let me firstly introduce my self I'm known as GOMA i have several years experience with broadcasting VOD contents online - known also as streaming.

now lets start by asking what VOD really means

" video-on-demand
The ability to deliver a movie, sports event or other video program to a TV set whenever the customer requests it. Video-on-demand (VOD) typically refers to free and paid programs from the cable TV companies or the telephone companies that offer video over DSL lines. Although the Web offers countless video clips and movies in a video-on-demand model, it is generally referred to as "streaming video."

here gets more interesting it stats that VOD - can be also referred to as streaming video via DSL broadband lines. but since 4OD doesn't provide real VOD services, I'm not sure why channel 4 has introduced the term VOD - it might be that they are offering a DOD - download on demand service.


streaming video - is a true VOD service

A one-way video transmission over a data network. It is widely used on the Web as well as private intranets to deliver video-on-demand or a video broadcast. Unlike movie files (MPG, AVI, etc.) that are played after they are downloaded, streaming video is played within a few seconds of requesting it, and the data is not stored permanently in the computer.

If the streaming video is broadcast live, then it may be called "real-time video." However, technically, real-time means no delays, and there is a built-in delay in streaming video

from the above quotes, you could easy disguise the differences between channel 4's 4OD service with the Real VOD services explained.


the problem with 4OD, its not entirely a VOD - video-on-demand service as channel 4 have stated. its completely the opposite what VOD stands for. its a service which offers users - Downloads on demand - if it were a Real VOD service you will be able to stream the VOD contents anytime you requested it.

another interesting problem with 4OD - is the DRM protected files, its well known that DRM can be removed from protected files with ease.

yet more, problems with the Kontiki Grid Delivery Technology - do you even know what a Upload Grid is ? channel 4 is using a peer to peer to delivery its DOD services to users, and thus the user gets the bill when it actives the Kontiki upload Grid, if you are on pay as you go internet - you will be charged every time the Kontiki upload Grid actives. do you see a problem ! another thing i keep on hearing is that after you remove the 4OD application the Kservice stays as a system service which can only be terminated via ( manual - services console )

so what do you really get out of 4OD ?

1. Peer to Peer - your internet speed will be effected - connects your computer into a large grid which might download packets of data then use it to send to others via the grid system.

2. DRM - can not burn to DVD etc

3. few free TV shows which are DOD services not VOD.

4. NO DTO - download to own

in my personal opinion 4OD is just another DOD services. i wouldn't recommend users to install due to the Kontiki Grid Delivery Technology, which is totally using you as a Delivery boy. channel 4 should be stating this in large Red fonts where appropriate.

if you would like to know a real VOD servies PM me or email i know many of them which i will not post here since i read its not allowed lol

laters

If you uninstall 4oD kservice is removed, it does not stay running.

In answer to you other problems
1 - As you probably know but refuse to mention is that kontiki will throttle back, so if you are surfing it will make no noticable difference to your internet speed

2 - and? Point me to a legal service that does not use DRM and has good content.

3 - Araid not, Wikipedia defines it as 'VOD systems either "stream" content, allowing viewing while the video is being downloaded, or "download" it in which the program is brought in its entirety to a set-top box before viewing starts.'

4 - Yes there is

It does say clearly that this is a peer to peer service.

While I (among many others here) realise the service is not perfect, it is a beta service and will only get better.

It is quite obvious that you have decided to try and use this forum to promote your agenda, it is a shame that most of your points leave me with the overall feeling of 'so what'

In reply to your reply RICH197803,
1. you are wrong kservice is not removed when 4OD is unistalled and continues to run I checked on my computer services.
2. It totally affected my internet speed and accessing my intenet explorer even effected IE when I TRIED TO CLOSE IE DOWN.
3. Though I cannot comment about whether 4OD is VOD or DOD i think it's a battle a cannot be bothered to get in to, I checked my internet usage through my ISP and usually my internet browsing takes up my most usage but while I had 4OD installed peer to peer usage far exceeded any other usage.
4. And lastly IT DOES NOT state clearly that it encompasses a peer to peer network with the download or I would definately would NOT of downloaded it

OK for a change of pace I will reply in reverse order.

4 - How clearer does it need to be? Taken from the terms on conditions
"4oD uses peer to peer ("P2P") technology. This allows content to be transferred directly from the computers of users of the Service (rather than through a website or directory). If you download Content to your computer, during the Licence Period, we may upload this from your computer (using part of your upstream bandwidth) for the purpose of transferring Content to other users of the Service. Please contact your Internet Service Provider if you have any queries on this.
"
What you are probably saying is that you did not read the terms and conditions prior to downloading, that is kind of your fault, no?

3 - I agree, pointless argument not really sure why I got involved. You should not be surprised that downloading videos will make 4oD your largest usage

2 - Not sure why you are shouting but kontiki should (and does for me) throttle, it might take a second or two for it to happen. Get in contact with support, they might be able to help?

1 - All I can say it did when I removed it, have you other programmes that use it? Other posts on this forum confirm that it does remove completely, although obviously not in every case.

Sounds like you have a problem with kontiki so I would manually remove it and start again and see if that is any better.

Again I can not really understand the hostility against the service, if you don't like, don't use it.

I just want wanted people to know how disappointed with the 4OD service after I downloaded it with much anticipation I might add. I had nothing but bugs in my system which got worse as time went by. I only downloaded a couple of episodes which wouldn't warranty such big usage I'm sure, but after that 4OD crashed every time I tried to access it also making my computer crash. So I did try to uninstall it and it crashed even when I tried to uninstall it, it took many man hours to get rid of it completely. I understand that a new service like this has some bugs but My God not that many. I'm so sad because it is such a good idea maybe I'll just get sky plus instead

" 1 - As you probably know but refuse to mention is that kontiki will throttle back, so if you are surfing it will make no noticable difference to your internet speed "

you answered your self, so you know what the effects are its pointles to tell you more

" You should not be surprised that downloading videos will make 4oD your largest usage "

" 2 - and? Point me to a legal service that does not use DRM and has good content. "


http://aznv.tv just a true VOD example 4OD doesnt Match aznv anytime soon i might say.

promote my agenda, its simply misleading info given by 40D its not a VOD service but a DOD. i know pedia mentions it as being also a VOD but, would you wait few hours or stream it on demand ! thats the whole point of even using the term vod, video on demand for i to be able to stream the video clip in real time.

who reads terms n co ?? nobody reads it

rich197803, signup with aznv its free, install winamp, im sure you will love it and forget about 4OD

"who reads terms n co ?? nobody reads it"
That may be true but you can't use it as an excuse for C4 not telling you something. If you do read them it's clear that P2P is used.

Video on Demand is used to distinguish this type of system fom the traditional broadcast model such as that used for TV. You ask for a video and they give you it, how they do this is irrelevant. DoD and SoD are subsets of VoD.

but its extremely poor if the ONLY place you can find the peer to peer facts are on the terms and conditions page, or in any small web print. one of the obvious reasons why this is? well, if its stated clearly and people realise this could slow down their internet and hurt their overall usage per month, they may think again about using the 4oD service, and thats certainly what channel 4 do not want! but people need to know, or some may even start court cases if any providers tried to overcharge their users for "unfair usage" even on an "unlimited" internet package!

vodasia- "Point me to a legal service that does not use DRM and has good content"...
well, you see, that could be a problem in itself. not for the user, but for the company (ch4) wanting to make their service (4oD) a huge success. DRM is one of the main reasons as to why so many WONT use legal services for tv programmes, even if they do have good content. they will either use other websites, wait to buy the dvds, or (easiest of all if youre in the uk) buy a dvd recorder and record the shows straight off their television! maybe even onto a blank disc they could even KEEP for long periods of time. SHOCK! lol.
again, its the 'we can make more money this way' factor, and the removal of DRM could even make a small number of people (that may have initially considered a dvd purchase) keep what theyd downloaded and not ever consider buying the disc release when it appeared on a certain local virgin megashelf. it does seem that legal services are in a no win situation unfortunately when competing with other not so legal methods, recording from tv or buying the dvds, and its hard to see where legal services of such a kind will be in the next 10 years with the average net connection getting faster and faster.

unfortunately it may not be easy for ch4 to remove the DRM even if they wanted to, with the companies involved in the creation of many of their programmes and series varying in acceptance of what material of theirs theyd like distributed, in what manner, and with what restrictions. i think because the internet is linked so much with illegal downloading of movies and music, and since its so easy for tv creators and companies to kick up a fuss (and a court case!) that everything would just turn out a complete mess when trying out a service such as 4oD with no restrictions in how long you can watch or keep video files.

ps- the kservice didnt disappear for me either when i uninstalled 4oD

4oD could add a real VOD video streaming solution at some point direct from the website to all their programmes available- with the option of a drm download right beside the related streaming video you are currently watching. if the demand was there and they were willing to spend more money on the service. its unlikely though since most people that would stream and watch would not need the additional download, so yes, it should probably have been a streaming service all along, but then i would imagine that would have been far more expensive than a kservice peer to peer

bottom line to have happy users:

(1).get rid of the nasty peer to peer software,
losing the 'required' 4oD player and letting all videos play in any standard pc or mac player!

(2).keep the price very low, especially if
limiting videos with DRM, remember you're competing with normal store rentals which offer better quality and no downloading!

(3).include a proper VOD service one day if you can- many other websites do it!

that is all..

The only problem I have with the 4OD software in principle, is that when I decide I want to temporarily close 4OD and use my bandwidth for something else, it doesn't properly close.

If you right click on the icon in your system tray and say "exit", it appears to exit the programme. However, when you look in your process list in the task manager, kservice is still there happily using your computer to share files you have downloaded.

I think it would be fairer to the normal user (who doesn't really know about processes in task manager) to allow people to actually terminate the programme when they don't want it running temporarily. I am prepared to believe that it removes the service after properly uninstalling the software, but I think it should at least give you the option to say "not now thank you very much...maybe later" when you do have it installed.

I agree that the software does not clearly indicate that it uses a peer to peer (P2P) client that will constantly run on your machine. I think they should be far clearer about this point rather than simply burying the fact in the terms and conditions. I don't know anyone that reads all the terms and conditions, license agreements etc for every piece of software. There simply isn't time to do so, so I expect supposedly ethical companies like channel 4 to show some transparency about this.

The Ch4 P2P software comes with the following risks;
1. It will use all available bandwidth of your internet connection. Ch4 say that it will throttle itself, however there is always a delay before it does so meaning it is annoying to constantly wait every time you go to a web page etc. Many people are also in a capped or pay as you go internet service and this software could end up using all their allowance unless it is stopped from sharing. This costs users money in the form of extra charges from their internet service providers.
2. If your machine is on a network the throttling feature is not so sensitive of other users on the network and may hog their bandwidth as well.
3. P2P software advertises itself on the internet so that other clients can connect to it. Any active service like that can be a security threat. There may not be any know exploits (bugs in the software that can allow an attacker access to your machine in some way) yet, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be some found in the future. Unlike Microsoft Ch4 don’t release auto updating patches to the software that I know of, therefore it is another way in which to open yourself up to attack.
4. The P2P application is set to run while the machine is turned on. One of the main causes of computer crashes is third party software or drivers running on the machine. The P2P software provided has an unproven track record for stability and should therefore be treated with caution.

Now my rant is over I have found the 4oD software ok to use, however I have had to restrict what it can do on my machine to limit the risks listed above. I only use it to download the free content I would like to see and then I disable the P2P client so it doesn't interfere with my bandwidth or pose a security risk. Also when viewing content downloaded I use Windows Media Player instead so I don’t have to have the P2P client running.

Here’s how to achieve this in Windows XP/2000;
1. Go Start menu -> Run and type in “regedit”.
2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and delete an entry on the right called “4OD”. Be very careful what you delete here and always make backups before deleting.
3. Go Start menu -> Run and type in “services.msc”
4. Scroll to the service called “KService” and double click it.
5. Change the Startup Type to “Manual” and click ok.
6. When you installed the 4oD application it will have created a shortcut on your desktop called “4oD”. Next to this create a new text document called “Stop 4oD.bat”. Inside this document type in the following (not including the inverted commas) “net stop kservice”.

Now when you want to run 4oD and browse titles, download films etc you can do so by using the 4oD shortcut. One you have finished browsing and downloading double click on the Stop 4oD.bat and it will close the P2P download client. If you have active downloads these will not download once the 4oD P2P program is stopped.

If you would like to view downloads through Windows Media Player rather than through the 4oD interface browse to the Shared documents folder (by default “C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents”) an in there is a folder called “My Deliveries” where your downloaded files will be in another folder called “4oD”

Hope this helps.

quote:

Originally posted by Wavey1001:
I only use it to download the free content I would like to see

When you say this, do you mean you have a firewall configured to only allow download of content via 4od and not upload? Just curious what restrictions you put in effect to do this if this is the case.

I was planning on doing the same, although when I went to analyze the traffic that 4od sends so I could set up some firewall rules to only download, I couldn't even get 4od to start due to high traffic and a message along the lines of 'everyone wants us! please call back later'. Suppose this is slightly better than the browser window just timing out as was the case before, but still...

In defence of considering allowing only download of content and not upload - I wouldn't feel the need to block uploading of content if only channel4 would consider ALLOWING USERS TO CONFIGURE HOW MUCH BANDWIDTH THE 4OD APPLICATION USES!!! Just a simple slide rule to allow you to configure how much bandwidth it uses - by all means set the default upload rate to something sensible like 15kBps and even have a minimum rate that you have to allow, but just expecting users to put up with an application that uses as much bandwidth as it sees fit is tantamount to malware author's way of thinking.

@channel4: If you expect users to pay twice - once for the (non-free) content and then again for the bandwidth - at least give them the option to decide how much of their bandwidth to use up. The argument about how kontiki throttles bandwidth only applies to single PC home networks - for people who have more than one PC on a home network, kontiki/4od causes a denial of service for the other users on the network - again another 'malware-like' approach which just isn't nice.

According to the Kontiki site, the functionality does exist in the delivery manager to allow users to throttle bandwidth to suit. In my opinion it would be a good PR move to enable this feature in 4od. Having your best efforts to provide a clean and easy to use content delivery system being labelled as 'malware' surely isn't what you want.

quote:

Originally posted by Wavey1001:

Here’s how to achieve this in Windows XP/2000;
1. Go Start menu -> Run and type in “regedit”.
2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and delete an entry on the right called “4OD”. Be very careful what you delete here and always make backups before deleting.
3. Go Start menu -> Run and type in “services.msc”
4. Scroll to the service called “KService” and double click it.
5. Change the Startup Type to “Manual” and click ok.
6. When you installed the 4oD application it will have created a shortcut on your desktop called “4oD”. Next to this create a new text document called “Stop 4oD.bat”. Inside this document type in the following (not including the inverted commas) “net stop kservice”.

Much appreciated! One problem I find here though is that whenever the 4od (frontend) application is started, the 'autorun' Run registry key is updated to include a 4od value so 4od starts again at next boot. Very frustrating.

To get around this issue I added a couple of lines to my batch script to remove the 4od autostart registry entries, so my '4odstop.bat' file looks like:

net stop kservice
reg delete HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v 4oD /f
reg delete HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v kdx /f

I would advise anyone who wants to do this to backup and check their own registry first though and confirm that the two key items really exist, otherwise modify the code above to suit.

Cheers!

Well it doesn't even work for me... This basically means I've downloaded this, got nothing out of it and filled my computer full with rubbish... 4oD is misleading, it's obvious these things have been left out of the "large print" for a reason. People only use small print for one thing and that's to abuse it. Another unhappy Channel 4 viewer...

Also to add, you can't end the Kservice task in task manager either, I can't anyway...

quote:

quote:
Originally posted by Wavey1001:
I only use it to download the free content I would like to see

I originally meant I just turn off the service after I have downloaded. However I did have a look at the connections while it runs and it looks to me that other people download from you on port 1947, so if you set a firewall rule to block this port inbound only it should stop others from being able to download from you (it seems to work for me). This is especially usefull if you share an internet connection with a few people.

quote:

net stop kservice
reg delete HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v 4oD /f
reg delete HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v kdx /f

Nice! I missed the HKEY CURRENT USER bit. It looks to me like the only key that is reinserted is this one. The HKEY LOCAL MACHINE one doesn't so the batch file that works for me is;
net stop kservice
reg delete HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v kdx /f

quote:

Originally posted by Wavey1001:
Nice! I missed the HKEY CURRENT USER bit. It looks to me like the only key that is reinserted is this one. The HKEY LOCAL MACHINE one doesn't so the batch file that works for me is;
net stop kservice
reg delete HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v kdx /f

Yeah you're right I think, the other key only seems to get inserted the first time it's installed(?) or something. Great stuff

Just my two pence. Sky OD used the same thing, and at first I thought it was brilliant, but then I found that my laptop was taking an age to start up, and things were running really slow - the one thing I found that was causing this was the "K Service", whilst the abilty to download and watch some great films was awesome, the complete bodge of my laptop it made wasn't - first and foremost I needed to be able to work with it. After I uninstalled it and removed it from startup, it actually reappeared which I was shocked at, again and again - despite having uninstalled it... I emailed the developers who sent me a different uninstaller and that worked - however my reply to them was more along the lines of why this peice 1. screwed up my laptop so badly I couldn't use it effectively and 2. why the standard uninstall didn't work ...

I would of course like to use a legal download type service, especially to catchup with Peep show which I unfortunately missed - but I need my computer to work properly too!!!

How do you play your files on Window Media? It says I need to get a license. and then says i must watch them on 4oD

Just thought I would through my hat in, I do think the Kservices is a real pain and needs raining in. I choose to do this in two ways
1 Stop the Khost service in the Startup tab of msconfig (Start -> Run -> msconfig) This is XP only but msconfig can be downloaded and used on most MS platforms
2 Stop the Kservice and Khost processes after viewing any content in task manager
This is a bit of a pain but having said this I think this is a great service but would think twice about paying for any content with ads in. When the BBC going to do this or are they sticking to YouTube...?

quote:

Originally posted by rich197803:

What you are probably saying is that you did not read the terms and conditions prior to downloading, that is kind of your fault, no?


Again I can not really understand the hostility against the service, if you don't like, don't use it.

In this cas i would say that the wording is extremely unclear. Many peope do not even know what peer to peer is yet. The use of "may upload" information is rediculous. Also the fact that the service is invisible to most people and cant be easily turned up so it stops using local resources let alone the internet ones. It may "throttle back" but it doesnt stop using local RAM. It is also right in the middle of about 4 pages and it isnt even mentioned in the actual software terms and conditions. These things get longer and longer every year.

What i find is that people end up collecting 10 or so of these blooming things that start every time invisibly and then they start complaining that everything has slowed down and that games no longer work because these things are unecessarily leeching off the CPU and memory.

I cant understand why channel4 doesnt want to act responsibly in this. Be upfront about it, use a peer to peer that is visible and you can shut down (there are plenty out there). It screams malware to me and I can see it coming back to bite them when the word is spread around.