MythTV, Zap2it, and Schedules Direct

As many of you probably now Zap2it labs will no longer be serving the open source community with TV listing data. As a result Schedules Direct was created to fill this void. In order to ensure Schedules Direct doesn't fail the open source community as Zap2it has (not really their fault) Schedules Direct has imposed restrictions on what applications can use it's service. The exact legal wording is still be discussed, but this is a pivotal moment for LinuxMCE and it should be involved.

LinuxMCE is an non-commercial, open source project itself and as such it shouldn't have a problem getting on the "Approved Applications" list. However, as I understand the TOS, third party vendors selling the core servers would not be approved... unless they sell just the hardware... but that's something that needs to be discussed with the Schedules Direct board. So companies like Fiire would need to have their own contract with Tribune in order to sell complete core servers that actually give TV listings... legally.

It's important to note that LinuxMCE uses the program guide data directly, not just through MythTV, so it must be on the "Approved Applications" list or we would be violating the TOS as it is currently written. Even though LinuxMCE is a distribution and not a single application it does need to be on the list (Even KnoppMyth is on the list).

Another problem is that only the newly released version of MythTV even supports Schedules Direct. This means that we have approximately 1 week (Zap2it stops service Sep. 1) to update MythTV to the latest release, integrate it into LinuxMCE, get LinuxMCE on the approved applications list, and release and update or will will start to loose TV listing data.