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    April 17

    Looking for Attractive Linux Media Player

    I need a good media player for Linux. But there's so many, and so many of them are so poor...

    If I use a media player, it's important that it complies with the following:

    • Last.fm support, at minimum it must be able to scrobble tracks I play so they come up on my profile.
    • Fast, informative library. I really like the library in Windows Media Player, and I want something at least similar to that.
    • No limits to the files it can play - I want a media player that will play music in whatever format (within reason) I've got. So Gstreamer preferably.
    • Decent looking; if it looks like MS Calculator I don't want to use it. So skin support, with good skins available would be good.
    • It should have some sort of minimal version like WMP has when you put it in the taskbar.
    • Must be ok to use maximized. I dunno about you, but I don't like windows when they aren't fullscreen. It just annoys me.
    • Must be quick, I don't like freezes. Nobody does.
    • Plugins! I want to be able to add extra features to it.
    • Album art, preferably IN the library, like in WMP.
    • Visualisations, possibly from libvisual. I just like them.
    • Integrated web browsers are dumb, I'd rather it stuck to its intended task.
    • Searching the library should be instant and effective.
    • Fading between tracks is nice, I want that.
    • Must be GTK2.

    The list goes on but they're the ones I can think of now.

    Contenders are:

    • Songbird; Mozilla based, promising. But, seems to think that I want firefox in my media player. Why would I? Unfortunately, the web browser side is dragging it down. The program feels cluttered, clumsy and slow, like a close relation of Netbeans.
    • Windows Media Player; oh, not available for Linux!
    • Totem/VLC; where's the bloody library?
    • Amarok; GTK version? Please?
    • Rhythmbox; ugly, ugly, ugly. And the interface is confusing. I don't want three panes.
    • Beep Media Player; shiny, I like, BUT. It's unreliable, and comes with support for stuff I don't want. Jamendo and all that should be plugins.

    Suggestions, please.

    7:34:50 PM | Add a comment | Permalink | Blog it | Guides To Computing
    April 15

    EU Makes Me Happy

    The European Parliament has decided that illegal file sharers shouldn't be criminalised, as long as they don't profit from it.
     
    I hope that means profit as in make money. Otherwise it could be interpreted as meaning any kind of profit, as in, getting anything useful out of download stuff... such as free movies. But I think it's money they mean.
     
    Anyway, this all comes as the latest development in the War On Piracy. As you may know, one of America's newest on-going wars is against copyright theft, and right on the front line is the IFPI - the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. That's PHONOgraphic, so stop giggling. The IFPI is totally uncool. Fortunately, their bark is much worse than their might so far they've failed repeatedly to stop piracy and if anything, they've encouraged it further.
     
    The music industry's current objective is to force ISPs (internet service providers, who you pay for internet access, like Tiscali or BT) to monitor people's internet usage, and employ a "Three Strikes" policy, where if someone is caught illegally downloading three times, they are banned from the internet.
     
    That's exactly the kind of nonsense I've come to expect from the music industry. If you stop people downloading from the internet, they'll just go back to buying pirate DVDs on the black market. Apparently that funds terrorism. And every time you buy a pirate DVD, North Korea plants a nuclear missle with your name on it. It's true.
     
    Anyway... needless to say, the IFPI are being arsey about the whole thing. Stupid IFPI.
    12:15:23 AM | Add a comment | Permalink | Blog it | News and politics