— 15 comments — Text by Stuart Brown
hose of you fearing that the BBC is out of touch as far as the web is concerned need worry no more - the recently-opened-private-beta of the BBC iPlayer is at the cutting edge of interactive design. I mean, just look at the Beta application page:
There never was a more timely design - it checks all the right Web 2.0 boxes:
Gradients - check. Not as many as there could be, but the grey shadow at the top definitely counts.
Official Web 2.0 colours - check. It's not an exact match, but that pink isn't a million miles away from 'Flickr Pink'.
Beta status - check. Like all good Web 2.0 applications, you can't just go ahead and launch. A good long stint in Beta should put everyone's minds at ease.
Web 2.0 name - check. Not quite as good as 'iPlayr', but at least the lower case 'i' makes it sound trendy and cool.
Screenshots floating in mid-air - check. I would have preferred the wet floor effect, but the floating screen with drop shadow is a nice touch nonetheless.
Oodles of hype - check. I'm reserving judgement on the iPlayer until I've seen it, but it's certainly had it's fair share of hype - and criticism - already.
Result: Full Web 2.0 compliance.
Full Web 2.0 compliance indeed- but an awkward beast to use. Completely illogical sign-up process, quite apart from spending years working on a system that simply isn’t very good.
Better idea would be to just stick the programs on the iTunes network, (already cross platform with DRM built in), plus podcasting power for subscribing to whole series. Still, as an Apple user I am naturally annoyed at having to use Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player to access programs I could record on me Sky+ box anyway.
Nevermind 'iPlayer', they should have named it 'oDear'.
Adam raises an excellent point. Why reinvent the wheel when they could do a sweet tie up with Apple and have the content available via the tried and tested iTunes network?
How could they even develop something that wasn't Vista compatible let alone OSX compatible? Shameful, and there's no reason for it other than bad planning and development. If the codebase was any good it would be easy to port to any platform.
Did we, the license payers, fund this?
Great post, when I first read the headline I thought iPlayer was all XHTML 1.1 and CSS 3 goodness - but "Web 2.0"-compliance is still loosely defined :-)
You forgot "Does not yet run in Safari (but we're working on it!)"
I disagree. All web 2.0 compliant sites work on Firefox, and only half of them work on Opera. This works on neither; stupid activeX controls.
Here's a screenshot of me, being a fool and trying to trick the iPlayer into thinking I was using IE, when I was actually using Opera (then I realised it was using activeX controls and so wouldn't work anyway):
http://img252.imageshack.us/my.php?image=screenshotiplayerwn3.jpg
What a waste of license money under the assumption that everyone is running Microsoft Windows. Whoever thought this should be fired for being an old dinosaur idiot.
It needs Internet Explorer, Active X, Media Player who the hell made this?! Microsoft?
I hope the iPlayer (AKA Idiot Player) burns and the people in charge of this project get kicked out the job.
I'm detecting a negative vibe on the general response to iPlayer, then :-)
Negative yes. But to be honest it's more disheartening to think that something as high profile as this could have been got so wrong.
To create something that relies on proprietary technologies, no matter how far reaching they may be in this day and age is rather sad. Especially when one considers the fantastic alternatives out there.
Whoever developed this really should consider whether they are in the right job.
True, true. Although I can imagine the poor soul in charge was forced to go through a lot of red tape - this degree of mediocrity smacks of design by committee.
Yes, either that or a project manager that used the internet to buy a book from Amazon 5 years ago and is subsequently a web 'expert'. He knows best!
Did anyone else see the logo and think 'Odeo'
I'm not saying it is a rip as they do look different, its just the pink with white punch-out looked a little familiar. Maybe the iPlayer guys got a little inspiration from Odeo?
"Runs best in Internet Explorer!" is so Web 1.0.
Netscape Navigator 3.0 Gold Edition sums up Web 1.0 for me :-)
Blink tags, animated mailboxes, and that godawful yellow "new" badge bring back memories.
Oh, and the mere mention of the word "Geocities".
I'm a mac user and never cease to be amazed at the fact that macs are largely ignored for DRM content, but I heard one problem was Apple not releasing the rights for their DRM, and therefore making it hard for 3rd parties to develop for it. Could someone clarify? I'm not on their side, but think Apple could make it easier for themselves.