The developer behind the innovative add-on cCloud has kindly taken the time out to answer some questions about him and his add-on. Bane has been trying to get the community involved in updating and maintaining his IPTV service by creating a simple framework which allows users to input streams they have found by copying and pasting the streams and uploading them.
First of all Bane, tell me a little bit about yourself, what’s your background?
I’m human being just like everyone else. Though the name Bane could be fiction there is real human being in background who is trying to bring change to the world of IPTV whilst working 2 jobs and barely having enough time to sleep. I come from IT background where I work with normal users, where simplicity is the key for everything. So in my free time I try to build some tools for users to enable a more user friendly experience.
How long have you been using Kodi?
Well not long. I was first introduced into Kodi when it was known as XBMC at the beginning of 2015. Around at that time I was going through some financial issues where by affording cable was not an option any more. So I did some research on IPTV services, but I found the them not to be stable or user friendly for every day users. However over time Kodi was updated and with custom builds it has brought a more user friendly experience to Kodi. One key thing about XBMC/Kodi is that you have to stay up to date with everything or else users will struggle on getting updated media. Although Kodi is effectively a media player which allows users to install third party add-ons, a lot of developers have brought good entertainment media into the Kodi player so yes user experience has been improving slowly. A big thanks to all of the developers who have been part of it.
What made you bring cCloud to the Kodi platform?
Users have been a big part of bringing cCloud TV on Kodi. Ever since the first version of cCloud TV was released I have had a lots of users requesting a plugin for Kodi. So one day around the time we were working on cCloud TV v0.6 PREVIEW, I decided to look into Kodi and the same day I was able to convert the cCloud TV’s data into a m3u playlist every 12 hours. So once it was launched Podgod took over the development for building the official cCloud TV addon for Kodi. Around that time our data solution was still work in progress so it was not as stable as it is now with cCloud TV Framework.
Could you give us a history of cCloud, what were its origins, how did it come about?
I was inspired by the way YouTube works on multiple platforms so sometime in 2014 I came up with the idea to build something similar, where the idea for streaming media content was just click, play and stream. Another thing I had in my mind was to give users control over rather than me. Before I work on any project, I always try to get as much feedback as possible.
Once I have received feedback I spent first 6 months testing and coding on multiple platforms where I tried to make everything user friendly as possible and then the time came when cCloud Movies v0.1 was released.
A guy called Superman then joined. Together as team we tried to build great movie content where same rules have been followed since day one. The rule being that any media will based on links that can be found anywhere on the web. After the cCloud Movies was released we pushed an update for cCloud TV Shows where work was in progress and then i decided to work on cCloud Music where the idea was to bring a platform for new musicians to share their music on. So I had over 100 musicians signed to the project but around that time I had some financial problems where affording cable was not an option. So I was searching for a good stable IPTV service without any ads, pop ups, signups across multiple platforms. No matter what I tried live tv was not stable.
However after a serious amount of research, I found IPTV links everywhere but you had to be expert in IPTV to understand how to use those IPTV links. The IPTV links have been around for years but they have never been user friendly. So I decided that day, if I can’t find it I will build the solution myself. I spent about 2 weeks building cCloud TV where I added support using VLC player within web browser. After cCloud Tv was launched, the traffic increased by 100% everyday. The project was just experimental but I saw users were looking for same answer I was. The time came where I had to drop all of the projects and just focused on cCloud TV. Around the time of testing I had awesome helper named Batman join the team as well. After the second week of launch, cCloud TV was featured on major blogs. The news was exciting but at same time legal issues occured although it was my fault for not explaning how cCloud really works. I was planning to drop the project but users didn’t let me so I decided that to continue working on the project just for the users. Just like everyone else we all make mistakes so yes I have made many in the project but have learned from mistakes. I have stopped the project multiple times but came back same day for users because they all were seeing hope in this IPTV. I had a user tell me “Rome wasn’t build in one day” first kind of surprised me and now it keeps me motivated since built cCloud TV service wasn’t built in a one day. It will take time to improve and patience is they key for everything. The biggest challenge is to unite the community. I would like to thank Superman, Batman, cCloud Superheroes, Birds,Sweepers, CID/OnDemand, users, the iVue team, everyone and my brothers CA and Podgod who has been a big support on building better project for the future of IPTV.
Now we recently did a blog on a new and innovative idea that you are trying to get people involved in, can you go into a bit more detail?
cCloud TV-Community Cloud TV. Reality is we all want free stable IPTV service but some users are not aware of how the IPTV services works, neither do they understand the real reason why some IPTV services come and go. So I have written IPTV 101 including how community can help each other to build free stable IPTV service for the long term at the following link www.tiny.cc/ccloudchc.
There are multiple ways community can help the cCloud project and the only skills helpers will need are just basic copying and pasting. Best of all users can help at anytime they want since we use cloud system/services users can help from anywhere around the world. If you would like to help, Please feel free to send me email at ccloudus@gmail.com with subject “here to help” thanks:)
What are you trying to accomplish with cCloud and where would you like to see it this time next year?
I’m just trying to bring change for stable IPTV service. If we all work together as community by end of 2016, We can help our family and friends to cut the cord, especially the ones who are struggling on paying cable bills. Since cCloud platform works on multiple platforms users can stream media on almost any device and stream media from all around the world.
I’m trying to build a cCloud TV one stop for all types of media. Hopefully by end of 2016, We as community can accomplish the dream for stable IPTV service we all have been dreaming of, which is the future of IPTV, built by the community for everyone around the world.
Outside of cCloud what do you think is good about the Kodi Community?
Community is awesome however some users are struggling to find help. Users are looking for a one stop for everything hopefully soon cCloud TV service will solve all of the problems.
And finally do you have any future projects that you are looking at bringing to the community?
cCloud project in itself has been involved in multiple projects it self. So community help is always needed. We are trying slowly to evolve database projects, cleaning it in multiple ways and we are adding new features to the database every month so community help will always be needed.
Kodicommunity would like to express their thanks to Bane for taking the time to answer these questions. You can find more information on cCloud here. Credit to Caz Wallace for the video.