortium that control one of those data sets along with their methaphor software for gridling playback. The cost of this latest box is dev costs that deliver nothing but a vanity player. It'll be wasted money. No distributors will want to know about this box. They couldnt even combine the FTA stations available in Ireland.

Johnboy1951

Former Former wrote: »

Again, I don't disagree with any of this.

But there is an unbridgable gap between what a private citizen can legally do with information that is freely available and what a commercial entity can do for profit in a regulated industry. That's the fundamental problem here.

So while it's a pity that we can't get a Saorview box with a Freesat EPG and features, it's not Saorview's fault and there's simply nothing they can do about it.

OK, you say there is a fundamental problem, without telling us what that problem actually is.
The purpose of my post was to try to elicit some information around this alleged problem.

It would help if you could elaborate and maybe provide some reference to aid in a search.

Thanks.

Tigerandahalf

Even if we had a combined 7 day epg would some fta channels still be missing. I see on another thread someone mentioned with freesat you only get the one itv and one c4 channel (set to your region). Is that correct?

That would be a bummer. I know you can set the freesat box to fta but would that be a bit of hassle and also no epg.

lsjmhar

Looks like the best thing to do here is give this a miss. Sticking with enigma2 box with plugins that increase functionality. Oh well!! We lived in hope!!!