[NV Greens] Fwd: TiVo for the PC with a Left Twist

[Paul Etxeberri]

>
>
>Monday, March 07, 2005, 12:00 A.M. Pacific
>
>Progressive peek at TV's Web potential
>
>Paul Andrews
><http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/paulandrews/2002199172_paul07.html>
>
>For all the news about phone companies, cable providers
>and Web portals bringing television to the Internet, a
>new Seattle-based Web service is helping provide an
>early glimpse of what TV could look like on the Web.
>
>Although only a few weeks old and still in beta,
>CommonBits.org is drawing on powerful new downloading,
>indexing and newsfeed technology under an activist
>agenda to help independent audio, video and other media
>find wider distribution and their natural audience. Go
>to the site and you find all kinds of content, from "The
>Daily Show" clips of Jon Stewart monologues to
>"Democracy Now" broadcasts.
>
>"We want to be a resource for politically left people
>and community-based organizations," said Jeff Reifman, a
>former Microsoft manager who works at Groundspring.org,
>a Web-tools builder for nonprofits. He helped put
>together CommonBits.
>
>Any legal or fair-use content, including Seattle-based
>events and gatherings, is appropriate for CommonBits,
>Reifman says. But it needs to fit CommonBits' philosophy
>and will be screened to meet the service's goals.
>
>Once the subscription capabilities of podcasting and RSS
>are incorporated in tandem with tagging, CommonBits
>registrants will automatically be notified of content
>meeting specific interests. Check out environmental
>attorney Thomas Linzey's recent Seattle talk on the site
>at www.CommonBits.org/linzey.
>
>Reifman compares the process to "TiVo for the desktop
>PC. CommonBits will provide a channel of content for
>political progressives."
>
>The power of video to document and astound ó witness the
>amateur clips of the tsunami ó is unrivaled. Once video
>is as easily downloaded and viewed via a PC as flipping
>on the boob tube, the definition of TV gets turned
>upside down ó the same way print, music and radio are
>being deconstructed by the Internet.
>
>The key to CommonBits' approach lies in a new file-
>sharing technology called BitTorrent. Video can burden
>servers, eat up bandwidth costs and still deliver subpar
>playback. BitTorrent cleverly solves the bandwidth
>bottleneck while at the same time protecting users from
>the petri-dish spyware and scams of typical file-sharing
>services. And you can wind up with DVD-quality video
>instead of the typical checker-sized viewing window.
>
>The product of Bram Cohen, a programmer now based in
>Bellevue, BitTorrent is getting a black eye from the
>entertainment industry for its use as a distribution
>mechanism for commercial films. But as CommonBits.org
>shows, BitTorrent's implications go far beyond movie-
>swapping.
>
>The CommonBits approach turns BitTorrent technology into
>something resembling an Internet broadcast network:
>liberal radio and TV on demand.
>
>As for copyright issues, Reifman hopes they can be
>circumvented through permission and fair use. CommonBits
>is an early example of a "repository" Web service
>accepting uploads, screening them and offering them to a
>select community using BitTorrent. While CommonBits has
>a liberal bent, its approach in principle would work for
>any would-be Web aggregator of audio-visual content.
>Conservatives could just as easily set up a similar
>site. In fact, any constituency ó hobbyist groups,
>neighborhoods, event-based organizations ó with video
>and other media content could use the CommonBits model.
>
>With everyone from Yahoo! and Microsoft to Verizon and
>Qwest looking to get into Internet TV, the fear is that
>the Web will simply turn standard TV content into
>Internet downloads.
>
>With CommonBits, the intent is to provide otherwise
>inaccessible content to Internet "viewers." Ultimately
>its contribution may have as much to do with enabling
>fans to obtain stuff they ordinarily wouldn't know about
>or couldn't access as it does with surmounting the
>bandwidth bottleneck.
>
>Paul Andrews is a freelance technology writer and co-
>author of "Gates." He can be reached at
>pandrews at seattletimes.com.
>
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-- 
Paul Etxeberri

"Forests precede civilizations and deserts follow"   ---Chateaubriand