We're now counting down the hours to the kickoff of Super Bowl 50, which begins at 6:30PM EST when the Denver Broncos meet with the Carolina Panthers in Santa Clara, California. The fact that the big game is carried by network TV was a problem a few years ago for anyone who had cut the cord, but those days are changing and doing so quickly.

These days you have options that weren't available in those earlier times. In fact, it's not even just the game, but the halftime show and even the commercials, which sometimes become the real star of the game.

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Legalities aside, there is one problem with content made available through the likes of the Pirate Bay. Whether you use traditional torrents or magnet links, you'll (usually) need to wait for a download to complete before you can enjoy the movie, show, or album of your choice. But not anymore.

A new beta feature for the world-famous torrent site makes it possible to stream videos without the need to download them first. By integrating the Torrents-Time plugin, the Pirate Bay now includes a Stream It option for all video torrents.

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Sunday is it. The big day will be here as the Denver Broncos take on the Carolina Panthers. Peyton Manning squares off against the up and coming Cam Newton in a showdown for the coveted Lombardi Trophy, first hoisted into the air by the Green Bay Packers back in 1967, three years before the legendary namesake passed away.

Fast-forward 40-plus years and we've arrived at that day again, though this time the game will be held in a more temperate climate, as that is now the way the league wants it to be. No more frozen tundra, but weather more suitable to fans and media.

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In the time since Amazon launched its Fire TV and Echo devices the two have continued to receive updates steadily. Both are popular products with a growing following of customers and remain near the top of Amazon sales rankings.

Now the Fire TV has graduated to generation two, and with that update came integration with Amazon Echo. The company, at the time, promised to bring this functionality to the first generation version of the set-top box and now it is doing just that.

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Roku is always adding new channels, the store is jam-packed now. You can even watch the upcoming Super Bowl using the new CBS Sports app the device recently added. All of these options leave it more difficult for users to find the content they want.

Now the set-top box maker is trying to fix that problem, at least to some degree. To ease the pain Roku is expanding its search capability to encompass more channels.

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Streaming services come and go, and some remain popular or even grow over time. Giving the users the ability to create and manage stations is a great idea, allowing anyone to become the radio DJ, perhaps a fantasy of many people, is an even bigger ambition.

The greatest option for this has been Live365, a service started back in 1999, in the early days of streaming. It brought the world of online radio to the masses and made it easy to create your own station.

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Just last week Netflix announced plans to clamp down on VPNs and proxy tools. In what appears to be a move to please license holders the company has already started to impose new restrictions.

Some Netflix customers in Autralia who are using the uFlix VPN have noticed that their access to Netflix has been denied. Attempting to access Netflix using the tool results in an error message being displayed: "You seem to be using an unblocker or proxy. Please turn off any of these services and try again". But this is not the end of the story.

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iHeartRadio, a leading provider of streaming music, has numerous stations customers can listen to either on the web or through mobile apps. It's a popular service in a crowded streaming market. In fact, it even sponsors a major music festival each year in Las Vegas, the most recent taking place back in September.

What sort of follower-base does putting on a show with big name artists take? Obviously there's a lot behind it, aside from followers -- contracts with artists and radio stations, for example.

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The big game isn't far off, though we don't yet know which two teams will square off. The field is, however, narrowed down to four contenders. Will the Broncos or Patriots win? Can the Cardinals triumph in Carolina? Those questions will be answered soon and subsequently followed by two weeks of hype.

If you've disconnected your cable or satellite service and are wondering how you will catch the big game then Roku has a solution for you.

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It's that time of the year. Campaign season, like the holiday shopping season, seems to begin earlier all the time. It's fascinating in some inexplicable way, but then again people slow down to look at car wrecks also. Regardless of who you are throwing your vote behind, it's good to watch the seemingly endless debates to get a feel for each candidate in the presidential election. And with Iowa right around the corner it's crunch time.

Tonight is the final Democratic debate and, unlike the plethora of folks on stage in the Republican contests, there are only three to focus on. We won't go into the good and bad of any of them, that's personal opinion and you should make up your own mind.

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The NFL playoff games continue this weekend with some big contests including some of the hot teams. Those games require viewers to have cable or satellite TV, or do they? If you have a Roku device then there is a work-around to watch at least a couple of games.

Who will win it all? You'll need to watch the games to find out. Roku's CBS Sports Channel will bring them to you. Obviously this only brings you the AFC games, but that's at least half of the weekend. Today you can catch the Steelers and Broncos at 4:40 ET.

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Netflix is set to clamp down on VPNs and proxy tools used to access its services. A large proportion of Netflix content is region specific, and to get around licensing issues it has become increasingly common for people to spoof their location so they can watch their desired videos.

Netflix says it is doing what it can to ensure that people around the world have access to the same content, but until this is officially the case, the company is looking to enforce geographic restrictions more stringently. In the coming weeks, anyone who uses a proxy is likely to find it impossible to access content that is not licensed for viewing in their country.

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The wild card games are out of the way now and this weekend the NFL heads into the next round to find out which teams will square off in the respective championship matchups. Can the Patriots repeat? It's hard to say, especially since the squad limped into the playoffs, though a first week bye may have provided some recovery time.

If you aren't near a TV then you can still catch all of the action from Peyton Manning, Tom Brady and the rest. You'll be doing so via the radio broadcasts, but that's not too bad since you'll still have a play by play coverage option.

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Following exhaustive tests, a BBC research team has confirmed that the H.265/HEVC video compression standard offers huge bitrate savings compared to H.264/AVC. The BBC R&D video coding research team focused primarily on UHD content and found bitrate savings of up to 50 percent.

With more and more content being streamed, and increasing demand for high definition and UHD content, finding ways to most efficiently deliver video will become increasingly important. The study found that greater savings were possible with larger pictures -- something the corporation says is key to the future of UHD delivery.

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It has taken a while to sink in, but on 11 January the world became a sadder and duller place following the death of David Bowie. As fan around the world struggled to come to terms with the tragic and untimely loss, they turned to the one things they all have in common -- Bowie's music.

At turns an artist, actor, poet, digital pioneer, style icon, and cultural behemoth, Bowie was predominantly a musician. His (as it turned out) final album, Blackstar was released just days before his death, and the lyrics and video for the second single from the album -- Lazarus -- took on a new, beautiful and heart-wrenching meaning. Bowie meant a lot to people the world over, and the level of affection felt for the ever-inventive musical chameleon can be seen by the surge in digital downloads and streams of his albums on the likes of Spotify and iTunes.

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