WinPhone iView app flap: Microsoft to pull 'unauthorised' app... coded by STAFFER A Microsoft employee has created an "unauthorised" Windows Mobile app to access a catch-up TV service in Australia. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is the country's largest public broadcaster and its official iview player app is only available on iOS and Android. The Windows Phone app, iview FTW!, is the …
This is similar to the you tube app debacle... MS can't get support for their crap phone platform that no one is buying, so they go ahead and make "unofficial" versions without permission. Which would be OK if they were making a calculator app or, say a flappy bird clone... But when you tap into someone else's content? That crosses a huge red line... How would MS themselves react if an unauthorized app tapped into bing or azure without permission? MS should know better, and I hope they get sued over this... Hiding behind the employee is pretty shady too! What is with MS these days???
Seriously?
I paid through my taxes for this content already, and it'd be great to be able to watch it on a device of my choosing - iPad, Android tablet, WinPhone8.
I can't watch iView from overseas without VPN jigggerypokery - this looks to be the same.
"But when you tap into someone else's content? That crosses a huge red line"
The content is already available to view if you simply navigate to the website using the phones browser. All the You Tube and iVew app do is provide a native app to allow access like all other devices. Broadcasting rights are not device dependent, ABC do not purchase the rights to show Prisoner Cell Block H only on TV, Android and iPhone they purchase the right to air that show on TV and to stream the content within Australia, so there is no reason why a vodafone user with an iPhone should be able to view the content where as a winphone user on the same network can't.
"so there is no reason why a vodafone user with an iPhone should be able to view the content where as a winphone user on the same network can't."
Except the value in spending money to test on that platform to ensure comaptibility...
Couple of comments after using the phone version:
- have to be on an Australian IP address (just like the other OS versions, with all the downsides that that technique has)
- doesn't directly support saving the content (just like the other OS versions, with the same potential for mischief for those so inclined)
- looks like it is a universal app - or at least the same layout as the Win8.1 version.
If you're on all you can eat data, there's a free TV app in win store that lets you watch live TV from umpteen countries (well there's about a 90 sec delay), so no need for any catch up malarkey. There's an android version of this too. No names but it's a belter esp. for viewing F1 without becoming a Murdochian or like I'm doing, watching Spanish TV in order to help me learn Spanish.
Les fanbois of the Jade(d) Garden are certainly missing out these days being stuck in 2007 and all.
From the windows phone store page, it seems that now it's been withdrawn, Aussie WinPhone users will no longer be able to catch up with Peppa Pig.
Oh the humanity!
"MS can't get support for their crap phone platform that no one is buying...."
Serious question.... does everybody really find Windows Phone that bad? As a long time daily Linux user I went straight for an Android phone (Moto G) when I returned from expatriotism and a land of feature phones. I found Android a frustrating experience, especially as it seemed like my phone had an identity crisis and clearly forgotten it was a phone.
Anyway, a briefcase theft later and I bought a Lumia 630 as a replacement. Okay, so trying to get it to sync with Linux is not great but Windows Phone feels far more intuitive than Android, it's fast, I haven't found any preinstalled crapware yet and the applications fit a phones purpose well.
Doesn't really matter, as it says in the article only 5% use it in Australia so the description of 'their crap phone platform that no one is buying' is correct
Does depend on your definition of crap, worse than that version x of Android or IOS7 or just not fit for purpose. Might totally depend on the phone, not just the OS of course. Maybe the Lumia630 is wonderful in terms of how it utilises Windows OS but others are awful?
By the same token of percentages that you mistakenly use it makes macBooks and Linux machines crap too.
Since both Linux and OS X seem to be perfectly adequate systems it suggests that percentage penetration is not an indicator of fitness-for-purpose or even superiority (according the Linux fans here at least).
For instance, if your need is that maps are on the phone, free and available in almost every country on earth, then WP might well be at the top of your list. if you wish it tied to voice-driven navigation, traffic and the rest of the OS/Apps then even more so.
If you want nice designs or a very good camera, or both, then a Lumia WP phone may well be at the top of your list.
I appreciate that other phones have useful features too, Waterproof(ish) phones are not a bad idea at all.
In fact, WP has several apps that are not available on all other platforms, Photosynth is very cool for instance (iOS, not Android).
The Nokia camera app is a very good app indeed.
The signature people app is far, far better at integrating and coalescing all of the different mechanisms of communication that other OSs are rubbish at. The messaging app also does this, albeit less well (and I hear it is being discarded with 8.1).
The live tiles work very well on a phone and are more sensible that widgets that may or may not be used on a given Android phone while iOS has nothing but passive icons requiring button presses for the simplest task.
And, not to mention that the Office apps are real and free, along with cloud integration etc.
Good design means better battery life than Android for sure and a slicker, nicer interface all around.
Just because most people are sold by marketing and peer pressure doesn't mean that product that doesn't sell is not a good product - I have read good things about BB's later efforts for instance.
And, for the record, there are few or zero apps that I want and don't have - always accepting that I may be missing out on the most wonderful things others are used to. Mostly it is specific apps (like the BST Hyde Park App for that specific festival - I managed to survive).
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