Radio Canada doesn’t like us…
Ok well not really but they’re trying really hard NOT to make their site compatible with the world.
It’s really nice that Radio Canada shares their videos online. I really appreciate that aspect considering that many broadcasting stations are still in the dinosaur era.
But then I saw this:
The questions is: why bother reinventing the wheel? Flash video is pretty much THE standard. Youtube recently introduced HD broadcasting and it works perfectly! If THAT is not good enough then what is good enough for Radio Canada? I don’t know… Why doesn’t Radio Canada inks a deal with Youtube to share revenues or something? Let the pros do their job and let Radio Canada do its own. Radio Canada is not and should not be a technological company. It is BTW a tax funded corporation and its mandate should be to investigate free or limited cost solutions in order to save taxpayers’ money.
Not only that but they are using SilverLight. ANOTHER technology… Why…? We’re already struggling to make Flash work on all browsers and platforms (including mobile devices & cellphones) so why cut yourself from the rest of the world?
Why be different? I’m not a Youtube fanboy but when there’s something out there that WORKS for millions of people, why make something different? And best of all, (listen Radio Canada) it’s free!
I hear ya. CBC Radio Montreal still uses RealAudio for putting some of its segments online.
RealAudio!
RadCan has been using Windows Media for a while, and I guess this was seen as a logical extension.
Wow, RealAudio..? Does the company still exist? That’s a nice way to ensure that no one listens to your audio.
Radio-Canada has always made awkward decisions concerning it’s media platforms and I’m still trying to guess why. Yes, they’re probably stucked with decisions they’ve made long ago but why can’t they support the old stuff AND offer the new stuff on the new standards?
Of course they should make it work in Flash video and should also make all the stuff they produce downloadable as podcasts. In this case there is no stolen-content issue: we’ve already collectively paid for it so we should be allowed to download it and watch it when and where we want. The standards are there, the platforms are widely used and simple to operate, let’s move forward?!
It’s just my 2 cents.
The real answer?
Internal IT is driving technology choices and not the internet department.
Radio-Canada must be the (public) company with the lowest (or highest, not sure, ie. what I mean is that it’s bad!) ratio of “internet cultured” employes vs. the actual digital media accomplishments… having just been recently passed by the NFB that finally got a part of it’s act together (after many, many years of incubating really innovative people but very few public results to show for it until the nfbtube launch).
What’s needed to kick them in the right direction? Time. The empire can’t resist that much longer… recession will help to accelerate change, too!
@Sylvain1: Interesting point. Should collective (i.e. we paid for it) content be available to all who paid for it? That would make a great post. Also, R-C is broadcasting it’s stuff for free. There is obviously a “license” attached to it but that’s another story…
@Sylvain2: Internet department? Most companies (unfortunately) don’t have such a thing :) That’d be a cool job though!
Marketing is probably the closest thing they have…
I recently read about “innovation by destruction” and I kinda like that way of thinking. Like you said, old dinosaurs will eventually die.