Q: You know what's REALLY easy to do? A: Take things out of context so as to change the meaning.
If you read the complete document, you will fins that the section you quoted reads:
The United States considers space capabilities -- including the ground and space segments and supporting links -- vital to its national interests. Consistent with this policy, the Unites States will: preserve its rights, capabilities, and freedom of action in space; dissuade or deter others from either impeding those rights or developing capabilities intended to do so; take those actions necessary to protect its space capabilities; respond to interference; and deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to U.S. national interests.
Gee, that means something different, doesn't it? As in, we will consider lasers aimed at our satellites to be hostile actions. We will not allow the launch of nuclear weapons into space. We will not allow a warship to take action against our spacecraft. So on and so forth.
What this document is doing, is that it's laying the ground rules for how the U.S. will behave. It says that we will be completely peaceful as long as we are allowed to peacefully explore and use space for non-weaponized purposes. Should someone like China try to prevent our peaceful use of space, we will consider that a hostile act against us. If necessary (note the word in the original document) we will prevent the launch of any space weapons that are intended for use against us.
Good God, there are a lot of Bush Hating trolls out today. Your comment speaks more of ignorance than insightfulness.
Here's the rundown of the situation:
1. This portion of the policy does not make space weaponry legal. It only says that weapons regulations should not prevent the development of technology required for space travel. Which, like it or not, is AN ABSOLUTE MUST should we humans ever want to travel in space. Chemical engines simply can't provide the power or life support capabilities that nuclear power can.
2. The Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was a Cold War artifact. The U.S. signed it to get certain concessions from the USSR. It also helped prevent issues like the contamination of Bikini Atol. In the future, it will continue to protect us against weapons testing, but should not inhibit craft bound for other celestial locations.
3. What exactly would putting nukes in space do that we can't already do? Allow us to bomb Iraq? Oh, too late. We already own their skies, and can reach them with ICBMs anyway. Allow us to bomb Iran? Well, we can own their skies in an instant, and we still have the ICBM option. Bomb China? See: Iran. Basically, space-based nukes would be useless. We already have the delivery systems to send them anywhere we want (*through* space rather than *in* space), at any time we want. There is no country on this Earth with the technology to stop our missiles. The only use in getting nukes in space would be to use them in Space Combat. And we're a LONG way from worrying about that.
4. The Rumsfield issue is another problem. Don't want that to happen? Donate to and support your local freedom foundation that will prosecute Supreme Court cases that further limit the President's ability. Last I checked, the Constitution is still in effect. Should the government continue to push aside our freedoms, then may I suggest you exercise your constitutional right to arm yourself to the teeth?
What you want is the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. It's an agreement between the major super-powers that no Earthly country will own celestial bodies, and that these places exist for the exploration of all mankind.
I expect that this treaty would be modified once space colonies become common (a country, corporation, or individual would obviously "own" the property on which its Space Habitats reside, as it "owns" those habitats), but that's a matter that will be worked out when that bridge is crossed.
FWIW, historical property laws do offer some guidance. The original property laws provided complete ownership for everything below a property, and all the sky above a property. These laws have been modified as new technologies like airplanes and spacecraft made the skies above open space, and subways, power, and gas made the areas below into necessary points of infrastructure.
Because not two months ago, he wanted to shut down the ISS missions because they were estimated to cost $200M.
You might be surprised, but a lot of space advocates would agree with this. The ISS, for all it's design and hardware, is a useless space station that can only be serviced properly by the Space Shuttle. Had compromises not been made earlier, the station would be worth holding on to. But as it is right now, the station sits in an orbit that's incredibly hard to reach, cannot be used as a lunar launching point, and isn't even all that spectacular for scientific endeavours.
A much more useful future would be to take that $200M per mission, and spend it on lots and lots of inexpensive, inflatible space stations. These stations could provide all the facilities of the ISS, but at a lower cost of launch and operation. If a particular station outlives its usefulness, a new one could be launched rather than trying to maintain aging hardware.
The ability to spread our resources across multiple stations would also mean that we could put Space Stations where-ever they're useful. Need one to support moon missions? Done. Need a different orbit to support Mars missions? Done. Need a temporary construction yard for a spaceship? Done.
Those options simply don't exist with the current station. So believe it or not, there may be some method to Bush's seeming madness about space.
There's one part of the policy I found particularly interesting:
The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit U.S. access to or use of space. Proposed arms control agreements or restrictions must not impair the rights of the United States to conduct research, development, testing, and operations or other activities in space for U.S. national interests.
Can you say, "Nuclear Space Drive"?:D
Bush's policy effectively states that the usage of nuclear power as engines of exploration is considered to take priority over any over-reaching treaties that ban nuclear power for the purposes of weaponry. Which means that the United States would consider a treaty like the 1963 Test Ban Treaty (the one that effectively killed the Orion) to not apply to space propulsion. Which, IMHO, can only be a good thing in the modern day world.
Any concerns over the environmental effects of launch are much more effectively handled by environmental groups rather than treaties designed with weapons in mind rather than actual fall-out issues. If they have a realistic concern, then the public will have an opportunity to evaluate that concern, and either take action or reject it. (The latter happening with the Cassini-Huygens environmental protest.)
That's odd. Maybe it's just me, but I thought the Enterprise-E was a 100% digital effects model? Why would they bother creating a physical model if they're only shooting the digital set? The only thing I can think of is a rough model to prototype the design before making a digital version.
Anyone have the deal on this, or do I need to run scandisk on my brain?
The Nintendo Tourney Cart was just a mishmash of Super Mario, Rad Racer, and Tetris. The idea was to get to a certain number of points in Mario, beat a race in Rad Racer, and then use the remaining time (yes, you were on a clock) to get the highest possible score in Tetris. The basic strategy was to get past the first two parts as quickly as possible so that you could begin raking up a huge score in Tetris before everyone else.
Pretty much all Nintendo tournaments used these carts, but a special few were made in Golden (colored plastic) Shells. These 25 Golden units were given to the winners and runner ups in the 1990 Nintendo World Championship tournament. Since the tournament carts are rare to begin with, the 25 gold ones are considered worth their weight in the real stuff. (Even though they're just plastic.)
Ah, but the summary says that they're worth searching for because of their, "their quality and their rarity". I honestly can't think of how most of these could be considered "quality". Most of the collectors items for old game systems are the crap that no one wanted to play the first time around. Stuff like Tooth Protectors, Chase the Chuckwagon, boxed "Action Packs" containing Combat and Dodge 'Em, Channel F consoles, Emerson Aracadias, etc. It's all rare, but it's also all junk.
The truly GREAT stuff are the rarities that are both hard to find and treasures to own. Avalon Hill, for example, made some great games. But their timing was off (video game crash and all that), so no one knew about them. That makes Shuttle Orbiter and Wall Ball a) collectable, b) extremely rare, and c) very expensive. I have a copy of the former, and I treasure it far more than I would an NES competition cartridge.
When it comes to video games, one does have to realize that they're made to be played. As a result, there are only a few affluent collectors willing to pay high prices for ultra-rare garbage. After all, these pieces are not much to look at. (Save for, perhaps, the tourney cart.)
If you want a real collectors item, go grab this unit. It's good looking, functional, pricey, and rare. Now THAT is a collectors item.;-)
I thought these titles were supposed to be worth tracking down? Atlantis II, for example, is not much different from the original. As such, it's just a collectors item rather than a really fun game. Pepsi Invaders is just Space Invaders (not even that different from the original 2600 version), and the NES Compo Cart is simply a timed game to get the most points in Mario, Rad Racer, and Tetris. (Ah, I remember actually competing on this cart. Memories.) Basically, I don't see why you'd spend money on these titles unless you're a more of a collector than a player.
For games that are actually fun, here's my list in no particular order:
The Intellivision is sort of a leader in this space as some of their best titles were released after Mattel Electronics folded. As a result, these titles are very hard to get ahold of. I've only named one's I've played. I'm sure that Stadium Mud Buggies and Thunder Castle are lots of fun too. (In fact, I've been forcefully told as much by others.)
Viacom owns Paramount. CBS owned Viacom. Viacom and CBS split, each taking part of the pie. Don't ask me to detangle it any further. My head already hurts trying to figure out who owns who.
The original question did mention specifically SDI or YUV-Component video signals. I'm assuming the broadcast will still be analog.
Not for long. According to the FCC, television stations *must* switch over to digital by February 17, 2009. That's only about 2 and a half years away. So anything he does now had better be digital ready. Otherwise he's going to be in a world of hurt, possibly before he even completes this project.
An interlaced scan monitor is not the same as an interlaced signal. By running at twice the resolution of a non-interlaced monitor, interlaced monitors were able to show the same picture but with less flicker. They were great for slow moving graphics, but looked horrible for anything fast moving. The VGA signal itself was non-interlaced, and was merely being shown on alternate lines each frame.
Just because you can sample an NTSC signal off of VGA, doesn't mean that it will produce the results you want. The equipment you linked to is designed to take a *clean* computer graphics signal, and then resample that for NTSC broadcast. Which makes it useful for stuff like the Superbowl helmets colliding, or digitally filmed/transferred television programs.
This fellow needs to take an interlaced signal from an old tape, encode that to MPEG-2 in an interlaced format (preferrably with no detectable quality loss), then reencode the signal as an interlaced NTSC signal for broadcast. The best way to do that is to keep the signal cohesive at all three steps. If you start transcoding the signal into progressive, then back into interlaced, you're going to get a significant drop in quality.
You can't do that. Broadcast television is interlaced. VGA is progressive. Never the twain shall meet.
This comes back to the problems he's going to have. He needs his MPEG source to be interlaced as well, OR he can use a 30fps deinterlaced source that gets interlaced in real time. Neither option is very appealing, and most people don't even understand what that entails. If he creates the signal incorrectly, all you're going to get on the screen (presuming you get anything) is a blurry mush of interlacing artifacts created by far too many transcodings.
Everyone seems to be forgetting the little part about translating the MPEG compressed video into a broadcast quality NTSC signal, preferrably without noticable artifacting and color problems. Depending on the equipment, a simple TV-OUT port could be used, but would that really give the results a television station needs?
Also, let's not forget that he needs to future-proof his solution for digital transmissions. While there's tons of NTSC equipment on the market, what does one use to broadcast in digital? Presumably, he'll need encoders that are well suited to broadcast technology and an advanced digital to analog signal coverter at a minimum. He'll also need to understand whether he will have to support SDTV broadcasts, HDTV broadcasts, or both. If it's both, does his software support anamorphic encoding? If not, what is the hit from multi-encoding?
I'm barely even scratching the surface of the problems he's going to have. Right now, Linux has media software intended for home use. Setting things up for a professional television station is a whole other ball of wax that probably hasn't been considered yet.
It's not scary because of credit or idea ownership issues, per se. If the discovery is really important then there will be more than enough credit/money/etc. to go around.
What can I say? Life carries risk. The key is that you are not an expert in the subject and don't know a trustworthy expert on the subject. So the chances are far higher that you've made a mistake rather than having stumbled upon something new. The gamble isn't as great as you might think, especially since most experts get into their field because they enjoy sharing knowledge.
While there is a minor possibility that you have stumbled on something amazing, you do have a "paper trail" of emails, Slashdot posts, and other evidence that - should it become necessary - could be used to prove your case in a court of law.
A much better idea would be to accept the expert on his offer. What offer would that be? Collaboration, of course. You probably lack the knowledge, expertise, and background to bring the matter to fruition. Which means that collaboration could provide you a way to bring the discovery to light while the expert gets to share the credit for your discovery. Thus everyone wins.:)
Ever read a good book, then get to the end and wish you had more to read? If it's a series, you'll probably go pick up the next book in the series so you can get back to that same feeling of elation that the previous book brought you. If the book isn't a series, then you might look for more books by the same author in hopes that his other titles will be just as good.
It's the same with video games. If a particular game brings you enjoyment, then you'll want more when you're done with the current one. A sequel provides a seemingly "safe" method of obtaining that enjoyment. Simply picking up a different title removes you from your comfort zone and exposes you to risk. Ergo, we try to minimize the number of new franchises we "get into"./End amatuer physcology
Interesting. It looks like the videos themselves are zangofied. Which is real easy to defeat by not accepting the DRM. (And people wonder why I hate Windows Media formats.)
Of course, the real issue is that no one is pointing to that page, yet this fellow is hell-bent on his Zango warnings for those pages. So either he's already infested (seems likely to me), or he likes to make mountains out of mole hills. Whatever.
I just searched the page for the "zango" links you so abhor. Know what I found? A: Bupkis.
Clean the spyware off your machine and you'll stop seeing Zango links. Then, with any luck, you'll be able to live down this embarassing ordeal. As long as you don't install any more spyware, that is.
should I first get a NDA or some other legal document signed by you that says you won't just take the idea and give it to someone you are already dealing with?
Most VCs will kick you out the door if you ask for an NDA. They see far too many screwball ideas to go through the legal proceedings that an NDA would require. In any case, they're more interested in the implementation of the company than the idea that founds it. i.e. They're investing in monetary potential, not your amazing brilliance.
Do you track down an expert in the field and ask them to explain why you're wrong?
This is usually the best answer. I've found that anything from a simple misunderstanding of how a bit of physics works to a lack of the necessary modeling calculations can cause you to start down a path that won't really work. Consulting with an expert (most of whom are happy to answer questions from someone who's honestly interested in the field) can often help you understand the problem, should one exist.
However, don't take an expert's word on something not working. If his answer doesn't make sense, then it may be a set of prejudices rather than known science. In which case you should continue to investigate the science behind your discovery until you either find the problem on your own, or feel you can prove it to the experts.
Good luck!:)
P.S. If you're questioning if you are a crackpot for your findings, then you're probably not a crackpot. The actual crackpots stick to their guns in the face of irrefutable evidence, and usually manufacture hilarous conspiracy stories on why they have to keep secrets about their work. I'd take the time to tell you about this one fellow (supposedly a Ph.D.) who tried to prove his super-luminal engine based on the relativistic mass increases in fuel, but that would be a rather lengthy tangent.:D
Your profile states your feelings that a "very strong team" is important to the success of a startup. However, most startups only have the basis for a technology team in place, and rarely have a strong executive team. In a recent interview with Robert X. Cringley, technologist-cum-Venture Capitalist Bill Joy stated that his firm worked with startups to assist in installing team members that are missing from a venture. (Google is an excellent example of this in action, with Page and Brin turning over the Chief Executive reigns to the more experienced Eric Schmidt.)
What are your thoughts and opinions on this practice? Does your firm assist startups with more than just financial matters, or do you feel it important that the startup be fully formed by the time you invest?
I don't know what kind of modifications you've done to your PET, but my PET can't do more than 40x25 character mode. So I don't really see the point in hooking a scanner up to it. Even if you find a vet from the great computer wars, I seriously doubt he'd be able to help. He'd probably just tell you to get a Commodore 64 instead. At least it had bitmapped graphics.
Slashdot Mirror
A: Take things out of context so as to change the meaning.
If you read the complete document, you will fins that the section you quoted reads:
Gee, that means something different, doesn't it? As in, we will consider lasers aimed at our satellites to be hostile actions. We will not allow the launch of nuclear weapons into space. We will not allow a warship to take action against our spacecraft. So on and so forth.
What this document is doing, is that it's laying the ground rules for how the U.S. will behave. It says that we will be completely peaceful as long as we are allowed to peacefully explore and use space for non-weaponized purposes. Should someone like China try to prevent our peaceful use of space, we will consider that a hostile act against us. If necessary (note the word in the original document) we will prevent the launch of any space weapons that are intended for use against us.
Good God, there are a lot of Bush Hating trolls out today. Your comment speaks more of ignorance than insightfulness.
Here's the rundown of the situation:
1. This portion of the policy does not make space weaponry legal. It only says that weapons regulations should not prevent the development of technology required for space travel. Which, like it or not, is AN ABSOLUTE MUST should we humans ever want to travel in space. Chemical engines simply can't provide the power or life support capabilities that nuclear power can.
2. The Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was a Cold War artifact. The U.S. signed it to get certain concessions from the USSR. It also helped prevent issues like the contamination of Bikini Atol. In the future, it will continue to protect us against weapons testing, but should not inhibit craft bound for other celestial locations.
3. What exactly would putting nukes in space do that we can't already do? Allow us to bomb Iraq? Oh, too late. We already own their skies, and can reach them with ICBMs anyway. Allow us to bomb Iran? Well, we can own their skies in an instant, and we still have the ICBM option. Bomb China? See: Iran. Basically, space-based nukes would be useless. We already have the delivery systems to send them anywhere we want (*through* space rather than *in* space), at any time we want. There is no country on this Earth with the technology to stop our missiles. The only use in getting nukes in space would be to use them in Space Combat. And we're a LONG way from worrying about that.
4. The Rumsfield issue is another problem. Don't want that to happen? Donate to and support your local freedom foundation that will prosecute Supreme Court cases that further limit the President's ability. Last I checked, the Constitution is still in effect. Should the government continue to push aside our freedoms, then may I suggest you exercise your constitutional right to arm yourself to the teeth?
What you want is the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. It's an agreement between the major super-powers that no Earthly country will own celestial bodies, and that these places exist for the exploration of all mankind.
I expect that this treaty would be modified once space colonies become common (a country, corporation, or individual would obviously "own" the property on which its Space Habitats reside, as it "owns" those habitats), but that's a matter that will be worked out when that bridge is crossed.
FWIW, historical property laws do offer some guidance. The original property laws provided complete ownership for everything below a property, and all the sky above a property. These laws have been modified as new technologies like airplanes and spacecraft made the skies above open space, and subways, power, and gas made the areas below into necessary points of infrastructure.
You might be surprised, but a lot of space advocates would agree with this. The ISS, for all it's design and hardware, is a useless space station that can only be serviced properly by the Space Shuttle. Had compromises not been made earlier, the station would be worth holding on to. But as it is right now, the station sits in an orbit that's incredibly hard to reach, cannot be used as a lunar launching point, and isn't even all that spectacular for scientific endeavours.
A much more useful future would be to take that $200M per mission, and spend it on lots and lots of inexpensive, inflatible space stations. These stations could provide all the facilities of the ISS, but at a lower cost of launch and operation. If a particular station outlives its usefulness, a new one could be launched rather than trying to maintain aging hardware.
The ability to spread our resources across multiple stations would also mean that we could put Space Stations where-ever they're useful. Need one to support moon missions? Done. Need a different orbit to support Mars missions? Done. Need a temporary construction yard for a spaceship? Done.
Those options simply don't exist with the current station. So believe it or not, there may be some method to Bush's seeming madness about space.
Can you say, "Nuclear Space Drive"?
Bush's policy effectively states that the usage of nuclear power as engines of exploration is considered to take priority over any over-reaching treaties that ban nuclear power for the purposes of weaponry. Which means that the United States would consider a treaty like the 1963 Test Ban Treaty (the one that effectively killed the Orion) to not apply to space propulsion. Which, IMHO, can only be a good thing in the modern day world.
Any concerns over the environmental effects of launch are much more effectively handled by environmental groups rather than treaties designed with weapons in mind rather than actual fall-out issues. If they have a realistic concern, then the public will have an opportunity to evaluate that concern, and either take action or reject it. (The latter happening with the Cassini-Huygens environmental protest.)
That's odd. Maybe it's just me, but I thought the Enterprise-E was a 100% digital effects model? Why would they bother creating a physical model if they're only shooting the digital set? The only thing I can think of is a rough model to prototype the design before making a digital version.
Anyone have the deal on this, or do I need to run scandisk on my brain?
Info
The Nintendo Tourney Cart was just a mishmash of Super Mario, Rad Racer, and Tetris. The idea was to get to a certain number of points in Mario, beat a race in Rad Racer, and then use the remaining time (yes, you were on a clock) to get the highest possible score in Tetris. The basic strategy was to get past the first two parts as quickly as possible so that you could begin raking up a huge score in Tetris before everyone else.
Pretty much all Nintendo tournaments used these carts, but a special few were made in Golden (colored plastic) Shells. These 25 Golden units were given to the winners and runner ups in the 1990 Nintendo World Championship tournament. Since the tournament carts are rare to begin with, the 25 gold ones are considered worth their weight in the real stuff. (Even though they're just plastic.)
Ah, but the summary says that they're worth searching for because of their, "their quality and their rarity". I honestly can't think of how most of these could be considered "quality". Most of the collectors items for old game systems are the crap that no one wanted to play the first time around. Stuff like Tooth Protectors, Chase the Chuckwagon, boxed "Action Packs" containing Combat and Dodge 'Em, Channel F consoles, Emerson Aracadias, etc. It's all rare, but it's also all junk.
;-)
The truly GREAT stuff are the rarities that are both hard to find and treasures to own. Avalon Hill, for example, made some great games. But their timing was off (video game crash and all that), so no one knew about them. That makes Shuttle Orbiter and Wall Ball a) collectable, b) extremely rare, and c) very expensive. I have a copy of the former, and I treasure it far more than I would an NES competition cartridge.
When it comes to video games, one does have to realize that they're made to be played. As a result, there are only a few affluent collectors willing to pay high prices for ultra-rare garbage. After all, these pieces are not much to look at. (Save for, perhaps, the tourney cart.)
If you want a real collectors item, go grab this unit. It's good looking, functional, pricey, and rare. Now THAT is a collectors item.
I thought these titles were supposed to be worth tracking down? Atlantis II, for example, is not much different from the original. As such, it's just a collectors item rather than a really fun game. Pepsi Invaders is just Space Invaders (not even that different from the original 2600 version), and the NES Compo Cart is simply a timed game to get the most points in Mario, Rad Racer, and Tetris. (Ah, I remember actually competing on this cart. Memories.) Basically, I don't see why you'd spend money on these titles unless you're a more of a collector than a player.
For games that are actually fun, here's my list in no particular order:
1) Shuttle Orbiter (2600) $50 - $80
2) H.E.R.O. (2600) $10-$20
3) Diner (Intellivision) $50-$100
4) Galaxy 5000 (NES) $10-$20
5) Thin Ice (Intellivision) $20-$50
6) Killer Bees (Odyssey 2) $10-$15
7) Dreadnaught Factor (Intellivision) $10-$30
8) Happy Trails (Intellivision) $10-$15
The Intellivision is sort of a leader in this space as some of their best titles were released after Mattel Electronics folded. As a result, these titles are very hard to get ahold of. I've only named one's I've played. I'm sure that Stadium Mud Buggies and Thunder Castle are lots of fun too. (In fact, I've been forcefully told as much by others.)
Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow...
:P
Cruel bastard.
Viacom owns Paramount. CBS owned Viacom. Viacom and CBS split, each taking part of the pie. Don't ask me to detangle it any further. My head already hurts trying to figure out who owns who.
Not for long. According to the FCC, television stations *must* switch over to digital by February 17, 2009. That's only about 2 and a half years away. So anything he does now had better be digital ready. Otherwise he's going to be in a world of hurt, possibly before he even completes this project.
An interlaced scan monitor is not the same as an interlaced signal. By running at twice the resolution of a non-interlaced monitor, interlaced monitors were able to show the same picture but with less flicker. They were great for slow moving graphics, but looked horrible for anything fast moving. The VGA signal itself was non-interlaced, and was merely being shown on alternate lines each frame.
Some history.
*sigh*
Trans. coding. Problems.
Just because you can sample an NTSC signal off of VGA, doesn't mean that it will produce the results you want. The equipment you linked to is designed to take a *clean* computer graphics signal, and then resample that for NTSC broadcast. Which makes it useful for stuff like the Superbowl helmets colliding, or digitally filmed/transferred television programs.
This fellow needs to take an interlaced signal from an old tape, encode that to MPEG-2 in an interlaced format (preferrably with no detectable quality loss), then reencode the signal as an interlaced NTSC signal for broadcast. The best way to do that is to keep the signal cohesive at all three steps. If you start transcoding the signal into progressive, then back into interlaced, you're going to get a significant drop in quality.
You can't do that. Broadcast television is interlaced. VGA is progressive. Never the twain shall meet.
This comes back to the problems he's going to have. He needs his MPEG source to be interlaced as well, OR he can use a 30fps deinterlaced source that gets interlaced in real time. Neither option is very appealing, and most people don't even understand what that entails. If he creates the signal incorrectly, all you're going to get on the screen (presuming you get anything) is a blurry mush of interlacing artifacts created by far too many transcodings.
Everyone seems to be forgetting the little part about translating the MPEG compressed video into a broadcast quality NTSC signal, preferrably without noticable artifacting and color problems. Depending on the equipment, a simple TV-OUT port could be used, but would that really give the results a television station needs?
Also, let's not forget that he needs to future-proof his solution for digital transmissions. While there's tons of NTSC equipment on the market, what does one use to broadcast in digital? Presumably, he'll need encoders that are well suited to broadcast technology and an advanced digital to analog signal coverter at a minimum. He'll also need to understand whether he will have to support SDTV broadcasts, HDTV broadcasts, or both. If it's both, does his software support anamorphic encoding? If not, what is the hit from multi-encoding?
I'm barely even scratching the surface of the problems he's going to have. Right now, Linux has media software intended for home use. Setting things up for a professional television station is a whole other ball of wax that probably hasn't been considered yet.
What can I say? Life carries risk. The key is that you are not an expert in the subject and don't know a trustworthy expert on the subject. So the chances are far higher that you've made a mistake rather than having stumbled upon something new. The gamble isn't as great as you might think, especially since most experts get into their field because they enjoy sharing knowledge.
While there is a minor possibility that you have stumbled on something amazing, you do have a "paper trail" of emails, Slashdot posts, and other evidence that - should it become necessary - could be used to prove your case in a court of law.
A much better idea would be to accept the expert on his offer. What offer would that be? Collaboration, of course. You probably lack the knowledge, expertise, and background to bring the matter to fruition. Which means that collaboration could provide you a way to bring the discovery to light while the expert gets to share the credit for your discovery. Thus everyone wins.
s/physcology/psychology/g
Ever read a good book, then get to the end and wish you had more to read? If it's a series, you'll probably go pick up the next book in the series so you can get back to that same feeling of elation that the previous book brought you. If the book isn't a series, then you might look for more books by the same author in hopes that his other titles will be just as good.
/End amatuer physcology
It's the same with video games. If a particular game brings you enjoyment, then you'll want more when you're done with the current one. A sequel provides a seemingly "safe" method of obtaining that enjoyment. Simply picking up a different title removes you from your comfort zone and exposes you to risk. Ergo, we try to minimize the number of new franchises we "get into".
Interesting. It looks like the videos themselves are zangofied. Which is real easy to defeat by not accepting the DRM. (And people wonder why I hate Windows Media formats.)
Of course, the real issue is that no one is pointing to that page, yet this fellow is hell-bent on his Zango warnings for those pages. So either he's already infested (seems likely to me), or he likes to make mountains out of mole hills. Whatever.
I just searched the page for the "zango" links you so abhor. Know what I found? A: Bupkis.
Clean the spyware off your machine and you'll stop seeing Zango links. Then, with any luck, you'll be able to live down this embarassing ordeal. As long as you don't install any more spyware, that is.
Most VCs will kick you out the door if you ask for an NDA. They see far too many screwball ideas to go through the legal proceedings that an NDA would require. In any case, they're more interested in the implementation of the company than the idea that founds it. i.e. They're investing in monetary potential, not your amazing brilliance.
This is usually the best answer. I've found that anything from a simple misunderstanding of how a bit of physics works to a lack of the necessary modeling calculations can cause you to start down a path that won't really work. Consulting with an expert (most of whom are happy to answer questions from someone who's honestly interested in the field) can often help you understand the problem, should one exist.
However, don't take an expert's word on something not working. If his answer doesn't make sense, then it may be a set of prejudices rather than known science. In which case you should continue to investigate the science behind your discovery until you either find the problem on your own, or feel you can prove it to the experts.
Good luck!
P.S. If you're questioning if you are a crackpot for your findings, then you're probably not a crackpot. The actual crackpots stick to their guns in the face of irrefutable evidence, and usually manufacture hilarous conspiracy stories on why they have to keep secrets about their work. I'd take the time to tell you about this one fellow (supposedly a Ph.D.) who tried to prove his super-luminal engine based on the relativistic mass increases in fuel, but that would be a rather lengthy tangent.
Your profile states your feelings that a "very strong team" is important to the success of a startup. However, most startups only have the basis for a technology team in place, and rarely have a strong executive team. In a recent interview with Robert X. Cringley, technologist-cum-Venture Capitalist Bill Joy stated that his firm worked with startups to assist in installing team members that are missing from a venture. (Google is an excellent example of this in action, with Page and Brin turning over the Chief Executive reigns to the more experienced Eric Schmidt.)
What are your thoughts and opinions on this practice? Does your firm assist startups with more than just financial matters, or do you feel it important that the startup be fully formed by the time you invest?
I don't know what kind of modifications you've done to your PET, but my PET can't do more than 40x25 character mode. So I don't really see the point in hooking a scanner up to it. Even if you find a vet from the great computer wars, I seriously doubt he'd be able to help. He'd probably just tell you to get a Commodore 64 instead. At least it had bitmapped graphics.
You kids and your screwy ideas.