BBC Radio to stop supporting WMA on Dec 31st, 2014.

[Vangelis forthnet]

 Hello to all !
The following is already one month old, but
since I didn't see it mentioned in the list (and
it does relate to GiP), I'm posting it now for
those that haven't read it yet:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/internet/posts/BBC-Radio-to-stop-supporting-Windows-Media-on-December-31st

In a nutshell:

1) As of Jan 1st 2015, WMA Listen Again streams
(UK: 96kbps (320kbps for R3), Intl: 48kbps) will no longer be available
for new radio programmes; it is still unclear when the
already existing WMA streams for archived or with-
extended-availability radio content will be completely
phased out.
2) As of Jan 1st 2015, WMA Listen Live streams
(UK: 128kbps (320kbps for R3), Intl: 48kbps) will no longer be available.
These will be substituted by new MP3 Live streams, for the next 1-2 yrs,
as a means of backward compatibility with older devices.

 So, from next year, --mode=wma and the likes
(--radiomode=wma , --liveradiomode=wma) will become
deprecated.
 I was personally using those streams for an old portable
music player that does not support AAC/M4A, just to
avoid transcoding - but I did not use GiP for the fetching,
due to the iffy nature of MPlayer as an MMS dumper;
several other tools are available on Windows that can
perform multithreaded and reliable MMS downloads.

More alarming news is the following paragraph:

> we have chosen the AAC codec and http streaming
> as our delivery method for the future.
> Http streaming includes HLS, HDS and eventually DASH.

and the more detailed Comment #16:

> These streams will be delivered to devices using the HLS (for iOS and 
> Android)
> and HDS (for desktop) delivery methods.
> This will replace windows media for some devices
> and rtmp for desktop machines

As you can read, they are planning on ditching the
RTMP streams altogether for both Live Radio & AOD.
RTMP streams are the backbone of GiP's radio recording
ability. ETA? Sometime in 2015.
With the WMA streams gone in about 2 months and
the planned RTMP streams demise, GiP would have to be
re-written from the start if to support radio recording...
(AppleHLS streams are already in use; they can be
dumped by FFmpeg. I haven't discovered yet any
audio AdobeHDS streams - I am very wary of this
method, 'cos it leaves room for DRM encryption..)
I don't want to instigate panic, but it's always good
to get a heads-up...

Regards,
Vangelis.