by Ethan Johnson
December 22, 2006

I'm not sure exactly how this happened, but somehow in the last month or so I got turned on to a nifty app called Democracy TV. The important part is, I'm quickly reaching the point of no return where I wonder how I lived without it for as long as I have. In short, Democracy is a DVR for internet (online) videos. This is a Big Deal. Where sites like YouTube made online video fun (if not essential), Democracy is making online video functional. Here's a brief primer. No, I'm not being put up to this by Democracy or any of their affiliates. Just sharing, as one is wont to do online.

(Note: This primer is based on the Linux version, currently 0.9.2. I presume that the Windows and Mac versions are eerily similar.)

Application Overview
Adding Channels
Viewing Channels/Downloading Content
Content Management
Tips and Tricks, Notes

Application Overview

Once the player loads, the channel bar/menu tree is accessible from the left side of the player. Before some final tweaking, mine looked like this:

Adding Channels

To add channels, you can do one of two things. The first method is to click the Channel Guide link at the top of the page.

The Channel Guide contains links to various online videos, and provides various methods for searching for whatever you're interested in. The trick is, these channels have been created specifically for the Democracy TV application, and/or their YouTube equivalent, VideoBomb. Pressing the +ADD button on any given channel will add the selection to your menu tree/channel bar.

However, not everything you may want to see is optimized (so to speak) for Democracy TV. If the web site (like this one) publishes a dedicated web feed just for video content, press the Add Channel button at the bottom of the Democracy TV panel.

As channels are added to the channel bar, a numbered indicator will appear to advise how many new (unwatched) videos are available per channel. For example, Rocketboom updates once per day, roughly. Other channels (like ours) may be less prolific, yet beloved just the same. YMMV.

Viewing Channels/Downloading Content

Simply click the title of any given channel in the channel bar to see what is available, and how fresh it is. Online video seems to be a bit flaky, in that some great-looking channels ceased to provide any fresh material in months or almost years (plural). If the videos are still viewable don't let the age of the content dissuade you.

If you see something you are interested in, press the (in this example) blue download icon and it will (in this example) turn orange and indicate that the download is in progress. A progress bar will appear on the right side of the selected video.

You can sit and watch the progress bar, or click around the app and do other things. Whatever works for you.

Content Management

Now here's how this is like a DVR. You can download the video and watch it right away, or you can end your current session and come back to it some other time (ideally within 30 days of download). Just like a DVR, the videos listed under the My Collection or New Videos sections have a set expiration date to clear room on your hard drive. If you want to keep them longer, press Save. The videos are indeed accessible directly on your hard drive and can be burned to CD/DVD, etc.

Pressing the trash can icon deletes the listing, and the video itself. It doesn't ask for confirmation, so use care.

Select a video to watch by pressing the Play icon incorporated into the track listing. From there, things are pretty standard video player operations.

Tips and Tricks, Notes

A word to the wise: When adding new channels, by default Democracy automatically downloads the newest video in the channel unless you deselect that option. By default, I deselect that option. I'd prefer to pick and choose videos rather than have some obnoxious 100mb file start humming along literally sight unseen.

Regular followers of Rocketboom or Ze Frank will probably want to set auto download for "on" and that way the freshest stuff is always on tap. I'm not into either show (yet) but that option is there for you. Plus it adds to the DVR-ishness of the app. Woo.

BTW, I never got into Rocketboom (for example) because I had to go to their site every day and either download or wait for the streaming video to kick in. Meh. I like Democracy wayyyy better in that the videos come to me, and they're ready to view. Bloglines strips out embedded video files in web feeds, so that puts a crimp in the "content comes to me" approach.

I really like that Democracy tells you up front what MIME type the video is, and the size, up front. I may be more willing to load up 40mb on a flyer than 100. Our videos show as "Quicktime" because I didn't know any better when I hand-rolled the feed (big minus for Drupal, hem hem). Democracy can even pull in videos via BitTorrent, which is nuts. But it works, quickly. Check it, yo.

So far, the one and only "can't miss" video feed for me (besides ours) is a charming offering called Feed Me Bubbe. I cite this show as being the catalyst that got me into making cooking videos. Not to be snotty and condescending, but come on, if they can do it, so can I (and you). That's not a slam, believe me. I think it's fantastic that the show's creator engaged in the time-honored tradition of "share and preserve the knowledge". And Bubbe is such a good sport about all of this fancy video jazz, especially when baking fish while some Steve Vai on crack soundtrack wheedlee-waaahs quietly yet persistently throughout the whole video. Plus there's the Yiddish Word of the Day. What more can one ask for?

Seriously: One look at Feed Me Bubbe, and you'll be smiling and saying "this is what [the internet/video blogging/video anything/etc] is for!" Then you'll decide to finally try that video thing out that the youngsters seem to be wild about these days.

Anyway, if you take a notion, give the Democracy TV player a try. I'll know that it has hit the Big Time(tm) when I hear people say "I Democracy'd [whatever video] yesterday." Because titles as verbs totally rawk, man. If you want to Democracy our stuff, the feed is here. Enjoy! <EM>

(Oh, and big thanks to Mark Pilgrim (who may never see this thank you note, but one never knows) for revealing unto me the secrets of two-pass MP4 encoding. I wasn't able to use his batch script, but he planted the seed, and his will was done via FFMPEG. I don't expect anyone (else) to know WTF I am talking about. Anyway, thanks. And for the rest of ya, I may be inclined to write up a quickie tutorial on how I hacked together my encoding scheme, depending heavily on how much pro-tutorial feedback I receive. No pressure.)