However, they won't spend that waiting time "evaluating other options," because for these customers, there is no other option.
For these non-gamers, other options are HDTV's, furniture, jewelry, or just about anything. I agree with you that these people are unlikely to evaluate other gaming systems. However, they still may loose their enthusiasm for the Wii, and spend the money someplace else. Sure, they might wait and buy a Wii when they are easier to find. Or, something else could catch their interest, and they may not care about the Wii so much anymore.
There was just a story on Slashdot where a company was doing exactly that. They were decrypting the movie and storing it on a media server -- with drm and the industry was still up in arms.
Yes, I remember this too. I tried to look for this but I don't remember the company's name. Last I heard, I think they won, or at least were winning the case. I wish I could check that.
Do you really expect them to expose themselves to this type of liability? Do you remember what happened to the original MP3.com when they tried to do the digital locker?
Although I wouldn't directly compare Apple to MP3.com, you are correct. On a cost/benefit basis, it's hard to argue that they should do what I suggest. (However, if they wanted to come out with a real portable video device (with a bigger screen), this would become necessary for the device's success).
Now that I think about it, Microsoft should do this to sell Zunes. Apple can pretty much ride their success for a while, but Microsoft needs a way to distinquish themselves. Yea, like that'll ever happen...
I just find this very frustrating. The law is clearly broken. If you asked almost anyone if they should be allowed to copy DVDs to their iPod for personal use, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who'd say "no". And yet, that's the law we effectively have. The only hope we have for the law changing is for someone to stand up and give the issue some attention.
So you expect a publically traded company to do something that is clearly illegal? It's not about the movie industry, it's against the law in the US.
Fine, so they should state how they'd like to sell us such a piece of software, but they can't because of the law... please write to your local congress critter to help us change this. Jobs has already mentioned that he'd like to sell music without DRM, so this isn't too different.
And besides, is the law really so cut and dry? They could make the arguement that they are only copying the movie because it is necessary in order for the movie to be compatible with this device. (And to further strengthen their arguement, they can encrypt it so you can't copy it off the iPod). I'm not sure whether they'd win or not, but it's a legitimate argument. All they need is enough legitimacy to get to court. Once in court, they're pretty much guaranteed to win in the court of public opinion, even if they loose the case. I'm not sure the movie industry would really want all the negative PR.
Who wants to grasp the concept that the only way to secure future rights from the grip of a DRM locked down future is to convince the studios, as Jobs is trying to do, that they can make money and give consumers more freedom.
This is one way for for a positive outcome. However, look at what (if this article is to be believed) Jobs is asking. He is asking for $4 (it's not clear if the money goes to him or the studio or both) for the ability to do something that we should be able to do for free. The reason we can't do it for free is not (entirely) because of the studios, but mostly because our laws are screwed up. I am hoping that our lawmakers will fix this, but until that happens I'd rather people like Jobs push for fixing the laws rather than (just) being opportunistic and trying to capitalize on it.
It's not always a trivial matter to rip a DVD and transcode it efficiently for an iPod.
If it wasn't for DMCA there would be plenty of commercial software out there that would do this, (just like there are plenty of polished products for ripping CDs). Because DVD ripping software is effectively illegal, no company is going to invest $$ into writing a polished piece of software. The best we get are home-brew solutions, and half-assed products both of which get sued out of existence (or at least out of the US) if they begin to look halfway decent.
The market for the $4 iPod version of movie only exists because the DMCA prevents a competing product from existing.
If it wasn't for Jobs (and Apple) being in bed with the movie industry, I'd hope that they would take Hollywood on and make such a piece of software. Most people are comfortable with the idea that you can copy a CD to portable device, so it would take quite a PR job for Hollywood to convince people that DVDs should somehow be different.
Blu ray is NOT a Sony format, anymore than the CD is a Sony format. They are the dominant member of the industry consortium that developed Blu Ray, and one of the original developers.
Thanks for pointing this out, and correcting me. It sounds like Sony would still get the benefit of licensing fees, if Blu-Ray succeeds over HD-DVD, but that's about it. It doesn't sound like it should be a big deal to Microsoft.
What Microsoft does NOT like about Blu Ray is that it requires a java VM.
Do you know whay this a big deal to Microsoft? It doesn't sound like there's any practical reason to me, other than the usual desire Microsoft has for controlling all formats. Is this really the sole reason Microsoft has spent millions trying to prop up HD-DVD? Maybe the author of the original article is right, and Microsoft really does want to kill both off?
Both Sony and MS throw money into supporting the horse that their respective wagon is tied to. That's how it is.
I agree. However, it is very clear why Sony is willing to dump a ton of money into Blu-Ray. It's pretty much their format. They'll make a killing if it becomes dominant, and they'll loose a ton if it looses.
Microsoft, on the other hand, isn't as heavily invested. For example, their console supports HD-DVD only as an add-on. If HD-DVD becomes dominant, they get some licensing fees on each unit sold, which is no doubt nice, but not that big a deal.
I think Microsoft wants to kill Blu-ray, but they don't care if HD-DVD succeeds or not. They don't want to be at the mercy of Sony for two reasons:
1. If Blu-Ray becomes dominant, they'll be forced to licence it for their next console, (and possibly a XBOX360 add-on). What if Sony denies them? What if the fees put them at too much of a disadvantage.
2. Microsoft envisions some soft of computerized media center in each home. They need some control of the format to do this.
I was at one of those big box electronics stores the other day, and they had a split screen demo Blu-ray disk (or maybe it was HD-DVD, I don't remember) comparing standard and HD quality. I could definitely see the difference, but all the demo did was make me see how little it mattered. The HD side was clearer, and you could see more detail. Still, the impression it gave me was "so what?" If I was just watching the movie, and not scrutinizing the clarity, I'm not sure I would notice the difference.
You can only claim that if the people in this case were going to buy the game/movie/music but decided not to because they recieved a copy through other means. To make that claim is a stretch by any measure.
You are correct. There's no way to know. Still, I don't think it's that much of a stretch to believe that many people aren't going to bother to buy something when they can get it for free. (Numerous studies have been done to see what the effects are filesharing are, but all the results seem to tell you is who funded the study, and what their agenda is).
CD sales are down because what is released on CD is crap.
Perhaps true, but I think CD sales are down for a number of reasons...
1 - filesharing We can debate this one, but I do think it has an effect.
2 - sale of singles For those who don't wish to fileshare, you can now buy singles on-line. The record company has long had a disconnect between what they market (singles on the radio) and what they sell (CD albums). They got away with this because you couldn't buy singles. Now you can, so many people are going to save their money and only buy the one or two songs they really want.
3 - crappy music I think music has been crappy in the past more than people realize, and people still bought music. Still, it does seem to be at a pretty low point now.
4- people are done replacing their vinyl/tapes I suspect that most people have been done for a while now, but as time goes on fewer and fewer are still doing this.
(Also, I really wish the moderators wouldn't list anything as troll just because it goes against conventional Slashdot wisdom. Whether you agree or not, the GP has a point).
So you are saying that Blu-Ray should be compared to ever so more successful UMD and it's established base of PSP owners?
I don't think they're really comparable. UMD was a product no one needed. It's competition was DVD, an already established standard. No one was interested in buying the same movies again, just to have them on smaller disks. (If Sony allowed people to transfer DVD's to UMD, the standard might have taken off, although not in the way Sony wanted).
One could argue whether HD is enough of improvement for a new format. Rather then get sidetracked on that issue, let's just agree (for arguement's sake) that it is. Then the battle is between Blu-ray and HD-DVD. 6 months ago I though Blu-ray won. Partially because of the PS3, but mostly because Blu-ray had more movie releases: Sony (and Disney) were exclusively backing Blu-ray. (Other studios may change their support, but Blu-ray will need to be dead and buried before Sony does). People will go where the content is. Then, Microsoft bought off a few studios, and the price for HD-DVD players has gone way below that of Blu-ray. And so, the format war is back on.
The price for HD-DVD players is significant . People who might have just waited this format war out, might now jump in. At $500, I'm not going to invest in a format that might not stick around. For $150, I might. It's no longer that big a risk.
So what do they do with SOI wafers? Remove the whole buried oxide layer by CMP?
Sure, why not? The buried oxide layer in an SOI wafer is much thinner than the oxides in the metal stack. If they are using an aggressive CMP to polish the whole metal stack away (which is what I am assuming they are doing, probably without the C, though - I bet it's purely a mechanical polish), removing the relatively thin buried oxide shouldn't add a whole lot to the process.
Ok, you've been (probably unfairly) ripped apart for your post, but this cracked me up...
My family had an atari when I was a kid and it was the same thing, the cool toy we pulled out twice a year, we NEVER got other games for the system, attach rate like 3 initial games, nothing else.
You've got to be kidding me. Where (and when) I grew up, we played the Atari all of the time. We bought tons (or at least as many as the money from my paper route allowed) of different games. I suppose the Atari had it's share of casual gamers, but there were plenty of people who weren't so casual about it.
Generations are *meant* to be incremental improvements - the very name implies they're nothing new, mostly the same thing, just done better. PS3 and Xbox360 are exactly "next generation";
Although people usually group video game generations by console lives, I think they should really be group by gameplay:
Generation 1: Classic (Atari through Collecovision) - anything goes as we explore this total new form of entertainment. Technology limits it to relatively simple games.
Generation 2: NES, Genesis, SNES - Side scrollers and platformers rule. Note that NES and SNES are in the same generation. SNES offers better graphics (and more involved games) than the NES, but the game mechanics are essentially the same.
Generation 3: Playstation(s), N64, Xbox(s), Gamecube - 3-D!! Again, all the systems, from playstation 1 to PS3 feature the same game mechanics. Games get more in-depth and better looking, but the essentially the gameplay elements haven't changed.
In some sense, video games have matured. There is nothing after 3-D, so we've topped out.
Or, perhaps... Generation 4: Wii - VR like interations
This is how I interpret Will Wright's opinion. I'm not sure if he's right, but I do think he has a point.
You are correct that people should tolerate differing views, and be willing to listen to other views (without attacking).
I am a scientist, and I don't see anything wrong with faith and religion. However science and religion are orthogonal - they work in total different dimensions. Science deals with what we can see, (i.e. measure and predict) and religion deals with what we will never be able to see or know (why are we here?, what happens to our souls when we die? - and where did they come from in the first place?). These should be total separate. As long as people don't use religion to answer questions that can (and should) be answered with science, I'm fine with religion. (Another requirement for me to be OK with religion, is that it can't be imposed on anyone).
When I speak to people who are religious (and beleive in intelligent design) I think one of the problems is that they don't want their god to be impotent. If their god isn't responsible for evolution, then their god isn't responsible for our existance. Not much point in having a god if your god isn't responsible for something as important as that.
Note that I'm not talking about creationism- I'm talking about intelligent design, which is essentially evolution with god somehow directing it. I honestly don't have a good arguement against intelligent design, I only have an arguement about it being taught as science. God's intervention can never be observed or measured or predicted - so it isn't science!
I agree with you. For instance, what's the point of having a small flat LCD screen in the kitchen, if you need this big box to go with it. However, my point, and the point of the original article was that you can't buy a box other than the one the cable companies provide. You can, however, by a cable card enabled TV just fine. The uptake has been slow, and they are pricier than they should be, but there are plenty of models out there. (Because of the price, it may be hard to find a small TV that's cable card ready, though).
You should check whether FIOS can work with cable cards. I think it does, but not everything is supported.
Most of the article describes how difficult it is to replace your cable company's basic STB with your own basic STB. It admits that there are options for DVRs (Series 3 and HD Tivo) and you can get cable card enabled TV.
My conclusion is the reason you can't replace the cable company's box with your own is that no one would want to. This isn't a great conspiracy, it's just that the STB manufacturers aren't going to try to sell a product that no one wants. Why would anyone want to replace one box with another box that does the same thing? The only motivation I could envision is cost, but the rental fees for the boxes aren't usually that high.
For a consumer, using the cable card to use a better DVR or to get rid of the STB entirely is worthwhile. So, the market has responded by providing these options. However, there's no motivation for someone to choose a different basic STB than the one the cable companies provide.
Why can't physicists be portrayed for what we really are, which is normal people who happen to do physics?
Because it's boring. Many (perhaps most) sitcoms have characters who are over the top. It's an easy way to get laughs.
Let's face it: science isn't interesting to watch. Generally you spends weeks/months/years fussing over lots of details in order to get an experimental result, which would still just be considered a boring detail to most of the world. (You think the world really cares about the Higg's Boson)? So, an LA scientist type drama would either be very boring or unrealistic. Probably the best scientist portrayal I can think of is CSI, and even here the science is fairly unrealistic.
Occassionally, you will have sitcoms which are just about normal people and their life and/or relationships. Most of the story takes place outside of work, so you could have one of these characters be a physicist as easily as a doctor, plumber, or whatever. I wouldn't mind if that happened, but I don't expect it to happen anytime soon. An engineer, maybe, but physicists are just too uncommon, and the stereotypes are just too popular.
I can't argue that we don't look at the past through rose colored glasses. We do tend to remember the best games, because they are the only ones worth remembering (and if we were smart, the only ones we spent much time playing). Back then, gameplay did trump graphics, but that's only because graphics pretty much sucked, and you had to provide something. That's not to say people didn't care about graphics. When Donkey Kong came out, people didn't just love the gameplay; they also really enjoyed what were very good graphics (for the time).
I think the important to remember is that graphics need to be a means to end. Sometimes that end is simply providing a visual reward to the gamer. (It's much more exciting to fight your way to the next level if the level is cool to look at). However, I think what's more important is that advanced graphics (and technology )allow new gaming experiences. The first video games were simple, single screen affairs. The entire world of the game was right in front of you (or maybe a few screens). With technology this expanded, and the Nintendo/Sega era featured worlds that were huge, but in 2-D. Then came 3-D, which creates a very different experience then 2-D games. However, what's next? I'm not sure I've come accross a single game in the last 10 years that couldn't have been done on my '97 PC by simply lowering the graphical detail. (I could be wrong, since I stopped playing games about 5 years ago. However, I still keep up a little bit, and nothing seems to indicate I'm wrong). So, the question is, is all this fuss about improving graphics really worth it, if it provides nothing more than eye-candy?
What you say is true, but you could also say the same thing about all the beat-um-up games (learning karate takes a long time and looks nothing like DOA), first person shooters (most FPS have people who run at 30 mph, can jump several feet in the air, and can turn on a dime all the while accurately shooting 100 lb weapons) and any other game type you can think of. The key is not to go for actual realism, just some psuedo realism that feels real enough while still being fun. Just like most games, it'll definitely be simplified relative to the real thing. Whether they can succeed or not in making it fun, I have no idea.
I attending a talk given by a senior director at Comcast the other day. The talk was for a technical audience but there was a lot of discussion about markets, etc.
Here's the thing I learned about cable companies. They would love to be able to drop analog. As many of us know, you can squeeze 10 (or more) digital channels in the spectrum used for one analog channel. Right now the analog bands take up something like 60% of the cable company's bandwidth. However, all the growth in cable company's revenue is from other sources. The cable company's want to expand the other services (Internet, VOD, phone, etc.) as much as possible to make more money. If the cable companies could drop analog TV, they could free up a huge amount of bandwidth for these other services, and still offer more channels.
However, the cable companies can't drop analog and keep their customers. People still want the analog signals, so they still have to provide it. They are facing competition from the phone companies and Satellite (at this point they are mostly worried about the phone companies) and one of the things that differentiates them from their competition is the analog TV signals.
I know from my experience, the lack of analog cable channels was the only thing that made me hesitate switching to FIOS. (I only have 2 TV's so the set-top boxes aren't a big deal. However, I had to replace my homemade PVR with the FIOS one. I have to say, I liked my homemade one better).
I wonder what the actual percentage of 'relationships' online have turned out where one of them was being clearly deceitful, i.e. a male pretending to be female.
I guess it depends on where you meet. A lot of people meet while playing games, and I wonder if it's deceitful to pretend to be something you are not if you are playing a game? Afterall, some games are clearly fantasy - I couldn't possibly be a wizard or elf. If I'm playing a game like Second Life, do I have to be a middle-aged male, or can I pretend to be younger (or even female) if I want?
In a chat-room, you'd expect people to be themselves, though. I also agree that there's inherently nothing wrong with meeting people on-line and forming relationships with them. I do have two concerns...
One is that an on-line relationship could negatively impact local relationships. For instance, an on-line relationship can suck away too much of your time and emotion. Relationships with people who you are physically near to (traditional friends and family) are obviously very important, and sacrificing these for an on-line relationship is probably not wise. As long as you keep your priorities straight, this shouldn't be a problem.
The second concern is that turning an on-line relationship into a real one might be challenging. Attributes that may be a problem in real life, don't necessarily appear when you are chatting on-line. However, to some extent this is true no matter how you meet. We all try to put on our best face when we meet someone, and it's only later that people generally get to really know us. Compared to other ways of meeting people, meeting on-line first actually seems to work pretty well.
You are abosuletly right and, yet, wrong. It is true we don't remember a lot of what we learn in school. It's use it or loose it, and the fact of the matter is we don't use most of it. I have an advanced degree in physics, and I work in the field, and yet I don't think I could pass a Calc 1 test today.
So, what's the solution? We don't teach anything beyond reading, write, and arithmetic? Because, really that's all the education that you can be pretty much guaranteed everyone will use. There are two problems with this. One is you never know which parts of your education you will need to use daily in your career. Yes, 90% of what you leaned may not matter in your daily life, but 10% you'd be in trouble without. Which 10% will be important is different for everyone, and not necessarily obvious when you are a teenager in school.
Another important problem is education not just about learning about specific things as much as it is about learning about the world, and learning how to learn. You need to teach a broad range of subjects to accomplish this. I agree, though, that an emphasis on teaching just to pass tests is not a good thing.
This doesn't make your cds "louder" than a "quiet" cd,
Actually, you're wrong,because it's not compression that's the problem, it's peak limiting. As you correctly state compression reduces the dynamic range. You make the quiet parts louder, and this does make a CD better for listening to in a car (and many other times, too). Personally I'd prefer they leave the compression off the CD and instead make it a standard feature in stereos and car radios. I know someone who had this feature in his factory car stereo (in a Saturn - not exactly high a end car) over 10 years ago.
The compression as I described above doesn't make the loud parts louder since the loud parts already reach the maximum range of the CD. However, peak limiting can make the loud parts louder. What peak limiting does is squash/chop the top off the largest peaks in the audio (loudest transients - usually a snare or bass drum). Once you cut down the highest peaks, you can have room to raise the volume of the whole thing. If only done for a few transients, this is good thing (or at least not too much of a bad thing). The small change in the transients won't be noticable, and you've increase the signal to noise for the rest of the file (assuming the master you started from has more bits than the final file) and as a bonus made the file louder. If taken a little overboard, you start changing a lot of transients and the snare and bass drums loose their kick. This is not great, but most people still won't notice. If taken even further, though, all the data starts to become distorted, and this plain sounds bad. This is how most current releases are done.
If you can find the link to the guy who compares Rush albums (I've seen others mention it in this thread) he gives great visual examples.
Few technologies are so useful and cheap that they are adopted by everyone instantly. Most follow a transition from early adoptors to mass adoption. I think HD televisions are past early adoption, but not quite to mass adoption. I don't know if there's a correct term for this, but I'd call it a luxury item at this point. Just as you said "it's still in the stage where it's a toy for people with expendable cash." However, there lots of people who buy such luxury items, and HD TV's are certainly past the stage where only a few tech oriented people have them. I don't think the market for high definition movies is small. It's smaller than the market for DVD's certainly, but there's a real market there. The stakes are, of course, much higher than the current market. There's a good chance that whoever wins this format war will have the ruling format for a while. (People may start just downloading movies, but people do like to buy movies on disks, so it's hard to predict).
So far, I think a lot of people have bought HD TV's because they are big and/or fashionable. (I know it seems rediculous to spend a lot of money on a flat TV because it's fashionable, but once you consider how much it costs to furnish a room with decent furniture, a couple grand for a TV that also looks good doesn't seem so outrageous). I don't think people have necessarily cared that they can watch HD on these TVs. However, eventually they will.
In the absence of a format war, I'd say that if the cost of HD players comes down just a little, and people are able to rent HD disks, it will take off. Enough HD TV's are out there, and the people who own the TV's are generally the people who'd be interested. (Again, people with expendable cash). Because of the format war, though, a lot of people are just going to wait it out.
Slashdot Mirror
However, they won't spend that waiting time "evaluating other options," because for these customers, there is no other option.
For these non-gamers, other options are HDTV's, furniture, jewelry, or just about anything. I agree with you that these people are unlikely to evaluate other gaming systems. However, they still may loose their enthusiasm for the Wii, and spend the money someplace else. Sure, they might wait and buy a Wii when they are easier to find. Or, something else could catch their interest, and they may not care about the Wii so much anymore.
The C64 has what many console lovers would dream of:
It also had one thing most PC programmers would dreams of:
A fixed platform. If the software worked on your computer, it'll work on everyone else's just the same (SID filter notwithstanding)
There was just a story on Slashdot where a company was doing exactly that. They were decrypting the movie and storing it on a media server -- with drm and the industry was still up in arms.
Yes, I remember this too. I tried to look for this but I don't remember the company's name. Last I heard, I think they won, or at least were winning the case. I wish I could check that.
Do you really expect them to expose themselves to this type of liability? Do you remember what happened to the original MP3.com when they tried to do the digital locker?
Although I wouldn't directly compare Apple to MP3.com, you are correct. On a cost/benefit basis, it's hard to argue that they should do what I suggest. (However, if they wanted to come out with a real portable video device (with a bigger screen), this would become necessary for the device's success).
Now that I think about it, Microsoft should do this to sell Zunes. Apple can pretty much ride their success for a while, but Microsoft needs a way to distinquish themselves. Yea, like that'll ever happen...
I just find this very frustrating. The law is clearly broken. If you asked almost anyone if they should be allowed to copy DVDs to their iPod for personal use, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who'd say "no". And yet, that's the law we effectively have. The only hope we have for the law changing is for someone to stand up and give the issue some attention.
So you expect a publically traded company to do something that is clearly illegal? It's not about the movie industry, it's against the law in the US.
Fine, so they should state how they'd like to sell us such a piece of software, but they can't because of the law... please write to your local congress critter to help us change this. Jobs has already mentioned that he'd like to sell music without DRM, so this isn't too different.
And besides, is the law really so cut and dry? They could make the arguement that they are only copying the movie because it is necessary in order for the movie to be compatible with this device. (And to further strengthen their arguement, they can encrypt it so you can't copy it off the iPod). I'm not sure whether they'd win or not, but it's a legitimate argument. All they need is enough legitimacy to get to court. Once in court, they're pretty much guaranteed to win in the court of public opinion, even if they loose the case. I'm not sure the movie industry would really want all the negative PR.
Who wants to grasp the concept that the only way to secure future rights from the grip of a DRM locked down future is to convince the studios, as Jobs is trying to do, that they can make money and give consumers more freedom.
This is one way for for a positive outcome. However, look at what (if this article is to be believed) Jobs is asking. He is asking for $4 (it's not clear if the money goes to him or the studio or both) for the ability to do something that we should be able to do for free. The reason we can't do it for free is not (entirely) because of the studios, but mostly because our laws are screwed up. I am hoping that our lawmakers will fix this, but until that happens I'd rather people like Jobs push for fixing the laws rather than (just) being opportunistic and trying to capitalize on it.
It's not always a trivial matter to rip a DVD and transcode it efficiently for an iPod.
If it wasn't for DMCA there would be plenty of commercial software out there that would do this, (just like there are plenty of polished products for ripping CDs). Because DVD ripping software is effectively illegal, no company is going to invest $$ into writing a polished piece of software. The best we get are home-brew solutions, and half-assed products both of which get sued out of existence (or at least out of the US) if they begin to look halfway decent.
The market for the $4 iPod version of movie only exists because the DMCA prevents a competing product from existing.
If it wasn't for Jobs (and Apple) being in bed with the movie industry, I'd hope that they would take Hollywood on and make such a piece of software. Most people are comfortable with the idea that you can copy a CD to portable device, so it would take quite a PR job for Hollywood to convince people that DVDs should somehow be different.
Blu ray is NOT a Sony format, anymore than the CD is a Sony format. They are the dominant member of the industry consortium that developed Blu Ray, and one of the original developers.
Thanks for pointing this out, and correcting me. It sounds like Sony would still get the benefit of licensing fees, if Blu-Ray succeeds over HD-DVD, but that's about it. It doesn't sound like it should be a big deal to Microsoft.
What Microsoft does NOT like about Blu Ray is that it requires a java VM.
Do you know whay this a big deal to Microsoft? It doesn't sound like there's any practical reason to me, other than the usual desire Microsoft has for controlling all formats. Is this really the sole reason Microsoft has spent millions trying to prop up HD-DVD? Maybe the author of the original article is right, and Microsoft really does want to kill both off?
Both Sony and MS throw money into supporting the horse that their respective wagon is tied to. That's how it is.
I agree. However, it is very clear why Sony is willing to dump a ton of money into Blu-Ray. It's pretty much their format. They'll make a killing if it becomes dominant, and they'll loose a ton if it looses.
Microsoft, on the other hand, isn't as heavily invested. For example, their console supports HD-DVD only as an add-on. If HD-DVD becomes dominant, they get some licensing fees on each unit sold, which is no doubt nice, but not that big a deal.
I think Microsoft wants to kill Blu-ray, but they don't care if HD-DVD succeeds or not. They don't want to be at the mercy of Sony for two reasons:
1. If Blu-Ray becomes dominant, they'll be forced to licence it for their next console, (and possibly a XBOX360 add-on). What if Sony denies them? What if the fees put them at too much of a disadvantage.
2. Microsoft envisions some soft of computerized media center in each home. They need some control of the format to do this.
I was at one of those big box electronics stores the other day, and they had a split screen demo Blu-ray disk (or maybe it was HD-DVD, I don't remember) comparing standard and HD quality. I could definitely see the difference, but all the demo did was make me see how little it mattered. The HD side was clearer, and you could see more detail. Still, the impression it gave me was "so what?" If I was just watching the movie, and not scrutinizing the clarity, I'm not sure I would notice the difference.
You can only claim that if the people in this case were going to buy the game/movie/music but decided not to because they recieved a copy through other means. To make that claim is a stretch by any measure.
You are correct. There's no way to know. Still, I don't think it's that much of a stretch to believe that many people aren't going to bother to buy something when they can get it for free. (Numerous studies have been done to see what the effects are filesharing are, but all the results seem to tell you is who funded the study, and what their agenda is).
CD sales are down because what is released on CD is crap.
Perhaps true, but I think CD sales are down for a number of reasons...
1 - filesharing
We can debate this one, but I do think it has an effect.
2 - sale of singles
For those who don't wish to fileshare, you can now buy singles on-line. The record company has long had a disconnect between what they market (singles on the radio) and what they sell (CD albums). They got away with this because you couldn't buy singles. Now you can, so many people are going to save their money and only buy the one or two songs they really want.
3 - crappy music
I think music has been crappy in the past more than people realize, and people still bought music. Still, it does seem to be at a pretty low point now.
4- people are done replacing their vinyl/tapes
I suspect that most people have been done for a while now, but as time goes on fewer and fewer are still doing this.
(Also, I really wish the moderators wouldn't list anything as troll just because it goes against conventional Slashdot wisdom. Whether you agree or not, the GP has a point).
So you are saying that Blu-Ray should be compared to ever so more successful UMD and it's established base of PSP owners?
I don't think they're really comparable. UMD was a product no one needed. It's competition was DVD, an already established standard. No one was interested in buying the same movies again, just to have them on smaller disks. (If Sony allowed people to transfer DVD's to UMD, the standard might have taken off, although not in the way Sony wanted).
One could argue whether HD is enough of improvement for a new format. Rather then get sidetracked on that issue, let's just agree (for arguement's sake) that it is. Then the battle is between Blu-ray and HD-DVD. 6 months ago I though Blu-ray won. Partially because of the PS3, but mostly because Blu-ray had more movie releases: Sony (and Disney) were exclusively backing Blu-ray. (Other studios may change their support, but Blu-ray will need to be dead and buried before Sony does). People will go where the content is. Then, Microsoft bought off a few studios, and the price for HD-DVD players has gone way below that of Blu-ray. And so, the format war is back on.
The price for HD-DVD players is significant . People who might have just waited this format war out, might now jump in. At $500, I'm not going to invest in a format that might not stick around. For $150, I might. It's no longer that big a risk.
So what do they do with SOI wafers? Remove the whole buried oxide layer by CMP?
Sure, why not? The buried oxide layer in an SOI wafer is much thinner than the oxides in the metal stack. If they are using an aggressive CMP to polish the whole metal stack away (which is what I am assuming they are doing, probably without the C, though - I bet it's purely a mechanical polish), removing the relatively thin buried oxide shouldn't add a whole lot to the process.
Ok, you've been (probably unfairly) ripped apart for your post, but this cracked me up...
My family had an atari when I was a kid and it was the same thing, the cool toy we pulled out twice a year, we NEVER got other games for the system, attach rate like 3 initial games, nothing else.
You've got to be kidding me. Where (and when) I grew up, we played the Atari all of the time. We bought tons (or at least as many as the money from my paper route allowed) of different games. I suppose the Atari had it's share of casual gamers, but there were plenty of people who weren't so casual about it.
Generations are *meant* to be incremental improvements - the very name implies they're nothing new, mostly the same thing, just done better. PS3 and Xbox360 are exactly "next generation";
Although people usually group video game generations by console lives, I think they should really be group by gameplay:
Generation 1:
Classic (Atari through Collecovision) - anything goes as we explore this total new form of entertainment. Technology limits it to relatively simple games.
Generation 2:
NES, Genesis, SNES - Side scrollers and platformers rule. Note that NES and SNES are in the same generation. SNES offers better graphics (and more involved games) than the NES, but the game mechanics are essentially the same.
Generation 3:
Playstation(s), N64, Xbox(s), Gamecube - 3-D!! Again, all the systems, from playstation 1 to PS3 feature the same game mechanics. Games get more in-depth and better looking, but the essentially the gameplay elements haven't changed.
In some sense, video games have matured. There is nothing after 3-D, so we've topped out.
Or, perhaps...
Generation 4:
Wii - VR like interations
This is how I interpret Will Wright's opinion. I'm not sure if he's right, but I do think he has a point.
You are correct that people should tolerate differing views, and be willing to listen to other views (without attacking).
I am a scientist, and I don't see anything wrong with faith and religion. However science and religion are orthogonal - they work in total different dimensions. Science deals with what we can see, (i.e. measure and predict) and religion deals with what we will never be able to see or know (why are we here?, what happens to our souls when we die? - and where did they come from in the first place?). These should be total separate. As long as people don't use religion to answer questions that can (and should) be answered with science, I'm fine with religion. (Another requirement for me to be OK with religion, is that it can't be imposed on anyone).
When I speak to people who are religious (and beleive in intelligent design) I think one of the problems is that they don't want their god to be impotent. If their god isn't responsible for evolution, then their god isn't responsible for our existance. Not much point in having a god if your god isn't responsible for something as important as that.
Note that I'm not talking about creationism- I'm talking about intelligent design, which is essentially evolution with god somehow directing it. I honestly don't have a good arguement against intelligent design, I only have an arguement about it being taught as science. God's intervention can never be observed or measured or predicted - so it isn't science!
I hate boxes.
I agree with you. For instance, what's the point of having a small flat LCD screen in the kitchen, if you need this big box to go with it. However, my point, and the point of the original article was that you can't buy a box other than the one the cable companies provide. You can, however, by a cable card enabled TV just fine. The uptake has been slow, and they are pricier than they should be, but there are plenty of models out there. (Because of the price, it may be hard to find a small TV that's cable card ready, though).
You should check whether FIOS can work with cable cards. I think it does, but not everything is supported.
Most of the article describes how difficult it is to replace your cable company's basic STB with your own basic STB. It admits that there are options for DVRs (Series 3 and HD Tivo) and you can get cable card enabled TV.
My conclusion is the reason you can't replace the cable company's box with your own is that no one would want to. This isn't a great conspiracy, it's just that the STB manufacturers aren't going to try to sell a product that no one wants. Why would anyone want to replace one box with another box that does the same thing? The only motivation I could envision is cost, but the rental fees for the boxes aren't usually that high.
For a consumer, using the cable card to use a better DVR or to get rid of the STB entirely is worthwhile. So, the market has responded by providing these options. However, there's no motivation for someone to choose a different basic STB than the one the cable companies provide.
Why can't physicists be portrayed for what we really are, which is normal people who happen to do physics?
Because it's boring. Many (perhaps most) sitcoms have characters who are over the top. It's an easy way to get laughs.
Let's face it: science isn't interesting to watch. Generally you spends weeks/months/years fussing over lots of details in order to get an experimental result, which would still just be considered a boring detail to most of the world. (You think the world really cares about the Higg's Boson)? So, an LA scientist type drama would either be very boring or unrealistic. Probably the best scientist portrayal I can think of is CSI, and even here the science is fairly unrealistic.
Occassionally, you will have sitcoms which are just about normal people and their life and/or relationships. Most of the story takes place outside of work, so you could have one of these characters be a physicist as easily as a doctor, plumber, or whatever. I wouldn't mind if that happened, but I don't expect it to happen anytime soon. An engineer, maybe, but physicists are just too uncommon, and the stereotypes are just too popular.
I can't argue that we don't look at the past through rose colored glasses. We do tend to remember the best games, because they are the only ones worth remembering (and if we were smart, the only ones we spent much time playing). Back then, gameplay did trump graphics, but that's only because graphics pretty much sucked, and you had to provide something. That's not to say people didn't care about graphics. When Donkey Kong came out, people didn't just love the gameplay; they also really enjoyed what were very good graphics (for the time).
I think the important to remember is that graphics need to be a means to end. Sometimes that end is simply providing a visual reward to the gamer. (It's much more exciting to fight your way to the next level if the level is cool to look at). However, I think what's more important is that advanced graphics (and technology )allow new gaming experiences. The first video games were simple, single screen affairs. The entire world of the game was right in front of you (or maybe a few screens). With technology this expanded, and the Nintendo/Sega era featured worlds that were huge, but in 2-D. Then came 3-D, which creates a very different experience then 2-D games. However, what's next? I'm not sure I've come accross a single game in the last 10 years that couldn't have been done on my '97 PC by simply lowering the graphical detail. (I could be wrong, since I stopped playing games about 5 years ago. However, I still keep up a little bit, and nothing seems to indicate I'm wrong). So, the question is, is all this fuss about improving graphics really worth it, if it provides nothing more than eye-candy?
What you say is true, but you could also say the same thing about all the beat-um-up games (learning karate takes a long time and looks nothing like DOA), first person shooters (most FPS have people who run at 30 mph, can jump several feet in the air, and can turn on a dime all the while accurately shooting 100 lb weapons) and any other game type you can think of. The key is not to go for actual realism, just some psuedo realism that feels real enough while still being fun. Just like most games, it'll definitely be simplified relative to the real thing. Whether they can succeed or not in making it fun, I have no idea.
I attending a talk given by a senior director at Comcast the other day. The talk was for a technical audience but there was a lot of discussion about markets, etc.
Here's the thing I learned about cable companies. They would love to be able to drop analog. As many of us know, you can squeeze 10 (or more) digital channels in the spectrum used for one analog channel. Right now the analog bands take up something like 60% of the cable company's bandwidth. However, all the growth in cable company's revenue is from other sources. The cable company's want to expand the other services (Internet, VOD, phone, etc.) as much as possible to make more money. If the cable companies could drop analog TV, they could free up a huge amount of bandwidth for these other services, and still offer more channels.
However, the cable companies can't drop analog and keep their customers. People still want the analog signals, so they still have to provide it. They are facing competition from the phone companies and Satellite (at this point they are mostly worried about the phone companies) and one of the things that differentiates them from their competition is the analog TV signals.
I know from my experience, the lack of analog cable channels was the only thing that made me hesitate switching to FIOS. (I only have 2 TV's so the set-top boxes aren't a big deal. However, I had to replace my homemade PVR with the FIOS one. I have to say, I liked my homemade one better).
I wonder what the actual percentage of 'relationships' online have turned out where one of them was being clearly deceitful, i.e. a male pretending to be female.
I guess it depends on where you meet. A lot of people meet while playing games, and I wonder if it's deceitful to pretend to be something you are not if you are playing a game? Afterall, some games are clearly fantasy - I couldn't possibly be a wizard or elf. If I'm playing a game like Second Life, do I have to be a middle-aged male, or can I pretend to be younger (or even female) if I want?
In a chat-room, you'd expect people to be themselves, though. I also agree that there's inherently nothing wrong with meeting people on-line and forming relationships with them. I do have two concerns...
One is that an on-line relationship could negatively impact local relationships. For instance, an on-line relationship can suck away too much of your time and emotion. Relationships with people who you are physically near to (traditional friends and family) are obviously very important, and sacrificing these for an on-line relationship is probably not wise. As long as you keep your priorities straight, this shouldn't be a problem.
The second concern is that turning an on-line relationship into a real one might be challenging. Attributes that may be a problem in real life, don't necessarily appear when you are chatting on-line. However, to some extent this is true no matter how you meet. We all try to put on our best face when we meet someone, and it's only later that people generally get to really know us. Compared to other ways of meeting people, meeting on-line first actually seems to work pretty well.
You are abosuletly right and, yet, wrong. It is true we don't remember a lot of what we learn in school. It's use it or loose it, and the fact of the matter is we don't use most of it. I have an advanced degree in physics, and I work in the field, and yet I don't think I could pass a Calc 1 test today.
So, what's the solution? We don't teach anything beyond reading, write, and arithmetic? Because, really that's all the education that you can be pretty much guaranteed everyone will use. There are two problems with this. One is you never know which parts of your education you will need to use daily in your career. Yes, 90% of what you leaned may not matter in your daily life, but 10% you'd be in trouble without. Which 10% will be important is different for everyone, and not necessarily obvious when you are a teenager in school.
Another important problem is education not just about learning about specific things as much as it is about learning about the world, and learning how to learn. You need to teach a broad range of subjects to accomplish this. I agree, though, that an emphasis on teaching just to pass tests is not a good thing.
This doesn't make your cds "louder" than a "quiet" cd,
Actually, you're wrong,because it's not compression that's the problem, it's peak limiting. As you correctly state compression reduces the dynamic range. You make the quiet parts louder, and this does make a CD better for listening to in a car (and many other times, too). Personally I'd prefer they leave the compression off the CD and instead make it a standard feature in stereos and car radios. I know someone who had this feature in his factory car stereo (in a Saturn - not exactly high a end car) over 10 years ago.
The compression as I described above doesn't make the loud parts louder since the loud parts already reach the maximum range of the CD. However, peak limiting can make the loud parts louder. What peak limiting does is squash/chop the top off the largest peaks in the audio (loudest transients - usually a snare or bass drum). Once you cut down the highest peaks, you can have room to raise the volume of the whole thing. If only done for a few transients, this is good thing (or at least not too much of a bad thing). The small change in the transients won't be noticable, and you've increase the signal to noise for the rest of the file (assuming the master you started from has more bits than the final file) and as a bonus made the file louder. If taken a little overboard, you start changing a lot of transients and the snare and bass drums loose their kick. This is not great, but most people still won't notice. If taken even further, though, all the data starts to become distorted, and this plain sounds bad. This is how most current releases are done.
If you can find the link to the guy who compares Rush albums (I've seen others mention it in this thread) he gives great visual examples.
Few technologies are so useful and cheap that they are adopted by everyone instantly. Most follow a transition from early adoptors to mass adoption. I think HD televisions are past early adoption, but not quite to mass adoption. I don't know if there's a correct term for this, but I'd call it a luxury item at this point. Just as you said "it's still in the stage where it's a toy for people with expendable cash." However, there lots of people who buy such luxury items, and HD TV's are certainly past the stage where only a few tech oriented people have them. I don't think the market for high definition movies is small. It's smaller than the market for DVD's certainly, but there's a real market there. The stakes are, of course, much higher than the current market. There's a good chance that whoever wins this format war will have the ruling format for a while. (People may start just downloading movies, but people do like to buy movies on disks, so it's hard to predict).
So far, I think a lot of people have bought HD TV's because they are big and/or fashionable. (I know it seems rediculous to spend a lot of money on a flat TV because it's fashionable, but once you consider how much it costs to furnish a room with decent furniture, a couple grand for a TV that also looks good doesn't seem so outrageous). I don't think people have necessarily cared that they can watch HD on these TVs. However, eventually they will.
In the absence of a format war, I'd say that if the cost of HD players comes down just a little, and people are able to rent HD disks, it will take off. Enough HD TV's are out there, and the people who own the TV's are generally the people who'd be interested. (Again, people with expendable cash). Because of the format war, though, a lot of people are just going to wait it out.