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Dependencies:

HTML::Entities, MP3::Info and HTTP:Cookies, from cpan (aside: you might want to download LWP on CPAN to stop it whining, but maybe avoid updating it unless you can leave it overnight, with a squirrel pressing enter every couple of hours)
flvstreamer (install with “make posix; mv flvstreamer rtmpsrv rtmpsuck streams /usr/local/bin/” as root)
FFmpeg (not strictly necessary, used to convert the flv file format into something more mainstream, like mp4)
- yasm (not the faintest idea what this is)

If you get the error:

WARNING: Running the updater again to obtain plugins.
ERROR: /usr/local/bin/get_iplayer is not writable - aborting update (maybe a package manager was used to install get_iplayer?)

the first time you run it, you need to run once as root to allow it to update its plugins. However, it may install them in the wrong place – in ~/.get_iplayer/plugins, when it will subsequently look in /usr/share/get_iplayer/plugins – so you may need to move them afterwards or symlink. Then you should be able to run get_iplayer as an ordinary user without it attempting to update.

flvstreamer

flvstreamer and rtmpdump are alternatives. This time I've had quicker success with rtmpdump than flvstreamer. To switch between the two, set the path to the preferred executable in ~/.get_iplayer/options:

flvstreamer /usr/local/bin/rtmpdump

Note that warnings about SWF verification aren't necessarily fatal.

Non-descript errors

I got very undescriptive errors when I tried to download to non-existent directories. Note this can also be set in ~/.get_iplayer/options so if you copied that across it might be screwing you.