Xshare v.01 Alpha

[jorm]

that is a good idea.

I can also see people without enough tuners to avoid conflicts using this (with automation) to get the program that they were unable to record.

[cginzel]

I have to say... as much as I like P2P technology and the features it brings... anything that allows you to swap shows not recorded by yourself for yourself is a slippery legal slope... and I hate to see GBPVR pulled into any legal scrutiny. The fact that we use comskip so nicely to skip commercials and transcode content to any format we want should give the content providers enough heartburn, especially as GBPVR usage grows. if we start sharing DRM free content effortlessly… I can only imaging how well that would go over. I'm not trying to be negative… I'm just trying to be realistic about the world we live in today...

[jorm]

We need to define what is the proper direction for this tool. Obviously it can be used for illegal trafficing of dvd's, or hbo shows (very illegal but common). However so can ftp.

We need to indiciate that sharing of your personal videos or publicly aired videos from a friend are the main usage. If someone uses it for something else we can indiciate it is illegal but they are private transfers between two friends. So there is no way to tell.

cginzel,
I appreciate your opinon I do not want negative attention I just think this tool can be of great legal use. Help us define it.

It does not seem that it would be illegal to download a show that a friend records on Channel-X if you also get Channel-X.

Any experts out there on how to cover ourselves?

[fla]

If it remains a plugin I don't see much risk to gb-pvr. If it became controversial the plugin may have to be removed from the wiki but gb-pvr would probably gain in popularity due to the publicity.

[jorm]

There are two levels of risk. One is to the author (me), second is gbpvr. As you said as it is a plugin gbpvr is not effected. It is just a fancy ftp for gbpvr. In its current form I think it is low risk but if it evolved into something that got lots of attention in might be a problem.

[flyswatta]

Wow! Sounds like an awesome idea. I'm up for some alpha/beta testing! I think that being a plugin of a pvr software that it would limit the exposure of the functionality. It would still be easier for 90% of the people out there to just use an existing method (bit torrent, etc) of downloading tv shows.

[stu8080]

It would still be easier for 90% of the people out there to just use an existing method (bit torrent, etc) of downloading tv shows.

Good point, although i love the idea of a sharing program in GBPVR (there was a really long thread about how to do this once before...!) given the existing methods, is it worth risking GBPVR?

[pBS]

make it a stand-alone prorgram as well,with ability to run inside GBPVR, and that may offer enough disconnect to limit liabilities to GBPVR even further..

i envisioned a community-style scheduler,where you would post stuff you're going to record, then as they are recorded they turn into shows you could d/l if you missed it, or use your tuner for something else if you knew several others would be recording it as well..tho i doubt we could get that anywhere near 'legal' status it would be what users would like and use..shame...
alos i see a bandwidth problem as shows,even with serious transcoding, are still huge and require almost all the bandwidth to send in a timely fashion, so users would need a 'permission' as it may hamper the "sender's" system speed..or maybe a 'request' that could be answered at sender's convenience [at night or such,from schedule of low usage times each user sets for availability of his/her media]
that way several request could be sent out and the first one who is available to send will respond,...
and on the fly transcoding not out of the question during off-peak times..
[would seriousy hamper useability while using host computer]

it really is the next step in entertainment...kinda like community TV
almost everything on the screen is about human interaction, so why shouldn't we interact when we experience it?
if we missed a show accidentally, why wouldn't they want us to be able to see it? wouldn't they make more money if we see it than don't?!
pay content has the bonus of possibly renting or buying the dvd if someone likes it enough...if they're already waivering and can't even see if it's worth it, surely there's no chance they will then...
anyways..there, that should be a nickel's worth
pirating is one thing, fair use is another..they just can't seem to make up their minds where to draw the line, so nothing's legal but they profit from all of it...

oh yea,my ati has a feature like this that only works over local lan,it connects two atiMMC sessions together and alows sharing of everything..
even on machines that don't have tv hardware...same thing only local..

hope to see more..
very cutting edge...i like it

[flyswatta]

I agree that it will be the next generation of pvr - a community pool of pvr's where you could have a "virtual pvr". Like you mentioned, there would be some challenges involving transcoding and file delivery. You'd have to build in some sort of bandwidth limiter, but not allow them to limit it so much that it's unusable (ie. all of the jokers that would set the upload to 1 Kb/s). I know that personally I can only allow about 30 KB/s upload on my cable internet without completely choking my upstream bandwidth. This would still be pretty slow for someone to download a file. I wonder if you could transcode the show down to a psp file (I'm assuming that they're much smaller)? How would that play on a tv? too blocky? I haven't tried it yet, but I'm guessing it would look pretty crappy.

You'd almost have to build in a "family and friends" type of authentication system to allow access to your pvr, and a way to drop people if they are abusing the system. Also, you'd want to make sure somehow that the members of your group somehow conform to some "minimum specs" - number of tuners, upstream bandwidth, willingness to participate, etc...

[stu8080]

This whole DRM thing is going to get worse before it gets better!

At least some companies are testing the water: Warner with bittorrent downloads, ABC's streaming shows, and even TiVo providing enhanced adverts (cookery demos and road tests of new cars etc)

Once they find ways to recoup the lost revenues elsewhere, they should lay off those that just want to watch tv shows when and where they like!!

With the above idea, we could avoid attention by describing the plugin as a way to share 'plugins' or something like that. Nothing illegal about sharing those, and since you can share a recording just as you would share a xip file?