Yes, lets post news stories so obfuscated that they need another story posted just to explain what the hell was said in the first story! Why stop at just one level of obfuscation, why dont we have stories that require four or five or even six degrees of obfuscation and reporting just to get the original content of the first article across as coherent thought?
Explain this in fucking ENGLISH. Hell, I'll even accept the Queen's English here in this case. But this story makes abso-fucking-loutely no sense the way its currently written.
I mean, does this mean that SCO is being forced to go into court without the advantage of their other motions...er stalling tactics being allowed to go forward?
The day I allow any ISP I work for sign a "code of conduct" agreement with the RIAA or their ilk is the same day the RIAA signs a "code of conduct" stating that they will not act like asshats and sue anything with a filename resembeling one of their precious artists.
You people seriously suffer from tunnel vision..
on
Router Built for Gamers
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
(Disclaimer: I have the router described in the article at home in use)
I see all these posts from people saying:
"Oh this is nothing special, I can do everything this routers does with my Linux box and iptables and tc"
Hello people! This is a CONSUMER ROUTER. How many people who are just regular people are competent enough to:
1. Build their own computer (ok, they could buy it prebuilt) 2. Install Linux 3. Configure Linux 4. Understand TCP/IP 5. Learn how traffic shaping/traffic prioritization works 6. Implement #5 on their new Linux box.
Just because us Slashdot nerds can build our own routers doesn't mean this isn't a bad product.
Also, for the people who are saying:
"Oh the Linksys routers can do QoS with the Sevasoft firmware"
This still requires the average consumer to:
1. Know what the hell QoS 1a. Know how the hell TCP/IP works 2. Learn what ports different online games and p2p apps utilize 3. Know about alternative niche firmware for their consumer router 4. PURCHASE the firmware and install it (without borking their shiny new router)
To the people who have been going on about how previous older/current different models of D-Link's have had problems for them I say this:
The D-Link gaming router actually works as advertised. I haven't had it burst into flames. It's been perfectly happy handling World of Warcraft, IRC, IM, DC++, and Bittorrent all simultaneously over my cable connection. The router hasn't spontaneously reset due to extreme traffic flow. The router has simply Just Worked.
RAID 5 for video storage has to be the stupidest idea I've ever heard. RAID 5 you loose a ton of performance on your write operations due to all of the redundancy. Also, don't forget your writing to the disk ALL THE TIME, 24/7.
AT&T Worldnet also maintains an internal RBL that is very difficult to get off of primarily because there is no documentation on how to get off their RBL! To find out you pretty much have to do a search in Google Groups for some posts to the abuse newsgroups where other admins ask "How the (*&#$&*#$ do I get off the Worldnet RBL?". Another cute trick with the Worldnet RBL is, once you've been blocked you must email your RBL removal petition from an IP/domain outside the blacklisted one as mail sent to their abuse admins will bounce due to the RBL. It's just annoying as all hell if you ask me.
They are a big pain in the ass for us providers to deal with. But they are also a necessary evil too sometimes. Personally I like the Spamhaus lists much better. And Spamhaus isn't a bunch of assholes so that gets them the cookie in my book.
I fail to see how a mere piece of software can turn your laptop from an inanimate object into a opisthobranch mollusc? If that was true then "bug hunting" would take on a whole new meaning!
I'm sorry but when was the last time journalism and ethics got uttered in the same room in the US here? See: Fox News, Dan Rather, Michael Moore, etc.
Don't get me wrong, ethics belong in journalism but it seems like as soon as you try to make money off reporting the news ethics gets fast-tracked to the bottom of the priorities ladder.
"Imagine a world where Sliders was a good show" is the motto of that show.
Early on Sliders was okay but as soon as the Professor left the show (gotta love John Ryes-Davies) the show quickly deteriorated into utter, utter fucking crap.
I mean, jesus near the end there the only original cast member on the show was fucking Rembrandt! The SINGER! He'll just SING HIS WAY OUT OF THIS MESS. NO MATTER THE WARPED REALITY!
Firefly did not "suck" Firefly was actually a well done show that wasn't trying to fit into a Trek mold and was trying to be something newer and better. It would have succeed better too had FOX not fucking assraped the show by showing it OUT OF ORDER. My god, how can you start a show off without INTRODUCING PEOPLE TO THE CHARACTERS YOU FUCKING FOX IDIOTS! That plus changing the shows timeslot around so that the only people who ever watched the shows were people who had Tivos. Way to fucking go there FOX, goram idiots.
B5 was good, we agree there.
Earth: Final Conflict was good I think for like the first 3-4 seasons and then the show just went fucking wierd/bad. Reminds me of the old War of the Worlds tv show that was on the air, great series for a few seasons and then one season it turned into super-dark "We're all fucked" post-apocalytpic or something for no apparent reason and then died quietly.
Haven't gotten into Andromeda, I still think of it as "Hercules Saves Space".
Enterprise was ok the 1st season, however the Temporal War crap has to go, jesus when will B & B let GO of the fucking time travel jesus christ.
BTW, particle of the week was pioneered on ST:TNG FYI.
Symantec has warned that as dspisak's Slashdot mind share increases his PC will start to come under increased attack from trolls
Security vendor Symantec is warning that dspisak's Slashdot posts are increasingly becoming a target for hackers and malware authors.
In its seventh bi-annual Slashdot Internet Security Threat Report, Symantec said over the past year, security researchers had discovered at least 37 serious typos and duplicate story submissions in dspisak's Slashdot useage. According to Symantec, as dspisak increases his mind share -- with new low content posts such as the Comment mini -- his fanbase is likely to come under increasing attack.
"Contrary to popular belief, the Slashdot discussion forums have not always been a safe haven from poor spelling and grammar," Symantec said. "Out of the public eye for some time, it is now clear that dspisak is increasingly becoming a target for the malicious activity that is more commonly associated with Jon Katz and various Slashdot editors like timothy," the report said.
"dspisak has become a target for new attacks... The appearance of a -1 Troll rating for a post called "Boo-Fuching-Hoo" in October 2004, serves to illustrate the growth in vulnerability research in dspisak's comments... The various dspisak comment vulnerabilities allow attackers to carry out information disclosure, punctuation bypass, troll execution, comment escalation, and IQ attacks. Symantec believes that as the popularity of dspisak's new paradigm continues to grow, so too will the number of attacks directed at it," the report said.
Symantec's concerns were echoed by James Turner, security analyst at Frost & Sullivan Australia, who said many of the people who read dspisak comments were not concerned about factual correctness, which left them wide open to attack.
"The duplicate story submissions, funny in-joke humor and mini Comments are cool creations," Turner said. "The by-product is that people are agreeing with these comments for style over actual usefulness. They say it looks pretty and then read it but don't fact-check it. As dspisak increases his mind share, he will be a legitimate target for the Secret Service".
Trend Micro senior systems engineer Adam Biviano said all complex comments had grammatical flaws and the more popular the person, the more likely he would be attacked.
"All sophisticated comments -- dspisak, bperens, goatse or anything else -- especially Natalie Portmans hot grits will have vulnerabilities," Biviano said. "The only reason goatse has had mass exploits written for it is the sheer number of connected people reading it that are present on most networks. As soon as you start seeing mass deployment of any comment mind share you are going to see exploits".
According to Biviano, while there have not been any mass outbreaks of viruses targeting dspisak, the potential does exist.
"You don't see dspisak trolls in mass outbreaks but you do see them in the labs as proof of concepts. There aren't any outbreaks because there are simply are not enough [dspisaks] out there. For a troll to be successful it needs a combination of a worthy jab and a large target audience," said Biviano, who nominated the mobile phone market as an example of malware writers targeting the comment, not goatse's mind share.
"Look at where mobile comments are going and they are not targeting goatse -- they are targeting the market leader, which is cmdrtaco," he said. The Symantec report found in the second half of last year, an increasing proportion of malware was designed to expose spelling errors. The report also found that phishing attacks increased by 366 percent while the number of goatse-based worms and viruses increased by 64 percent, when compared to the first half of 2004.
one says to the other "Man, I hate having to wait so long for my distro to update!". The other then asks the man "What distro is that?". "Gentoo" he replies. The other advocate chuckles "At least your distro wasn't last released 3 years ago".
If a set says its HDTV yet it doesn't have a builtin HDTV tuner then its not an HDTV set. What does an HDTV tuner cost these days?
And I thought that using your standrd UHF over the air house antenna wasnt good enough for HDTV otherwise why do I see and hear about all of these HDTV antennas?
Oh and while I'm picking nits, what about our good old friend the Broadcast Flag? I'm not exactly thrilled that to get a better screen I have to give up rights I already have with my current equipment.
Well shit howdy, they why are they not using that crap on glasses? Casual handling might be fine then, there is always the little kid test however. Wonder if Disney is salivating at that prospect or not.
" Cablevision has already spent more than $1 billion on Voom. It's hard to envision that Dolan and even the incredibly wealthy Malone could spend more than that. And, even if they did, why would the results be any different? As Cablevision's chairman, Dolan has already been, in effect, the head of the satellite service. Voom won't suddenly generate more subscribers just because he starts a new company to run it. It's the irrational thinking of someone who just won't let go.
In the Reuters interview, Malone appears to be telling his old friend that it's time to pack up and call it a day.
"It seemed like I might be helpful in terms of settling things down for him," Malone said when asked why he agreed to Dolan's request to sit on Cablevision's board."
" Last week, Cablevision's new 15-member board, including six independent directors and three Dolan sons, gave Charles Dolan until the end of this month to find a way to take Voom off Cablevision's hands. At the board's insistence, he has put up $10 million of his own cash and stock to help fund Voom this month."
"The Voom story
October 2003: Cablevision launches Voom satellite TV service; plans to split it off.
May 2004: Problems emerge in attracting customers as Voom losses mount.
September 2004: Cablevision says it will delay Voom's spin-off.
November 2004: Voom reveals it lost more customers than it attracted in the summer amid operational and marketing problems.
December 2004: Board, backed by chief executive James Dolan, abandons spin-off and defies chairman Charles Dolan by deciding to sell or shut Voom.
January 2005: After a face-off pitting Charles Dolan against his son and a majority of Cablevision's board, the company agrees to ditch Voom and sell its sole satellite to EchoStar Communications for $200 million.
Feb. 10: Cablevision signs letter of intent to give rest of Voom to Charles Dolan and son Thomas Dolan if they arrange financing.
Feb. 28: Cablevision says it has no definitive agreement with the Dolans and will shut Voom by the end of March. The Dolans say they have financing and want a deal.
March 2: Voom.com Web site says service ends at the end of month, but VoomLLC.com site, established by Charles Dolan and son Tom Dolan, proclaims "Voom Still Delivers."
March 3: Charles Dolan ousts three directors and picks five new ones, giving him a theoretical 8-7 edge.
March 8: New board gives Charles and Tom Dolan to month's end to come up with an "alternative transaction" that prevents Voom's shutdown.
March 10: Charles Dolan puts up $10 million of his own fortune to help keep Voom running."
10 million dollars is like pissing into a supertanker of debt that once held 1.4 BILLION dollars.
VOOM is dead or is dying. I don't care WHO is backing it or believes in it right now. The market for it simply is not mature enough right now. Sure its a great idea but its too early to market.
Sure Govmt is mandating stations to push HD to consumers but that is when? In 2007! It's 2005 right now. I will buy an HDTV when its cost effective and USEFUL. Today it is neither. Perhaps by 2007 market forces will have prevailed on the price point at least. Once that happens then the market can start to grow.
I wear glasses that are "sratch resistant" and guess what they have on them?
Sratches.
Do you really think Blu-Ray discs are magically delicious and going to be any different?
Unimaginable Optical Storage....
on
Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
in a tiiiiiiiny living space!
But seriously, with the specs that Blu-Ray has for the physical aspects of the disc this format would force drive makers to reinstitute the disc-caddy system to keep your fragile Blu-Ray discs from getting scratched or otherwise hosed up by the environment. Just imagie what hell it is going to be to rent Blu-Ray's if there are no caddys!
No matter how much error correction you put in at the block layer on a disc of this level of info density stuff like a ball-point pen or medium to fair sized scratches are going to present a HUGE problem for maintaining media readability and reliability! Not to mention old tricks like polishing scratches out with Turtle Wax just aren't going to work when the protective layer of the Blu-Ray disc is 1/6th as thick as a DVDs!
Plus, why does everyone here think that Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is a wanted thing?
I already own a sizeable collection of movies in DVD format and some older ones in Laserdisc format. I'm not about to buy the same movie again in Blu-Ray just because its higher resolution. Especially since I don't own a HDTV set and I still fail to see the compelling reason to shell out the extra cash for a set. HDTV still costs too much and is still too confusing for the average consumer not to mention you can hardly get dick-all worth watching on it unless your in a major metropoloitan area or have a cable provider that has dedicated a significant amount of their coax bandwidth to delviering premium HDTV channels.
For starters the fact that people think there is this huge pent up demand for 1080i res movies is flat out ricockulous! Hello people, didn't anyone here see that VOOM just went tits up? You want to know how many subscribers they had?
46,000!
If you assume the VOOM subscribes are the same customers with sufficent money and HDTV equipment at home to want HDTV res movies on some format then I think its safe to say what format will win is moot at this point because there is hardly a sustainable market for this format for the movie industry at the current rate of HDTV adoption.
Sure it would be nice to have a higher capacity format but I for one am sick and tired of formats that get mired up in Hollywood dick-swinging.
Why can't the computer industry come up with their own format for optical data storage that is intended for JUST data and as such wont get hijacked by a bunch of egotistical profit grubbing movie studios who will just want to fsck with it to make it "Secure" for their precious movies.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, lets post news stories so obfuscated that they need another story posted just to explain what the hell was said in the first story! Why stop at just one level of obfuscation, why dont we have stories that require four or five or even six degrees of obfuscation and reporting just to get the original content of the first article across as coherent thought?
Explain this in fucking ENGLISH. Hell, I'll even accept the Queen's English here in this case. But this story makes abso-fucking-loutely no sense the way its currently written.
/.
I mean, does this mean that SCO is being forced to go into court without the advantage of their other motions...er stalling tactics being allowed to go forward?
MOST.
CONFUSING.
EVAR.
The day I allow any ISP I work for sign a "code of conduct" agreement with the RIAA or their ilk is the same day the RIAA signs a "code of conduct" stating that they will not act like asshats and sue anything with a filename resembeling one of their precious artists.
UPDATE IT YOU BASTARDS!
(Disclaimer: I have the router described in the article at home in use)
I see all these posts from people saying:
"Oh this is nothing special, I can do everything this routers does with my Linux box and iptables and tc"
Hello people! This is a CONSUMER ROUTER. How many people who are just regular people are competent enough to:
1. Build their own computer (ok, they could buy it prebuilt)
2. Install Linux
3. Configure Linux
4. Understand TCP/IP
5. Learn how traffic shaping/traffic prioritization works
6. Implement #5 on their new Linux box.
Just because us Slashdot nerds can build our own routers doesn't mean this isn't a bad product.
Also, for the people who are saying:
"Oh the Linksys routers can do QoS with the Sevasoft firmware"
This still requires the average consumer to:
1. Know what the hell QoS
1a. Know how the hell TCP/IP works
2. Learn what ports different online games and p2p apps utilize
3. Know about alternative niche firmware for their consumer router
4. PURCHASE the firmware and install it (without borking their shiny new router)
To the people who have been going on about how previous older/current different models of D-Link's have had problems for them I say this:
The D-Link gaming router actually works as advertised. I haven't had it burst into flames. It's been perfectly happy handling World of Warcraft, IRC, IM, DC++, and Bittorrent all simultaneously over my cable connection. The router hasn't spontaneously reset due to extreme traffic flow. The router has simply Just Worked.
RAID 5 for video storage has to be the stupidest idea I've ever heard. RAID 5 you loose a ton of performance on your write operations due to all of the redundancy. Also, don't forget your writing to the disk ALL THE TIME, 24/7.
Emperor of the Moon? It's taking too damn long.
A TV show or short segment showing what people are looking for on Google? Oh god, I can just imagine it now:
193.53.2.10 is looking for "l33t w@r3z" with 57 hits
Oh but check this out! 216.23.129.44 is looking for "vast right wing conspiracy" with 683,000 hits!
101.23.64.99 is looking for "CENSORED" with 2,947,345 hits. What a perv!
Etc.
AT&T Worldnet also maintains an internal RBL that is very difficult to get off of primarily because there is no documentation on how to get off their RBL! To find out you pretty much have to do a search in Google Groups for some posts to the abuse newsgroups where other admins ask "How the (*&#$&*#$ do I get off the Worldnet RBL?". Another cute trick with the Worldnet RBL is, once you've been blocked you must email your RBL removal petition from an IP/domain outside the blacklisted one as mail sent to their abuse admins will bounce due to the RBL. It's just annoying as all hell if you ask me.
World of Warcraft geek!
They are a big pain in the ass for us providers to deal with. But they are also a necessary evil too sometimes. Personally I like the Spamhaus lists much better. And Spamhaus isn't a bunch of assholes so that gets them the cookie in my book.
I fail to see how a mere piece of software can turn your laptop from an inanimate object into a opisthobranch mollusc? If that was true then "bug hunting" would take on a whole new meaning!
Besides,
DUDE!
YOU GOT A DELL!
Dell laptops = crap
I'm sorry but when was the last time journalism and ethics got uttered in the same room in the US here? See: Fox News, Dan Rather, Michael Moore, etc.
Don't get me wrong, ethics belong in journalism but it seems like as soon as you try to make money off reporting the news ethics gets fast-tracked to the bottom of the priorities ladder.
Well thats a Useless as Hell(tm) link since that lists phones and devices that are compatible with 10.3's iSync, NOT 10.4.
We still have no idea what the supported list is going to look like on Tiger or how frequent updates will be.
"Sliders was good."
BWHAHAHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
HAHA!
You're killing me....oh my god, HAHAHAHAHAA!
"Imagine a world where Sliders was a good show" is the motto of that show.
Early on Sliders was okay but as soon as the Professor left the show (gotta love John Ryes-Davies) the show quickly deteriorated into utter, utter fucking crap.
I mean, jesus near the end there the only original cast member on the show was fucking Rembrandt! The SINGER! He'll just SING HIS WAY OUT OF THIS MESS. NO MATTER THE WARPED REALITY!
Firefly did not "suck" Firefly was actually a well done show that wasn't trying to fit into a Trek mold and was trying to be something newer and better. It would have succeed better too had FOX not fucking assraped the show by showing it OUT OF ORDER. My god, how can you start a show off without INTRODUCING PEOPLE TO THE CHARACTERS YOU FUCKING FOX IDIOTS! That plus changing the shows timeslot around so that the only people who ever watched the shows were people who had Tivos. Way to fucking go there FOX, goram idiots.
B5 was good, we agree there.
Earth: Final Conflict was good I think for like the first 3-4 seasons and then the show just went fucking wierd/bad. Reminds me of the old War of the Worlds tv show that was on the air, great series for a few seasons and then one season it turned into super-dark "We're all fucked" post-apocalytpic or something for no apparent reason and then died quietly.
Haven't gotten into Andromeda, I still think of it as "Hercules Saves Space".
Enterprise was ok the 1st season, however the Temporal War crap has to go, jesus when will B & B let GO of the fucking time travel jesus christ.
BTW, particle of the week was pioneered on ST:TNG FYI.
What is MARID? And why should I care about it being killed?
"The PC market isn't dead"
what Bill really means
"The market for my product is still growing ergo MS products will continue to see double digit growth thus pleasing our investors"
Symantec has warned that as dspisak's Slashdot mind share increases his PC will start to come under increased attack from trolls
Security vendor Symantec is warning that dspisak's Slashdot posts are increasingly becoming a target for hackers and malware authors.
In its seventh bi-annual Slashdot Internet Security Threat Report, Symantec said over the past year, security researchers had discovered at least 37 serious typos and duplicate story submissions in dspisak's Slashdot useage. According to Symantec, as dspisak increases his mind share -- with new low content posts such as the Comment mini -- his fanbase is likely to come under increasing attack.
"Contrary to popular belief, the Slashdot discussion forums have not always been a safe haven from poor spelling and grammar," Symantec said. "Out of the public eye for some time, it is now clear that dspisak is increasingly becoming a target for the malicious activity that is more commonly associated with Jon Katz and various Slashdot editors like timothy," the report said.
"dspisak has become a target for new attacks... The appearance of a -1 Troll rating for a post called "Boo-Fuching-Hoo" in October 2004, serves to illustrate the growth in vulnerability research in dspisak's comments... The various dspisak comment vulnerabilities allow attackers to carry out information disclosure, punctuation bypass, troll execution, comment escalation, and IQ attacks. Symantec believes that as the popularity of dspisak's new paradigm continues to grow, so too will the number of attacks directed at it," the report said.
Symantec's concerns were echoed by James Turner, security analyst at Frost & Sullivan Australia, who said many of the people who read dspisak comments were not concerned about factual correctness, which left them wide open to attack.
"The duplicate story submissions, funny in-joke humor and mini Comments are cool creations," Turner said. "The by-product is that people are agreeing with these comments for style over actual usefulness. They say it looks pretty and then read it but don't fact-check it. As dspisak increases his mind share, he will be a legitimate target for the Secret Service".
Trend Micro senior systems engineer Adam Biviano said all complex comments had grammatical flaws and the more popular the person, the more likely he would be attacked.
"All sophisticated comments -- dspisak, bperens, goatse or anything else -- especially Natalie Portmans hot grits will have vulnerabilities," Biviano said. "The only reason goatse has had mass exploits written for it is the sheer number of connected people reading it that are present on most networks. As soon as you start seeing mass deployment of any comment mind share you are going to see exploits".
According to Biviano, while there have not been any mass outbreaks of viruses targeting dspisak, the potential does exist.
"You don't see dspisak trolls in mass outbreaks but you do see them in the labs as proof of concepts. There aren't any outbreaks because there are simply are not enough [dspisaks] out there. For a troll to be successful it needs a combination of a worthy jab and a large target audience," said Biviano, who nominated the mobile phone market as an example of malware writers targeting the comment, not goatse's mind share.
"Look at where mobile comments are going and they are not targeting goatse -- they are targeting the market leader, which is cmdrtaco," he said. The Symantec report found in the second half of last year, an increasing proportion of malware was designed to expose spelling errors. The report also found that phishing attacks increased by 366 percent while the number of goatse-based worms and viruses increased by 64 percent, when compared to the first half of 2004.
That's okay. I don't buy music anymore.
Now I get to see an army of Slashdot comments with links to their free iPod pyramid schemes. Lovely!
one says to the other "Man, I hate having to wait so long for my distro to update!". The other then asks the man "What distro is that?". "Gentoo" he replies. The other advocate chuckles "At least your distro wasn't last released 3 years ago".
Just a pet peeve but...
If a set says its HDTV yet it doesn't have a builtin HDTV tuner then its not an HDTV set. What does an HDTV tuner cost these days?
And I thought that using your standrd UHF over the air house antenna wasnt good enough for HDTV otherwise why do I see and hear about all of these HDTV antennas?
Oh and while I'm picking nits, what about our good old friend the Broadcast Flag? I'm not exactly thrilled that to get a better screen I have to give up rights I already have with my current equipment.
Well shit howdy, they why are they not using that crap on glasses? Casual handling might be fine then, there is always the little kid test however. Wonder if Disney is salivating at that prospect or not.
And I quote:
m l
a r16,0,193027.story?coll=ny-business-headlines
" Cablevision has already spent more than $1 billion on Voom. It's hard to envision that Dolan and even the incredibly wealthy Malone could spend more than that. And, even if they did, why would the results be any different? As Cablevision's chairman, Dolan has already been, in effect, the head of the satellite service. Voom won't suddenly generate more subscribers just because he starts a new company to run it. It's the irrational thinking of someone who just won't let go.
In the Reuters interview, Malone appears to be telling his old friend that it's time to pack up and call it a day.
"It seemed like I might be helpful in terms of settling things down for him," Malone said when asked why he agreed to Dolan's request to sit on Cablevision's board."
From: http://www.tvpredictions.com/voomreality031405.ht
Also...
" Last week, Cablevision's new 15-member board, including six independent directors and three Dolan sons, gave Charles Dolan until the end of this month to find a way to take Voom off Cablevision's hands. At the board's insistence, he has put up $10 million of his own cash and stock to help fund Voom this month."
"The Voom story
October 2003: Cablevision launches Voom satellite TV service; plans to split it off.
May 2004: Problems emerge in attracting customers as Voom losses mount.
September 2004: Cablevision says it will delay Voom's spin-off.
November 2004: Voom reveals it lost more customers than it attracted in the summer amid operational and marketing problems.
December 2004: Board, backed by chief executive James Dolan, abandons spin-off and defies chairman Charles Dolan by deciding to sell or shut Voom.
January 2005: After a face-off pitting Charles Dolan against his son and a majority of Cablevision's board, the company agrees to ditch Voom and sell its sole satellite to EchoStar Communications for $200 million.
Feb. 10: Cablevision signs letter of intent to give rest of Voom to Charles Dolan and son Thomas Dolan if they arrange financing.
Feb. 28: Cablevision says it has no definitive agreement with the Dolans and will shut Voom by the end of March. The Dolans say they have financing and want a deal.
March 2: Voom.com Web site says service ends at the end of month, but VoomLLC.com site, established by Charles Dolan and son Tom Dolan, proclaims "Voom Still Delivers."
March 3: Charles Dolan ousts three directors and picks five new ones, giving him a theoretical 8-7 edge.
March 8: New board gives Charles and Tom Dolan to month's end to come up with an "alternative transaction" that prevents Voom's shutdown.
March 10: Charles Dolan puts up $10 million of his own fortune to help keep Voom running."
From: http://www.newsday.com/business/ny-bzvoom4177303m
10 million dollars is like pissing into a supertanker of debt that once held 1.4 BILLION dollars.
VOOM is dead or is dying. I don't care WHO is backing it or believes in it right now. The market for it simply is not mature enough right now. Sure its a great idea but its too early to market.
Sure Govmt is mandating stations to push HD to consumers but that is when? In 2007! It's 2005 right now. I will buy an HDTV when its cost effective and USEFUL. Today it is neither. Perhaps by 2007 market forces will have prevailed on the price point at least. Once that happens then the market can start to grow.
I wear glasses that are "sratch resistant" and guess what they have on them?
Sratches.
Do you really think Blu-Ray discs are magically delicious and going to be any different?
in a tiiiiiiiny living space!
But seriously, with the specs that Blu-Ray has for the physical aspects of the disc this format would force drive makers to reinstitute the disc-caddy system to keep your fragile Blu-Ray discs from getting scratched or otherwise hosed up by the environment. Just imagie what hell it is going to be to rent Blu-Ray's if there are no caddys!
No matter how much error correction you put in at the block layer on a disc of this level of info density stuff like a ball-point pen or medium to fair sized scratches are going to present a HUGE problem for maintaining media readability and reliability! Not to mention old tricks like polishing scratches out with Turtle Wax just aren't going to work when the protective layer of the Blu-Ray disc is 1/6th as thick as a DVDs!
Plus, why does everyone here think that Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is a wanted thing?
I already own a sizeable collection of movies in DVD format and some older ones in Laserdisc format. I'm not about to buy the same movie again in Blu-Ray just because its higher resolution. Especially since I don't own a HDTV set and I still fail to see the compelling reason to shell out the extra cash for a set. HDTV still costs too much and is still too confusing for the average consumer not to mention you can hardly get dick-all worth watching on it unless your in a major metropoloitan area or have a cable provider that has dedicated a significant amount of their coax bandwidth to delviering premium HDTV channels.
For starters the fact that people think there is this huge pent up demand for 1080i res movies is flat out ricockulous! Hello people, didn't anyone here see that VOOM just went tits up? You want to know how many subscribers they had?
46,000!
If you assume the VOOM subscribes are the same customers with sufficent money and HDTV equipment at home to want HDTV res movies on some format then I think its safe to say what format will win is moot at this point because there is hardly a sustainable market for this format for the movie industry at the current rate of HDTV adoption.
Sure it would be nice to have a higher capacity format but I for one am sick and tired of formats that get mired up in Hollywood dick-swinging.
Why can't the computer industry come up with their own format for optical data storage that is intended for JUST data and as such wont get hijacked by a bunch of egotistical profit grubbing movie studios who will just want to fsck with it to make it "Secure" for their precious movies.