There's good news and bad news for users of free PC-based PVR suites like MythTV, Media Portal, and GB-PVR. While Zap2it Labs plans to cease offering the free television program guide data used by these programs in September, there are at least two groups planning to offer similar data. And both are close to having tools in place to pick up where Zap2it leaves off in September. That's the good news.
The bad news is that neither group will be able to offer this data for free. It's not surprising. Zap2it was offering the TV episode data in an XML format in addition to its online TV guide. The company was is owned by Tribune Media Services, so providing data to the open source community cost Zap2it nothing.
That's not true for CTpvr or Schedules Direct, the two new groups planning to offer TV episode data. Both now say that they will be charging users for access to the data, although pricing has not yet been set.
Most users of commercial PVR applications like BeyondTV, SageTV, and Windows Media Center won't be affected. Those companies get their data from alternate sources. So you have a choice. Pay for the software, received the program guides for free. Or get free software and pay for the program guides.
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