Schedules Direct Announces Initial Pricing

[fender]

Cheap!!! Yes men are cheap, no one wants to part from their money.. Now if you waste your money on a Call Girl or HOE, Soccer, Football Side betting, Horse Racing, Dog Racing, Boxing Bets, Lottery Tickets, BEER, Smokes then you all in that group can cough-up some extra money.. If you want EPG this is what you got to do.

I know ...

ELECTRIC!!!!
3-in-1 Cable-Internet-Phone is second highest bill to my Electric
Now do I have room for another bill... I'll have to budget myself or give up something else..

I don't waste my money on any of the things you mention. No gambling, prostitution, beer, lottery tickets, smokes. I do pay for Cable/net/phone but those are essentially a business expense these days. Part of the price of being alive.

[ram4x4nut]

Not complaining just stating the facts... I thought there were young adults here at one time? Well it's choice I'll decide to the factors I have to deal with?

1. Analog Cable going away by Dec 2007 after the major upgrade won't be able to use my 4 PVR-150s only to dub from DVR... Use Video/Audio/S-Video Amp Distrib

2. Cost of EPG data to continue to flow to my HTPC?

3. ?

Tipstir, call your cable company ... you WILL be able to use your 150's. It's only analog BROADCAST not analog cable that is going away. The cable company will still have analog cable service and no STB will be needed. That's a fact.

[sub]

PS. Sub - In a previous post, you indicated you knew the number of subscribers to zap2it broken down by their software app. Would you be able to post some stats as to number of users by type?

Sorry, I'm unable to supply that info, but I can say there is a very significant number of GB-PVR users in the US/Canada.

[Braklet]

I dont think this is something you need to worry about. These guys are not out to take your money.

Only about 10% of existing regular zap2it users need to sign up to make this service viable.

Frankly, after all the caterwauling from here to Alaska when labs.zap2it announced they were pulling the plug, I am completely mystified by the hemming and hawing as schedulesdirect.org tries to solve the problem.

For the record, I don't blame Tribune for yanking the free web service after seeing all the pay PVRs that leeched off of labs.zap2it. I am completely willing to adopt a pay model in order to weed out the leeches. It must be significantly less than e.g. TiVo subscription, but US$5/month is OK.

Yes, I like free better than pay. But when "free" is abused by profiting weasels, it is time for we enthusiasts to step up to the plate to defend our projects. I love that EPG and while I could manage just fine with GB-PVR serving as a computerized VCR, I'm glad I don't have to.

[sub]

I am completely willing to adopt a pay model in order to weed out the leeches. It must be significantly less than e.g. TiVo subscription, but US$5/month is OK.

I'm sure it will get down to significantly lower than this US$5 starting point - but only if people support it.

[KingArgyle]

Hey, I'm as cheap as they come, but I've worked long enough in open source software to know the time and expense that these people devote to a hobby. I also work for a non-profit and there are rules and regulations they need to follow, so I doubt that anybody is going to get rich off this.

$5 a month for a consistent source of data, is pocket change. Sub is right, we got spoiled with Zap2It. If you don't like the price point, then by all means feel free to screen scrape. I also expect TitanTV will plug their XML Webservice at some point, as it's only supposed to be available to users for companies they licensed too. Yahoo will plug their data at some point as well.

Easier on everybody in the long run to just pony up the $60.

[pcostanza]

It's probably been posted already but I just looked at the zap2it site and saw this:
[B]IMPORTANT MESSAGE:[/B]

August 9, 2007[B]Zap2it Labs received many emails inquiring if television listings could be provided on a paid for basis once the current service is discontinued. Today we are pleased to announce an agreement that will allow for many of you to continue to have access to your personal television listings data.

In collaboration with Schedules Direct, a non-profit organization created by founding members of MythTV and XMLTV, an agreement has been reached that will continue to support the open source and "freeware" communities. As of September 1, 2007, there WILL BE an alternative television listings source for certain Zap2it Labs users who become members of Schedules Direct, which includes a membership fee.

While Schedules Direct will continue to support the open source community and the users of "freeware", it will not support users of "commercial" products, such as DVRs, that were purchased from either a retail outlet or a company that used Zap2it Labs as its television listings source.

For those of you who lived by the original spirit and intent of Zap2it Labs and wish to continue to have access to listings, we encourage you to visit Schedules Direct for more information at http://www.schedulesdirect.org[/B]

[agidius]

been posted in here once, and in support once.

not exactly what they mean by "...listings source for certain Zap2it Labs users who become members..."

[sub]

been posted in here once, and in support once.

not exactly what they mean by "...listings source for certain Zap2it Labs users who become members..."

They mean they dont want the commercial applications that were illegally selling apps using the zap2it listings.

[laserfan]

I encourage all you cheap bastards to pony up the $15 and help get the costs down for everyone $15 isnt a huge commitment.

Once again I am late to the party, but I gotta bump sub's great comment above, and say I think that $15 bucks to see "who's serious out there" and a goal of 66% less in the future is very reasonable; I'm tempted even to call it "admirable" as who'd-a thunk they would create a nonprofit to try to provide this service.

I think it's funny that people burn hundreds and thousands of dollars a year on DVDs and Starbucks and video cards and magazines and Blackberrys and god-knows-what kinda junk, but then they balk at $5 bucks just because the idea of a committment scares them. I wonder too what folks here might think if sub said "you get GB-PVR and all the guide data you want for $6/month". Who wouldn't do that in a heartbeat?