Tried to install BBC iPlayer, didn't work. Some random error message that caused some background process to fail to work which caused the iPlayer application to not be able to load. Or something. I'm sure they'll sort it one day, or they won't sort it at all, or something.
They really should have managed the press a bit better with the iPlayer launch, because the expectation is WELL high. All the news reports on Friday were of the BBC "launching" its new service that lets you download TV. It's not really their fault that when people go to the site and find its a Beta, and their application to use it has to be approved, they get disappointed. Well, it probably is their fault, but maybe not really.
The installation process was very complicated, even if it had worked. Go to a website, login with a password, accept an ActiveX control (but they didn't tell you about that part), install an EXE application, go back to the browser and refresh, sign in to bbc.co.uk with a different password (create an account if you don't have one, which is four screens of questions), then go back to the browser again and hopefully download the WMV file. I got as far as the EXE application, and it wouldn't run, so... meh.
I wonder if the BBC are really that geared for "delivering product". For the brief moments it lived before it was axed, the BBC Jam platform was ruddy awful. Should a corporation whose background is in making content really be trying to make computer programmes? Mind you, in both the iPlayer and Jam cases, they contracted out to Microsoft, so maybe that's their mistake right there.
2 comments:
Too bad this is dated. iPlayer seems to have some of the bugs worked out, but it can still get wonky on you.
I was hoping for newer info on this.
Clearly this is 2.5 years old and things have come on a long way since. Fascinating to think it has enough google juice for you to have found it! It's almost easy to forget that iPlayer started as a disasterous P2P client beta that clashed with almost all other contemporary clients. It only lasted a few months before they saw the error of their ways and just started streaming like they always should have!
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