True, but hard drives are so large nowadays that it shouldn't be a problem. Apparently, it takes 8-10GB per hour of 1080p recording. This means a 1TB hard drive will record about 100 hours of programming. Not too shabby and you could always disconnect the hard drive, connect it to a computer, and compress the recording in some fashion (e.g. MP4) to save it long-term without taking up tons of space.
You pretty much answered your own question. In the not-too-distant past, if you wanted video entertainment, you went to the "giants." If you wanted to see a show that was on at 6PM on Tuesday, you sat in front of the TV at 6PM on Tuesday. They controlled what you watched and when.
Then came VCRs, DVRs, the Internet and other disruptive technologies. Slowly but surely, their control was pried away from them. They could no longer guarantee that people watching a show would be sitting in front of the TV at 6pm on Tuesday. They couldn't guarantee that people wouldn't fast-forward through ads. Now they can't even guarantee that people will come to them for video entertainment.
They have two options: 1) Embrace the future but risk not having a prominent place in it, or 2) throw all their still-considerable muscle behind slowing progress to a halt so that they profit for longer.
They've chosen 2. This might lock in their status as obsolete, but it pushed off when that will be for as long as they can hold off technology. As long as they can retain the barest shreds of control, they'll keep pulling in profits in the short term and that's what's important to them.
I believe Amazon VOD does this already. Programs (mostly) seem to appear the day after it airs on TV. In addition, you can buy a season pass and get the episodes for a reduced rate.
There are so many TV shows that I just don't watch because I've been burned so often that I don't want to get into another show only to have it cancelled in the first season or on a cliffhanger.
Thank you for this. I've been planning for our near-inevitable cord cutting for some time. OTA is nice, but without a DVR you just go back to "I need to be at home and not interrupted to watch this show." Tivo is nice, but very expensive - especially when you consider either having to pay a monthly fee or spend $300 on a lifetime subscription. The HomeWorx, though, looks perfect. Inexpensive ($46), no pay-for-guide data (that I can see), and would work on OTA broadcasts. Combine this with our existing Netflix and Amazon Prime subscriptions along with some Amazon VOD purchases (to get must-see cable shows without cable) and cable's days in my household are even more numbered.
Starting my own ISP would require investing time and money into the project: Two things that are in short supply for me right now. I have a full time job, have no time to start an ISP business on the side, and can't take the financial risk of quitting my job to launch an ISP in my area. I have nothing but respect for the people who do this and if someone like this was available in my area I'd definitely look into it as a possibility, but launching it myself isn't really an option.
That's the position I'm in. I can use Time Warner Cable for my ISP or Verizon DSL. Not only is DSL slower, but Verizon has all but said they want out of the DSL business. They've ignored their DSL lines and outright ditched them where possible. Verizon didn't run FIOS to my neighborhood so that's not an option. Meanwhile, Time Warner Cable and the other cable ISPs have financial interests in people not doing a lot of video streaming. That's why they've introduced caps and "per bit billing." They frame it as a "fair billing" or "protect our network from data hogs" practice but really it is a method of killing streaming so that people go back to their (uncapped) VOD solutions.
In my case, we still have cable only because they gave us a good deal on cable TV + Internet. The amount we'd save just going to Internet-only would be chipped away at by needing to purchase programs that we can't get from Netflix or Amazon Prime streaming. (For example, new episodes of Mythbusters and Doctor Who.) There were enough of these that it just didn't pay to cut the cable. However, my cable company (Time Warner Cable) has indicated that they're not cutting deals of this sort anymore. If they don't then cable will be going away when our current deal ends. I simply can't afford to pay $100 more a month for cable. We'll get our TV entertainment from OTA, Netflix, Amazon VOD (both Prime and pay-per-episode), and DVD rentals from our local library.
Exactly. It's weasel words. "We're only targeting 60 Americans" might be true, but it leaves an impression that they're only capturing data on 60 Americans when what it really means is "We're capturing metadata on EVERY American, but most of that data goes into our servers to be accessed/searched on later. Right now, we're only looking at the actual communications for 60 Americans, but that could change at any moment if we deem it to be needed for any reason we think up."
Good point. I wonder how many of those religious fundamentalists would mind if someone married his wife's sister and slept with a few maids because they wanted more kids. After all, it worked for Jacob, Rebecca, and Leah.
(Side Note: It's probably telling which I'm more into that I almost spelled that "Leia" and not "Leah." Then again, I don't remember THAT scene in Star Wars. Perhaps that was in the Extra Super Special Edition: Now With More CGI.)
I wouldn't term harassment and stalking as "good manners laws." They come into play when someone refuses to leave another person alone to the point that the person doesn't feel safe. It's a big stretch from "talked on a cell phone on an airplane" to "hiding out in the bushes outside someone's house because the person you're stalking went over there." The former is annoying but not harmful the latter can lead to real harm.
While I agree that a law against phone calls on planes is stupid, I wouldn't lump the Do Not Call list into that. With phone calls on planes, consumers have a choice. You can not fly on or complain to airlines that permit this. If they get enough complaints/lost revenue, they'll ban it without the need for legislation.
With the Do Not Call list, though, there were companies calling people to solicit them. These people didn't have the option of just not getting these calls. You could demand to be taken off that caller's list only to find yourself on three more lists. The Do Not Call list made sure that people could say "I don't WANT these calls" and that they would stop. (It's not perfect. Nonprofit and political calls still go through, but it was an improvement.) This was the perfect example of how government should be used. An industry refused to police their own behavior and was harassing individuals so the government steps in and says "You're going to abide by these rules (designed to be as minimally invasive as possible while still being effective) or else."
Having government enforce good manners between two people is something completely different (and completely unneeded).
It's not always built out to the edges of the cities. I live in a city and FIOS was built to the suburbs around me. If you live on the edge of the city, near the suburbs, you might be able to get FIOS. If not, you are stuck with Time Warner Cable or Verizon DSL. And Verizon is more and more trying to disown DSL users so that's not really an option. Since going without Internet isn't an option either, I'm forced to take what Time Warner Cable offers me at the price they demand and they know it so there's no reason for them to improve service, speed up the network, or drop their prices.
No worse news would be that the universe is a hologram... and that the hologram is being watched by Jar-Jar Binks and our Universe-Simulation will stop if he breaks the hologram player. So as long as Jar-Jar Binks isn't clumsy, we're ok.
Bah! The Internet and the World were only created last Tuesday. Any history before that is just a test of true believers in Last Tuesday-ism I dare you to prove otherwise! Also, don't listen to those Last Wednesday heretics. They're just crazy.
I did this eight years ago when my oldest (then only) son turned two. I took photos of him from birth through two (or as close to two as possible since I was doing this ahead of time), ran it through a photomosaic program (possibly even the same one mentioned above) with a "master photo" that would be revealed when you stood far enough away, and produced a large image. Then, I had a few poster sized prints made and framed them. I hung one up in my office, gave one to my in-laws, etc. The hardest part of all of this is going through the hundreds or thousands of photos needed to produce this. Other than that, it's dead simple.
Of course, in my case all the photos were local (not posted on social networks), but the principle is the same.
On another note, if there are companies who can scan tweets (such as stocktwits) to give you sentiment analysis, why cant Twitter do the same ? Have they realized that they just have a bunch of web developers who know only Javascript and can't do text processing using it ?
Even more so because Twitter has direct access to their databases while all other developers must work through the Twitter API. Don't get me wrong: It's nice, but if you need to analyze massive amounts of data, it can be slow to transfer it from Twitter to your application.
See also: The Duggars (For the churning them out part. I don't know how good their marriage is because I honestly can't see past the "Why hasn't her uterus imploded yet" part.)
The Jewish religion actually has 613 commandments. (Though many can't be observed anymore since the Temple isn't in operation and only the very, very, VERY religious even try to observe all of the rest.)
The real "mark of the beast" is supposedly 616 so that makes us Jews only 3 away from that.
If my Comparison of Religions college professor is correct, then Jesus was actually a super-strict Jew. Whereas most rabbis would say you're fine if you walk past a McDonald's, smell a bacon double-cheeseburger and think about eating it, Jesus would have said that merely thinking about eating it was as bad as actually eating the non-kosher meat and cheese combo. (Which, if you think about it, is a stupid idea to have. If thinking about something is as bad as doing it, then you might as well do what you think of and enjoy the act.) The Christians in that class squirmed so much!
I'm proud of the fact that we Jews drive some of these evangelical conservatives nuts. How so? They believe that Jesus will return when a) the Jews return to Israel and b) the Jews accept Jesus as their savior. The former happened (which explains why evangelicals are such big supporters of Israel), but the second hasn't. Why haven't we Jews flocked to Jesus? Don't we know we're holding up Jesus? He's waiting just offstage looking at his watch and tapping his foot impatiently and we just stubbornly refuse to give up our religion and accept their religion instead.
("Jews for Jesus" is actually a evangelical Christian effort to convert Jews. They realized saying "you're going to Hell, now worship Jesus" wasn't working, so they decided to be sneaky and say "You can stay Jewish and STILL worship Jesus.")
Honestly, God himself could appear to these guys and tell them to stop being so idiotic and they'd write it off as a test of their faith. ("God wants to see if we're really faithful. Only by ignoring what He tells us to do can we do as He wants us to do.")
I always wonder if the people who spout this nonsense think that there's some sort of timer or fine print on a marriage. "I now pronounce you man and wife... unless you fail to produce a child within five years at which point your marriage will be considered null and void."
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True, but hard drives are so large nowadays that it shouldn't be a problem. Apparently, it takes 8-10GB per hour of 1080p recording. This means a 1TB hard drive will record about 100 hours of programming. Not too shabby and you could always disconnect the hard drive, connect it to a computer, and compress the recording in some fashion (e.g. MP4) to save it long-term without taking up tons of space.
You pretty much answered your own question. In the not-too-distant past, if you wanted video entertainment, you went to the "giants." If you wanted to see a show that was on at 6PM on Tuesday, you sat in front of the TV at 6PM on Tuesday. They controlled what you watched and when.
Then came VCRs, DVRs, the Internet and other disruptive technologies. Slowly but surely, their control was pried away from them. They could no longer guarantee that people watching a show would be sitting in front of the TV at 6pm on Tuesday. They couldn't guarantee that people wouldn't fast-forward through ads. Now they can't even guarantee that people will come to them for video entertainment.
They have two options: 1) Embrace the future but risk not having a prominent place in it, or 2) throw all their still-considerable muscle behind slowing progress to a halt so that they profit for longer.
They've chosen 2. This might lock in their status as obsolete, but it pushed off when that will be for as long as they can hold off technology. As long as they can retain the barest shreds of control, they'll keep pulling in profits in the short term and that's what's important to them.
I believe Amazon VOD does this already. Programs (mostly) seem to appear the day after it airs on TV. In addition, you can buy a season pass and get the episodes for a reduced rate.
There are so many TV shows that I just don't watch because I've been burned so often that I don't want to get into another show only to have it cancelled in the first season or on a cliffhanger.
Thank you for this. I've been planning for our near-inevitable cord cutting for some time. OTA is nice, but without a DVR you just go back to "I need to be at home and not interrupted to watch this show." Tivo is nice, but very expensive - especially when you consider either having to pay a monthly fee or spend $300 on a lifetime subscription. The HomeWorx, though, looks perfect. Inexpensive ($46), no pay-for-guide data (that I can see), and would work on OTA broadcasts. Combine this with our existing Netflix and Amazon Prime subscriptions along with some Amazon VOD purchases (to get must-see cable shows without cable) and cable's days in my household are even more numbered.
Starting my own ISP would require investing time and money into the project: Two things that are in short supply for me right now. I have a full time job, have no time to start an ISP business on the side, and can't take the financial risk of quitting my job to launch an ISP in my area. I have nothing but respect for the people who do this and if someone like this was available in my area I'd definitely look into it as a possibility, but launching it myself isn't really an option.
That's the position I'm in. I can use Time Warner Cable for my ISP or Verizon DSL. Not only is DSL slower, but Verizon has all but said they want out of the DSL business. They've ignored their DSL lines and outright ditched them where possible. Verizon didn't run FIOS to my neighborhood so that's not an option. Meanwhile, Time Warner Cable and the other cable ISPs have financial interests in people not doing a lot of video streaming. That's why they've introduced caps and "per bit billing." They frame it as a "fair billing" or "protect our network from data hogs" practice but really it is a method of killing streaming so that people go back to their (uncapped) VOD solutions.
In my case, we still have cable only because they gave us a good deal on cable TV + Internet. The amount we'd save just going to Internet-only would be chipped away at by needing to purchase programs that we can't get from Netflix or Amazon Prime streaming. (For example, new episodes of Mythbusters and Doctor Who.) There were enough of these that it just didn't pay to cut the cable. However, my cable company (Time Warner Cable) has indicated that they're not cutting deals of this sort anymore. If they don't then cable will be going away when our current deal ends. I simply can't afford to pay $100 more a month for cable. We'll get our TV entertainment from OTA, Netflix, Amazon VOD (both Prime and pay-per-episode), and DVD rentals from our local library.
Exactly. It's weasel words. "We're only targeting 60 Americans" might be true, but it leaves an impression that they're only capturing data on 60 Americans when what it really means is "We're capturing metadata on EVERY American, but most of that data goes into our servers to be accessed/searched on later. Right now, we're only looking at the actual communications for 60 Americans, but that could change at any moment if we deem it to be needed for any reason we think up."
Good point. I wonder how many of those religious fundamentalists would mind if someone married his wife's sister and slept with a few maids because they wanted more kids. After all, it worked for Jacob, Rebecca, and Leah.
(Side Note: It's probably telling which I'm more into that I almost spelled that "Leia" and not "Leah." Then again, I don't remember THAT scene in Star Wars. Perhaps that was in the Extra Super Special Edition: Now With More CGI.)
I wouldn't term harassment and stalking as "good manners laws." They come into play when someone refuses to leave another person alone to the point that the person doesn't feel safe. It's a big stretch from "talked on a cell phone on an airplane" to "hiding out in the bushes outside someone's house because the person you're stalking went over there." The former is annoying but not harmful the latter can lead to real harm.
While I agree that a law against phone calls on planes is stupid, I wouldn't lump the Do Not Call list into that. With phone calls on planes, consumers have a choice. You can not fly on or complain to airlines that permit this. If they get enough complaints/lost revenue, they'll ban it without the need for legislation.
With the Do Not Call list, though, there were companies calling people to solicit them. These people didn't have the option of just not getting these calls. You could demand to be taken off that caller's list only to find yourself on three more lists. The Do Not Call list made sure that people could say "I don't WANT these calls" and that they would stop. (It's not perfect. Nonprofit and political calls still go through, but it was an improvement.) This was the perfect example of how government should be used. An industry refused to police their own behavior and was harassing individuals so the government steps in and says "You're going to abide by these rules (designed to be as minimally invasive as possible while still being effective) or else."
Having government enforce good manners between two people is something completely different (and completely unneeded).
It's not always built out to the edges of the cities. I live in a city and FIOS was built to the suburbs around me. If you live on the edge of the city, near the suburbs, you might be able to get FIOS. If not, you are stuck with Time Warner Cable or Verizon DSL. And Verizon is more and more trying to disown DSL users so that's not really an option. Since going without Internet isn't an option either, I'm forced to take what Time Warner Cable offers me at the price they demand and they know it so there's no reason for them to improve service, speed up the network, or drop their prices.
Are these "turtles all the way down", teen-aged, mutated, and trained in the art of ninjitsu by any chance?
No worse news would be that the universe is a hologram... and that the hologram is being watched by Jar-Jar Binks and our Universe-Simulation will stop if he breaks the hologram player. So as long as Jar-Jar Binks isn't clumsy, we're ok.
Bah! The Internet and the World were only created last Tuesday. Any history before that is just a test of true believers in Last Tuesday-ism I dare you to prove otherwise! Also, don't listen to those Last Wednesday heretics. They're just crazy.
I did this eight years ago when my oldest (then only) son turned two. I took photos of him from birth through two (or as close to two as possible since I was doing this ahead of time), ran it through a photomosaic program (possibly even the same one mentioned above) with a "master photo" that would be revealed when you stood far enough away, and produced a large image. Then, I had a few poster sized prints made and framed them. I hung one up in my office, gave one to my in-laws, etc. The hardest part of all of this is going through the hundreds or thousands of photos needed to produce this. Other than that, it's dead simple.
Of course, in my case all the photos were local (not posted on social networks), but the principle is the same.
Even more so because Twitter has direct access to their databases while all other developers must work through the Twitter API. Don't get me wrong: It's nice, but if you need to analyze massive amounts of data, it can be slow to transfer it from Twitter to your application.
See also: The Duggars (For the churning them out part. I don't know how good their marriage is because I honestly can't see past the "Why hasn't her uterus imploded yet" part.)
The Jewish religion actually has 613 commandments. (Though many can't be observed anymore since the Temple isn't in operation and only the very, very, VERY religious even try to observe all of the rest.)
The real "mark of the beast" is supposedly 616 so that makes us Jews only 3 away from that.
If my Comparison of Religions college professor is correct, then Jesus was actually a super-strict Jew. Whereas most rabbis would say you're fine if you walk past a McDonald's, smell a bacon double-cheeseburger and think about eating it, Jesus would have said that merely thinking about eating it was as bad as actually eating the non-kosher meat and cheese combo. (Which, if you think about it, is a stupid idea to have. If thinking about something is as bad as doing it, then you might as well do what you think of and enjoy the act.) The Christians in that class squirmed so much!
I'm proud of the fact that we Jews drive some of these evangelical conservatives nuts. How so? They believe that Jesus will return when a) the Jews return to Israel and b) the Jews accept Jesus as their savior. The former happened (which explains why evangelicals are such big supporters of Israel), but the second hasn't. Why haven't we Jews flocked to Jesus? Don't we know we're holding up Jesus? He's waiting just offstage looking at his watch and tapping his foot impatiently and we just stubbornly refuse to give up our religion and accept their religion instead.
("Jews for Jesus" is actually a evangelical Christian effort to convert Jews. They realized saying "you're going to Hell, now worship Jesus" wasn't working, so they decided to be sneaky and say "You can stay Jewish and STILL worship Jesus.")
Honestly, God himself could appear to these guys and tell them to stop being so idiotic and they'd write it off as a test of their faith. ("God wants to see if we're really faithful. Only by ignoring what He tells us to do can we do as He wants us to do.")
INCONCEIVABLE!!!
I always wonder if the people who spout this nonsense think that there's some sort of timer or fine print on a marriage. "I now pronounce you man and wife... unless you fail to produce a child within five years at which point your marriage will be considered null and void."