Let's take a more direct approach: Let people subscribe to this for six months, then have a cull of all community members, preferably with something large and blunt.
Result: The base level of stupidity is removed from the gene pool. Rejoice!
"Errm , not quite. If I rent a movie I can lend it to someone else to play it at their place after I've finished watching it. And occasionally I do. Try doing that with VOD."
While that's true enough, it's hardly a convincing argument for renting a physical DVD over VOD. I would hazard an assumption that most people who rent DVDs, or in fact movies on any medium, do not do it with the intention of lending their rental to friends. Blockbuster, for instance, only loan the most recent releases for one (although that is effectively two often as not) night. This doesn't leave much loan-to-friends-time (not that any of my friends live close enough for this anyway). Also, most times my girlfriend and I will rent out a DVD in the evening, and take it back in the morning on the way to work, rather than risk forgetting that night and having to cough up for the same film, yet again.
The fact that you say 'occasionally I do' points to the fact that even for you it's not your normal modus operandi. Once again, that's not a convincing argument for DVDs over VOD.
I myself have some DVDs of movies that I want to collect (LOTR being the perfect example). But similarly I used to have HomeChoice before moving out of their catchment area, and I found their service to be great. Something that seems to have been missed so far was the availability of not just movies, but a large selection of television material, both British and American. Whole series could be sat down and enjoyed, and not on a pay-per-view basis, but as part of the subscription package. This content wasn't updated as often as it should have been, I admit, but once again it demonstrated a flexibility that physical rental can't match.
"Well I've got 16 year old CDs that still play perfectly and I've not reason to believe why pre-recorded DVDs should be any different."
Well, how about different recording methods to CDs, laser type/intensity, build material of DVDs/quality, depth of encoding per unit area leading to a higher possibility of corruption... Agreed these are absolute guesswork, but certainly no more than your above statement.
I thought thanks to my/. name I had to reply to to this post!
I can more than recommend Iain Banks' novels. The society of the culture is a fascinating study in what might be. I really agree with the previous post, but in fact think [s]he's sold Iain Bank's SF credentials, and the idea of the Culture itself, somewhat short.
He displays good understandings of physics, underpinning his plots with intense realism - you can believe that what he writes one day may come to pass. The Culture does not descend from humanity (at least not from earth), as evidenced by one short story included in 'The State of the Art' (Although amazon.com says that it's out of print?) where the culture are examining earth (and us) and evaluating us. This seperates them nicely from us, giving Banks more freedom of expression, in my opinion.
Also, Banks actually started out as a SF author. In an interview I saw with him a few months ago on BBC 4, he admitted that he had written several SF short stories (a few of which are published in TSOTA mentioned above) before turning to conventional fiction.
He also has a wicked sense of humour, instantly recognisable. The ship's ideosyncratic names illustrate this nicely (meatf*cker anybody?:)
All in all, do take a look. Well worth it - and his 'normal' fiction too, while I'm at it. I would write all day about his books, but the best way is to just take a look yourself. Happy reading.
Although you have to say the reason that Brazil had such trouble qualifying in the first place was because so many of their European-based players (often the best ones in the Brazilian squad, of course) weren't available for qualifying matches!
As for tying Pele, it's amazing, and impressive. But you have to remember that Pele spent an entire world cup injured after getting crocked (Brit term for being injured by being harshly marked) in the very first game - and that was when he was in his 20s, I'm sure he'd have scored plenty.
Afterall, this man has scored no less that 92 (count 'em!) hat tricks in his career!
"And that is true, the BSD license does give you more freedom, and with more freedom, you have more of a responsibility, part of that being to give back to the community that you borrowed from."
I don't dissagree with you for one moment, but I do have an observation - how will Microsoft attempt to give back to the "free" software communitity from which it borrowed for its TCP/IP stack in win2k? I seriously doubt they will, which in the end is yet another example of how they employ quite base hypocracy.
You'll notice that Bill is careful not to overtly criticise free software in his piece, but directs his attention more towards the GPL and its failings in his point of view. He is trying to avoid being labeled a hypocrite, but in the end, Microsoft is extremely unlikely to give anything back to the community from which it borrowed, making any critisism levelled at the GPL (one of the cornerstones of the free software community) ultimately foolish.
Microsoft (embodied by Bill in this case) should concentrate on producing good enough software to compete with the likes if Linux and FreeBSD, creating the "rich ecosystem" that Bill mentioned and forgetting about semantical (almost theological at times!) arguments about how software should be produced.
Slashdot Mirror
Let's take a more direct approach: Let people subscribe to this for six months, then have a cull of all community members, preferably with something large and blunt.
Result: The base level of stupidity is removed from the gene pool. Rejoice!
"Errm , not quite. If I rent a movie I can lend it to someone else to play it at their place after I've finished watching it. And occasionally I do. Try doing that with VOD."
While that's true enough, it's hardly a convincing argument for renting a physical DVD over VOD. I would hazard an assumption that most people who rent DVDs, or in fact movies on any medium, do not do it with the intention of lending their rental to friends. Blockbuster, for instance, only loan the most recent releases for one (although that is effectively two often as not) night. This doesn't leave much loan-to-friends-time (not that any of my friends live close enough for this anyway). Also, most times my girlfriend and I will rent out a DVD in the evening, and take it back in the morning on the way to work, rather than risk forgetting that night and having to cough up for the same film, yet again.
The fact that you say 'occasionally I do' points to the fact that even for you it's not your normal modus operandi. Once again, that's not a convincing argument for DVDs over VOD.
I myself have some DVDs of movies that I want to collect (LOTR being the perfect example). But similarly I used to have HomeChoice before moving out of their catchment area, and I found their service to be great. Something that seems to have been missed so far was the availability of not just movies, but a large selection of television material, both British and American. Whole series could be sat down and enjoyed, and not on a pay-per-view basis, but as part of the subscription package. This content wasn't updated as often as it should have been, I admit, but once again it demonstrated a flexibility that physical rental can't match.
"Well I've got 16 year old CDs that still play perfectly and I've not reason to believe why pre-recorded DVDs should be any different."
Well, how about different recording methods to CDs, laser type/intensity, build material of DVDs/quality, depth of encoding per unit area leading to a higher possibility of corruption... Agreed these are absolute guesswork, but certainly no more than your above statement.
I thought thanks to my /. name I had to reply to to this post!
:)
I can more than recommend Iain Banks' novels. The society of the culture is a fascinating study in what might be. I really agree with the previous post, but in fact think [s]he's sold Iain Bank's SF credentials, and the idea of the Culture itself, somewhat short.
He displays good understandings of physics, underpinning his plots with intense realism - you can believe that what he writes one day may come to pass. The Culture does not descend from humanity (at least not from earth), as evidenced by one short story included in 'The State of the Art' (Although amazon.com says that it's out of print?) where the culture are examining earth (and us) and evaluating us. This seperates them nicely from us, giving Banks more freedom of expression, in my opinion.
Also, Banks actually started out as a SF author. In an interview I saw with him a few months ago on BBC 4, he admitted that he had written several SF short stories (a few of which are published in TSOTA mentioned above) before turning to conventional fiction.
He also has a wicked sense of humour, instantly recognisable. The ship's ideosyncratic names illustrate this nicely (meatf*cker anybody?
All in all, do take a look. Well worth it - and his 'normal' fiction too, while I'm at it. I would write all day about his books, but the best way is to just take a look yourself. Happy reading.
Although you have to say the reason that Brazil had such trouble qualifying in the first place was because so many of their European-based players (often the best ones in the Brazilian squad, of course) weren't available for qualifying matches!
As for tying Pele, it's amazing, and impressive. But you have to remember that Pele spent an entire world cup injured after getting crocked (Brit term for being injured by being harshly marked) in the very first game - and that was when he was in his 20s, I'm sure he'd have scored plenty.
Afterall, this man has scored no less that 92 (count 'em!) hat tricks in his career!
Maradona eat your heart out.
yes, yes, alright2 00&cid=40
;P
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=01/06/19/1837
I've got my coat
"And that is true, the BSD license does give you more freedom, and with more freedom, you have more of a responsibility, part of that being to give back to the community that you borrowed from."
I don't dissagree with you for one moment, but I do have an observation - how will Microsoft attempt to give back to the "free" software communitity from which it borrowed for its TCP/IP stack in win2k? I seriously doubt they will, which in the end is yet another example of how they employ quite base hypocracy.
You'll notice that Bill is careful not to overtly criticise free software in his piece, but directs his attention more towards the GPL and its failings in his point of view. He is trying to avoid being labeled a hypocrite, but in the end, Microsoft is extremely unlikely to give anything back to the community from which it borrowed, making any critisism levelled at the GPL (one of the cornerstones of the free software community) ultimately foolish.
Microsoft (embodied by Bill in this case) should concentrate on producing good enough software to compete with the likes if Linux and FreeBSD, creating the "rich ecosystem" that Bill mentioned and forgetting about semantical (almost theological at times!) arguments about how software should be produced.
theCulture