SnapStream Blog

Hulu is probably the best thing since sliced bread. Okay, okay maybe not, but it sure is a pretty ingenious idea. I mean you are able to watch all of your favorite TV shows and movies free of charge right from your computer. It really hits on the convenience factor, which I greatly appreciate. The only down side is that it never really gave me the “I’m hanging out on my couch watching my favorite show” feeling, it was more of the “I’m awkwardly sitting in front of my computer screen watching my favorite show” feeling.

So, when Hulu announced they were releasing their own desktop application I was pretty excited. After downloading the desktop application, and playing around with it I thought to myself, “You know what would be really amazing? A remote control!” You know to give me the relaxing watching TV feeling. Having Beyond TV setup at home I decided to see if maybe my FireFly Mini Remote could fill this role. And guess what? It did! Victory is mine! Now off to test the capabilities of the FireFly Mini Remote with Hulu. As far as functionality, I really just need to navigate the surprisingly simple Hulu interface. It only requires Up, Down, Left, Right, Enter and Back.

Test: Using the arrows I cruise on over to Burn Notice (Scrolling. Check.). I click OK and choose the latest episode. Click OK again and it starts playing (Able to play. Check). My phone rings and I hit OK again (It pauses. Check.). What did he just say? Hold the left arrow down to backtrack. (It rewinds/forwards. Check.) In the end, being able to use the FireFly Mini Remote with my Hulu Desktop Application is useful and amazing!

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The question came to my mind the other day “what will the DTV transition actually look like?”
Will it be a fanfare followed by a 21 gun salute?
Will it just be going to static?

Well, I have the answer for you.

Using a SnapStream TV Server, I recorded all of the broadcast networks over their analog signal overnight 6/12/09.
I then found each of the cutoffs and clipped them out into one video.
You’ll see some that were signed off kindly, some static and some that just didn’t get it right.

We want to remind you that on June 12, 2009 all full-power broadcast television stations in the United States will no longer be broadcasting on analog airwaves and will begin broadcasting only in digital. (More info at www.dtv.gov)

With that said, if you are currently using an analog antenna you have a couple of alternatives to keep your Beyond TV working.

1) Continue using your antenna to record, but you will now be recording over-the-air digital TV. You will need a digital converter box and an USB-Uirt IR Blaster in order to use your existing analog tuner. (Here’s a step-by-step article on setting up a digital converter box with Beyond TV.)

2) Switch from using an antenna to something like cable or satellite in Beyond TV. (Additional accessories may be required depending on the service you purchase.)

3) Purchase and install an HD TV tuner card.

If you have any questions please visit the SnapStream forum thread, Beyond TV and the Digital Transition.

We just launched SnapStream TV Trends, a web-based tool for tracking trends on traditional TV here in the United States. You can reach it at http://www.snapstream.com/tvtrends/.

Read more about it on our TV Searcher blog (that’s our blog dedicated to our Enterprise business).

In a webinar for city governments that we’re hosting today (it’s at 2:30pm central, you can register here), one of our customers, the City of Austin’s public information office (PIO), will be talking about how the use SnapStream in their city to track and quickly respond to television coverage.

City of Austin’s City Hall building

Here’s an overview of the City of Austin’s story… (read more)

Here are the latest posts from the SnapStream Enterprise Blog*:

• Stratatech automates TV recording and analysis with SnapStream (February 25, 2009): an in-depth look at how Stratatech is using SnapStream to monitor and analyze television
• SnapStream gets namecheck’ed at Republican tech event (February 18, 2009): In an article on Slate.com, Christopher Beam mentioned that SnapStream got a nice shout-out at the Republican Party’s Tech Summit
• VHS is memorialized… in craft. (February 11, 2009): a collection of photographs showing cool and unusual uses for old VHS tapes
• Industry Spotlight: Using TV to Enhance Curriculum in K-12 Schools (January 29, 2009): how K-12 schools are using SnapStream servers to bring TV into the classroom
• SnapStream TV Search in Action: Plane Crash in the Hudson (January 22, 2009): how quickly could you publish a story on a plane crash?
• Chatting With FreshDV’s Matt Jeppsen About How “The Soup” and Others Are Using SnapStream (January 6, 2009): Rakesh talks with Matt about how different industries - including entertainment programs like “The Soup” - are using SnapStream TV search servers
• The era of VHS tapes and VCRs is ending (December 26, 2008): Rakesh shows off a collection of photographs of lots of old VHS tapes, VCRs, and finally, some more tapes
• Searching television for breaking news (December 5, 2008): Rakesh talks with Matt about how different industries - including entertainment programs like “The Soup” - are using SnapStream TV search servers

* If you’re wondering what SnapStream Enterprise is, it’s our TV search technology. Like Beyond TV, it lets you record television. But unlike Beyond TV, SnapStream Enterprise also allows you to search inside those TV shows to locate mentions of whatever you might be looking for on television… a celebrity, a political candidate, a topic you’re writing about, your government, a country, a person, etc. And it’s delivered on turn-key pre-configured hardware (the SnapStream Mini and the SnapStream Server).

A number of our users are reporting problems with their TV channel line-ups right now in Beyond TV.  We license TV listings information from Tribune aka Zap2It.com.  And it seems, perhaps in the midst of the switch to digital, some of their channel line-up data is incorrect.

We simply takes the data that we received from Tribune and we pass it down to Beyond TV users.  So for your line-up to get fixed, we need to let Tribune know about your problem so they fix it in their data feed.

While we’re working as fast as we can to take discrepancy reports and pass them to Tribune, the fastest way to get Tribune to fix your line-up is to contact them yourselves.  Per the instructions on Zap2It.com, you can submit a channel line-up discrepancy report to Tribune by emailing them the following information at feedback@zap2it.com:

Please fill-in the “Subject:” line as “Lineup Discrepancy,” and include the following information or your request will not be processed:

• Cable System Name (please copy exactly from our list of providers)
• Specific Description of Problem (channels missing or incorrect, program data incorrect, date/time of specific occurrence, etc.)
• Provider Phone Number
• Provider Service (cable, satellite)
• Apartment or Hotel Complex Name (if applicable)
• City
• State or Province (and country if outside of the United States)
• Zip or Postal Code

While I don’t recommend it, as a quickfix you could create a custom line-up using the same technique used for the HDHomeRun to customize an existing line-up and re-arrange the channels yourself.  But if you do this, you’ll lose the ability for Beyond TV to automatically update your program guide in the future.  You can find more information about customizing your line-up in this thread on the SnapStream forums.

This weekend, Lifehacker published a great article on cheap upgrades to your home theater.

Mentioned in the article is rolling your own DVR using a TV tuner card and 3rd party software (like our Beyond TV).

They also mention using iTunes, Airport Express and an iPhone or iPod Touch [link] to achieve “whole home audio” akin to what you get from a Sonos. This setup is a big hit at my house — now my family can listen to any of our music in the backyard (apologies to my neighbors).

Check out the Lifehacker article for more solid ideas.

Home Theater PC – 02/04/09
The case for computers (HTPC’s to be exact) over extenders. Home Theater PCs are by design (and by name) Personal Computers and there are still many good reasons to use a computer by your TV instead of an extender I’ll explain why today. Via GeekTonic

Attention, Analog Users: You have until June 12th – 02/04/09
The House has passed the bill that delays the digital-TV transition from February 17th to June 12th. If you’ve got any analog TVs bumping around the house that aren’t connected to a digital source, you’ve got slightly under four additional months to (A) buy a converter, (B) supply them with a digital-ready set-top box, or (C) buy a snazzy new TV. via Technologizer

In the latest version of Beyond TV launched in late November 2008, version 4.9, without a lot of fanfare, we made it easy for Mac OS X users to watch recordings made in Beyond TV.

Here’s how:

1. Download VLC: First, download the open source and free VLC Player for the Mac.

2. Open the Beyond TV web interface: Open the Beyond TV web interface on your Mac.  Typically, you’ll do this by entering a URL like this:

http://<COMPUTER NAME>/

into your web browser (Firefox or Safari).  For example, if my PC running Beyond TV was named “BEYONDTV-PC”, I’d enter http://beyondtv-pc/ into my web browser.

From the Beyond TV web interface, get the list of recorded shows by choosing “Recorded Shows”.

3. Configure “Play” links in Beyond TV: The first time you enter “Recorded Shows”, you’ll see this window:

It will default to “ASX Remote Playlist” as long as you’re on a Mac – that’s the correct setting so click “OK”.

If you’ve made this setting before on your Mac, to change it again, scroll to the bottom of the page and choose “Change Play Options”:

…and then explicitly choose the “ASX Remote Playlist” option.

4. Choose the TV show: Now, choose the show you want to watch and click “Play” (under the “Options” menu):

Depending on your browser, you might see a message like this:

Just click “OK”…

5. And that’s it! VLC should grab the link and start playing back the show:

While VLC is playing back the show, you can seek around inside the file, fast-forward, rewind, etc.  And this should work with both standard definition MPEG-2 recordings as well as MPEG-2 transport streams that are created when you recorded clear QAM or over-the-air (OTA) digital TV (here’s a screenshot of a high-definition recording playing back on the Mac)

So all in all, it’s a pretty decent way to watch Beyond TV recordings on any Macs you might have around at home!

(And some additional notes:

• If you have “Security” turned on, you’ll need to go in and turn authentication “off” for file downloads.  Here’s a screenshot of the “File Downloads” option on the “Security Settings” screen.
• You can only playback completed recordings this way — this does not work with in-progress recordings (ie live TV).
• This should not only work with Beyond TV, but should also works with SnapStream’s Enterprise products — ie the SnapStream Server and the SnapStream Mini.
• This is something we haven’t tested that much and it’s NOT something we officially support, so your mileage may vary.)