Clip & Sling II

A quick correction on my previous post regarding Clip & Sling. I went back to the main Sling booth again and learned the following:
1. You can record up to 2 minutes from any source without a content redistribution contract. However, your clips are only accessible to you.
2. All recorded clips are automatically uploaded to the Sling server. There is no local file storage for your own clips.
The concept of “fair use” is still foreign to these guys. By playing the content owners game, they are digging themselves into a hole for the future.

Clip & Sling – The Ugly Truth

In keeping with my unhealthy obsession with Slingbox, I talked to a representative today here at CES regarding their “recording” feature in the upcoming SlingPlayer 2.0 called Clip & Sling. As we suspected, it’s not pretty.

Turns out Sling has had to reach content redistribution deals with EVERY TV content owner on the planet for this feature. Each content owner must explicitly give Sling permission to record, and then sets the time limit – some may allow 15 seconds, some four minutes, etc. No agreement: no recording.

This is an INSANE amount of work for a feature with dubious value to customers. From our perspective it’s great news, as SlingPlayer 2.0 will NOT have any significant recording options.

At-Large Recorder (and every other Applian product) is all about recording for personal use. You’ve paid for the content already, you can record it. Just don’t redistribute it to others.

Breakthrough Recording XM & Sirius Online

Replay A/V 8.4 is now available! This version is an exciting breakthrough for XM & Sirius customers. Now you can automatically schedule and record using Stream Capture, which lets you record two or more shows simultaneously, with perfect quality, and eliminates many tuning errors or problems with an “Are You Listening” prompt. No other software can do this.

If you’re into recording Howard Stern, Martha Stewart, Opie and Anthony, or any of the other XM and Sirius shows you should give Replay A/V 8.4 a try!

Techware Slingbox Hosting Service

In spite of the fact we’ve been dissed by Sling in the past, I continue to be fascinated with the SlingBox, and how it disrupts the media business.

The latest cool service is the Techware Slingbox Hosting Service. These guys will host a Sling Box for you, and let you stream cable TV from Wisconsin to anywhere in the world. It’s not cheap at $45/month, but it appears legit as far as not redistributing cable TV or satellite feeds.

If you’re a Packers fan, for example, this is one great way to catch all the action. Not sure how pleased the NFL is with this arrangement though.

You can read more about it here.

Replay Music 3 Public Beta Available

Music lovers rejoice! Even though Microsoft has tried their best to restrict your ability to record audio in Windows Vista, our software engineers have developed the coolest version of Replay Music ever! It will work with any sound card, and yes, with Windows Vista too. No silly workarounds needed. Just install and start recording music from your favorite online sources.
Here’s the spiffy new Replay Music user interface:
Replay Music 3
Replay Music 3 will be a free upgrade for all Replay Music 2 owners. Please download the public beta and take it out for a test drive. We’d love to hear your feedback.
UPDATE: Please report any problems to the Replay Music Technical Support Department (not the blog comments here). This will assure that Replay Music’s developer is made aware of all issues in this beta.
Click here to report a problem with Replay Music 3
Click here to read the Replay Music 3 FAQ.

Greatest FLV Player ever

In conjunction with Martijn DeVisser, we’re proud to announce new version 2 of FLV Player. The worlds most popular player for FLV files downloaded from YouTube and other similar video sites just got even better.

You can download FLV Player 2 here.

Here’s what’s new in FLV Player version 2:

New features:
– zoom 50% – 100% – 200% and fullscreen
– double click video view-port to toggle fullscreen
– drag-and-drop (multiple) files
– seek through video with mouse scrollwheel
– extensive meta-data inspection
– remember position on screen at next launch
– remember audio settings a next launch
– optional video smoothing for fast cpu’s
– auto-update feature
– keyboard controls:

[SPACE] – toggle play/pause
[CTRL-.] – zoom 50%
[CTRL-1] – zoom 100%
[CTRL-2] – zoom 200%
[CTRL-ENTER] – toggle fullscreen
[CTRL-O] – open file…
[CTRL-V] – paste URL
[CTRL-W] – close window

Download now!

The Windows Vista Anti-Recording Conspiracy Thwarted

For several years now, the ability to record audio on new Windows PC’s has slowly eroded, until it’s become virtually impossible to record anything but your Microphone on new Windows Vista machines. Recording streaming audio, or sounds from any application, simply couldn’t be done. But today, that has changed.

Today is the official release day for Freecorder Toolbar Sound Recorder, our new free audio recording application that makes audio recording in Vista (and XP for that matter) better and more accessible for everyone. To understand why this is a big deal, it’s helpful to know a little about the technology behind sound recording. But if you’ve recently bought a new Windows PC and tried to record audio, you’ve learned what I’m about to tell you the hard way.

Recording audio is traditionally done two ways: either by using a “loopback” line exposed by the sound card in your PC, or by using a third party program that creates its own Sound Card Driver. The loopback method has been slowly phased out, even with XP machines. There used to always be a “What U Hear”, “Stereo Mix”, “Wave Out Mix” or similar recording line on every sound card installed in every new PC, which hundreds of applications could use to record sounds.

Then all of the sudden, many PC’s shipped without loopback lines, especially with the popular RealTek cards, and millions of customers were out of luck- unless you had a recording application like Replay A/V with the Enhanced Sound Card Driver, Total Recorder or Soundtap. These specialized applications used custom written Sound Card Drivers to record, and didn’t require a loopback line. However with Windows Vista, Microsoft has required that all drivers be certified and signed by Microsoft, which effectively kills this method of recording. If you own a new Vista PC with no loopback line, you are unable to record audio – until now.

Our new Freecorder Toolbar Sound Recorder uses a brand new audio recording method invented by us. It works great with Vista, XP and even Windows 2000, and doesn’t require any special recording line or driver – it just works. Plus, an added benefit is Freecorder Toolbar’s Sound Separation technology, which isolates sounds from the application it was generated in. This means that the beep from your Instant Messenger program won’t wind up in the recording from your favorite internet radio station.

Our other products are getting this new technology shortly, but Freecorder Toolbar has it now, and it’s totally free. Give it a try and enjoy!

New Web Site

In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve launched our newly redesigned Web site last night. We’ve focused on making everything easier to find and navigate – I hope you like it!
One of the best new features is the search box on every page, which should make it easy to locate things on our site. And the new navigation is cleaner too.
If you see anything broken, or something we can do better drop us a line!
Finally – a big shout out to Debbie who did 99% of the work on the redesign, including fixing 1000+ pages. Way to go Deb!

Clear Channel Radio Online

In the past few days, Clear Channel has changed how their online radio stations work. They have made it harder to acquire a static URL that tunes properly to their stations. This is unfortunate, as it interferes with your legal right to automatically schedule recordings for listening later. A lot of online radio directories are similarly hosed.

Fortunately, we’ve come up with a solution in Replay A/V. If you’re looking to record a Clear Channel station, just open Replay A/V and add it from the Media Guide using the Shows menu option. Until Clear Channel changes something, this works great! If your station doesn’t work, just tell us, and we’ll update our radio station database.

Speaking of Clear Channel, poking around on their site uncovers some interesting discoveries. They are trying to compete with XM/Sirius in the content space with their new Format Lab service. And they have some interesting on-demand music and video content too.

Some people say Clear Channel is getting too large, but the innovation they are doing is pretty impressive, and they are poised to do to the online radio space what they’ve done to the terrestrial space. Watch out!