Attn: hTtP Streams Removed

[Jay]

If you were running a stream which utilized the hTtP url trick to force open a Winamp user's Mini-Browser. You may now notice that your stream is no longer listed in the Media Library. As of now and until further notice no one may use the hTtP trick and get listed in the yp directory or Media Library.

This comes as a result of increased abuse which occurs by SHOUTcast operators with no intent but to get webhits.

Also in addition, you must have the bandwidth neccessary to broadcast at or near your advertised bitrate, if that fails or if your server is full when you attempt to add yourself to the directory, you will be denied. To ensure listing add 205.188.234.41, 42, 73, and 74 to your reserve lists.

[ElChevelle]

hTtP trick
I could give those guys a kIcK in the ass.

[Inedible Bulk]

Well someone coded it into winamp in the first place.

Will it come back when 5.04 is released? Quite a few streams used it correctly, to show information and ask for help (club977 was one of those).

Recently I noticed all club977 streams just died (i'm guessing they were removing the link) as all the servers said service not found.

They were also not listed in winamp.


I hate you guys. I <3 Club977.

[Jay]

being banned from the directory does not mean you can't stream. Club977's streams being down have nothing to do with this issue. Unless of course the operator of that stream was removing the hTtP url's from their servers.

[Inedible Bulk]

They did. I remember seeing a popup from them once.

http://club977.com/ads/

It's a nice page isn't it? Useful, right? Guess not.

[Jay]

added more new requirements to the original post.

[Inedible Bulk]

Originally posted by KXRM
To ensure listing add 205.188.234.41, 42, 73, and 74 to your reserve lists.

What about those servers that are almost always full? How have they been getting listed, or at least updated, in the past?

I had presumed there was a secret hardcoded reserve list that can go over the userlimit (as I've seen that there was a peak of 1 more than whatever the limit was on MANY stations).

[Jay]

This is a new restriction, so even if it has been happening in the past it will no longer occur now.

Also these tests only occur when your server requests to be added to the directory. Not during touches or removes of course.

[DKinTahoe]

I don't blame you guys at all. I recently began streaming adult movies - totally rules compliant and with mellow advertising - and I saw that you guys were wasting a whole bunch of your time banning a bunch of dipsh*ts who did nothing but highjack people's browsers.

Memo to my adult 'colleagues': if you're so untalented and brain-dead that the only way you can make a buck is to screw over surfers with your scumware, then maybe it's time to consider a career change commensurate with your talents...McDonald's is always hiring.

[Inedible Bulk]

I wouldn't want that scum anywhere near my food.

[AussiePride]

What a fucking joke, honestly. Do you guys realise how much bandwidth it takes to run a stream? Seriously? I can understand the banning of people who abuse the feature, but how can you ban everyone who simply pops up one thing in the mini-browser? To me it only seems fair that if people are going to leach all your bandwidth that you be able to show them your website at the same time.

Unless I am mistaken, you are taking this ability away from people, and instead all they are left with is a bunch of people entering their stream, burning their bandwidth, and leaving (with very few even visiting their site). It is not as if people get paid to put in television adverts like regular stations, so how the hell is someone meant to recover their costs and effort? Oh thats right, you really don't give a shit.

[MattO]

AussiePride, it's the hijackings and crazy popups that have caused the bannings, I'm sure when they upgrade the browser with anti-script code they'll enable it again.

[Inedible Bulk]

Originally posted by MattO
AussiePride, it's the hijackings and crazy popups that have caused the bannings, I'm sure when they upgrade the browser with anti-script code they'll enable it again.

OMG! I said that!

Will it come back when 5.04 is released?

Incredible!

[Germ]

Originally posted by AussiePride
What a fucking joke, honestly. Do you guys realise how much bandwidth it takes to run a stream? Seriously? I can understand the banning of people who abuse the feature, but how can you ban everyone who simply pops up one thing in the mini-browser? To me it only seems fair that if people are going to leach all your bandwidth that you be able to show them your website at the same time.

Unless I am mistaken, you are taking this ability away from people, and instead all they are left with is a bunch of people entering their stream, burning their bandwidth, and leaving (with very few even visiting their site). It is not as if people get paid to put in television adverts like regular stations, so how the hell is someone meant to recover their costs and effort? Oh thats right, you really don't give a shit.

Try in stream ad's, home fry.
If they really like what you're doing that should be more than enough.
Nothing wrong with being a little more creative than annoying people with the minibrowser. You either adapt or you die off, if you don't like it then - bye bye I'm sure you will be dearly missed.

[Jay]

Unfortunately the acts of a few have affected the many. Don't be angry at us be angry at those who abuse those features you rely on so much.

The truth is those who don't utilize the hTtP trick out-weigh those that do so it really doesn't affect the network as a whole that much.

[ken7177]

http://pcmovieman.sprynetwork.net:8052
http://pcmovieman.sprynetwork.net:8052/;stream.nsv

Had a nice little page in the mini browser
showing our site with no popups, etc.
Now I'm banned. Is this permanent?

hTtP has been changed to http and server
has been restarted but still not showing in directory.

What's the fix?

[ken7177]

====================
Looks like we're back in - THANKS...
Any plans to allow legit mini browser use in the future??
Heck, It's worth buying space on it -
AT A REASONABLE RATE

[ElChevelle]

Originally posted by Germ
Try in stream ad's, home fry.
If they really like what you're doing that should be more than enough.

That's the only way I'll even tune in. From the other side of the fence, I can tell you that I am annoyed by anything more and will tune you out permanently if you do advertize in a more intrusive manner. For taking advantage of what is basically a free service, you need to be patient, after all it is still pretty new.

[sankt]

Originally posted by Germ
Try in stream ad's, home fry.

The In Line advertising idea sounds good, but in reality that option is not possible for small broadcasters. The market simply does not exist.

Even large scale broadcasters are having a rough time building up a steady client base of inline advertising.

Windows Media and Real Video have the ability to include click through banners and links within the video screen area, perhaps this is a option that NullSoft video could pursue. It would certainly aleviate the problem of spurious webpages and popup ads and allow broadcasters to generate money for station operation.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...streamads.aspx

http://www.realnetworks.com/resource...mil/index.html

[Germ]

If you have good content and people actually give a shit, a little video advertising your website played every 20 or 30 minutes or so will work just fine to get people to visit your site. Forcing these people to view your website only pisses them off and makes them not want to view it all the more.

[Jay]

those who think they are clever using instream hTtP tricks to force the browser window open will be banned.

[Inedible Bulk]

LOL! KXRM, are you saying they would edit the url while streaming, similar to how you can do with the audio stream DSP plugin? hahahaah

incredible, they're persistent.

[ken7177]

In line ads are a little tougher to track results with then the mini browser ads. My hTtP page actually sold a few DVDs that I could track. With the in line ads I'm running I can't tell where the sale came from. You can't speak complicated URLs in a commercial - people won't type them or get them wrong. It either needs to be a clickable link or the main URL of your site. ie: you can't say 'visit www.mysite.com/store/adtrack=123' - you can only say 'visit www.mysite.com for xyz...'

I agree with sankt about providing some alternate clickable method or a non-popupable browser, etc.

Actually the whole reason I started using Shoutcast/Winamp was for the listing and advertising value. Even Shoutcast has the ability to visit the website via the listing.

Perhaps adding video the the SHOUTCAST directory instead of just the winamp library????

[sankt]

Winamp could be configured to allow the ability to click banners or links within the video display area - like realvideo or windows media.

The winamp minibrowser could still remain offlimits and closed.

[drewbar]

Perhaps adding video the the SHOUTCAST directory instead of just the winamp library????

That was planed for the shoutcast.com update that is now a few years off

Hell, the documentation there is still hella out of day (all references to Winamp 2.X instead of 5.X). Unfortunately, Nullsoft is very understaffed so SHOUTcast and SHOUTcast.com updates are few and far between (AOL seems to likes to take the SHOUTcast people and have them work on their own stuff, such meanies)


Winamp 5.04 will offer an option"Do not allow web content to execute or download Java/JavaScript scrips and ActiveX controls" Which I think was checked by default.

This should all but eliminate the abuse of the Minibrowser. But there is no word from Tom yet if hTtP will be re-enabled after the release of 5.04. (CraigF or KXRM might be able to anwser that, they talk to Tom )

[Inedible Bulk]

Originally posted by ken7177
ie: you can't say 'visit www.mysite.com/store/adtrack=123' - you can only say 'visit www.mysite.com for xyz...'

you can setup a subdomain that has forwarding. This is very easy to do if you use cpanel (which is a very common webadmin interface)

Just set winamp.mysite.com to forward to www.mysite.com/store/adtrack=123, and there you go.

"visit winamp.mysite.com"

I would say put nsv, but people spell it nvs way too often for that to be a good idea.

[sankt]

A person watching the stream would not have the ability of clicking directly on a banner or link. They would have to open a web browser and enter the url. Most people wouldnt go to the extra trouble of opening up a web browser. This would be a exercise in futility.

[Jeeper One]

Hi everyone:

Originally posted by sankt
[B]The In Line advertising idea sounds good, but in reality that option is not possible for small broadcasters. The market simply does not exist.

Even large scale broadcasters are having a rough time building up a steady client base of inline advertising.

The gang over who run the DLDVDS group of streams have found a way to insert pre-stream ads. They don't have clicking capabilities nor are they tricky by any means, but you see them every 20 seconds or so as you re-connect to the stream.

Kinda makes it hard to enjoy porn on there when the ad you see takes up half the time you're connected though. I really wish they'd figure out a way to SPEED THAT THING UP.

I realize they have to cover costs and such, but still, there's nothing like being on the verge of "doing it" only to have the moment wither away while you see that stupid thing (I've come close a few times too, believe it or not!).

Just my opinion...

Cheers for now

[Jeeper One]

Hi everyone:

Originally posted by drewbar
[B]That was planed for the shoutcast.com update that is now a few years off

*picking jaw up off floor*

You mean to tell me we're NOT going to see SHOUTcast 3.0 - UNTIL 2007 ??????

*GULP!*

Unfortunately, Nullsoft is very understaffed so SHOUTcast and SHOUTcast.com updates are few and far between (AOL seems to likes to take the SHOUTcast people and have them work on their own stuff, such meanies)

If all AOL sees in Nullsoft is a company that is nothing more than THEIR TECH SUPPORT GEEKS, then they may as well just sell Nullsoft to people WHO GIVE A DAMN.

WE KNOW THE TECHIES AT NULLSOFT ARE BETTER THAN JUST POO-POO FOR AOL.

I wonder if AOL is somehow under the MISTAKEN IDEA that the Open Source movement on the 'net is just some sort of "passing fad" that will be here today and gone tomorrow.....

Just my opinion

Cheers for now

[drewbar]

Nah, shoutcast.com has been needing an update for a few years now. There was a old beta site based on the old Winamp Classic / Winamp3 sites several months ago that never got finished.

I think a lot of the Nullsoft staff are working on streaming related stuff for AOL (this is all rumor and comjecture). A lot of new AOL stuff uses NSV and SHOUTcast. A new version of Ultravox, AOL Streaming Server. WinampX. Radio@AOL, Radio@Netscape Beta. AOL Media Player. Crap like that.

[Inedible Bulk]

http://beta.shoutcast.com used to be that beta, and now it's squirrelmail... IM CONFUSED.

[rockouthippie]

Well that killed my site and it's 50 slots in the shoutcast directory. I guess I'm permanently banned for sending an email getting hot about it too.

My site covered it's expenses by using banner ads in the mini-browser. My mini-browser ad income was about $20 a day and went to $4. That won't fly. Just the dedicated servers cost $114 a month, not to mention programming.

Months of work for a site that actually had good quality content, flushed down the drain.......

I care about as much as you do.

Kevin VandeWettering.

[AussiePride]

Originally posted by rockouthippie
Well that killed my site and it's 50 slots in the shoutcast directory. I guess I'm permanently banned for sending an email getting hot about it too.

My site covered it's expenses by using banner ads in the mini-browser. My mini-browser ad income was about $20 a day and went to $4. That won't fly. Just the dedicated servers cost $114 a month, not to mention programming.

Months of work for a site that actually had good quality content, flushed down the drain.......

I care about as much as you do.

Kevin VandeWettering.

Exactly. But seriously is Winamp run by Stalinist's or something? Seriously they seem to have such scant regard for people trying to broadcast decent streams whilst at the same trying to make a buck (i.e. through an appropriate minibrowser popup). Seems they think that ruling through a communist iron fist will solve the problem, yet at the same time they release their paid version of winamp. Guess that is the nature of business though.

[rockouthippie]

Well, it looks like they lifted the ban off my streams, but that still isn't going to fix my revenue problem. I might squeak a few slots in, but I really can't afford to run a quality web with no revenue.

This really shot me in the foot. If I'm going to continue this way, I'll have to immediately dump one server, that's gonna cut my channels down to 2 and I won't have any money for new programming, unless I want to pull it out of my own pocket.

I think this is still dead....

Kevin

http://webranger.net

[rockouthippie]

I am bringing my web up with 10 slots instead of the former 50. Hopefully something I batched together will keep the web alive. This is a nice web, and a lot of work. I hope I can make it fly under the current circumstances.

I hope you guys will work out something with the new Winamp to make it so that spammers can't corrupt the stream. I always thought it was convenient to have the web page in the mini-browser. Of course, I don't look at the smut sites anyway, so I guess I missed the havok, the mini-browser launching was causing.

[Inedible Bulk]

yes, actually, i know someone who runs very popular streams. the little tiny google ads in his popup made him over 10$ a day (usually), which is really nice. no spyware, adware, or any flashy banners, just a google ad. that helped out largely on his expenses.

so, i hope the minibrowser stuff is allowed back in 5.04

oh wait, wont javascript being disabled mess up google ads?

[rockouthippie]

That's all I was doing. And yes, google needs java.

[Jeeper One]

Hi everyone:

Bulk - Don't count on it.

Kevin - I'm surprised. Every time I brought up one of your streams, all I got was the web page. No popups or anything like that.

Also, have you checked the FEATURE FILMS section of the Internet Archive lately? I'm finding ALL KINDS of new movies on there. They must be adding stuff like every other day or something. Already have NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD on there now and I'll be adding a load of other stuff just as soon as Ken fixes that GUI of his (Ken, WHEN is that thing gonna be done? Just wondering' ).

Between that, Niterider's OTRHub plus whatever else I get off the net and old movies I have on VHS tape, I don't think I'll have a problem finding SOMETHING to add.

My BIGGEST stumbling block is BANDWIDTH. But unless and/or until Live365 (or somebody with their vision) comes along, it looks like I'll be streaming my videos off my own server for quite awhile.

The other thing I've got to look out for is not having enough programming and having too many of those classic TV commercials playing in between shows, but I think I've got a handle on that.

Once Ken fixes his GUI that is (I'm having to use Slavas' GUI just to stay on the air! ).

Cheers for now

[rockouthippie]

There wasn't any pops, or crap. Just a google ad and an enter here.

[Inedible Bulk]

the actions of a few have affected the many.

deal with it. cunts live.

this is like disabling html in email so you wont get a virus, but as a result you cant put pretty tables and other things in the body.

too bad, it's a price you pay. for the greater good.