What is FoV? Why Does it Not Seem to Work?

I can't get FoV files to play. I am not alone. Tens of thousands of others have had the same complaint. They download a video then find out that it does not work in any of their media players. The first thing anyone does in this situation is use the Internet to try and find out how to use this file. And the problem here is that the FoV file does not seem to exist. There is currently no existing FoV media player. And yet thousands of torrents for FoV files have flooded the Internet. Someone must be playing them. And for so many to exist there must be a demand for them.

A bit of history here. The first practical media players showed up in 1991, the Windows Media Player for PC's and Apple's Quicktime for the Macintosh. This was followed by the Real Player in 1995, and the DivX in 1998. Each player played files that only worked on their respective players, but inevitably updates were made available that allowed videos designed for one player to work in another. DVD movie burner devices like Nero needed to be able to translate any video file into DVD files and the first media converters were programmed. As more media players and codecs were invented it became common practice to need to download new software or update your current player in order to play the latest file extension. In the early 00's those downloading videos were stumped by zipped files such as .rar. These files had been compressed for better storage but would need a program to convert them back into the larger readable files. Many thought that .rar files were some new codec and unsuccessfully attempted to view them in their respective media players. There was a definite learning curve when it came to videos, as well as a lot of new software that needed to be installed to play or decode the latest files.

Whenever I downloaded a weird new file that was unplayable I would usually send it to the trash bin. That is up until it was something I really wanted to see. When that was the case then I would go to the trouble of finding the file extension on the Internet and after a quick debate on adding yet another program to my computer would end up installing a new media player, codec, unpacking program, DVD burner, media converter program, etc. No such luck though with the FoV's. No web site seems to have any information on them. Look up the definition and what comes back is that it is shorthand for "field of view", a technical term used by photographers to describe the zone that can be picked up by the lens. In other words the field of view of a camera is everything in front of the lens and nothing behind the lens or to the extreme left and right. This sounds like nothing to do with video files. If FoV was a legitimate file extension then something should turn up when I put the word into Google. I should be finding a FoV player, or codecs, or decoder, or something. If someone commercially released FoV encoding then they would need the decoding software easy to find. But no such software turns up on Google, even in their sponsored links. No interfacing software seems to exist, so therefor FoV can not possibly be a legitimate file extension.

Aside from several references to "field of view" the only FoV references I can find on the Internet is a few links to message boards where the stumped ask other board members if anyone knows how to play the files. Several suggestions are given but none seem to work. Some suggest that FoV is another zip file program that needs to be unpacked before it can be used. This is not the case. Others suggest simply changing the file extension to .wmv or some other player they have. Once again no such luck. One of the best suggestions as to what FoV stands for was that it was actually the tag name of the hacker who originally seeded the video and not some sort of codec. I am not sure this is true as I have found files marked FoV for both shows coming out of the U.K. and the U.S. If FoV is the name of a single person then how is he getting shows broadcast in both countries? Not over the Internet as the FoV files turn up days before playable files show up. Is it possible FoV is a tag for several hackers? An underground international organization? And is it possible these hackers have encoded these videos with a secret codec that only they possess so that only their members can play and decode these videos? Well, not likely. There are such things as secret underground organized hacking clubs who trade videos that they only want their members to have access to. But these guys keep their files secret by giving them alternative names. Lets say this organization got their hands on the latest Harry Potter movie. They would not name the file Harry Potter but something like Snotty Wizard Kid. The members would tell each other through emails and texts and such that the Harry Potter file will be available for download but under the name Snotty Wizard Kid, something no one else would think of looking for and thus something that does not get deleted by the hosting website.

Not finding any answers by searching Google I attempt to find out myself what exactly the FoV file is. I put it into a very good media converter which simply does not recognize it. I then turn to a free online media converter site which is kept up to date with the latest formats, but once again it is unable to recognize FoV. I am beginning to think that maybe FoV is some sort of junk file. As I recall, a few years back junk files were created by record labels and movie studios that wanted to try to block illegal downloading of their product. Someone would download a fake file for the latest Britney Spears single only to find that it was blank. By this time this was discovered others would have already downloaded the file from then and eventually the majority of Britney Spears files being traded would be fake making the real file hard to find. This did not work as well for movies that took hours to download. This did not put a dent into illegal downloads and the practice was eventually abandoned. The FoV is not exactly a junk file as it does not play. A junk file would have been a recognizable extension that when downloaded plays a blank screen. This is an unrecognizable file. So is this the same junk file trick all over again? This time with a twist where the file will not even play? Could be. My suggestion is this, do not download what you can not play. You want to download a file extension which you have codecs for on one of your media players. And if the person or persons uploading FoV files onto the Internet turns out to be legitimately attempting to do it with some sort of advanced program, he or she should recognize that most people are finding FoV impossible to play.