Channel TEN’s contractor/outsourcer/… Posts TV Show Online Before It Airs
It seems that channel ten (or at least their contractor/outsourcer/whatever) decided to release episodes of a show its airing (Merlin) on the interent before their have aired on TV. Its not such a big deal because the show has already aired in the UK, but I would still say good on you channel 10 for going that extra mile and supporting the fans who want to watch the show through legal methods.
The links are (its a 13 episode season),
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But they are sure to change, esp the dates (but they were valid when I posted them (wget -S –spider filename, will verify if a file exists for you)), so you may need to change them (the dates) (ps. DownThemAll is great at trying many different file names to see which ones get a hit). On ten’s web site they only list the most recent episode but if you look at your HTTP logs you can see the flv URL. There is no key in the file so you should be able to just change the episode number and then try all dates in the near months.
PS. In the odd chance than someone from TEN reads this you should note that Australia has poor interent (in terms of IP quota) as such we have a greater need to be able to download shows and watch later (so the download can be done off peak, or from a location with more generous IP quota). You should consider promoting friendly file formats straight for download. Perhaps then you will have a larger uptake of online viewers (I would find a short advertisement at the start and/or end of the video acceptable).
PSS. I’m not one of those people who thinks posting links to pirated material should be (or is) illegal or immoral. Among many other reasons, how is the person who posts the link supposed to know if the material they are linking to is infringing?
PSSS. This is not a vunrability and as such I don’t think I am required under my own ethics to let them know. But regardless this is obviously intentional, and dispite all this I cannot report it to TEN anyway as there is no email listed on their contact us page.
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noooo you son of a bitch. nooooo
Was going to do this for australian idol but obviously ten found your post and now has started putting codes in the filenames.
oh well. If you do find a way around it let me know ey? 🙂
Sorry. Won’t do that again then (post direct links, but I may post general stuff), but not sure it was because of this post.
Anyhow as an excuse to practice my shell/perl scripting I’ve worked out how you could write your own interface. (ie. get the flv url when it is made available through their web site.) (Much like get_iplayer (http://linuxcentre.net/iplayer) and the “ABC iView Downloader by sge, converted to OSX by lightguard, updated by vipher” over at http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1212283)
But under your logic you don’t want me to publish that, and despite all the posts I tag as “law”. I can’t definitively know that some annoyed Channel Ten exec won’t hunt me down and send me threatening legal letters (Even though there are no digital locks here to break, so I can’t be breaking the AUS version of the DMCA, and I still don’t know if wordpress.com would give my IP address to the authorities who in turn would get my ISP to release my details allowing them to pursue me instead of the host. I need to do my research.).
So by ‘made available through their website’ do you mean when the flv is uploaded to the server or when they provide the link?
Yeah fair enough about the legality stuff. You’re not exactly anonymous here (lol full name everywhere). Maybe you and some of the guys at whirlpool should make a channel ten downloader. I mean if whirlpool allows an abc iview one then a channel ten one would be fine.
It’s like a maze. You start off at http://www.ten.com.au and following certain rules you can find the FLV url (but they can change the maze at any time so things are prone to breakage easily). So I mean when they link, not when they upload.
I know that GetFlv can help us download channel 10 tv shows. You can get it from http://www.superlogix.net/ten.com.au-downloader/index.htm
May you will like it.