Tried this out, initially this past Friday night, then again last night.
You set up a bookmark for www.locast.org. They ask you to set up a
username/password, which is easy enough to do, and store in your browser. So
subsequent logons are a snap.
Then they tell you, if you have not done so already, that you need to enable
geolocation service in your browser. Aha. I had that turned off, in my
desktop-dedicated-to-TV. So I had to enable it in Windows, and then specify it
also for the Edge browser.
At this point, they show a list of cities, in big buttons, with a nice photo of
the city in each button. Strangely enough, on Friday, I could choose any of the
cities listed, and had access to their local TV stations. Wow, I thought, not
bad. It looked like anyone within the US could use this service, even if they
wouldn't have access to their own local stations.
Not so fast. On Saturday evening, when I wanted to be absolutely sure this was
the case, oops, doesn't work anymore. Try another market now, and they'll tell
you it's outside your DMA, and to contact them if this seems to be a mistake.
Shucks. So the other issue is, you only get the main TV stations. You don't get
all of the subchannels you can access OTA. And, as stated previously, this is
just whatever is on live. For someone who hasn't watched live TV, except just
to surf the channels, or France 24 news, ever since 1985 or so, it's not going
to be a game changer. (The station that carried all the international 24-hour
news channels went dark some time ago. So I've stopped using OTA even for the
news.)
And every time you log on, they ask for a $5.00/mo. donation. Not too bad, for
those who still watch by appointment TV, I suppose. The image and audio quality
are just fine. I didn't do a direct A/B test, to compare against OTA HD, but it
seems the Locast service only degrades OTA HD marginally. The OTA broadcasters
should be pleased with the service, especially these days, when hoping to force
people onto MVPDs is kinda a thing of the past.
Better yet, broadcasters, compete against Locast by convincing the network to
let you do your own streaming, and make the programs available on demand too!
Even for your subchannels.
Bert
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