PS3 iPlayer DLNA Prototype

Unfortunately, I’m not going to make it to Mashed (Hackday 2008) – so instead, here’s a video of a fun iPlayer-related project I’ve been working on. Excuse the stuttering at the start of the videos, it’s due to me turning down the amount of pre-buffering so I could cut down the time for the streams to begin playing for the purpose of this video.

This is a UPnP/AV 1.0 Compliant Media Server which lets you browse current iPlayer programmes on any DLNA 1.5 compliant Media Controller. If the Beeb wouldn’t keep fiddling with the Quicktime streams, it would also let you play them on any media controller that supports H.264/MPEG4-AVC in an ISO MPEG4 container (the server remuxes the data from the Quicktime container to MPEG4 on the fly).

This can’t really be released into the world as keeping up with the BBC’s protection of the Quicktime streams is a maintainence nightmare. Also, collection of the iPlayer data is done by screen-scraping the iPlayer site, as the very promising bbc.co.uk/programmes can’t yet provide the required data.

I wonder if the BBC could at some point open up an iPlayer Developers Program, with SDK. It could formalise the relationship between all of us out here that are keen on developing ways to get the iPlayer onto different devices and platforms, whilst helping the BBC to ensure that their data is not misused and hopefully keeping the rights-owners and the BBC Trust happy.

Each application that a developer registers could be given an unique key that is required to download a standard MPEG4 stream, which could be encrypted using public-key encryption and an open MPEG4 DRM system (e.g. OpenIPMP). If an application is hacked and its private key is obtained, the BBC or application developer could revoke that key, fix their application, request a new key and release an update. If a developer is found to be abusing the system (e.g. not adhering to copy-restrictions, storage time limits, etc), their account could be blocked and all their application keys revoked.

The idea of key revocation is well accepted within the media industry, e.g. it’s a major feature of the AACS system used to protect HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs, and the idea of developer and application keys is well established with large sites that provide an API for developers (e.g. Facebook, youtube, amazon, etc.) If combined, these ideas could provide far more security than the BBC’s current method of protecting the streams.

It would also be nice if such a program could provide XML representations of the iPlayer data to save developers having to screen-scrape. DIDL-Lite, as used by UPnP/AV appears suitable. It lets you express a tree-structure of media items, each with a varying number of alternative streams (e.g. original version, signed version, etc.) along with associated meta-data e.g. episode and series name and number, validity period and allowed uses (times playable, are copies allowed, etc). But any such representation of the iPlayer categorisation and programme lists would be nice.