The theaters are clinging to a business model that worked well before people had other choices. Now people have those choices, and they're going elsewhere. If movie theaters want to be around for another generation, they need to put some hard and creative thought into what it is that they offer, and what consumers want and are willing to pay for. Getting a six-week monopoly on a new film is a shoddy way to stay in business, and I think in the long run, consumers will find other ways to spend their time while they're waiting for the DVD to come out.
I seem to remember circa late 70s early 80s where you could catch a film like Star Wars or The Last Starfighter and actually buy the Graphic Novel in the theater. Not to speak of posters and other misc bits of crap. It seems to me that they should go out of their way to sell the damn DVD, perhaps in some form of spiffy limited edition numbered case. Rather than bitching early DVD releases, they could be the first to release it.
Disney stumbled upon the pin trading as being a cash cow... in part due to the fact that if a staff member is wearing the same pin as a person, they have to talk to them. At least that's my understanding. Very popular among the kids. So sell the damn pins, be the first to sell the damn pins, make a buck.
Addition: according to this knowledge base article, free access only works if you already accessed the Hotmail account using Outlook or Outlook Express before they switched to paid access. So you can't access an old account using OE for free if that account wasn't accessed throug OE before.
MSN is tweeky that way... for example there was a time you could pick a domain when subscribing to hotmail. This would include.msn..MSN is now reserved to people paying for service which gives them special privileges such as accessing msn chat.
You're not finding a significant number of newer releases being mastered in either format, even though they are technically superior because people don't really care about multi-channel and they're definitely down on not being able to rip the music from either one of these DRM laden formats and they don't offer enough of a premium over CDs to make adapting them worthwhile.
I think you are giving people too much credit. Most average people don't know that you can put a normal CD into a DVD player. The few who are are buying into combo DVD + home theater units which may or may not support DVDA/SACD, but are not likely to even notice the whole slew of logos on the front of their unit. Most people think in terms of music disc which they call CD, or video disc which they call DVD... and the moment they buy something that doesn't work they return it.
I know it's amazing... I find it hard to believe my self... but your average joe just wants to buy something, and have it work. This would include as you said ripping like to their portable unit, putting a disc in their player and have it play whether music or video. The moment they hear a cryptic acronym their brains lock up and their mouth says "ugh, no work".
Like just recently I had to buy a copy of Word for a publishing deal. Cost me $286 CDN. What does that give me? A word processor that only runs in Windows and only edits Word files. The latter bit doesn't sound so bad until you realize the format is not properly documented anywhere and essentially requires me to keep using Windows and Word to work with the files.
Could be worse. Could be Microsoft Works. I've had to deal with a few small libraries that had had all their data in works, both database and spreadsheet.
Don't forget Macross Zero, the OAV miniseries that sets up the whole Macross scenario, excellent CG animation, decent story and plot (which in turn kind of spells out how the human race is just a cargo cult for space aliens). Good character development as well (the early years of Roy Fokker and a few other related characters who came back in the TV series).
Tech geeks would soil their trousers watching the technical effects as well.
I thought I said "prequel" in relation to macross... which would be Macross Zero. What I wasn't remembering was Macross Plus, a sort of spinoff OVA/Movie. I tend to forget about that one though the english sub was pretty top notch.
But yes, Macross Zero is worth very much worth watching.
I can understand how fans can be frustrated with writers who go out of their way to produce a story... esp long epic stories... and want more not understanding the story has already been told. The Pierce Anthony Zanth series is a good example of this... in fact from my understanding he kept on making them due to demand. The first one is pretty good, and the first 5 are readable... but after that they start degenerating into the hip punny catchprases with no real substance. Note i've not read all 31 of them, nor do I wish to. But some bugger is reading them.
Robotech / Macross is another excelent example of this. SDF Macross is a long epic with good closure and along comes Harmony Gold expanding a damn good series of 36 episodes to 85 Monster that is the Robotech saga, which basicly from my memory took two unreated series, put in some "protoculture" references and wrote a script that pretty much matched the same story arc (War #1, War #2, War #3). This is not to say that Macross didn't have it's spinoffs. There was a movie, an unoffical movie, a prequel, and Macross 7 (ORE NO UTA O KIKE!) but for the most part Macross does a great job of standing by it self, where Macross 7 comes across as a vehicle to sell music and got mixed reviews. After all, what story could there be after Macross other than rebuilding and making babies than stumbling upon some left over villain while you're wondering around finding a new place to build and make more babies.
So we have here, George Lucus... who like many fans is not understanding the story has been told. Even better was helping establish a new ecconomic model for film and TV... make your money selling crap, people like crap. He did the sequels, he did and the prequils, and what is he doing next, a sequel to the prequel? 20 years of growing up as a dirt farmer on some backwater planet? Star Wars is done... the story has been told, the back story has been told. There is nothing more to really tell esp in the inbetween period of the fall of the republic and the early days of the Empire, except perhaps for a few rogue Jedi stumbling around trying to find a planet to continue training and making babies, but you can't exactly show *that* on network television.
I'm sorry, but if you don't think physical combat between two human beings is more viscerally exciting (and more easy to empathise with) than a couple of pastel lit loonies in wet suits lobbing frisbees at one another, you're a loony.
I'm not a big fan of tennis my self but it is a legit sport that many people enjoy. Darts is also in the same class... it seems like rather a silly game but when you stop to think about the fact that darts are handy to catch small game you can respect the skill a bit more. And when you stop to think about it... the boomerang is also handy for that application as well, which "Discs of Tron" looks like it's modeled after with the exception that it's a disc that bounces off walls with ease and not a full blown bommerang.
One of redeaming qualities of Tron was the series of games played on the game grid. This would include Lightcycles, "Discs of Tron" (don't know another name for it), and "Balls of Tron", not all were included on the coin-up edition but where included in the Tron 2.0 game released within the past few years. While I would lean tward lightcyles as my favorite, use of the disc does require some skill. Again keep in mind the 1980s mindset... discs were "high tech" and any fantisy virtual computer program is going to have one, and it's going to be important. Break the disc, and the program is gone (derezzed).
Re:Simple reason for the "bomb": It was too early
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The Story of Tron
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Especially, the audience for such a movie was too small. And the studio was the wrong one. First of all, it's Disney. Back then, what did you get from Disney? Cute li'l films about cute fuzzy animals having some cute adventures. So people did not expect a "serious" science fiction movie.
Tron was a "serious" science fiction movie? It was ment to me?
Disney has some science fiction. The first thing that comes to mind is "Black Hole" which was really their first attempt to entire the sci-fi market. Rated "PG", which IIRC was a first for Disney. Before that we had "Escape/Return to Witch Mountain", or perhaps the title "The Computer that wore tennis shoes" would be more approperate. And let's not forget "The Cat From Outer Space". Disney doesn't do dark pieces... which is rather why 20 people defected and went on to produce "The Secret of Nymh".
And however good the background plot, it becomes irretrievably stupid if the method of resolution is DayGlo Frisbees.
No more or less stupid than gladiator combat, boxing, or martial arts except in this case it's satire. It's a look at how a computer generated culture views the macro-universe. Yes... it's stupid... that's the point... life is a series of conflict and resolutions no better than tossing around DayGlo Frisbees.
There was nothing intrinsically wrong with the plot : Man gets zapped into machine and has to battle his way back out.
The plot was a little deeper than that. A man (Flynn?), an ecentric genius, was obsessed over video games... designs a few blockbusters but a not to bright but sneaky person takes the credit for his work and as a result gets promoted to a position of control (VP?) and uses his position and access to lock out Flynn preventing him from vindicating his name and creates a master control program who's purpose is to steal other people's work and prevent others from accessing it. This tale is told by two other employies who are attempting to figure out what is going on with the system. They express shocked disbelief but one statement has enough of the way of truth to it for them to investiate. The MVP retaliates in the only way it knows how and zaps Flynn into it's world... which as you said "man gets zapped into machine and has to battle his way back out".
While your statement was ment with sarcasm, there is nothing wrong with the plot, nor the sub plot of romance between not only the real life characters but between their programs. It's your run of the mill heroic tale that has been told many times before. Those who want to be critical on the store should be on that point as heroic epics have been a staple of western culture even before to Roman empire was born. It was clearly made with a cookie cutter script generator that would work just as easily with an evil prince and dragons or gunmen and the wild wild west. It's redeming qualitys are the satire on bureaucracy and insight on religion, which are two things you would not expect in a film who's main purpose seems to be a vehicle for hi-tech CGI graphics.
"The Master Control Program has chosen you to serve your system on the Game Grid. Those of you who continue to profess a belief in the Users will receive the standard substandard training, which will result in your eventual elimination."
See? That's dialogue bad enough to have come from one of the Matrix sequels
It's a laugh isn't it? Take this for example
The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't. --Douglas Adams
In order to take Tron seriously, you have to not take it so seriously. This was what 1981 or 1982 or so... video arcades were newish and computers were fancy mystical machines no one understood, esp this whole concept of easily editable word processed documents I.E. how someone with no real skills can delete someone else's name and take credit for their work, or worse yet create a program which will do this automaticly. Take into the account the 1980s mindset of computers which for the most part would be arcade style video games, using them and some spiffy new computer animation and you have the perfect vehicel for satire. And yes, the dialog is the likes of which that you would find in a Matrix sequal... and *that* is what makes it so funny.
Talking of indecency, why don't the authorities shut down the Jerry Springer Show? I have seen a level of indecency I'd never imagined! Can anyone figure how a mother could compete with a daughter for a man? I watched on such episode on Jerry Springer. To say the truth, I almost fell sick!
Sure there is a market for CD's, with their covers, artwork fold out images, lyric sheets.. oh wait. that was vinyl.. nah, cds are worthless.
I have to admit, I do sometimes feel nostalgic for the 12 inch disc standard as with vinyl and laser disc. Lyrics printed on the leave were nice, and foldout books were spiffy. And I have to admit that covers designed for the 12 inch standard don't fit so well on longbox. But let's face it... it's the 21st century. Things like art and lyrics can be stored electronicly and displayed for your enjoyment and pleasure on either your monitor or heck, your TV via your DVD player. Granted I don't see this technique employed but it is at the very least "possible".
The big issue I see is space saving. Think of the space 100 12 inch discs take up, then think of the space that 100 5 inch discs take up. Add to that the space savings of slim cases. While I do sometimes feel nostalgic, that feeling ends the moment I have to move that milk crate filled with vinyl.
At th thought of not owning physical media with an album. Plus I think the CD has a bonus of liner notes, art etc. I realize most people don't care about this, but I do.
Current technology permits printing to your own CDs. You have the Canon and Epson inkjets, as well laser etching as with Lightscribe via HP and LabelFlash by Fuji & Yamaha, or wax transfer as with the Signature printers. While inkjet is spiffy enough, it's not as spiffy as a true blue silkscreened disk in terms of durability. Wax transfer is OK, at least water proof, but the wax will scratch off. Lightscribe/LabelFlash are monochrome only.
The cover and booklets are, in the most simple terms, paper and ink. Making your own covers is a time consuming task and people using OEM ink on their printer can make one but at the cost of bucks a piece, where as commercial printing can produce a better product in bulk on mass for less. I've said this before but the best way to cash in on the pirate market is to offer for sale licensed covers and booklets for the consumer as a form of license to listen to the media no matter where they got it from.
Even those who don't care about booklets and cover art might care about a disc with a spiffy spine that they can spot on a shelf, rather than a slew of unmarked cases. This is something worth paying a few bucks each for.
In the article they say that customers will be able to download the movies and burn them to DVD. I don't imagine they'll let us download full DVD5 or DVD9 ISOs of the movies. More likely, it will be some highly compressed MPEG-4 variant, along with some Amazon-branded "preparation/conversion" app that outputs a burnable DVD5 or 9 ISO image. Even this sounds like it'd be a bit much for the average computer user to get a handle on. They'd better make sure this whole process is fairly idiot-proof or it's doomed to failure.
It would be more simple to say "Buy this freaking $50 player". Seriously... this whole business of supporting DVD+/-R video would be a nightmare. On the best of days about 1/2 of consumer owned players play burnt media well, and of those half some prefer +R and others prefer -R. Even with an easy peasy application, it's not going to make a hill of beans difference when there are a slew of players that just won't play it.
and for $40 a month, I get a hell of a lot more content than 4 shows.
You pay $480/year. How many shows do you actually watch?
I'm not saying cable isn't a good deal, nor am I saying it is. I will say that $480 can represent 32 to 48 shows/year assuming $10 = 16 episodes, and a given season is between 16 and 24 episodes. While this might not be a good value for you, for someone who watches less than 16 shows/year that's a decent value.
One question, as TV shows become available for sale on the Internet, will this make it harder to share clips online, such as through Google Video? In your answer, ignore facts. Just go with what feels true -TFA
Totally easier to share, but that's hardly the point. The point is I pay for cable, and there is no way I'd pay for both cable service and downloads... so if what I watch is available for download at $10/season... I'd ditch the cable. I'm not offended by the idea of paying for media. I pay for cable, I chuck money tward PBS from time to time. I'm not that hip paying for DVDs as in contrast to downloads they take up a hell of alot less space.
Parents would also be interested as I'm starting to notice more switching to video rentals rather cable subscriptions.
I can't help but wonder, though, why a cop would even bother writing a ticket for a car with no plates? How else are they going to know whose car it is?
The vin number, usually visiable on the dashboard unless we are talking something very old. IIRC the tickets reflect the plate if visiable, the vin, and color. And I believe, not having much experence with this, a car if parked on a public street needs to be ticketed to be towed.
Im just about making ends meet as a software develoepr, and one of my games is available as a torrent. No doubt this isnt exactly helping sales. So I suppose that the torrent sites you support check the financial data of each submitted torrent, will spot that I'm a solo developer who needs the cash, and decline to list torrents of my stuff right?
And piracy didn't exist before torrents?
And you are complaining that your software is so popular that there is a torrent?
I hate to say it (no that's not true), but piracy does a good thing... you have people more than willing to spread the name of your product through word of mouth for free. Look at the American Anime market... for ever we were stuck in an endless circle of:
Japan: We don't see a market in America American Otaku: How would you know unless your product visits america
And through the Anime pirates, though blatent piracy... a market was created.
But as a copyright holder it's your right to put your foot down and choose how to distribute your product... and it's your right to shoot your self in the foot if that is your wish.
Computers are cheap. Let people do their porn viewing in the privacy of their own home and foot the bill themselves.
I object to the public financing the vehicle for perverts to get a FREE thrill at taxpayers expense. These sickos go wank off in the library then leave the mess behind for someone else. BS to that. That's just flat out wrong.
Does it actually cost more money for someone to go to the library and surf for porn than it does to find a farmers almanac? No? Then your point is moot. While lately I feel deep shame for being an American there are some things that make me feel some pride... and free public libraries are it starting circa 1731 by Ben Franklin and company IIRC. The free exchange of information paramont to American culture and one of the keystones to the foundation of the USA. They are open to all whether one's interest is theology, science, pop culture, or the art of macrame coat hangers. This is what I, as a taxpayer, pay for. While I would prefer not sharing a seat next to someone looking up cumshots... this is the job of the librarian to deal with such matters. For any goverment agency to take it upon them selves to police them is a stain on the very soul of the founding fathers, and is simply unamerican.
I know it's hard for the/. crowd to understand because network is typicaly more simple to jack into than dialup. It's this whole PPPoE thing sold by the likes of Earthlink and other ISPs or worse yet AOL Broadband that gives the impression of something rather complex that makes broadband so much so less attractive, esp AOL with slow DNS servers that make the net look like "the slug.
I often hear about these so-called "media centres", and I must truly wonder what major benefit they bring. For the average person with a few dozen DVDs and music CDs, the cost would not appear to balance out the benefits one would reap.
Discs go into long term storage, stuff you use gets stuck on a HD and is in finger stroke reach. Nifty but I'm in agreement with you. Given you can buy DIVX dvd recorders to do your serials, most DVD players can play.mp3 from DVD-rom, if you plan is to limit the amount of space entertainment discs take up it's not really worth it, esp since no bugger knows how to use a media center, but everyone can master putting the disc in and hitting play.
The only real benifit to a media center is the ability to download codecs, but even at $1000 this represents the value of many DVD players.
"e.g. is a "white men can't dance" joke unshowable?"
No, but a "black men can't read" joke is. It's ok to sterotype and make fun of white people no matter what. If you are black you can make fun of black people and stereotypes as well as whites. If you are white you cannot. It's not just that way for blacks, pretty much the same thing for any minority in the US. This is called being politically correct.
Basicly. Part of the reason some of the episodes of the banned 11 are so bad is because they sort of cross this line. I know it's hard to imagine, but back in the 1970s and 1980s there was a busing program to help integrate the schools. This was actually important because there were still many towns where the population was not integrated at all.... and education was not equal among all schools. I lived in a town where it was not unusual for highschool graduates to be illiterate. Not talking unread, we're talking can't read a recipe out of a cook book.
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The theaters are clinging to a business model that worked well before people had other choices. Now people have those choices, and they're going elsewhere. If movie theaters want to be around for another generation, they need to put some hard and creative thought into what it is that they offer, and what consumers want and are willing to pay for. Getting a six-week monopoly on a new film is a shoddy way to stay in business, and I think in the long run, consumers will find other ways to spend their time while they're waiting for the DVD to come out.
I seem to remember circa late 70s early 80s where you could catch a film like Star Wars or The Last Starfighter and actually buy the Graphic Novel in the theater. Not to speak of posters and other misc bits of crap. It seems to me that they should go out of their way to sell the damn DVD, perhaps in some form of spiffy limited edition numbered case. Rather than bitching early DVD releases, they could be the first to release it.
Disney stumbled upon the pin trading as being a cash cow... in part due to the fact that if a staff member is wearing the same pin as a person, they have to talk to them. At least that's my understanding. Very popular among the kids. So sell the damn pins, be the first to sell the damn pins, make a buck.
Addition: according to this knowledge base article, free access only works if you already accessed the Hotmail account using Outlook or Outlook Express before they switched to paid access. So you can't access an old account using OE for free if that account wasn't accessed throug OE before.
.msn. .MSN is now reserved to people paying for service which gives them special privileges such as accessing msn chat.
MSN is tweeky that way... for example there was a time you could pick a domain when subscribing to hotmail. This would include
You're not finding a significant number of newer releases being mastered in either format, even though they are technically superior because people don't really care about multi-channel and they're definitely down on not being able to rip the music from either one of these DRM laden formats and they don't offer enough of a premium over CDs to make adapting them worthwhile.
I think you are giving people too much credit. Most average people don't know that you can put a normal CD into a DVD player. The few who are are buying into combo DVD + home theater units which may or may not support DVDA/SACD, but are not likely to even notice the whole slew of logos on the front of their unit. Most people think in terms of music disc which they call CD, or video disc which they call DVD... and the moment they buy something that doesn't work they return it.
I know it's amazing... I find it hard to believe my self... but your average joe just wants to buy something, and have it work. This would include as you said ripping like to their portable unit, putting a disc in their player and have it play whether music or video. The moment they hear a cryptic acronym their brains lock up and their mouth says "ugh, no work".
Like just recently I had to buy a copy of Word for a publishing deal. Cost me $286 CDN. What does that give me? A word processor that only runs in Windows and only edits Word files. The latter bit doesn't sound so bad until you realize the format is not properly documented anywhere and essentially requires me to keep using Windows and Word to work with the files.
Could be worse. Could be Microsoft Works. I've had to deal with a few small libraries that had had all their data in works, both database and spreadsheet.
Don't forget Macross Zero, the OAV miniseries that sets up the whole Macross scenario, excellent CG animation, decent story and plot (which in turn kind of spells out how the human race is just a cargo cult for space aliens). Good character development as well (the early years of Roy Fokker and a few other related characters who came back in the TV series).
Tech geeks would soil their trousers watching the technical effects as well.
I thought I said "prequel" in relation to macross... which would be Macross Zero. What I wasn't remembering was Macross Plus, a sort of spinoff OVA/Movie. I tend to forget about that one though the english sub was pretty top notch.
But yes, Macross Zero is worth very much worth watching.
I can understand how fans can be frustrated with writers who go out of their way to produce a story... esp long epic stories... and want more not understanding the story has already been told. The Pierce Anthony Zanth series is a good example of this... in fact from my understanding he kept on making them due to demand. The first one is pretty good, and the first 5 are readable... but after that they start degenerating into the hip punny catchprases with no real substance. Note i've not read all 31 of them, nor do I wish to. But some bugger is reading them.
Robotech / Macross is another excelent example of this. SDF Macross is a long epic with good closure and along comes Harmony Gold expanding a damn good series of 36 episodes to 85 Monster that is the Robotech saga, which basicly from my memory took two unreated series, put in some "protoculture" references and wrote a script that pretty much matched the same story arc (War #1, War #2, War #3). This is not to say that Macross didn't have it's spinoffs. There was a movie, an unoffical movie, a prequel, and Macross 7 (ORE NO UTA O KIKE!) but for the most part Macross does a great job of standing by it self, where Macross 7 comes across as a vehicle to sell music and got mixed reviews. After all, what story could there be after Macross other than rebuilding and making babies than stumbling upon some left over villain while you're wondering around finding a new place to build and make more babies.
So we have here, George Lucus... who like many fans is not understanding the story has been told. Even better was helping establish a new ecconomic model for film and TV... make your money selling crap, people like crap. He did the sequels, he did and the prequils, and what is he doing next, a sequel to the prequel? 20 years of growing up as a dirt farmer on some backwater planet? Star Wars is done... the story has been told, the back story has been told. There is nothing more to really tell esp in the inbetween period of the fall of the republic and the early days of the Empire, except perhaps for a few rogue Jedi stumbling around trying to find a planet to continue training and making babies, but you can't exactly show *that* on network television.
I'm sorry, but if you don't think physical combat between two human beings is more viscerally exciting (and more easy to empathise with) than a couple of pastel lit loonies in wet suits lobbing frisbees at one another, you're a loony.
I'm not a big fan of tennis my self but it is a legit sport that many people enjoy. Darts is also in the same class... it seems like rather a silly game but when you stop to think about the fact that darts are handy to catch small game you can respect the skill a bit more. And when you stop to think about it... the boomerang is also handy for that application as well, which "Discs of Tron" looks like it's modeled after with the exception that it's a disc that bounces off walls with ease and not a full blown bommerang.
One of redeaming qualities of Tron was the series of games played on the game grid. This would include Lightcycles, "Discs of Tron" (don't know another name for it), and "Balls of Tron", not all were included on the coin-up edition but where included in the Tron 2.0 game released within the past few years. While I would lean tward lightcyles as my favorite, use of the disc does require some skill. Again keep in mind the 1980s mindset... discs were "high tech" and any fantisy virtual computer program is going to have one, and it's going to be important. Break the disc, and the program is gone (derezzed).
Especially, the audience for such a movie was too small. And the studio was the wrong one. First of all, it's Disney. Back then, what did you get from Disney? Cute li'l films about cute fuzzy animals having some cute adventures. So people did not expect a "serious" science fiction movie.
Tron was a "serious" science fiction movie? It was ment to me?
Disney has some science fiction. The first thing that comes to mind is "Black Hole" which was really their first attempt to entire the sci-fi market. Rated "PG", which IIRC was a first for Disney. Before that we had "Escape/Return to Witch Mountain", or perhaps the title "The Computer that wore tennis shoes" would be more approperate. And let's not forget "The Cat From Outer Space". Disney doesn't do dark pieces... which is rather why 20 people defected and went on to produce "The Secret of Nymh".
And however good the background plot, it becomes irretrievably stupid if the method of resolution is DayGlo Frisbees.
No more or less stupid than gladiator combat, boxing, or martial arts except in this case it's satire. It's a look at how a computer generated culture views the macro-universe. Yes... it's stupid... that's the point... life is a series of conflict and resolutions no better than tossing around DayGlo Frisbees.
There was nothing intrinsically wrong with the plot : Man gets zapped into machine and has to battle his way back out.
The plot was a little deeper than that. A man (Flynn?), an ecentric genius, was obsessed over video games... designs a few blockbusters but a not to bright but sneaky person takes the credit for his work and as a result gets promoted to a position of control (VP?) and uses his position and access to lock out Flynn preventing him from vindicating his name and creates a master control program who's purpose is to steal other people's work and prevent others from accessing it. This tale is told by two other employies who are attempting to figure out what is going on with the system. They express shocked disbelief but one statement has enough of the way of truth to it for them to investiate. The MVP retaliates in the only way it knows how and zaps Flynn into it's world... which as you said "man gets zapped into machine and has to battle his way back out".
While your statement was ment with sarcasm, there is nothing wrong with the plot, nor the sub plot of romance between not only the real life characters but between their programs. It's your run of the mill heroic tale that has been told many times before. Those who want to be critical on the store should be on that point as heroic epics have been a staple of western culture even before to Roman empire was born. It was clearly made with a cookie cutter script generator that would work just as easily with an evil prince and dragons or gunmen and the wild wild west. It's redeming qualitys are the satire on bureaucracy and insight on religion, which are two things you would not expect in a film who's main purpose seems to be a vehicle for hi-tech CGI graphics.
See? That's dialogue bad enough to have come from one of the Matrix sequels
It's a laugh isn't it? Take this for example
In order to take Tron seriously, you have to not take it so seriously. This was what 1981 or 1982 or so... video arcades were newish and computers were fancy mystical machines no one understood, esp this whole concept of easily editable word processed documents I.E. how someone with no real skills can delete someone else's name and take credit for their work, or worse yet create a program which will do this automaticly. Take into the account the 1980s mindset of computers which for the most part would be arcade style video games, using them and some spiffy new computer animation and you have the perfect vehicel for satire. And yes, the dialog is the likes of which that you would find in a Matrix sequal... and *that* is what makes it so funny.
I say BS, because being honest, how many people watch movies with the lights on?
I would prefer to use my monitor with the lights off but some bastard keeps on turning on the sun.
Talking of indecency, why don't the authorities shut down the Jerry Springer Show? I have seen a level of indecency I'd never imagined! Can anyone figure how a mother could compete with a daughter for a man? I watched on such episode on Jerry Springer. To say the truth, I almost fell sick!
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"So I married a horse" The episode not shown on Jerry Springer
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/Pf/0,1527,3032,
I think it was the television stations who opted to show a rerun rather than the FCC getting down their backs.
Sure there is a market for CD's, with their covers, artwork fold out images, lyric sheets.. oh wait. that was vinyl.. nah, cds are worthless.
I have to admit, I do sometimes feel nostalgic for the 12 inch disc standard as with vinyl and laser disc. Lyrics printed on the leave were nice, and foldout books were spiffy. And I have to admit that covers designed for the 12 inch standard don't fit so well on longbox. But let's face it... it's the 21st century. Things like art and lyrics can be stored electronicly and displayed for your enjoyment and pleasure on either your monitor or heck, your TV via your DVD player. Granted I don't see this technique employed but it is at the very least "possible".
The big issue I see is space saving. Think of the space 100 12 inch discs take up, then think of the space that 100 5 inch discs take up. Add to that the space savings of slim cases. While I do sometimes feel nostalgic, that feeling ends the moment I have to move that milk crate filled with vinyl.
If you tear something up, put the odd slices in this weeks trash, and the even slices in next weeks (or better, next year's) trash.
Then let's see them put it back together...
Fire. Fire good!
At th thought of not owning physical media with an album. Plus I think the CD has a bonus of liner notes, art etc. I realize most people don't care about this, but I do.
Current technology permits printing to your own CDs. You have the Canon and Epson inkjets, as well laser etching as with Lightscribe via HP and LabelFlash by Fuji & Yamaha, or wax transfer as with the Signature printers. While inkjet is spiffy enough, it's not as spiffy as a true blue silkscreened disk in terms of durability. Wax transfer is OK, at least water proof, but the wax will scratch off. Lightscribe/LabelFlash are monochrome only.
The cover and booklets are, in the most simple terms, paper and ink. Making your own covers is a time consuming task and people using OEM ink on their printer can make one but at the cost of bucks a piece, where as commercial printing can produce a better product in bulk on mass for less. I've said this before but the best way to cash in on the pirate market is to offer for sale licensed covers and booklets for the consumer as a form of license to listen to the media no matter where they got it from.
Even those who don't care about booklets and cover art might care about a disc with a spiffy spine that they can spot on a shelf, rather than a slew of unmarked cases. This is something worth paying a few bucks each for.
In the article they say that customers will be able to download the movies and burn them to DVD. I don't imagine they'll let us download full DVD5 or DVD9 ISOs of the movies. More likely, it will be some highly compressed MPEG-4 variant, along with some Amazon-branded "preparation/conversion" app that outputs a burnable DVD5 or 9 ISO image. Even this sounds like it'd be a bit much for the average computer user to get a handle on. They'd better make sure this whole process is fairly idiot-proof or it's doomed to failure.
It would be more simple to say "Buy this freaking $50 player". Seriously... this whole business of supporting DVD+/-R video would be a nightmare. On the best of days about 1/2 of consumer owned players play burnt media well, and of those half some prefer +R and others prefer -R. Even with an easy peasy application, it's not going to make a hill of beans difference when there are a slew of players that just won't play it.
and for $40 a month, I get a hell of a lot more content than 4 shows.
You pay $480/year. How many shows do you actually watch?
I'm not saying cable isn't a good deal, nor am I saying it is. I will say that $480 can represent 32 to 48 shows/year assuming $10 = 16 episodes, and a given season is between 16 and 24 episodes. While this might not be a good value for you, for someone who watches less than 16 shows/year that's a decent value.
One question, as TV shows become available for sale on the Internet, will this make it harder to share clips online, such as through Google Video? In your answer, ignore facts. Just go with what feels true -TFA
Totally easier to share, but that's hardly the point. The point is I pay for cable, and there is no way I'd pay for both cable service and downloads... so if what I watch is available for download at $10/season... I'd ditch the cable. I'm not offended by the idea of paying for media. I pay for cable, I chuck money tward PBS from time to time. I'm not that hip paying for DVDs as in contrast to downloads they take up a hell of alot less space.
Parents would also be interested as I'm starting to notice more switching to video rentals rather cable subscriptions.
I can't help but wonder, though, why a cop would even bother writing a ticket for a car with no plates? How else are they going to know whose car it is?
The vin number, usually visiable on the dashboard unless we are talking something very old. IIRC the tickets reflect the plate if visiable, the vin, and color. And I believe, not having much experence with this, a car if parked on a public street needs to be ticketed to be towed.
Im just about making ends meet as a software develoepr, and one of my games is available as a torrent. No doubt this isnt exactly helping sales. So I suppose that the torrent sites you support check the financial data of each submitted torrent, will spot that I'm a solo developer who needs the cash, and decline to list torrents of my stuff right?
And piracy didn't exist before torrents?
And you are complaining that your software is so popular that there is a torrent?
I hate to say it (no that's not true), but piracy does a good thing... you have people more than willing to spread the name of your product through word of mouth for free. Look at the American Anime market... for ever we were stuck in an endless circle of:
Japan: We don't see a market in America
American Otaku: How would you know unless your product visits america
And through the Anime pirates, though blatent piracy... a market was created.
But as a copyright holder it's your right to put your foot down and choose how to distribute your product... and it's your right to shoot your self in the foot if that is your wish.
Computers are cheap.
Let people do their porn viewing in the privacy of their own home and foot the bill themselves.
I object to the public financing the vehicle for perverts to get a FREE thrill at taxpayers expense. These sickos go wank off in the library then leave the mess behind for someone else. BS to that. That's just flat out wrong.
Does it actually cost more money for someone to go to the library and surf for porn than it does to find a farmers almanac? No? Then your point is moot. While lately I feel deep shame for being an American there are some things that make me feel some pride... and free public libraries are it starting circa 1731 by Ben Franklin and company IIRC. The free exchange of information paramont to American culture and one of the keystones to the foundation of the USA. They are open to all whether one's interest is theology, science, pop culture, or the art of macrame coat hangers. This is what I, as a taxpayer, pay for. While I would prefer not sharing a seat next to someone looking up cumshots... this is the job of the librarian to deal with such matters. For any goverment agency to take it upon them selves to police them is a stain on the very soul of the founding fathers, and is simply unamerican.
I know it's hard for the /. crowd to understand because network is typicaly more simple to jack into than dialup. It's this whole PPPoE thing sold by the likes of Earthlink and other ISPs or worse yet AOL Broadband that gives the impression of something rather complex that makes broadband so much so less attractive, esp AOL with slow DNS servers that make the net look like "the slug.
I often hear about these so-called "media centres", and I must truly wonder what major benefit they bring. For the average person with a few dozen DVDs and music CDs, the cost would not appear to balance out the benefits one would reap.
.mp3 from DVD-rom, if you plan is to limit the amount of space entertainment discs take up it's not really worth it, esp since no bugger knows how to use a media center, but everyone can master putting the disc in and hitting play.
Discs go into long term storage, stuff you use gets stuck on a HD and is in finger stroke reach. Nifty but I'm in agreement with you. Given you can buy DIVX dvd recorders to do your serials, most DVD players can play
The only real benifit to a media center is the ability to download codecs, but even at $1000 this represents the value of many DVD players.
"e.g. is a "white men can't dance" joke unshowable?"
No, but a "black men can't read" joke is. It's ok to sterotype and make fun of white people no matter what. If you are black you can make fun of black people and stereotypes as well as whites. If you are white you cannot.
It's not just that way for blacks, pretty much the same thing for any minority in the US.
This is called being politically correct.
Basicly. Part of the reason some of the episodes of the banned 11 are so bad is because they sort of cross this line. I know it's hard to imagine, but back in the 1970s and 1980s there was a busing program to help integrate the schools. This was actually important because there were still many towns where the population was not integrated at all.... and education was not equal among all schools. I lived in a town where it was not unusual for highschool graduates to be illiterate. Not talking unread, we're talking can't read a recipe out of a cook book.