Vancouver City Streaming video format

[Pedro I. Sanchez]

I would recommend Theora/Vorbis videos in Ogg packaging. If the web
server in the city of Vancouver supports PHP then they can use the
itheora project to get the videos into any web browser without having to
install any client software. It supports MS Windows, Linux, and any
client machine loaded with the Java run time.

I wrote a little note about how to set up itheora which you can read here:

http://pedroivan.com/wsc/streaming_ogg_multimedia_content

Hope it helps,

-- 
Pedro



Alan Pater wrote:
> A while ago I found that the City of Vancouver streams our council
> videos in a closed, proprietary format and wrote to them about it. I
> received a response from a manager involved in these decisions. They
> are willing to look into moving to an open format, but are unsure of
> what that should be, as well as the costs involved.
> 
> The obvious format would be ogg, no? Does anyone have any examples of
> sites which use that, or another format that just works on a typical
> unmodified Linux install?
> 
> The current videos are available at:
> http://www.city.vancouver.bc.ca/ctyclerk/councilmeetings/video.cfm
> 
> Alan
> 
>> Dear Sir,
> 
> I understand the issue you have raised.  I have brought this to the
> attention of staff who are developing and implementing standards for
> our website.  Unfortunately, it will take some time to resolve the
> issue.  As there are costs associated with any open source solution, I
> cannot say when, or even if, the City will choose to implement an open
> standards solution to Council videos.
> 
> To support the decision-making process, we are prepared to investigate
> the cost of moving towards an open source format to post the Council
> videos.  It is not clear to us what the best open source format would
> be.  If you have any suggestions, they would be appreciated.
> 
> ...
> 
> Manager, Corporate Information & Privacy
> City of Vancouver, City Clerk's Department
> Vancouver BC   V5Y 1V4
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> 
> Hello
> 
> I am unable to view the Council Videos, as they are distributed in a
> proprietary closed format. Please consider providing this publicly
> owned information in an open format.
> 
> I was reminded of this issue as the BBC has run into a similar problem.
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6236612.stm
> 
> Alan Pater
>