I've been using Freemake to download hulu videos (so I can download Good Dog! and play it on plex over my roku). It's the first software I've seen that can do this. (I forget where I first saw it.)
I've also noticed that hulu videos are also uploaded to dailymotion. But they don't appear on the dailymotion app on the roku. Must be filtered out.
Now I wonder if I can download the dailymotion videos without using software. Noticed this tip of the week from Retrevo about deturl.com which is supposed to be able download youtube videos easily and also supports dailymotion and vimeo. Let's see.
Look up a Good Dog! video. Say this one (which is episode one).
Copy and paste url into deturl.com.
It takes me to this link.
Putting in the video there gets a message No Preset. This video is not available because. OK I guess it's blocked.
I wonder there are other sites to download dailymotion videos?
Keepvid.com is the first google link to come up.
Doesn't seem to be working in firefox. Let's switch to IE.
Hmm. Doesn't seem to be working.
Try a youtube video. OK that works (the download links came up). I guess dailymotion is doing a good job blocking it. How about a non-hulu dailymotion video. Nope.
OK, it ain't that easy. I wonder if freemake will do it?
Nope, says "failed to obtain video info".
Another one is catchvideo.net.
Dailymotion ain't working. Youtube ain't working either.
Next. How about this free dailymoton downloader from apowersoft?
seemed to hang up in firefox. switch to I.E.
sorry, currently we could not find any download link.
OK, I guess dailymotion ain't that easy.
*** 3/19/14
darn. Freemake not working on hulu now. I guess hulu must have changed their format.
Monday, July 29, 2013
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Chromecast
Google is taking another swing at commanding the television with its
new Chromecast, a low-cost accessory that plugs into a TV and allows
users to stream video, share tabs from the Google Chrome browser, or
play music from their smartphones, tablet or computer on the big screen.
The big selling point? The Chromecast lets users can do that streaming or sharing while also allowing the devices to do other tasks.
With the Chromecast, analysts said, Google appears to have learned a lesson from some of its own missteps and those of its competitors. The small device, which fits into a TV’s HDMI port, eliminates some of the usual frustrations with TV streaming.
For example, while Apple TV and, to a lesser extent, the Xbox allow users to beam some content from their mobile devices to the television, the mobile devices then can’t be used for anything else at the same time. Google says that the Chromecast will enable multitasking on the laptop, tablet or other device without interrupting what’s streaming on the TV.
Chromecast also comes with built-in support not only for Google devices but also for Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Chrome browser on Macs and PCs. That means that nearly every television can now get a Google upgrade — a major shift for the competitive landscape, analysts said.
Now, said James McQuivey, a principal analyst at Forrester, “it’s not a war of smart versus dumb TVs — it’s a war of which smart TV.”
And, finally, there’s the price. Apple TV and Roku are both priced to move with their newest models starting at $99. Chromecast costs $35.
That lower price, McQuivey said, draws a sharp line between Google and competitors such as Apple and Microsoft and shows that the company has a different vision for how to make money off the television. Apple, he explained, aims for profit from the sale of its popular devices and won’t take a run at a new product unless it believes it can make money off the sales of that hardware. Microsoft is splitting the difference by packaging multimedia entertainment in a dedicated device of its own, the Xbox One.
But for Google — which hasn’t made much inroad with its own TV devices — the motivations are now completely different.
“Google doesn’t care about making any money on the device,” McQuivey said. “The future is about software.”
This new strategy doesn’t even focus so much on selling the content, he noted. It’s aimed more at gathering information on consumer habits — data that Google could combine with search and other data from its services to expand its user profiles.
“This is a deep, deep relationship built with you,” he said. “It opens potential for them to do much more for you than they could before.”
The big selling point? The Chromecast lets users can do that streaming or sharing while also allowing the devices to do other tasks.
With the Chromecast, analysts said, Google appears to have learned a lesson from some of its own missteps and those of its competitors. The small device, which fits into a TV’s HDMI port, eliminates some of the usual frustrations with TV streaming.
For example, while Apple TV and, to a lesser extent, the Xbox allow users to beam some content from their mobile devices to the television, the mobile devices then can’t be used for anything else at the same time. Google says that the Chromecast will enable multitasking on the laptop, tablet or other device without interrupting what’s streaming on the TV.
Chromecast also comes with built-in support not only for Google devices but also for Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Chrome browser on Macs and PCs. That means that nearly every television can now get a Google upgrade — a major shift for the competitive landscape, analysts said.
Now, said James McQuivey, a principal analyst at Forrester, “it’s not a war of smart versus dumb TVs — it’s a war of which smart TV.”
And, finally, there’s the price. Apple TV and Roku are both priced to move with their newest models starting at $99. Chromecast costs $35.
That lower price, McQuivey said, draws a sharp line between Google and competitors such as Apple and Microsoft and shows that the company has a different vision for how to make money off the television. Apple, he explained, aims for profit from the sale of its popular devices and won’t take a run at a new product unless it believes it can make money off the sales of that hardware. Microsoft is splitting the difference by packaging multimedia entertainment in a dedicated device of its own, the Xbox One.
But for Google — which hasn’t made much inroad with its own TV devices — the motivations are now completely different.
“Google doesn’t care about making any money on the device,” McQuivey said. “The future is about software.”
This new strategy doesn’t even focus so much on selling the content, he noted. It’s aimed more at gathering information on consumer habits — data that Google could combine with search and other data from its services to expand its user profiles.
“This is a deep, deep relationship built with you,” he said. “It opens potential for them to do much more for you than they could before.”
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Netflix
Well finally decided to pay up the $8 a month and get Netflix. Well, actually I haven't paid anything yet as you get a free 30 day trial. My impetus was selling a portion of my NFLX stock which has increased 5-fold from the low, though still not quite back to the $300 high where it was. So that's in effect paying for the subscription.
So how is it?
First of all, lots (and lots) of content. No more searching through Crackle or Popcorn Flix to find a movie that I might want to watch. And not only movies, lots of TV shows too.
In fact, that's probably what I'm going to use it most for, TV shows.
Right off the bat, there's Everybody Loves Raymond which is not on hulu. I was afraid of whether I would be able to see subtitles, but there's an option where you can turn it on and off and I can't imagine why older models of Roku wouldn't be able to support this.
There's also the Dick Van Dyke Show, Family Ties, Cheers, the Andy Griffith Show, Leave It To Beaver.
But they don't have everything though. No Three Stooges, I Love Lucy, Beverly Hillbillies, Gilligan's Island, Get Smart, Green Acres, Mary Tyler Moore Show, All In The Family, Sanford and Son, Bob Newhart Show, Welcome Back Kotter, Taxi, Seinfeld, King of Queens.
Some of these are on hulu though: I Love Lucy, Green Acres, Mary Tyler Moore Show, Bob Newhart Show. And Three Stooges is on youtube (illegally) with some on crackle.
What else is on? Hercules, Xena, Charmed, Monk, Columbo. So no real need to keep the DVDs I have (well maybe Columbo since Netflix doesn't have all the episodes). One nice thing is that the Hercules and Xena shows have subtitles, which the original Anchor Bay DVD sets didn't have.
Netflix has 13 episodes of Dog Whisperer. There are much more (currently 109) on hulu (but not hulu+). Oddly the subtitles didn't work on the Roku, but did work on my iPad and computer. Maybe that's what they meant by subtitles not working on older version on the roku. And not all the shows have subtitles, though most of them do. Coach was one show that didn't, though the website says it does.
Another one was Ken Burns' Baseball series (which I was suprised to see on there). The old DVD set (which I have) has closed caption for TV, but no DVD subtitles. However I think the newer remastered series does have subtitles. [12/9/13 - Netflix has updated the series with subtitles and the 10th Inning episodes.]
And lots of movies. I was surprised to see The Avengers on there. Also Captain America and Thor. But no Iron Man or Hulk or X-Men.
Using the universal Roku search (for actor names for axample), there's actually a lot more movies not on, then on. But what do you expect for $8?
They do have all the Star Trek TV series (also on hulu+ except for the animated series). But not all of the movies (just Wrath of Khan, Search for Spock, Insurrection, Nemesis).
*** [8/30/13]
Here's one minor gripe about Netflix. Yes, they have subtitles for the majority of the shows, but they don't look very good on my Roku, mainly because they are sometimes hard to read overlaid over the picture. On the other hard, they look fine to me on my iPad, partly because the iPad has a 4:3 screen, so the subtitles are partly display below the picture. And they also look OK on my computer on the 16:9 LCD screen. I wonder if it's because I have a Roku HD instead of a Roku 2 or Roku 3. [I would think unlikely.]
[12/9/13 - The subtitles look different depending on the player. For example, the subtitles are yellow on the Windows 8 app, but white while playing on a browser. They also look bigger on the Roku.]
[1/14/14 - yep Netflix subtitles on Roku appear as pale yellow even on the Roku 3. Evidently the subtitles look better on Apple TV. Reading further, evidently the new Netflix app on the Roku 3 has more readable subtitles. So maybe I should get a Roku 3. Or an Apple TV. Or just wait to see if the new Netflix app will eventually come to my Roku HD. Or just hook up my laptop to the PC.]
*** [4/15/14]
Cool. Netflix is now showing the Roku captions instead of their own on my Roku HD. Don't see that the Roku app was updated, so I'd have to deduce that the Roku firmware was updated. And somehow it connected to the Netflix app. Another clue is that there is an option to set opacity to 50% whereas before it wasn't there (they just went from 25% to 75%). So one less reason to upgrade to a Roku 3. However Hulu Plus still is locking up and using their own caption style. And still no YouTube. VideoBuzz works, but doesn't support captions. I have my doubts that captions would work on Roku YouTube anyway, as it doesn't work on the Apple TV.
Apparently captions have to be in SMPTE Timed Text format and was added in software build 4.9 in December 2012. Looking now, I my Roku is on software version 5.4.
So how is it?
First of all, lots (and lots) of content. No more searching through Crackle or Popcorn Flix to find a movie that I might want to watch. And not only movies, lots of TV shows too.
In fact, that's probably what I'm going to use it most for, TV shows.
Right off the bat, there's Everybody Loves Raymond which is not on hulu. I was afraid of whether I would be able to see subtitles, but there's an option where you can turn it on and off and I can't imagine why older models of Roku wouldn't be able to support this.
There's also the Dick Van Dyke Show, Family Ties, Cheers, the Andy Griffith Show, Leave It To Beaver.
But they don't have everything though. No Three Stooges, I Love Lucy, Beverly Hillbillies, Gilligan's Island, Get Smart, Green Acres, Mary Tyler Moore Show, All In The Family, Sanford and Son, Bob Newhart Show, Welcome Back Kotter, Taxi, Seinfeld, King of Queens.
Some of these are on hulu though: I Love Lucy, Green Acres, Mary Tyler Moore Show, Bob Newhart Show. And Three Stooges is on youtube (illegally) with some on crackle.
What else is on? Hercules, Xena, Charmed, Monk, Columbo. So no real need to keep the DVDs I have (well maybe Columbo since Netflix doesn't have all the episodes). One nice thing is that the Hercules and Xena shows have subtitles, which the original Anchor Bay DVD sets didn't have.
Netflix has 13 episodes of Dog Whisperer. There are much more (currently 109) on hulu (but not hulu+). Oddly the subtitles didn't work on the Roku, but did work on my iPad and computer. Maybe that's what they meant by subtitles not working on older version on the roku. And not all the shows have subtitles, though most of them do. Coach was one show that didn't, though the website says it does.
Another one was Ken Burns' Baseball series (which I was suprised to see on there). The old DVD set (which I have) has closed caption for TV, but no DVD subtitles. However I think the newer remastered series does have subtitles. [12/9/13 - Netflix has updated the series with subtitles and the 10th Inning episodes.]
And lots of movies. I was surprised to see The Avengers on there. Also Captain America and Thor. But no Iron Man or Hulk or X-Men.
Using the universal Roku search (for actor names for axample), there's actually a lot more movies not on, then on. But what do you expect for $8?
They do have all the Star Trek TV series (also on hulu+ except for the animated series). But not all of the movies (just Wrath of Khan, Search for Spock, Insurrection, Nemesis).
*** [8/30/13]
Here's one minor gripe about Netflix. Yes, they have subtitles for the majority of the shows, but they don't look very good on my Roku, mainly because they are sometimes hard to read overlaid over the picture. On the other hard, they look fine to me on my iPad, partly because the iPad has a 4:3 screen, so the subtitles are partly display below the picture. And they also look OK on my computer on the 16:9 LCD screen. I wonder if it's because I have a Roku HD instead of a Roku 2 or Roku 3. [I would think unlikely.]
[12/9/13 - The subtitles look different depending on the player. For example, the subtitles are yellow on the Windows 8 app, but white while playing on a browser. They also look bigger on the Roku.]
[1/14/14 - yep Netflix subtitles on Roku appear as pale yellow even on the Roku 3. Evidently the subtitles look better on Apple TV. Reading further, evidently the new Netflix app on the Roku 3 has more readable subtitles. So maybe I should get a Roku 3. Or an Apple TV. Or just wait to see if the new Netflix app will eventually come to my Roku HD. Or just hook up my laptop to the PC.]
*** [4/15/14]
Cool. Netflix is now showing the Roku captions instead of their own on my Roku HD. Don't see that the Roku app was updated, so I'd have to deduce that the Roku firmware was updated. And somehow it connected to the Netflix app. Another clue is that there is an option to set opacity to 50% whereas before it wasn't there (they just went from 25% to 75%). So one less reason to upgrade to a Roku 3. However Hulu Plus still is locking up and using their own caption style. And still no YouTube. VideoBuzz works, but doesn't support captions. I have my doubts that captions would work on Roku YouTube anyway, as it doesn't work on the Apple TV.
Apparently captions have to be in SMPTE Timed Text format and was added in software build 4.9 in December 2012. Looking now, I my Roku is on software version 5.4.
Sunday, July 07, 2013
video game consoles: the eighth generation
Did you know that we are already in the eighth generation of video game consoles? The eighth generation started with the Wii U and will include the PlayStation 4 and XBox One.
Here are some highlights of each generation.
Generation One: Pong
Generation Two: Atari 2600, Intellivision, Atari 5200, Colecovision
Generation Three: Atari 7800, Sega Master System, Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)
Generation Four: Genesis, TurboGrafx-16, Neo-Geo, Super Nintendo (SNES)
Generation Five: Atari Jaguar, Sony Playstation, Sega Saturn, 3DO, Nintendo 64
Generation Six: Sega Dreamcast, Nintendo Gamecube, Playstation 2, Microsoft XBox
Generation Seven: Playstation 3, Nintendo Wii, XBox 360
Generaton Eight: Wii U, Ouya, Playstation 4, Xbox One
The full list is at wikipedia.
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