Catching up with the BBC’s iPlayer and Channel Four’s 4oD, British broadcaster ITV has released its own free video-on-demand service: ITV Player.
ITV Player uses Microsoft’s Silverlight format to stream its media, which allows it to be played on Windows and Macs. Users report problems with it working under the Linux build of Silverlight. The website itself looks quite slick but is nowhere as near as nice to use as BBC’s iPlayer.
The service allows users to watch shows like Coronation Street but I cannot see any way to download these episodes to watch portably as you can with iPlayer.
Whilst it’s nice to see ITV using a non-Windows only brand (unlike Channel 4), it would have been good had they used a more universal format like Flash or OGG.
There are a few other issues with it. Many shows can’t be watch live due to licensing issues, the video is too small and the only options are small or fullscreen – unlike iPlayer. ITV Player also fails to offer HD shows.
I think ITV Player will either be drastically improved or scrapped! I’m surprised ITV are in-touch enough with the public to stay clear of DRM but I’m disappointed they used Silverlight and made it incompatible with Linux. The interface needs work too.
I expect the site won’t work outside the UK but it’s still a convenient service British readers may have overlooked. If it does work outside, please comment and let us know!
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19 Responses to “ITV Player: UK Silverlight-based catch-up”
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[...] had been using Silverlight since the launch of the service, but if the ITV forums and other reports are anything to go by, the use of Silverlight had certainly caused frustration for many visitors to [...]
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[...] had been using Silverlight since the launch of the service, but if the ITV forums and other reports are anything to go by, the use of Silverlight had certainly caused frustration for many visitors to [...]
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[...] ITV Player: UK Silverlight-based catch-up [...]
While not being familiar with the iPlayer, you could try Moonlight to get Silverlight to work on Linux.
http://www.mono-project.com/Moonlight
Why would it be scrapped? The only reason ITV is alive is because of it’s soaps and they’re not going.
Peter S: Doesn’t work under Moonlight.
Just bypass the need to install Silverlight on whatever platform by using the Firefox plugin.
Also lets you resize it etc.
http://chris.orr.me.uk/caughtup/xpi/caughtup-latest.xpi
You realise that all the major networks (BBC, ITV and Channel 4) are working on a universal platform called Kangeroo – whch would allow one user to access content from all the different providers??
Sadly the competition watchdog has put some holds up on it saying that it is anti-competitive to over digital cotent providers and thus not in the interests of the UK users (huh!! how is giving us access to all shows on one player not in our interest,stupid watchdog). So, whilst they figure out those legal issues,I guess itv-player is ther to fill in the gap.
I wish they’d just used Adobe AIR like the BBC. Silverlight has really bad browser support and Mono is a joke on Linux.
Yet another FAIL by ITV.
You think that is bad?
Channel 4 using Windows Media Player for their catch-up??? MAJOR ./fail
No problems watching BBC at all but cannot watch an ITV programme through without several reloads.
ITV player does NOT work outside UK. The choice of Silverlight was probably one of convenience since Microsoft probably gave them a ton of support to use Silverlight instead of some other platform. M$ is pushing silverlight as a better option than using flash, however I suspect someone will find that it has better DRM than flash does and that is why so many users are having problems with it.
This leaves people outside the UK with no options to legally watch ITV programming. The only recourse is illegal methods. It is regrettable that can’t legally access some really good programs. why is it that I can listen to the BBC, but I can’t watch it?
i can’t install silvershite on linux. I’ll just torrent any shows i didn’t want to miss and connect my laptop to my HDTV PC port sorted!
I watch ITV, iplayer etc etc. from Greece using ADTelly.
http://www.adtelly.tv
The itv player is garbage with many people, inc me, only getting adverts, c4 catch up also rubbish due to player probs, only the bbc iplayer is stable and extremely user friendly, and their HD with a good connection is amazing. Outside the UK you need an IP cloak, tunnel or something that puts your IP address in the UK. But be warned only the bbc will work for sure, but as it is excellent, downloadable and on call it is probably worth the 100 euros or so it ll cost. Shame you can t just pay the beeb the cash and have a unique pin but it seems they haven t worked out just how good the iplayer is and are losing millions in revenue from ex pats, etc.
BTW Kangaroo is dead in the water
itv have the drama compulsion on iplayer to watch why ? all you get is a blank screen. i live in england. if that is the best they can do, may be they should close down
Just another thing, how come the BBC has this very good tech team but they can t set up a pin ID system so I could give them my money and not a cloaking company. They would earn millions. I d happily pay a 100 Euros a year for the BBC, I m sure there are millions of others who would too. Is there any reason they can t do this? There are no copyright issues as all shows in Iplayer are BBC programes so why can t I access them for a fee?
It’s a doddle to watch both outside the UK. I’m in the USA and do it all the time — use a UK proxy server.
BBC ITV etc are stopped from making content available outside the UK by the copyright holders. That means that the copyright holders – Holywood, Documentaries, Premier Leage, etc want to collect money from each country broadcaster seperately to maximise their revenues. Hence we are never likely to see legitimate global broadcasts until the copyright holders have found a way to secure payment from the global audience.