==============   ASFRecorder - DOWNLOAD STREAMING CONTENT!   ===============
                        Thank you for reading this!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                           General announcements
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This  tool is distributed freely with full source code included.  The author
wants to remain anonymous.  Source code may be used and changed as you like.
Use  this  program at your own risk.  No warranties for correct function can
be given.

This  document in some parts expresses the personal opinion of the author as
an  individual  with  the rights to speak, think and express himself freely.
Please excuse any typing errors or grammatical deficiencies in this text.

Please  spread  and  mirror this program on many sites.  Microsoft will most
likely  try  to stop its distribution.  However - from the author's point of
view  -  there  is  nothing  illegal  about  this particular program and its
distribution archive (see legal section for details).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                         So what is this all about?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This  tool enables you to download streaming content in Windows Media Format
to  your  hard  drive.  The resulting files will be in ASF format and can be
played with Windows Media Player and derived tools.

You  may  call  this  the  "DeCSS"  for Windows Media - although neither any
serious  reverse-engineering nor any particular knowledge about protcols was
necessary to program this simple application.

Development time overall:  several hours for a first, working streaming code
and   some  more  days  for  general  performance  tweaking,  cross-platform
portability,  the  Windows graphical user interface and the XML (redirection
file) parser.

For program usage:  See below
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
              The impact on the music and streaming industry?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Until  now, most people thought Microsoft streaming media cannot be saved or
copied...

This  program  creates  the  possibility  to DOWNLOAD LEGACY AND COPYRIGHTED
CONTENT  -  live or pre-recorded - from any Microsoft streaming media server
that  offers  HTTP streaming.  This has the potential to make some headlines
in the news.

Now  content  providers  will  have  to seriously reconsider their policy to
provide  high-quality, legacy content using non-encrypted, non-authenticated
and generally unsafe data channels.

I  am  talking  about content providers offering music videos, recordings of
concerts  and  TV  broadcasts  in  "high bandwidth" (300kbit/s) video.  Same
applies  to  streaming  audio.  There is virtually no difference to offering
copyrighted MP3 files for public download on a freely accessible server.

Is this Microsoft's definition of SDMI compliance ?

HELLO CONTENT PROVIDERS!
YOUR CONTENT CAN BE AS EASILY COPIED AS IT CAN NOW BEEN DOWNLOADED FROM YOUR
SERVERS!  WOULD YOU MIND COPY-PROTECTING THIS CONTENT, PLEASE?

HELLO MUSIC INDUSTRY AND ARTISTS!
THE  CONTENT  PROVIDERS ARE CURRENTLY GIVING AWAY YOUR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
IN  AN  UNSAFE,  NON  COPY-PROTECTED DATA FORMAT.  JUST LIKE MP3!  THESE ASF
FILES CAN BE DOWNLOADED AND COPIED WITHOUT ANY PHYSICAL RESTRICTION.

WHAT CAN CONTENT PROVIDERS DO ABOUT IT ?
- Disable HTTP and TCP streaming?
  Wouldn't  really  help.  UDP streaming could also be recorded by a program
  similar to this.
- Switch from Microsoft to RealMedia products?
  Not  much difference.  I am pretty sure the RealMedia servers have exactly
  the same vulnerabilities in their streaming protocols.
- Finally start using digital rights management and authentification methods
  offered by Windows Media?
  I  hope  so.  This would make an attack like this very difficult.  Windows
  Media  is  not  generally  unsafe.   It  does in fact offer digital rights
  management and encryption methods.  Get yourself informed.

WHAT CAN THE MUSIC INDUSTRY DO ABOUT IT ?
- Pull back from the internet business?
  Bad idea. Would give MP3 pirating a serious boost.
- Force content providers to use safe methods for providing their streams?
  I hope so.

WHAT CAN MICROSOFT DO ABOUT IT ?
- Try to find out who wrote this program and sue him?
  Bad idea - from the author's point of view.
- Inform  content  providers  and  the music industry about how to correctly
  encode  media  streams and configure servers so that the content cannot be
  downloaded and copied _that_ easily?
  Yeah, good idea.
- Implement  an effective authentification mechanism to make sure only Media
  Player and no other program can access the data streams?

  Why didn't they do it already?  It would have made this attack impossible.
  Does  it  always  require  a "LOVELETTER.vbs" or a tool like this to prove
  that some Microsoft products are unsafe (when incorrectly used)?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Some advantages/special features of this utility
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
* With  this utility it is possible to download high-quality (high bandwith)
  content  using  a  low-bandwidth  connection  (e.g.   modem) for later and
  repeated replay.
* You  can  record  live video content from web cams and internet broadcasts
  that you can't record otherwise.
* The  code  is  written  in  portable ANSI-C, so it can be compiled on many
  operating  systems.   The  INTEL  byte-ordering  of  the  data  stream  is
  processed   in   a  system-independent  manner.   Only  the  GUI  code  is
  windows-specific  and is limited to a Windows platform.  Download a stream
  at university/at work on Unix systems and enjoy it at home on your PC.
* This   tool   is   using   a   HTTP   streaming   protocol.    HTTP  is  a
  connection-oriented  protocol  based on TCP.  The protocol layer has built
  in  error correction (ARQ).  So packet loss does not have any influence on
  visual  or acoustic quality of the downloaded stream.  You will always get
  the same quality that the source stream on the media server can offer.
* HTTP  streaming  passes  most  firewalls.  UDP does not.  That is the only
  reason why it was implemented by Microsoft.
* This utility supports automatic resuming of an interrupted download.
* This  utility  does  _not_  send  detailed information about your computer
  system  to the media server, as the Windows Media Player 6.4 does (monitor
  the  packet traffic for a HTTP transmission and see yourself, if you don't
  believe me)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 Usage as a stand-alone Windows application
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The  Windows GUI offers a simple player interface... .

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
      How to find out the stream URL in Webpage-embedded Media Players
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

*** This works for www.centerseat.com:

Move the  mouse  over the  embedded player window and  use the  right  mouse
button to pop up the context menu of the Media Player.

Select Properties. Click the "Show" tab. In the Location field you will find
the server and directory name.  To the right of the item is  the ASX  or ASF
stream name.

Now merge the server and stream name to get a complete URL (like this).

mms://servername/optional/directories/streamname.asf

Enter this URL into ASFRecorder (File/Open URL...) or pass  it as  a command
line argument and here we go...

*** This  works  for www.vidnet.com:

If there  is no  "Show" tab,  there might  be a  "Clip" tab. Again,  get the
server and directory name from the Location field  and  the stream name next
to the movie icon. Merge the URL as described above.

*** An alternative:

Click into the frame  that contains  the embedded  Media Player. Right-click
and select "View Source". Now Notepad (or similar)  will pop up.  Search for
an URL reference  that contains  either .asf or .asx.  Copy  and paste  this
into the "Open URL" dialog of ASFRecorder and here we go....

I am sure that you will find out how it will work for many other sites.  You
might also find some sites where it wont't work at all ;-)

*** This works for www.streambox.com:

Their ASX redirector files must be downloaded because clicking on the links
does not bring up ASFRecorder even if the  redirector  file types have been
registered.  In Internet explorer,  use the right  mouse button to show the
link's context menu and select "Save Link As...". I  suggest  you save  the
ASX file to your desktop and double-click it there. Now ASFRecorder will do
its job.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 Questions and Answers on Program Operation
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Video and/or audio preview does not work in ASFRecorder!

A: It might be that  you  are missing  the DirectShow/ActiveMovie  transform
   filters that are required for playing WindowsMedia.

   First, try reinstalling  the full  Windows Media Player 6.4  distribution
   archive.  If this still does not help, install the  "Windows Media Tools"
   that can be obtained on the Microsoft web site. Have a look at

   http://msdn.microsoft.com/windowsmedia/
   or
   http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/
   (see the "Downloads" page)
   

Q: When starting the program, I only receive the message "missing DLL export
   API WSAEnumEvents" (or similar).

A: You seeem to have Windows 95 OSR 1 installed.  Your  ws2_32.dll (WinSock)
   is too old. You need to update your WinSock DLL. The  update archive  can
   be downloaded from
   
   http://www.microsoft.com/windows95/downloads/contents/wuadmintools/s_wunetworkingtools/w95sockets2/?RLD=114

   The download is  approximately 960kb in size. You  will need to reboot in
   order to complete the installation. The filename is "W95ws2setup.exe"

   In case this URL should become outdated,  try to search for "WinSock"  on
   the Microsoft web site and find the link to the Windows 95 update.


Q: My friends using Windows 98 or 2000 do get a fancy color gradient  in the
   main window, but my program window looks quite monochrome. Why that?

A: You are missing the "msimg32.dll".

   You can get this DLL from "The DLL archive" on the Internet.
   
   The URL is: http://solo.abac.com/dllarchive/M.html

   After downloading, put it either in your WINDOWS\SYSTEM directory or copy
   it into the ASFRecorder program directory. Now you  should get that fancy
   color gradient as well. Be warned: The effect may render quite slowly.


Q: I  have a fast connection to the internet?  Why does the stream arrive at
   a constant, low data rate?

A: That's  the  concept  of  streaming.  The stream is sent by the server at
   exactly the data rate that is necessary for realtime replay.  So a 56kbit
   stream  will arrive at a constant rate of 56kbit, no matter how fast your
   internet uplink is.


Q: Can't this be accellerated?

A: Depends on the server.

   There  is a RATE specification in the HTTP header used for requesting the
   stream (see source code).  Modifying this RATE to anything different than
   1.0 makes most servers  reply with  an  error message  of "500 - internal
   server error". So you are limited to the stream's original data rate.

   However you can request and download different streams at the same time -
   until your available bandwidth is consumed.


Q: During replay, when moving the position slider, seeking within the stream
   is very slow.  What is the problem?

A: A Windows Media server does not transmit the index data of the ASF files.
   This  index  data  is  required for fast seeking in the stream.  You can,
   however generate a new index for the ASF files after download.  Therefore
   you  have  to  obtain  the Windows Media Tools from Microsoft and use the
   "ASF Indexer" to generate a new index.


Q: I cannot seek in the media stream captured from a live broadcast. Help!

A: I am sorry, you cannot seek in captured live broadcasts.  This is because
   the media player  (even when playing from disk)  still  thinks the stream
   is arriving from a live source. I am working on that particular topic.


Q: I  receive the error code "connect() failed:  CONNREFUSED" for streams on
   some servers.  Why this?

A: Bummer.   The  server  does  not  allow  access  using the HTTP streaming
   protocol.   This  does  not  only prohibit access for most users behind a
   firewall.  It  does  also  prohibit access for the ASFRecorder utility as
   well.  Well, try a different stream on a different server.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
               Questions and Answers on Safety and Protocols
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Is this a "crack" of Windows Media?

A: No.   This  is  not  a  crack.   This  program  is  just  a simple client
   application  that  receives  streaming  data and stores it on hard drive.
   The  program  looks  like  a standard "Windows Media Player" to the media
   server on the other end.

Q: It  was  not  necessary  to break any security or encryption barriers for
   obtaining  the  raw stream data.  The protocol used for streaming is very
   simple  and  based  on HTTP - a standard protocol used for the "word wide
   web".

   And  that  is  the  scandal  about all this.  Why does the music industry
   complain  about the MP3 piracy when - at the same time - they offer equal
   content in a similar, equally unsafe manner?


Q: Is  Windows  Media  unsafe?   Why  is  it possible to simply download the
   streams?

   This  is  not  a problem with Microsoft or Windows Media in general.  The
   Windows Media Toolkit does in fact offer possibilities for digital rights
   management and secure, authenticated and even encrypted channels.

   The  problem  is  with  the  lazyness of the content providers.  Very few
   companies actually use the available options of digital rights management
   and encryption.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
            Questions and Answers on Legal and Copyright Issues
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Does this tool infringe any Microsoft patents?

A: From my point of view: A definitive No!

   This  tool  was  developed using neither the Microsoft Format SDK nor the
   Windows  Media  Tools SDK.  The licensing conditions of these SDKs do not
   apply  here.   In  order  to  save  the ASF files to a storage medium, no
   specific  knowledge  about  the  inner  ASF  file  structure  was needed.
   Basically the data is saved in the very same format  as it arrives on the
   HTTP connection. The only thing that needs to be determined  by this tool
   is the segment (chunk) size for saving syntactically correct ASF files.

   Microsoft does claim a patent on the ASF file format in the United States
   and  possibly  in  other  countries as well.  There has been at least one
   succesful  attempt  to  reverse engineer the ASF format by a GNU software
   author.   The  program I am talking about is VirtualDub 1.3 by Avery Lee.
   By  threatening him with legal action, Microsoft has forced the author to
   remove  support  for  loading  ASF  media  files  because of the programs
   ability  to  transcode  these  media files to AVI format.  You can find a
   nice article about all this on the following URL:

   http://www.advogato.org/article/101.html

   But  as  I  told you, it was not really necessary to reverse-engineer the
   ASF  file format in this case.  I still know very little about the format
   itself.  The program just saves it to disk.


Q: Is it legal to use this tool?

A: That depends on what content you actually download with this tool.  If it
   is copyrighted content and if the download is expressly prohibited by the
   content provider, you are acting in an illegal manner.


Q: So is it legal to download and distribute this tool?

A: Yes. This  is a very simple tool using a very simple internet protocol. It
   does  NOT  break any encryption or authentification procedure.  So I don't
   see any point why this program could be illegal. Download, copy and spread
   as you like, THIS PROGRAM AND ITS SOURCE CODE IS LEGAL.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                    Bugs and limitations of this utility
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

* You are welcome to fix the following (potential) problems in this program:

* Recording  of live streams  cannot currently  be  resumed. So  you  better
  specify a  different target file  for the ASF stream.  Otherwise your  old
  file will be overwritten.

* Will   probably   fail  on  copy-protected  streams  using  encryption  or
  authentification protocols.

* Will  fail if the server allows UDP streaming only.  Error message in this
  case:  connect() failed:  CONNREFUSED

* Might  fail on some streams  that make  use of yet unknown extensions or a
  different header layout of the file or streaming protocol.

* Does not show plaintext strings for network errors in the console version.

* The  program  is only working properly for streams up to 4 GB in size.  It
  is  not  possible  to  allow  processing  of  larger  files without losing
  cross-platform (ANSI-C) compatiblity.

* The  time  code  of live streams is not properly decoded.  Now the program
  just  calculates a delta to the time when you zapped into the live stream.
  I  don't  have  the intention to reverse-engineer the date/time format any
  further.

* %-Escape sequences in URLs are not properly handled.

* The  program  might fail to save a stream in batch mode when the file name
  part  of  the  URLs  contain  characters  that  cannot  be handled by your
  computer operating system's file system (?  \ / :  * etc.)

* The  GUI  only  offers  a very simple player interface.  Other players are
  much more powerful and flexible.

* When compiled with GCC, the program does not show its icon in any dialogs,
  although this has been specified  in the .RC resource definition file.  Is
  this a bug in the CygWin resource compiler? Using VC++ this works fine.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 My personal wish list of program-features
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The  following  features  did not make it into this program, because of time
restrictions.   I  wanted  to get a working release on the way as quickly as
possible.  You are welcome to implement these features:

* A  video  preview  area  inside  the  main window (like in Media Player or
  RealPlayer)

* A full screen mode for the video preview and a volume slider.

* Internet URL Drag & Drop support for the main window.

* Tooltips for the buttons/status bar in the main window



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                            Program compilation
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

In  the top  section  of the source file "asfrecorder.c" you will  find some
instructions for compilation on different platforms. The program is known to
compile on Linux, SunOS, CygWin/Windows and Visual C++.

The GUI version can only be built on the Windows platform. You do NOT need a
commercial compiler like MS Visual C++ to build this fancy little program!



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 How to setup the free GCC compiler on Windows
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

There are  two  basic steps  of installation for the  compiler and  required
libraries and it won't cost you a single penny!

1)

Just get the CygWin B20.1 package from Cygnus (it's free!).  It  offers Unix
functionality in Console (aka DOS) windows. You should be used to working in
Unix/Linux environments  in order to feel at home in the  CygWin bash shell.
The CygWin B20.1 package is installed using a setup utility.

I recommend to install the following packages (binary archives only)

* CygWin system and shell
cygwin-1.1.2, ash, bash
* the basic Unix shell tools
fileutils, shellutils, textutils, less, grep, gzip, tar
* tools for displaying and formatting man and info pages
man, groff, texinfo
* The compiler, linker and make utility
binutils, gcc, make

If you are familiar with Unix,  you may want to install some more, depending
on your needs and requirements.

Download  the documents archive (cygwin-docs.tar.gz)  from the Documentation
link on the CygWin home page. I suggest you read the doc "cygwin-ug-net.pdf"
file to get a quick introduction into CygWin and its basic configuration.

2)

Now get the free Win32 headers and libraries  and install these  in your lib
and include directory  (simply by  untar'ing  the archive  into the root '/'
directory)

3)

And now the easy part: Compilation!

After changing  into the  asfrecorder directory,  a single "make"  should be
sufficient to compile my baby in both the GUI and the console version.


Where to get all this fine and free software:
---------------------------------------------

*** Get CygWin B20.1 here:

http://sourceware.cygnus.com/cygwin/

On the FTP mirror sites you will find the "latest" directory. This contains
a file called SETUP.EXE - using this SETUP.EXE you can install the complete
CygWin package either  from internet  or from  the current directory (given
that you downloaded all the packages that are of interest to you)

Just have a look how many unix  tools and applications have  been ported to
the  CygWin  environment! (http://sourceware.cygnus.com/cygwin/ported.html)

*** Get the latest Win32 headers here (required for compilation!)

ftp://ftp.xraylith.wisc.edu/pub/khan/gnu-win32/cygwin/gcc-2.95.2/


Internet resources about using GCC on Windows
----------------------------------------------

For compiling programs that are able to run without the CygWin environment,
use the -mno-cygwin compiler option. A HOWTO text file on this topic can be
downloaded from:

http://www.xraylith.wisc.edu/~khan/software/gnu-win32/mno-cygwin-howto.txt

A very detailed FAQ about mingw is also available from:
http://www.mingw.org/mingwfaq.shtml

Colin Peters offers an  excellent tutorial on  building Win32 programs with
GCC on his hompage (http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Towers/6162/win32.zip)

http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Towers/6162/gcc.html


Did you know that you can even compile DirectX programs and games with GCC?
DirectX 6.1 headers/libraries for GCC are available from:

http://pws.prserv.net/thefortins/cyg-directx.html



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                     Who is the author of this program?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The author is not willing to reveal his identity.

Microsoft  has  already shown that they are not willing to let anyone tamper
with  their  proprietary  ASF  media  format (see the VirtualDub issue).  It
takes an American government to win a court trial against Microsoft.

And  besides  this  source  code  is  really  not  an  example  of excellent
programming style.  So why should it be labelled with my name?

In case anyone ever claims to have programmed this original release, you can
be sure he is a liar. The author  of this program is  never going to  reveal
his identity. And that's for sure.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                What software was used to develop this tool?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

- The  CygWin32  platform   (available for free from Cygnus Solutions, Inc.)

  Used as development environment.  I don't trust VisualC++,  it might leave
  behind some GUIDs and fingerprints in the EXE file.

- GNU C compiler (gcc).

  Used for compilation on Windows and on SUN platform.

- Windows  Packet  capture library and Network Analyzer 2.02  (available for
  free from the University Politecnico di Torino, Italy)

  Used for spying on network protocols and packets.

- frhed

  A  free  (non-shareware,  non-commercial)  HEX editor.  Used for getting a
  peek on streamed and locally stored ASF files.

- Windows Media Player.

  For playing and testing ASF downloaded streams.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                         Other recommended software
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

You  will  find  the  following software on the web using appropriate search
engines like AltaVista and FTP search.

- VirtualDub 1.3c (try "virtual dub" and "virtualdub" in the search engines)

  allows conversion of ASF files to AVI format.  This is no software that is
  easy  to use.  Important:  The current version 1.3d no longer supports the
  ASF file format. So get the 1.3c version  (not available from the author's
  web site anymore)

- Shuffler Music converter (available on www.illustrate.org)

  allows transcoding of WMA files to MP3 (might not work with copy-protected
  content, but most providers do not set the copyright bit in their streams)
  You may need to rename ASF streams to WMA for transcoding them. This  tool
  is open source as well (for Borland CPP). The  tool  can  rip  audio  data
  from combined audio/video streams, but generally takes too much  processor
  time (makes system unusable during conversion).
  
- PAM (available on http://pam.au-ja.de/, also listed on CNETs winfiles.com)

  Nice audio/video player.  Supports ASF video. Has playlist  management and
  can be "skinned" like WinAmp. It's free software. A slight disadvantage is
  the fact that it was written in VisualBasic and is sometimes slow.

- WinAmp (get it on www.winamp.com)

  for playing streaming  or downloaded WMAs and ASFs,  however this  tool is
  limited to audio. Video in ASFs will be ignored.

- DivX video codec (a hacked version of Microsofts MPEG 4 video codec).

  Records  and  plays  MPEG4  data  to/from  AVI files.  Could be useful for
  transcoding the ASF files to different formats.  Writing a transcoder does
  require  a profound programming  knowledge  and further re-engineering  of
  the ASF format.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                   Recommended streaming media web sites
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

www.windowsmedia.com - for  a  comprehensive  selection of streaming Windows
                       media content on the web.  Links to many other sites.

www.centerseat.com   - offers music videos, movie  trailers  and much  more.

www.vidnet.com       - for streaming music videos  and movie trailers etc...
                       See text file  "CONTENT_ON_VIDNET.TXT"  for  details!

www.streambox.com    - a search engine and catalog for streaming media files
                       on the web. The majority  of content is  for the Real
                       Player,  but  you   can  also  find  downloadable ASF
                       streams there.

www.sonixradio.de    - pretty cool audio streams (techno mixes  from various
                       DJ's), 32kbit/sec WMA stereo. Approximately 1 hour or
                       12-16 MB per stream.

www.jamtv.tunes.com  - This site rocks! Excellent  broadband  music  videos,
                       live streams and webcast archives. Be sure  to check
                       out the "videos / broadband videos" section! See the
                       text file "CONTENT_ON_JAMTV.TXT" for details.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                      Does this program have a future?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yes,  definitely.   The  sourcecode is available and I hope many programmers
will try and improve this program.  Just some ideas and recommendations:

* Please  support  this  program  on  your  home  page.   Spread, upload and
  distribute it as quickly as you can.  Please keep the distribution archive
  UNINFECTED of any viruses and backdoors.

* Can  _you_  do it with Real Networks?  Who does the first working release?
  Let's  start  a  contest!   You  will  only  have to rewrite or expand the
  networking   code.    The  GUI  already  exists  -  it  only  needs  minor
  modifications.

* Translate  this  README.TXT to your native language.  Translate the GUI to
  your native language.  I am sorry  for not using unicode  for the strings.
  Also, I did not put all the strings into the resource file. Oops.

* Add  code  for a cool Macintosh or X11 (KDE) GUI.  Now as Media Player 6.3
  beta  is available  for Mac, a  Macintosh  port of ASFRecorder is a really
  cool idea.

* Write a Media player clone or a Media player shell with a record button.

* Write a proxy server for pre-recorded streaming content.  It could be used
  at universities and network backbones to reduce network traffic a lot.

* Write a better GUI than mine and add a media mangement tool for downloaded
  content (like RealJukebox or MusicMatch Jukebox).

* Monitor  UDP  traffic and adapt this program to the UDP streaming protocol
  used  by  Microsoft.   I am pretty sure the data frame format must be very
  similar to the one used in HTTP streaming.  Recording UDP data requires to
  arrange  incoming  packets  in the right order before saving (use the seq.
  number  for  sorting).   Packet loss could be compensated by re-requesting
  any missing portions of the stream.

* Write  your  own - maybe platform independend - streaming media server for
  HTTP and/or UDP streaming Windows Media content (wow, what a nightmare for
  Microsoft),  although I don't really see a point in it.  The RTSP protocol
  is  an open, non-proprietary streaming protocol standard and probably much
  better.

* Modify  the  source  code to simultaneously request several fragments of a
  single  stream.   This  allows  faster  access to this stream, allowing to
  download at any multiple of the stream's original data rate (assuming your
  own and the content provider's internet connection offers enough bandwith)

* If  you  are  the hacker-type guy, then you might be interested in finding
  more vulnerabilities in the Windows Media format (clearing copyright bits,
  breaking authentification and encryption, hacking windows media DLLs etc)

* Write  a  transcoding tool (WMA to MP3, ASF/WMV to AVI or MPEG).  However,
  be  warned:   If  you base this work on Microsoft's Windows Media or Audio
  SDK,  you  are violating their SDK lincense conditions.  If you don't base
  your  work  on thir SDKs, you might get in conflict Microsoft's patents on
  the  ASF  file  format.   However I doubt that patents describing a simple
  file/  frame  format  are  valid  in  every  country  or could be enforced
  everywhere.



And finally...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
  You have the permission to use my source code as a base for shareware or
commercial development (It may be up to you to fight it out with Microsoft).

                        May the source be with you.
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                 Don't expect my name or signature here ;-)