[Fsfe-uk] [(even further) OT] Re: Explanation of Tivosiation and problems - comments sought

[Richard Smedley]

On Mon, 2006-12-18 at 22:22 +0000, Nic James Ferrier wrote:
> Interestingly, television has been an unusual technology so far in
> that it has not had many hackers. Think canal boats, steam trains,
> cars, radio - all have good hacker communities. 

It depends what you mean by hacking television. 25 years ago 
I was involved with the British Amateur Television Club, a
group of people with home office licences to transmit
television pictures to each other.
This wasn't about broadcasting and content, just having fun
with the technology. Most people were doing 405 (or 625) line
PAL, but there were a few people dedicated to 25-line
mechanical TV gear - think of it as akin to ascii-vision ;-)

> But that is changing
> and changing fast. Look at online video. It's massive. The content
> side is driving interest in the hardware/software side because they
> are inextricably linked.

And that's what's different - but there were quite a few of
us (more than 1000 in the UK) back when it was just
hardware hacking.

> Many people won't be
> involved because they're off shooting animals or driving Ford
> cars. But many will because they're interested in it.

 - Richard [off to shoot some Fords whilst driving animals ;]


-- 
Richard Smedley,                                   address@hidden
Sustainable IT Consultant
http://m6-it.org/          ``Software Freedom for the Voluntary Sector''