I'm thinking of launching a MythTV distro website

[jarod-ajLrJawYSntWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org (Jarod Wilson)]

On Dec 17, 2009, at 5:08 PM, Rich Braun wrote:

> Jarod Wilson <jarod-ajLrJawYSntWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org> wrote the final nail in the coffin of my idea:
>> Call me dubious, after having worked on MythDora in my spare time
>> ... There are ALWAYS
>> combinations of hardware and/or software where things aren't stable,
>> ALWAYS users asking for support for new hardware/software/features, etc.
> 
> It didn't take y'all very long to talk me out of this idea.

Well, hadn't actually heard exactly what the idea was yet, was still waiting to hear it. :)

> But I do think that "this time is different" thanks to trends in the economy
> and the state of the PC industry.
> 
> First, the economy:  there aren't very many Mega Corp Media companies able to
> raise the capital right now to change fundamentals of the business.  Hence now
> is a time when volunteers and non-profits can make more of a difference than
> in boom times for big companies.
> 
> Second, the PC industry.  There is no more "IBM clone" mentality: every
> company is fending for itself, utterly refusing to share/unable to impose
> standards for basic stuff like graphics adapters, infrared remotes and so
> forth.  And there is enough capacity even in the cheapo PCs (like the Aspire
> R1600 at $199) to run full 1080p.
> 
> I'd compare this stage of the industry to roughly 1995 when MP3 was first
> coming to the desktop PC.  I struggled mightly to get sufficiently-stable
> software to move my library of CDs onto a hard drive:  the hardware had gotten
> cheap enough but the software was all fundamentally unstable.  A few years
> later everything came together and today we all take for granted that a home
> music collection can and should be put onto a shared hard drive.
> 
> By 2015 (probably sooner) it will be an article of faith that a home video
> collection should be housed and accessed from the same user interface as an
> audio collection, a computer game, the Internet, cable, satellite, everything
> else.
> 
> If MythTV doesn't get some help now, it's going to be obsoleted by commercial
> hardware platforms.  And soon.

Not sure about that. I doubt there's going to be a commercial hardware platform that is anywhere near as open as MythTV. And the openness is one of the major things that appeals to a lot of MythTV users. Its never really been a goal to make it pervasive in every home, especially those without any geeks in 'em. So perhaps MythTV would lose out on potential market share that its developers really don't give a damn about, but its never been about getting more people to use it. Developers hack on it because its fun and useful to them. If others find it useful, they're welcome to use it too.

> Will we enjoy the consequences of losing fair use?
> 
> I do have an approach that will solve the problems raised here but not without
> help.  It'll require building a QA lab and coming up with a business model
> that can employee a handful of intern-level QA people in order to compete with
> the onslaught of commerce heading our way.  That's why I posted here, not to
> argue the merits of my technical approach.

But wasn't your core issue that mythtv wasn't stable enough? That sounds like a major technical issue, so your technical approach seems rather key to me...

-- 
Jarod Wilson
jarod-ajLrJawYSntWk0Htik3J/w at public.gmane.org