Oh yes, I'm certainly familiar with Antennaweb. Unfortunately it's pretty tricky for me to install an antenna where I currently am.. first because trees along the sidewalk will block the signal, and secondly since I don't want to install a permanently-mounted antenna at a place I'm only going to be staying at for another 8 months or so.
You know, I take back that first statement. There were two "rootkit" stories printed on Monday, and I, like a few others probably, got the two of them mixed up. I was thinking of the MS USB key story where the key software created hidden/inaccessible folders. Now that's something to get annoyed about. SecuROM only creates a few reg keys that can't be deleted? Well that's simply sloppy because it makes the registery an unmaintainable mess, but it's par for the course in the history of that database.
Sorry, but Sony deserves the bashing for making SecuROM in the first place, not just as a copy protection technology but because it creates folders that standard utilities can't see and that other Malware could exploit. Much like with situation with the rootkits distributed with audio CDs, it's not so much maliciousness on the part of Sony as it is with the danger posed by malware writers taking advantage of unintended consequences.
While it's certainly fashionable to bash Sony these days, they have brought much of the pain upon themselves. I still like their audio components though (receivers, amps, etc) and if they ever give the PS3 a reasonable price discount I might go for that too.
Um. Okay. I guess they aren't mandatory. Unless, you know, you want to drive. Which nearly everyone in this country needs to do to survive. Why is entering a public park any more of a right than driving on the public highway?
Because driving is an activity that is inherently dangerous to the safety of others if you don't know what you're doing. States don't license drivers because it's fun, they license drivers because supposedly that's a way to weed out people who, if they got behind the wheel, don't know forward from reverse or can't see the street signs. Entering a public park is not an inherently dangerous activity.
Seriously, I think I know what you mean about "geek syndrome." A lot of us do have a tendency to see some issues as "my way is 100% correct, and any other way is 100% wrong."
Hell, you even see it with the geek's entertainment, whether it be arguing about Star Wars or failing to realize that Monty Python and the Holy Grail isn't funny when the geek retells it.
There is one true way to fix this mess: their countries should be invaded, their leaders shot, their priests jailed and reeducated, and their populace converted to Christianity.
OTA-HD looks great.. as long as you have signal. If it gets a little stormy, or a little foggy, or the tree out in front sways a little, or someone runs through the room and throws off the perfect alignment of your antenna, then you're SOL. I live across the bay from Sutro Tower in SF and I get pretty good reception when the rabbit ears are perfectly aligned. Of course, this means that they have to stay in the only large southwest-facing window, and you'd better not TOUCH the blinds at any point when the HD DVR might be recording, since that will mess with the signal. And oh, you'd better hope the signal is 100% clean, because if not MythTV will choke on it. I love MythTV for SD cable recordings, but it likes non-broken streams, and only non-broken streams. A glitch in the recording signal makes MythTV freak out in a state it doesn't recover from unless you save position, exit the stream, and then restart from the saved spot. I've gotten so sick of messing around with this sort of thing and having to scan the recording signal to see what exact angle works best that I'm considering dumping it all for an HD tivo.
Even good movies are far, far better when watched on a high-definition display.
Go to a good-quality theater with a 70mm projector when they screen Lawrence of Arabia and you'll see how it blows even the home theater experience away. Of course, that's not the easiest thing to find, a theater nearby in San Francisco plays older classics in 70mm sometimes. YMMV.
this gives it incredible power to say to other studios you do it our way or no one sees your movies
Not... really, no. There's no way Sony can make arbitrary demands based on their control of a standard that is mostly open. The requirements for Blue-Ray are out in the open.
Until very recently, although it was dead in the consumer world, Beta decks were extremely popular in the movie industry (if something wasn't recorded directly onto 35mm film, it was recorded onto a Beta tape) and no one really complained. Well, other than "why haven't we gone digital yet?"
they'd probably have 50% market penetration in 2 years.
>.
Actually, from what I had heard, porn makers don't want to have to increase the quality of their current works now -- porn looks worse in HD than it does in DVD, not better. The only time they like high-res images are with static shots that can be photoshopped.
But what do you do in the situation of families whose house/estate is basically their only asset? This was especially true in the case of the housing bubble where the value of homes rose and rose to ridiculous levels until, especially in certain areas, a house which was bought rather cheaply a few decades ago would be consider very expensive under the estate tax. Maybe now that the bubble is bursting the situations might change again..
Calling the Governator overly conservative is quite a stretch. As another poster hinted, Arnold is more in the vein of 60's and 70's Republicans rather the neo-cons of the Reagan/Bush era. His biggest problem with the California Legislature at the moment is that he gets better results working with the Democrats than he does with the Republicans who don't think he's conservative enough. And the bill's author and primary sponsor is Leland Yee, a Democrat who's clueless about games, hardly a right-wing figure.
When it comes to media censorship, the Democrats have not had a stellar track record.
Actually, you don't own the contents of the delivery media. You own a license to utilize said contents.
Incorrect. You own the contents, you do not, however, own the copyright. Of course the EULA will say differently, they're documents to convince you to voluntarily give up ownership control. With computer software, you own the contents of the discs (but again, not the copyright), but you really can't do anything with it until you agree, through the EULA, to relinquish your ownership rights. When you click that agree button, things get a little murky. Some courts have ruled they're valid contracts, but there's still the unsettled question of whether they're adhesion contracts.
All the ones that are runner ups have albums, and the winners get albums, etc.
Actually I would say the American Idol runner-ups are often quite better than the eventual winners. This last season is a perfect example where the third place winner, Melinda Doolittle, far out-classed the 1st and 2nd-place contestants. She gave some.. pretty amazing performances, better than any I'd seen in my somewhat spotty viewing history for the show, and better than the "professional" musical acts you'll see hyped so much. She was older than the other two though, and the Idol voters skew young and superficial, so they went with the less talented 17-year old and a boy who was outclassed by them both. Yeah, so.. ignore the winners' albums. The runner-ups are usually better musicians but might not always match up to the "teen pop star" ideal.
There's a difference though. They've designed the product to work in such a way that prevents me from using competitors supplies. However, once I've purchased their product, I'm free to do whatever I want to it, including workarounds to use third-party supplies.
Actually, the printer example the grandparent used was probably a reference to Lexmark's invocation of the DMCA to stop third parties from making toner cartridges that were compatible with Lexmark printers. As well, the DMCA was invoked to crack down on XBOX mod chips which allow you to play third-party games, backup games, and pirated games. The XBOX action was allowed to stand, but after Lexmark won a preliminary injunction, their suit was tossed.
They might be a little more charitable if someone could come up with a modchip that let you load an alternative OS on the device but didn't allow for pirated games. I don't see how that would even be possible though, so they'll continue to bust mod-chip makers as long as those chips facilitate copyright infringement.
"In the early Seventies there were at least ten albums released every week that were fantastic. [...] Now you're lucky to find ten albums a year of that quality."
Umm... no there weren't, not in the early 70s or any other era I can think of. Elton needs to put down the rose-colored glasses for awhile.
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Wasn't that the 2600 defense too?
Even a stopped watch is right twice a day.
Oh yes, I'm certainly familiar with Antennaweb. Unfortunately it's pretty tricky for me to install an antenna where I currently am.. first because trees along the sidewalk will block the signal, and secondly since I don't want to install a permanently-mounted antenna at a place I'm only going to be staying at for another 8 months or so.
You know, I take back that first statement. There were two "rootkit" stories printed on Monday, and I, like a few others probably, got the two of them mixed up. I was thinking of the MS USB key story where the key software created hidden/inaccessible folders. Now that's something to get annoyed about. SecuROM only creates a few reg keys that can't be deleted? Well that's simply sloppy because it makes the registery an unmaintainable mess, but it's par for the course in the history of that database.
While it's certainly fashionable to bash Sony these days, they have brought much of the pain upon themselves. I still like their audio components though (receivers, amps, etc) and if they ever give the PS3 a reasonable price discount I might go for that too.
Because driving is an activity that is inherently dangerous to the safety of others if you don't know what you're doing. States don't license drivers because it's fun, they license drivers because supposedly that's a way to weed out people who, if they got behind the wheel, don't know forward from reverse or can't see the street signs. Entering a public park is not an inherently dangerous activity.
Hell, you even see it with the geek's entertainment, whether it be arguing about Star Wars or failing to realize that Monty Python and the Holy Grail isn't funny when the geek retells it.
Ah, the good old days...
Go to a good-quality theater with a 70mm projector when they screen Lawrence of Arabia and you'll see how it blows even the home theater experience away. Of course, that's not the easiest thing to find, a theater nearby in San Francisco plays older classics in 70mm sometimes. YMMV.
Not... really, no. There's no way Sony can make arbitrary demands based on their control of a standard that is mostly open. The requirements for Blue-Ray are out in the open.
Until very recently, although it was dead in the consumer world, Beta decks were extremely popular in the movie industry (if something wasn't recorded directly onto 35mm film, it was recorded onto a Beta tape) and no one really complained. Well, other than "why haven't we gone digital yet?"
Ah, HTML filter. I was trying to make a wincy face there, but no such luck.
>. Actually, from what I had heard, porn makers don't want to have to increase the quality of their current works now -- porn looks worse in HD than it does in DVD, not better. The only time they like high-res images are with static shots that can be photoshopped.
Not really. The porn industry is content with DVD and doesn't actually want an HD format. Porn at HD is not necessarily a good thing.
But what do you do in the situation of families whose house/estate is basically their only asset? This was especially true in the case of the housing bubble where the value of homes rose and rose to ridiculous levels until, especially in certain areas, a house which was bought rather cheaply a few decades ago would be consider very expensive under the estate tax. Maybe now that the bubble is bursting the situations might change again..
Well it's still near-instant death if you make the mistake of holding your breath. Not so much with the exploding bodies though..
When it comes to media censorship, the Democrats have not had a stellar track record.
Because only those capable of actually caring for their children should be having them.
New York City is for rich yuppies. If you are not a rich yuppie, then why are you there? It's just too expensive a place to live.
Incorrect. You own the contents, you do not, however, own the copyright. Of course the EULA will say differently, they're documents to convince you to voluntarily give up ownership control. With computer software, you own the contents of the discs (but again, not the copyright), but you really can't do anything with it until you agree, through the EULA, to relinquish your ownership rights. When you click that agree button, things get a little murky. Some courts have ruled they're valid contracts, but there's still the unsettled question of whether they're adhesion contracts.
Actually I would say the American Idol runner-ups are often quite better than the eventual winners. This last season is a perfect example where the third place winner, Melinda Doolittle, far out-classed the 1st and 2nd-place contestants. She gave some.. pretty amazing performances, better than any I'd seen in my somewhat spotty viewing history for the show, and better than the "professional" musical acts you'll see hyped so much. She was older than the other two though, and the Idol voters skew young and superficial, so they went with the less talented 17-year old and a boy who was outclassed by them both. Yeah, so.. ignore the winners' albums. The runner-ups are usually better musicians but might not always match up to the "teen pop star" ideal.
There's a difference though. They've designed the product to work in such a way that prevents me from using competitors supplies. However, once I've purchased their product, I'm free to do whatever I want to it, including workarounds to use third-party supplies.
Actually, the printer example the grandparent used was probably a reference to Lexmark's invocation of the DMCA to stop third parties from making toner cartridges that were compatible with Lexmark printers. As well, the DMCA was invoked to crack down on XBOX mod chips which allow you to play third-party games, backup games, and pirated games. The XBOX action was allowed to stand, but after Lexmark won a preliminary injunction, their suit was tossed.
They might be a little more charitable if someone could come up with a modchip that let you load an alternative OS on the device but didn't allow for pirated games. I don't see how that would even be possible though, so they'll continue to bust mod-chip makers as long as those chips facilitate copyright infringement.
"In the early Seventies there were at least ten albums released every week that were fantastic. [...] Now you're lucky to find ten albums a year of that quality."
Umm... no there weren't, not in the early 70s or any other era I can think of. Elton needs to put down the rose-colored glasses for awhile.