OneAndOneIs2

As you may well have heard, the BBC has launched it's online video service. It hasn't done so to universal enthusiasm.

The main stumbling block? You need Windows XP SP2 and IE 6+ - so if you have a Mac, Linux, or even Windows Vista, you can't use it.

Unlike many, I don't have a problem with it being XP-only to start with: So long as multi-platform support is on the way, and it apparently is, if they have to support one platform at a time, and they apparently do, then they might as well start with the biggest and work down.

No, it all starts with the "support a platform" issue.

Why do they need to do this? There are numerous video formats that are fully platform-independent. Ogg would be the ideal, but even MPEG, with its legal issues, can be easily run on Linux, Solaris, BSD, you name it... And as YouTube has made very clear, Flash can do a lot...

But they haven't gone with any of these. No, they've gone with something that only works on a single platform.

Why? DRM! It's vital that DRM be put in place, to prevent piracy.

Even more than usual, this one inspires the rebuttal: What a crock!

DRM is pointless at the best of times, for reasons everybody outside of the media industry fully understands. However, in the BBC's case, it's even more so.

Let's say, for argument's sake, that I want to get the next series of Dr. Who on my Myth box. The BBC offers me three ways to do this:

- A (currently) Windows-only download service that will let me get a DRM'd copy of the episode for seven days, which will become unwatchable after 30 days. AKA iPlayer

- A fairly CPU-intensive capture & encoding of the analogue broadcast

- A high-quality DRM-free digital stream that can be saved to hard drive without even having to encode it. AKA Freeview

In other words, the BBC first transmits the episode in a form ideal to be saved to a hard drive, completely unencumbered by any form of DRM. And then they make it available online, and are suddenly obliged to wrap it thoroughly in protective encryption to prevent it being misused.

Can you see the logic here?

I mean, at least in the "unprotected CD vs DRM'd iTunes" argument, somebody has to actually pay for the CD before it's available to be ripped to DRM-free.

Something that's broadcasted across the country? Needs DRM? Come on! Has anybody engaged their brain here?

The other argument that worries me is the "I pay my license so the BBC has to make their content available to me without forcing me to pay for Windows" one.

Not that I disagree with this as far as it goes. I've paid my license fee, I should get the same opportunities as everybody else who's paid the license fee.

But then, a bloke I work with, he's got a Windows XP computer. But he's on dial-up, not broadband - it'll take him forever to download worthwhile amounts of content. And he's only got 7 days.

A few other people I know don't have PCs at all. (Luddites, the lot of them!) They can't get any value from this new service at all. And yet they've paid the same fees I have.
So arguing that Linux users should be catered for because we've paid the license fee is tantamount to saying that the BBC should provide free broadband-connected PCs for everybody who's paid the license fee.

So I wonder: Considering the amount of fuss being kicked up on the "It has to be available to everybody who's paid the license!" front, the BBC could take the easy way out.

They could make it a separate service, not covered by the license, for which you pay separately.

Just because it's BBC, doesn't mean it's got to be free to license-payers. I know, I've got over a hundred quid's worth of their DVDs sitting on the floor at home.

They say Linux support is on its way. I, for one, am happy to just let them get on with it. There are worse alternatives than being the third in the queue.

P.S. I found this to be a quite insightful illustration of why DRM can never attain its ultimate goal.