FIX RTSP ACCESS IN FIREFOX AND OTHER NON-IE BROWSERS
by M. Blevins

There’s a little bit of magic that web-browsers perform in order to correctly forward instructions about special MIME-types (represented by the letters that appear to the left of the first colon (:) you see in a web-address [usually http for most standard web-pages]). However, because of various draconic presumptions by content-providers and the companies that make web-browsers, forwarding of this information DOESN’T ALWAYS HAPPEN AS EXPECTED (C-SPAN’s often invoked RTSP streams, for example, are readable ONLY by the proprietary RealPlayer software (available for free from REAL, but not installed automatically with Windows, and also frequently disabled by the Windows Update Software, or other programs, if you aren’t careful).

If you can’t open RTSP streams with your browser, you may have to install RealPlayer (or re-install, in some cases…obnoxious, but true). Don’t try to understand the problem—just accept that the world isn’t a perfect place, and install (or re-install) RealPlayer.