[rspencer]

Originally Posted by sonofedg

What are the Specs for Dime Webcasts?

We don't base our standards on other sites. There are things DIME allows that we do not, and vice versa. But, to answer your question, here's the gist (DIME doesn't have a well-defined policy either):

Regarding digital stream sources

Note: This section pertains to captures of streamed digital audio sources such as satellite broadcasts, webcasts, HD Radio, and the audio portion of digital television dish reception. See elsewhere on this page for policies covering material already captured or circulating as lossy digital files or the audio content of a digital video file or of a video on DVD.

Nearly all digital broadcasts and webcasts carry lossily compressed content. For some examples, broadcasts bearing acronyms such as DVB, DAB, and ADR or carried on networks like Sky Digital and Freeview are lossily compressed digital streams. Despite being lossy, they may be shared on DIME, provided that

No higher-bitrate digicast source is known to be at the trading community's disposal;
The description on the torrent's page and the internal info file of the torrent state both the compression format and the bit rate of the broadcast stream;
and
either ...

Preferably, the lossily compressed material is shared in its original compressed format, even if that prevents dividing it into tracks;
or
If the stream was transmitted at a bit rate of 192 kb/s or greater (for spoken [but music-related] content, 64 kb/s or greater), it may be shared in a conversion to a lossless compression format.

This provision is a special relaxation of DIME's standard losslessness requirement. If the bit rate and the codec are not stated, or if the torrent's information does not acknowledge its descent from a digital stream, then it does not qualify for this relaxation, and if the material proves lossy, the torrent may be banned for lossiness or lack of information or both.