Some pertinent questions have emerged following Moovida 2.0’s announcement, enough to dedicate a whole post explaining in more detail Moovida 2.0’s stance on open source and licensing.

The Moovida Core UI is basically Banshee with some tweaks and arrangements. It will use the same license as Banshee, however it is important to understand that Banshee is not only a UI, but also a framework with a lot of extensions. Each extension can have its own license. So it is correct to say that the Moovida Core UI will use the MIT licenses, and some extensions and services inside it will be proprietary.

Extensions, services and the whole Banshee framework is made accessible to the Moovida Immersed UI through XML-RPC data exchange. So MIT or Proprietary extensions in the Moovida Core UI will be available to the 3D UI through that communication channel.

The whole project can be contributed to by either writing Moovida/Banshee extensions or by adding LUA code to extend the 3D UI, accessing the services through XML-RPC.

Just consider the Diesel engine as a rendering platform, like a web browser, and you develop the UI with the LUA language and the artwork we are providing.

The Diesel engine will support OpenGL ES on some platforms. We are not going to maintain Moovida 1.0’s Python framework for long, but hey it’s free software, if someone wants to make something out of it, help yourself!

As the release of Moovida 2.0 draws near, we decided it was time to share the details of what’s to come with our community.

The next Moovida release is a completely innovative concept, and actually consists in 2 applications in one.

When first running the software, you’ll get Moovida Core, the flexible application ideal for desktop use. Most of you will be familiar with its features, which are based on the popular open source project Banshee. When ready to access your media via tv, the Moovida Immersed media center extension can be opened from the Core app, introducing a more visually engaging experience, optimized for HDTV navigation with remote control. In other words, Moovida Immersed will be the substitute for Moovida 1.0.

The software is still free to download and intends to provide users with a full scope media solution, bridging the gap between desktop and connected tvs. As we transition from project to commercial software with Moovida 2.0, our desktop app will be ad supported and initially compatible under Windows, with a Linux and Mac version to follow shortly. We also plan to offer a variety of premium content through the Moovida Immersed media center.

Moovida Core 2.0 is now being distributed under limited release for testing, and the complete solution will be available publicly this summer.

Moovida’s next phase of development focusses on working closely with Banshee, upon which our backend is now based. We highly encourage those who want to contribute to Moovida Core to participate in the Banshee project. We also plan to open our UI to encourage developers to keep playing with the software and adding new features.

Got questions or comments? Check out this FAQ page, or contact us any of the following ways:

• post a comment below
• email us: info@moovida.com
• post on our Forum

We’re very excited about this next release, and we very much look forward to presenting you with the finished product.

In relation to my recent post about piracy, I just HAD to comment on the shocker that was just announced about the latest James Bond film being suspended indefinitely. This is the first real tell-tale sign of Hollywood running out of steam after the digital revolution in film. What hasn’t helped is the fact that MGM has been slow keeping up with the times, and now the latest Bond Film is paying for it dearly.

I just had to point out that this is probably the first blatant illustration of the vicious circle that is piracy, and how some movie goers (Bond fans in this case) are finally paying for this vice. I, for one, won’t be crying over it, especially since I had the misfortune of paying to see Quantum of Solace in theaters.

I’m curious to see what lessons the Hollywood industry will take away from this, and whether the next owners of MGM’s film library will embrace the online VOD model. Can we hope to see some MGM films on Moovida any time soon, or more specifically the next Bond?

We often spur debates around the office by sharing ‘controversial’ articles related to what we do here at Moovida. Last week it started with the TorrentFreak article U.S. Government Recognizes Benefits of Piracy passed on by resident media scanner guru Fernando.

‘Building a Digital Economy’ [1] was quickly fired back by another colleague, this time from the industry’s point of view. The report highlights the important loss of European jobs in entertainment at the hand of piracy. He then went on to counterbalance his argument by saying that piracy could be acknowledged as an economic impulse for the Internet sector, but at the copyright owners’ expense (I’m sure there are a quite a few of us that can be thankful for piracy’s economic impulse factor).

Needless to say, TorrentFreak is biased with their interpretation of the Governmental report. I’d declare something more along the lines of ‘U.S. Government recognizes that there may be some benefits to piracy, and cannot prove its negative effect on the economy as a whole due to lack of evidence, nevertheless Hollywood is still taking a big hit’, which somewhat weakens their position. One thing is certain, piracy is becoming synonymous with cultural values in Spain, and its movie industry is suffering for it.

I think the conclusion I’m trying to come to, in layman’s terms, is that piracy rocks for some, sucks for others, and for those who haven’t felt the sting yet, may well feel it soon enough. Unless that is, we all start substituting piracy for a sustainable media consumption model that benefits everyone.

And where does Moovida stand? Are we a product of piracy, a catalyzer for content freedom, or a combination of both?

[1] You can easily find the article ‘Building a Digital Economy: The importance of Saving Job’s in the EU’s Creative Industries’ by searching it online.

Some of you may have noticed a certain “slow down” of Moovida 1.0, with less Launchpad activity and no new plugins. A few of Moovida’s most active community members have been recently informed that there are many changes in the works for the next release, which will radically change the product (for the better, IMHO). Indeed some questions have been popping up, so let me try to clarify some of your concerns:

• Our current focus is on our next version, which is a complete overhaul of Moovida as you know it (different architecture and development language, UI revamp)
• Because of this, we currently have very little time to review requests, bug fixes and the like on Launchpad for 1.0, and we won’t  be able to merge any changes in the short term, so please bare with us in the meantime
• The next release will remain open, but not to the same extent as Moovida 1.0. We understand this may be upsetting to some of you who vow allegiance to 100% open source solutions, but we have followed this direction for specific reasons. We wanted to keep developing a great media center that could prosper in a highly competitive and evolving industry, and this is what made most sense given our objectives.
• Moovida will remain free, but will also offer premium content on demand
• Please be patient for another 1-2 months before experiencing our next release, after which we hope to blow your socks off (make sure to be wearing socks, otherwise your toes could suffer)

We’ll keep you posted as new info becomes available. Hang in there and please keep the feedback coming in the comments section and in our Forum, we’re doing our best to incorporate your valuable suggestions.