rowan.depomerai

BBC iPlayer is a great service, and its recent expansion in the mobile space is impressive, but the line-up has a gaping hole – the iPhone. The iPhone and iPod touch have been able to stream iPlayer content over WiFi for over a year now, and were in fact the first mobile devices to support iPlayer at all. But you can’t download programmes to your iPhone, and so you can’t watch them offline, which is a very large caveat. The issue has been addressed in blogs by people like Anthony Rose, saying:

Unfortunately, Apple keeps its DRM technology close to its chest and has so far not licensed that technology to third parties. This means that as of today, it’s not technically possible for us to make rights-protected BBC iPlayer programmes available for download from the bbc.co.uk/iplayer website in a format compatible with Apple devices.

He promised that the issue has the team’s full attention, which was reassuring. But here’s the problem – I think there’s an obvious solution, and I’ve not heard any progress to making it work. So consider this an open letter to the iPlayer team – here’s my ideas, please take them and run with them if you can, or if not, please engage with users as you’ve done in the past, and point out the flaws you find in my argument.

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Last week I shared some of my favourite iPhone apps. Here’s a few more, including transport tools, media apps and a set of web information tools…

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The percentage of my friends who have an iPhone is quite frankly incredible. So when we get together, once we’ve caught up on our latest news and got through a pint or two, the question inevitably arises, have you got any good new apps? Similarly when chatting to someone new who turns out to have an iPhone, the same kind of question pops up. The App Store is like a little club that we all joined, and sharing recommendations about the best downloads is a new game. So as to further ruin my conversation possibilities with my friends (one of whom says that my blog is great because she can keep up to date with my life without ever having to speak to me!) I thought I’d share the current contents of my home screen. Here’s part one…

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And now the final instalment of my set of posts containing selections from my University coursework. You can also view the first, second and third.

The zip file contains some second year work, including:

• Advanced Media Systems – 3 reports covering my AMS work on virtual augmented environments. Also see this post.
• Final Project – the proposal and product brochure for my masters project, Methods For Enhancing Visitor Experience In Connected Museums. The final report is not included, as I don’t want to make it freely available (a lot of work went in to it!) but I may be willing to send a copy if you’re really interested. Just drop me an email.

Uni Year 4 – Download Now

This is the third in my series of posts containing selections from my University coursework. You can also view the first, second and fourth.

The zip file contains some second year work, including:

• Desktop Search – a research report I did into desktop search technology. I was quite pleased with this, though it already is a little dated… the joys of technology!
• Production Report – for a video post-production coursework assignment I did based on my work for the Further Maths Network.
• Analogue ECAD Datasheet – the datasheet for an operational amplifier (OpAmp) that I designed with Richard Ash for my Analogue ECAD module.

Uni Year 3 – Download Now