Lovefilm and Netflix

[jerome1232]

a drm cannot exist as a opensource product. It is a fundamental problem with open source. Microsoft does not have any control on the integration of the drm when it becomes open source, since anyone is able to modify it source code.

The drm itself doesn't have to be open sourced to be integrated into moonlight, I admit I don't know a whole lot about it, but I'd assume Microsoft would have to provide some sort of api and a binary so that moonlight could work with the drm. Silverlight has been ported to OS X (drm and all), so it's possible. I think it's a matter of "is the work worth the reward?", and Microsoft has decided that no, it's not worth it.

The drm has also been licensed out to embedded systems, such as all 3 major consoles, most blu-ray players etc. It's is simply a matter of Microsoft porting the code.

Well then why doesnt microsoft just give us a silverlight for linux. Oh, yeah thats right we didnt pay for it

Reiterating, silverlight has been ported to OS X.

[EoRaptor013]

Answer me this: Netflix runs just fine on my Android phone (htc Evo 4G). Ergo, Netflix runs on Linux. Would it really be that hard for someone in the Linux community to port the phone app to a desktop app?

[lisanels47]

I also run Windows XP in a virtualbox for those pesky "Windows-only" apps... Use a stripped down version of XP if you have the license, and it runs really good in a window on my desktop.

[jerome1232]

Answer me this: Netflix runs just fine on my Android phone (htc Evo 4G). Ergo, Netflix runs on Linux. Would it really be that hard for someone in the Linux community to port the phone app to a desktop app?

Android uses a modified Linux kernel, so the kernel is different, how different? I don't know. It's also a licensing issue, Microsoft has not licensed that drm code to run on Linux Desktops.

[MonkeyPaw]

The lack of Netflix compatibility was an issue for me for a while--until we canceled Netflix. We just realized that we hadn't used it in 2 months. Consequently, I also unplugged our Wii, since it was basically a Netflix streaming machine.

I know it's not the same, but we just rent stuff through our local library. You often have to wait a few weeks, but it's free unless you forget to turn it in on time or somehow manage to destroy the discs. We've watched entire TV series that way.

[al111]

+1 running windows xp in a virtualbox to stream Netflix-

[gencon]

Has there been any movement or advance on this in the 5 months since the last post on the issue?

I recently bought a new laptop and want to install Ubuntu on it instead of Windows 7 which came pre-installed. My only reservation is that I'd quite like to stream the occasional LoveFilm movie on it. I would consider installing VirtualBox and running XP (for which I have a licensed version) as a virtual machine and use that (since others have reported that it works that way) but I'd much prefer the simplicity of a native Linux solution.

Thanks all.

[SeijiSensei]

This problem will never be resolved. The studios do not want them to support Linux, so Netflix cannot either. It is pretty obvious that Netflix will never release a Linux-compatible player. There is no technical limitation that keeps them from doing so; there is just no will to do so.

[sreeslinux]

Looks like they have solved the issue and got it working on Wine.
http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/11/h...flix-on-ubuntu

[ADTJ]

That link was definitely interesting, I had a quick look and downloaded the player, I wonder why they locked out the firefox stuff such that you can only easily access Netflix.
Unfortunately, our netflix subscription had recently expired, so I thought I'd try it for Lovefilm.
I made a quick HTML file to link to LoveFilm, and used Ctrl+O from the Netflix firefox to access it.

On Lovefilm instant, the silverlight thingy would appear and it would look like it was loading but then firefox would just crash. I don't know if this is just my machine or not but it may be worthwhile others taking a look.

If it works, then glad to have helped,

if not, then sorry to have wasted your time, haha...