IT Secretary / SOMA FM / DRM / Win 8

[woodsmoke]

I won't go into details but today a secreatary with whom I visit daily and I were visiting about music and she asked what I played in class before class.

i indicated how I used to play SOMA FM but that Win 8 won't recognize a WMA file or an MP3 file ...of course it doesn't recognize AAC etc. either.

And that I used to be able to use QuickPlayer but it won't play it either.

And that I had to go to Shoutcast........which plays exactly the same stream.....only with Advertisings........and all under ..........which political adminstration.......when QuickTime would play it under the previous windows. and that the windows before that would at least use the popup player.

She came back with.....well VLC should play it........I indicated.....um no.....try it..........and VLC popped a notice that it could play not play the file.........

She came back with that Windows offered to solve the problem......I said, go ahead........and she then was sent to "fix the problem hell" at Windows... lol

Why.......she asked........which I have explained several times but typical academic.........nothing stays on the radar for very long except academic "stuff"....

DRM.......predatory practices........now also occuring in Quicktime and also previously in Apple......

She tried REALLY HARD to get the stream to play.......... and also tracked down the url.......for SOMA FM THROUGH.......... Shoutcast.....which would play...........

Smoke started coming out of her ears......

What is very encouraging though......is.......yet again.........I have a student that is running Ubuntu as a dual boot with Win XP on a lappy and........very nicely showed the rest of the class how she could stream Soma Fm...

but............too little.........too late.........for the U.S..........we truely are being walled into a digital garden........

woodsmoke

[NickStone]

And that I had to go to Shoutcast........which plays exactly the same stream.....only with Advertisings........and all under ..........which political adminstration.......when QuickTime would play it under the previous windows. and that the windows before that would at least use the popup player.

What has the current political administration got to do with your not being able to stream music on Windows 8 machine? Surely this is an issue with Microsoft.

Also, if you really want to stream music online why not bring in a laptop with a Linux distribution on it and use that?

[woodsmoke]

Hi Nick

A valid and cogent question!

I am not "against" Obama or any other president or whatever, what I am against is "predatory practices" and being "two faced".

Obama extended and expanded the definition of "possible threat" to a "company". Even a lot of Dems howled about it, look it up for yourself... after all what is "the definition" of "possible"?

Since I deal with a closed windblows system that uses scheduled and frequent "updates" from Microsith I've seen the gradual degradation of being able to " play" music and such over the last decade.

The most ludicrous situation was the very first semester that I was at the college AND THIS OCCURRED under GW Bush...

I took in some tracks from a couple of my obscure lp records, "African tribal music" and could not even get them to PLAY from a usb stick.

However, next day, I took in a cd.....and the music played just fine, from the cd.

I tried transferring the music from the usb stick to the college hard drive and..........could transfer the music, and it would then play!

BUT, I could not transfer the very same track from the cd.

The academics are all paranoid about DRM, RIAA, SPCA, and any other kind of spaghetti names. The IT people just go along with whatever Microsith tells them to do because MS then gives the college a "discount".

It is all a big game that has intensified over the last few years especially.

AT THE COLLEGE....Shoutcast itself has almost "all" ( I have not checked how many of the stations) , stations BLOCKED on the college's computers... that are "offshore" from the U.S.

The interface/menu for Shoutcast loads really slow, I assume because of that, but then the "allowed" streams play just fine.

This all "started" under the GWB administration "a little", kind of went into a "lull" and then has really intensified the last few years.

BUT GUESS WHAT!!!!!!! A fulltime faculty computer in an office of the person is just like any other widblows machine..at home.......

BUT... they have a "snooping" program that actually checks each and every image on your hard drive.........

One full time faculty had a pic sent as an attachment by his brother of the guy's daughter who was on the "top" of a "cheerleading pyramid" at her college and they had won some kind of competition........the gnome that actually does the snooping of EVERYBODY's pics......called him into "the office" and told him that he was being warned about having "questionable pics" on his hard drive/e-mail and that it was to be deleted forthwith and this time there would only "be a letter".........

I mean a CHEERLEADING PIC sent as an e-mai attachment! :0

THE BIG POINT.........is that Clinton actually tried to "help the folks" (The DOJ antitrust lawsuit against MS) ....yes one can argue about it, but he at least SEEMED to be trying to do something "for the folks"...... DOJ does not do anything without at least the tacit approvial of the Prez...

Ok, GWB "tried to do something" for the folks by expanding the number of low power radio station liscences, but then started on this kind of DRM stuff after 9-11..... "harm to a company"...well we tend to think of say.......Ford being "hacked" but it got shaded into the whole DRM thing and has accelerated under Bush and Obama..

I can SEE the point of the DRM thing in terms of "copying cds/dvds//yada yada"......musicians should be paid......but.......

what possible HARM can be caused to "a computer" or a "college" or the finances of say........SONY..... by listening to a STREAM?

Now......yes..........we all know that a hacker can hack seemingly anything......but......... really! a stream?

Bush and Obama "could" have gone to MS and "whoever" through the DOJ and said......hey.......lets give this one to the folks........

but no.........

+++++++++++++++

changing gears.....

+++++++++++++++

If one remembers....the DOJ antitrust suit against MS was initiated under............CLINTON.......... for all of Clinton's "problems" with the opposite sex, Clinton actually did try to do somthing about Microsoft.

But anyway, no way to PROVE what I am typing here except in that people who know my history know that I rail agains the conservatives and liberals the Repubs and the Dems equally.

Thanks for the question though.

################

Sooo I had come back to post a followup to what had occurred.

Back to the OP, I tried, yet again, to get a stream to play today and WOAH.............. VLC popped it and it played!

WOAH!!!

OK some history, The college originally allowed ONLY Windblow media player to be on the desktop, but a few years ago, QuickTime player appeared and I could play a stream under that.

I could also, sometimes, get the popup from SomaFm to play a stream but not regularly.

FOR THE FIRST TIME........under Win 8.1 Metro.......

.VLC is on the computer ...........it has never, I REPEAT, never been on the computers before. :0

So.......again, today, SOMA fm, clicked from the downloaded link/file played in VLC.

I was kinda blown away.......... :0

Later ...I mentioned it to the secretary and.......... lol.......... she rather cryptically said.........."only for you Mr. Woodsmoke, and only on the computers in your classrooms and in your lab."....and just smiled and went to get some coffee.

So........since I have a master key to all of the labs I tried another computer and.............. no go........no va......oops, that is the name of a Chevy! lol

The important takeaway here is that there are a lot of "forces" swirling around concerning "media" and "the evil hacker that might steal a song"... but..still an "entity" can do what they da$# well please if they want to. :0

WHY NOT BRING IN A LINUX LAPTOP?

Any such device has to be "certified" as safe and that can take..........MONTHS...................I mean MONTHS...........

I took in a built from junqe tower that had a "biotechnology" Linux on it and it took almost a semester to get it certified.

This last few weeks I purchased, for the department, with department funds, a "motion detector" that has proprietary software. Since I knew we were going to Win8.1, I had the company verify themselves that it would run under Win8.1, and they did so verify.

The IT department is in the process of "checking" the software prior to "pushing" it to my classroms and labs...I mentioned it to the head of the department, and was told to not to expect to be able to use the several hundred dollar peice of equipment for at least half of the semester.......

The paranoia is just stifling.....everybody is "afraid".......if "everything"........

woodsmoke