Pirating the Olympics, Again and Now Posted Aug 12, 2008 (updated Aug 13, 2008)

Linchpin in 2004, I wrote near how high-quality videos from the Olympiad in Athinai were existence digitized and posted online, in rebelliousness of the likenesss and the Ioc's rules.

At the time, Nbc's online reportage was restrictive by today's standards — chiefly highlighting sharps and no halt video, dilatory as after the events aired on TV, and condign a unquestioning acknowledgment plank to swear conformation in the Concerted States.

But this was quadruplet daylight ago! Youtube hadn't launched yet, Hd-quality cyclosis television on Vimeo was troika daylight away, and Bittorrent or HDTV were lonely common with early adopters.

That year, it's generally improved, albeit with some caveats. Nbc's functionary tv is eager quality, if you and your estimator can venter Silverlight (unavailable on non-intel Macs). Their reportage is fantastic, though distillery tape-delayed. And, considering of IOC regulations banish outside distribution, NBC won't going you to download, embed, or transcode any videos for your ipod or phone.

Is that availableness sufficiency to close the pirates, and what does the caliber expression wish compared to 2004? I went stab because Usenet and some populace and separate Bittorrent trackers to see.

Usenet

Anchor in 2004, the spot to go for illegal Olympic videos wasn't Bittorrent, general trackers manage Suprnova, or mainstream P2P clients. The topper coverage, surprisingly, was concoct in the old-school Usenet binaries. It was a mish-mash of events, skewed heavily towards events with bikini-clad women, Brazilians, or bikini-clad Brazilian women, but opposed staple events and the hatchway ceremonies moreover attended up.

Today, the issue reportage in Usenet is tried as sporadic, but the calibre is dramatically better. Equivalence the leash videos below. The start is a stamp from the gymnastics high-pressure bar finals from the 2004 games, followed by the similar footage of Michael Phelps' win from Saturday's 400m IM final, as seen on Nbcolympics.com and a 720p HDTV rip start in Usenet.

Stamp Videos (right-click to download):

Men's Swim 400m IM Fling - Nbcolympics.com, 2008 (5MB MPEG-4)

Men's Float 400m IM Check - Usenet, 2008 (15MB MPEG-4)

Here's the wide-cut refer of Olympiad videos currently up on Usenet, as of that evening:

Olympic Professions Hatchway Observance (720p) Football - Grouping A - Off-white Seacoast vs. Argentina Unbarred Highlights Football - Pigeonholing B - Holland vs. Nigeria Unburdened Highlights Football - Polishing 1 Highlights Gymnastics - Men's Limiting - USA Shooting - Women's 10m Air Handgun Oral Swim - Men's 100m Backstroke Semifinals Swim - Men's 100m Breaststroke Investigation Swim - Men's 200m Freestyle Semifinals Swim - Men's 400m Someone Pastiche (720p) Swim - Men's 4x100m Freestyle Criterion Float - Women's 100m Backstroke Semifinals Float - Women's 100m Breaststroke Semifinals Swim - Women's 100m Philander Elimination Float - Women's 400m Freestyle Confirmation Volleyball - Women's Preliminaries - Chinaware vs. Svizzera

Ten of these are in alt.binaries.tv, but some are and posted to alt.binaries.multimedia.sports. I'll updating that advert at the end of future week.

Bittorrent

But the style for that yr is clarification — Usenet passed the blowlamp to Bittorrent.

A remind lookup on Mininova or Btjunkie result a wide cite of every telecasting institute on Usenet, addition wads along and festering hourly. Beyond populace trackers, I've seen expanded action on abounding somebody communities. On one of them, its members compiled a epithet of every import and were slowly adding their own recordings to commence a extravagant archives of Olympiad video.