Tag: WINDOWS MEDIA

British readers be warned: the Free Software Foundation's Defective by Design campaign is coming to our side of the pond tomorrow in protest at the BBC's decision to make extensive use of DRM (and in particular MIcrosoft's DRM) in their beta iPlayer software. For those who are unaware of the iPlayer, the BBC is making its programmes available for 'catch-up' via the iPlayer - albeit only for 7 days ...

Earlier this year Netflix announced a new service that lets you watch a limited number of videos online instead of waiting for the DVDs to come in the mail. There's just one problem. You have to watch on Netflix's terms. The video player is browser based, and the movies are wrapped up in Windows Media DRM. If you want to want to copy a movie to a portable device for viewing on the go, you're out ...

Yesterday, Jordan blogged an announcement from Microsoft's Steve Riley that Vista users will need to have 64-bit superpowers if they want the ability to play HD video. It turns out this isn't entirely true, as Engadget is reporting that Microsoft has clarified the complication: 32-bit versions of Vista can play HD - but not without help from third party folk like CyberLink and InterVideo. The ...

It's not often that Microsoft distributes third-party tools on its own web site, but it looks like they're making an exception for Flip4Mac, a plugin for QuickTime Player that lets Mac users to watch WMV and listen to WMA files without downloading Windows Media Player. It supports pretty much all the formats that WMP9 does, and since it's a QT plugin, it'll also let you watch streaming Windows ...

Last night Bill Gates, assisted by Justin Timberlake, used his CES keynote to officially announced Urge, the new music and media store from Microsoft and MTV that we reported on a few weeks ago. The service will have two million songs, more than 100 CD-quality radio stations, and exclusive MTV content. Currently Urge.com is a "coming soon" placeholder, curiously hosted on a Sun server. ...