YahooXMLTv (requires Go for TV)

[ram4x4nut]

Just a quick question. Are you going to keep this alive now that there is the "paid" rendition of Z2L? I'm a cheap bastage when given the chance, and so far I really like what you have done. It works well for me so I see no reason to pay for something that I already have working with no complaints ... and it's free.

[zehd]

It works well for me so I see no reason to pay for something that I already have working with no complaints ... and it's free.

That is exactly why we are debating pulling the tools. If too many people cheap out, it will be more expensive for those who don't. And without a good reliable EPG, GB-PVR's very existence is questioned...

[ram4x4nut]

That is exactly why we are debating pulling the tools. If too many people cheap out, it will be more expensive for those who don't. And without a good reliable EPG, GB-PVR's very existence is questioned...

Cheap out? I don't look at it that way at all. The tools that were developed here work fine. Why pay for one thing when another works great and is free? Isn't that the whole spirit in which GBPVR was created?

[zehd]

Cheap out? I don't look at it that way at all. The tools that were developed here work fine. Why pay for one thing when another works great and is free? Isn't that the whole spirit in which GBPVR was created?

Not quite. GB-PVR requires tuner cards (mostly) and they aren't free. Then there's the cost of the cable/dish etc... Sure there are all sorts of ways to get around paying but most are not legal.

It is illegal to use a scraper.

But seriously, if only a hundred people join, the service will likely fail. If it fails, you will be at the mercy of scrapers, and they are not reliable. And in a real sense, GB-PVR will be in jeopardy.

The more people who pay, the less the price will be... And there would be less people joining if there were free alternatives.

BTW, don't expect the free ride to keep going either way you choose. It's so easy to gum up the works from the web site side, it's crazy... one little tag...

[mulletback]

Cheap out? I don't look at it that way at all. The tools that were developed here work fine. Why pay for one thing when another works great and is free? Isn't that the whole spirit in which GBPVR was created?

Well, I've been using YahooXLMTv since it first came out, BUT, I will buy the listings from SchedulesDirect to eliminate the uncertainty. Why? Because you get what you pay for. This AM, my guide was totally hosed - it took 3 hours to figure out that Yahoo had changed my listings: subtle changes in the way the channels were named, plus creating a duplicate channel, removing some other channels. YahooGoForTV didn't care, but gbpvr choked. Yahoo doesn't care about, and isn't aware of, breaking our systems. Plus I spent half the time chasing non-existent config problems in YahooXMLTv.exe, before I realized that the problem was the source.

The SchedulesDirect folk will probably make their format(s) transparent, standard, and not change them without warning to their subscribers. All worth the token sum they are proposing.

[smajor]

That is exactly why we are debating pulling the tools. If too many people cheap out, it will be more expensive for those who don't. And without a good reliable EPG, GB-PVR's very existence is questioned...

I think I missed a thread... exactly who are "we".

I think everyone here can make their own decision to either support the new service or not. If you pull the tools here, others will pop up elsewhere. If people want a free alternative (scraping and all), then they'll find it here or somewhere else.

I've read in a couple of threads where people want the "ease" of the Zip2It way and from my understanding, that's what the new service will provide. There are those that want it free, period, and will jump through the hoops of setting up a grabber, like this one, in order to get that and are comfortable with those extra steps.

Let the market decide instead of trying to herd people to the new solution by "taking things away."

[pastro]

Not quite. GB-PVR requires tuner cards (mostly) and they aren't free. Then there's the cost of the cable/dish etc... Sure there are all sorts of ways to get around paying but most are not legal.

It is illegal to use a scraper.

But seriously, if only a hundred people join, the service will likely fail. If it fails, you will be at the mercy of scrapers, and they are not reliable. And in a real sense, GB-PVR will be in jeopardy.

The more people who pay, the less the price will be... And there would be less people joining if there were free alternatives.

BTW, don't expect the free ride to keep going either way you choose. It's so easy to gum up the works from the web site side, it's crazy... one little tag...

I'm not a lawyer, but I wouldn't have thought it would be illegal to use a scraper. Where did you see that it was?
At any rate, the Yahoo method isn't a scraper. It uses the same method to get data that the Yahoo GoTV app uses.

[zehd]

I think I missed a thread... exactly who are "we".

I think everyone here can make their own decision to either support the new service or not. If you pull the tools here, others will pop up elsewhere. If people want a free alternative (scraping and all), then they'll find it here or somewhere else.

I've read in a couple of threads where people want the "ease" of the Zip2It way and from my understanding, that's what the new service will provide. There are those that want it free, period, and will jump through the hoops of setting up a grabber, like this one, in order to get that and are comfortable with those extra steps.

Let the market decide instead of trying to herd people to the new solution by "taking things away."

And that would be the controversy that I mentioned from before. The 'we' is the 3rd party GB-PVR plugin and utilities developers.

And of course, you will be free to write your own tools should you require them.

It should be pointed out that I am not advocating bible thumping nor moral judgement...

Scraping is illegal. That's a fact.

It's proprietary, purchased and owned data that is being culled and recirculated for others' uses...

That we had a free service like Zap2it for so long, has truly spoiled ALL of us North Americans (myself included)...

I will be backing out of this discussion now. The GB-PVR forums are famous for being a peaceful, and respectful forum. I believe this has the makings of a flame war...

[whurlston]

I think I missed a thread... exactly who are "we".

"We" are the people involved in the development of YahooXMLTv and MceEpg2XmlTv. We fully support Schedules Direct and plan to use them ourselves and we have to consider that the more people that use our utilities instead of signing up for Schedules Direct means the smaller likelyhood of the membership price dropping. This means that the utilities we wrote are actually costing us even more than just the time we have spent on them.

We highly encourage everyone to sign up for at the very least, the first three months. After that, we can see what the prices are like.

I'm not a lawyer, but I wouldn't have thought it would be illegal to use a scraper. Where did you see that it was?
At any rate, the Yahoo method isn't a scraper. It uses the same method to get data that the Yahoo GoTV app uses.

Using YahooXMLTv violates the TOS for Yahoo Go for TV. Same with the MceEpg2XmlTv.

[smajor]

And that would be the controversy that I mentioned from before. The 'we' is the 3rd party GB-PVR plugin and utilities developers.

And of course, you will be free to write your own tools should you require them.

It should be pointed out that I am not advocating bible thumping nor moral judgement...

Scraping is illegal. That's a fact.

It's proprietary, purchased and owned data that is being culled and recirculated for others' uses...

That we had a free service like Zap2it for so long, has truly spoiled ALL of us North Americans (myself included)...

I will be backing out of this discussion now. The GB-PVR forums are famous for being a peaceful, and respectful forum. I believe this has the makings of a flame war...

Well, I certainly have no desire to start a flame war either!

I was simply advocating letting people choose rather than pulling working choices away from them in an effort to drive subscriptions to the new service.

Will I join the new service? I don't know yet, I'll probably wait for a few folks here to give feedback as to accuracy, etc. If it's good, I have no problem paying.

I see there is a poll and some other topics about this over in General discussion and I'll bring any comments I have in that direction instead of derailing this thread further.

In the meantime, I do look forward to another release of this grabber as I'm currently using it and it's working wonderfully!