It's ironic that Unix has managed to put a decent operating system under the Apple UI before anyone else.
Ironic? How? Let's be fair. How many people have tried, outside of Apple, to improve Mac OS proper? Besides, UNIX isn't an entity, it's a set of technologies that are open for implementation by whoever is smart enough to do so, as Apple (in the form of NEXT) have been doing for over a decade now.
In comparison, how many desktop attempts have there been for UNIX? How many match Mac OS in terms of simplicity and usability? Face it, Apple has done it better than anyone else yet, and there are still people who can't deal with that fact alone.
Regarding your comment of Linux catching up in usability before the next 17 years are over, which is available now? A Linux desktop your grandma can appreciate, or a simplified computer (Mac) that runs traditional Mac OS alongside BSD on Mach, with all the benefits thereof? As much as I love open-source, UNIX-based OSes, this smacks of denial. Linux -- later, but better?
I'll get modded down to the core of the earth for ranting like this (if there actually are any vigilant moderators who read stories as old as this one), but Apple honestly deserves our accolades for at least attempting what they're doing with UNIX. They've gone a step beyond that...they've done a good job.
Or maybe I've gotten your points all wrong. Maybe you don't mind that Apple has handily achieved the Holy Grail of UNIX in the home. In that case, the beer's on me. (Sorry mate! Zealotry...that's where I'm a viking.)
How is Korean pictographic? I can read and write Korean, but other than hanja (Chinese characters), it is not pictographic.
Korean characters do not carry any intrinsic meaning, like hanja do. They simply represent syllables, like Japanese kana.
Either way, I agree, hangeul is a much more logical and easier to read phonetic system than Japanese kana systems (which are also easy for non-speakers to read and write). This is particularly so because the syllables are more descriptive and complete.
Hey, sorry to be off-topic, but if you are who I think you might be, I just wanted to let you know that it was cool meeting you @ Anime Expo '92. (I was a gopher there.) The game show that year was great!
Peace! And if I'm not making any sense, peace anyway. O_o
BTW, there will be a Mac-compatible USB version of the scanner soon. I snagged my PS/2 version a couple of days ago.
Carl Macek (of Streamline infamy) had it right when he announced at some convention I gophered as an early teen punk otaku that widescreen-ratio flicks should be shifted towards the top of the screen, so that the extra letterboxed area at the bottom of the screen could be dedicated entirely to subtitles. That way, purists would be satisfied on two grounds: Subtitles would no longer obstruct actual imagery, and those of us with wide screens could just get rid of the subs entirely.
This was at Anime Expo '92 or '93. Cheers rose up from the crowd, even for this man, butcher of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada...which were chopped up to form "Robotech." (I'm only guessing that they used Mospeada instead of Super Dimension Orguss because the motorcycle-armor thing is SO FUCKING COOL. Plus, the Orguss mecha looked too "organic.")
I agree that the ubiquity of FireWire on digital video cams is one feather that FireWire has in its cap. Personaly, I love FireWire. But at what point does "must-comply-with-the-standard" kick in? Isn't it a little too early to forego any possibility of competition between the two standards when it comes to the areas where they are able to compete?
Especially when it comes to issues of bandwidth -- today's fat pipe is just tomorrow's bottleneck -- we should be open to increased competition betwen evolving standards. In the end, we have to concede that market confusion and incompatibilities will sometimes be the price you pay for BETTER STUFF.
Forgive me; I am unable to download it right now, but I am curious: Is it possible to enable close-behind windows, such as Mac OS Finder's command-OPTION-up/down arrow, as an option when multiple-window mode is the default in Nautilus?
(For anyone unfamiliar with the efficiency of the Finder when keyboard-driven, this is substantially more powerful and useful than it may sound.)
On the whole, I don't disagree with you, with the exception that Japan uses NTSC (not PAL), and that Digimon is anime. Yeah, so Saban is a chops up decade-old sentai shows; so what? I'm familiar with Saban's contributions, and they seem no different from other chop-shops like Harmony Gold and Streamline. Digimon is a Toei production. It has translation credits. If it has an American feel, it is because of these translators and their need to make the spoken dialog sound natural to American audiences as well as fit the lipsync...same as with any other show, which is why any self-respecting, non-Japanese-speaking anime fan prefers subtitles to dubbing, preferably fan-subbed by a good translation club who "gets it," like the old-school Ranma Project. Watching it on TV is pretty much out of the question, unless you're just a casual fan (which most of the/. anime community seems to be, unfortunately).
Perhaps I was careless in not pointing out the differences between anime styles intended for children and the many many other categories, but I thought I would leave that for all the other posts to come before mine which had stated as much. But it all starts with the kids, and as someone has already posted, the Pokemon generation (in America) will ensure that someday soon I'll be even more sick of anime than I have been for the past four years. (Mind you, before that, I used to be obsessed...to the point of going to all the friggin cons and pirating all the damn Japanese LDs I could find.)
Finally, a question posed to anyone reading: Why does everyone always talk about Urotsuki Doji as if it's some kind of merit badge of kewlness to have seen it? It's old, and it's boring!!! Humorous hentai and roman hentai were always much more entertaining to me than the tentacle kind, but overall I prefer real-life prawn, if any at all.
that, and it's great entertainment for us anti-pop-culture types too.
Hmm, it seems more and more to me that anyone who still thinks manga/anime isn't mainstream in America is living about eight years in the past. No offense intended, of course, but I just happen to be typing this with English-dubbed Saturday-morning Digimon annoying the hell out of me from the TV in the other room.
...Whoop, apparently Fox is going to show Escaflowne, if I just heard that commercial correctly. Muckingfarvelous. Unlike Gundam Wing, Escaflowne is pretty good. And of course it will be dubbed for its audience: American kids (read: mainstream).
Let's get over ourselves. It's not just the tech industry/lifestyle, or anyone else in particular. It's America in general that's just now picking up on anime. What worries me is that it's being treated like a trend, as opposed to something that's been around for longer than a lot of us have been alive.
Crap. A Blade Runner discussion on/. and I miss it. Oh well, I'm a latecomer, sue me.
The Blade Runner FAQ, initially authored previous to your '96 paper, poses the same argument, with many of the same supporting details. I recognized so much of it by reading your post that I wonder if you hadn't just used this FAQ as "inspiration" for your own paper.
Additionally, it's never been a secret that Ridley Scott and Harrison Ford themselves (as detailed in the FAQ) believed Deckard to be a Replicant. For true fans, there is no problem with believing either way, just as you state that you felt when watching the film yourself.
Hmm...commenting a little late, but it's here for anyone that cares.
Pioneer used to use this same technique with their Elite line of laserdisc players. It was called Legato Link. When tested by the A/V rags, it was found to produce effects that made any audio -- music, movie soundtracks -- sound unnatural. It's something that can be lived without.
It's really a shame too. I was prepared to buy a Pioneer Elite CLD-97 simply because it was one of the best auto-reverse LD players in existence at the time, but there was no way to turn off Legato Link.
I would venture a guess that it's a lot easier to set up a cell somewhere in the vicinity of a few neighboring villages than wire each and every house in all of the villages in the far-off provinces for telephone service.
Wireless phones make sense for the Philippines. Vanity plays no part in the whole decision of whether or not to own one there. Of course in the more heavily-populated cities, there is that possibility.
Yeah, and you don't have to eat it if you don't want to. =)
< dubuhead >
=P
Re:Mozilla... Mozirra... proper pronunciation?
on
Mozilla M16 Released
·
· Score: 1
There are at least two conflicting stories regarding the origin of the name "Godzilla" itself. Depending on whose story you believe, the correct pronunciation is either the common American English one with which we are all familiar, or "Gojira," which is the most-correct transliteration of the Japanese pronunciation of this name.
One suggests that it was the suggestion of an American boy, who lived in Japan and whose father was somehow affiliated with Japanese film producers at the time. In this case, the most correct pronunciation is the English one, "god.zil.la."
(BTW, this explanation was revealed to me on a websurfing excursion for Mac OS-related software several years ago, so this should be taken with at least three grains of salt. Since this was a while ago, unfortunately I no longer have the URL handy.)
The other explanation, which for some may be more credible, is explained here. In this case, the most correct pronunciation is the Japanese one, "go.ji.ra."
I had heard this latter explanation before the first, but somehow I was convinced after reading the "American" origin that it was the more likely of the two. Still, when speaking Japanese, I always say "gojira," just like I always say "youguruto" when referring to yogurt in Japanese.
But then, this is all irrelevant. The Mozilla folks are mostly Americans, so it would be American English, meaning "mo.zil.la." Of course, that will not prevent native Japanese-speakers from pronouncing it as "mo.ji.ra," which is perfectly fine too, for them. =)
Actually, I wish/. would gather lists of (somewhat) related Quickies together more often. Too many trivial topics are getting their own articles nowadays, and sometimes "normal" quickies are hard to spot and discuss, because searching for comments regarding them is dificult amidst the other discussions.
"Freeing yourself from Microsoft-based PCs on the desktop is difficult to do. It's not practical. Just try to find a non-Microsoft PC when you walk into a computer store today. It's not easy."
Funny, I just turn my head left when I walk into CompUSA, and there are all these funny-looking things called Macintoshes.
Granted, I would probably have to use Office on them for any real office work, since Corel no longer "officially" supports WordPerfect on Mac OS. I don't even know if there's been a new version since 3.5, released around 3-5 years ago.
...is a UNIX environment on Win32, not a Win32 environment for Linux, as the article states. Since the source for this tidbit is a Red Hat spokesman, and Red Hat now owns Cygnus, I would assume that the mistake was on the interviewer's part.
Eschew otakudom. So many recovering ex-otaku can only laugh nowadays when watching all the English-only new-schoolers play catch up after coming so late to the game, trying to watch as much "good stuff" as possible. It's funny, in a sad way, because such a feat is nearly impossible, due both to the fact that the politics of the translation houses/stateside distributors is often fucked up, and also because not many people are willing to learn Japanese like we did, go to the cons like we did, and do their own fan-subbing like we did. And that's how it should be, since after almost fifteen years of true fandom, what do I have to show for it? A lot of signed paraphernalia (Mikimoto-signed Macross VHS cassette shells and jackets...oohhh), boxes upon boxes of unwatched bootlegged subs, and a lot of money out the window. With that spent cash, I could have bought my own server farm, dammit. Luckily I've been anime-free for about three years, with no looking back.
The situation is completely different for casual fans. For them, I'd recommend all the standards listed by so many in this article, especially the Miyazaki films. Even the counter-culture punks that say they hate everything popular and mainstream usually end up moved by his work. I've even met (and been) one of those anti-dubbing elitists, who really _can_ stand to watch a dubbed version of Miyazaki's films. Despite the dubbing. Despite (in the case of Tonari no Totoro) Carl Macek's involvement. His works are so beautiful that they are enjoyable even after American chop-shoppers (like Macek/Streamline) have had their hands on them.
I also used to be a big Gainax fan. This studio is different from most others, because they are able to laugh at themselves -- something that most fanboys can't even do, because of their overzealousness. Watch Toppu o Nerae! Gunbuster and keep Gundam, Macross, and Top Gun in mind. You'll see why these guys are master satirists of the industry. And definitely watch their Otaku no Video. As soon as you think you recognize any of the people in that video, you'll know that you've stepped into some mighty shit.
Like I said above, I haven't noticed any quality loses with recording MP3s. Do they sound as good as if I had recorded from a CD? No, but this is the MP3 compressions fault, not ATRACs. Do not toss MD out the window just because it's compressed.
You can't blame either codec for the (relatively) poor quality of twice-compressed audio. They (MP3 and ATRAC) use different psychoacoustic models -- you know this -- which inherently will introduce more artifacts to the signal. If, hypothetically, MP3 were to be worse at pre-echo control and the ATRAC-flavor-du-jour were worse at reproducing high-end frequencies, it seems obvious that the two problems would both be evident in a file compressed with both codecs.
Even compressing MP3 to MP3 will produce poor results. The poster to whom you were replying has a valid concern with this practice, especially since Sony seems to be wanting people to do exactly this, with their line of Memory Stick ATRAC recorders that come with PC-based MP3 decoders. I personally would also be interested in an MD player that played MP3 files natively from cheap MDs.
Slashdot Mirror
Ironic? How? Let's be fair. How many people have tried, outside of Apple, to improve Mac OS proper? Besides, UNIX isn't an entity, it's a set of technologies that are open for implementation by whoever is smart enough to do so, as Apple (in the form of NEXT) have been doing for over a decade now.
In comparison, how many desktop attempts have there been for UNIX? How many match Mac OS in terms of simplicity and usability? Face it, Apple has done it better than anyone else yet, and there are still people who can't deal with that fact alone.
Regarding your comment of Linux catching up in usability before the next 17 years are over, which is available now? A Linux desktop your grandma can appreciate, or a simplified computer (Mac) that runs traditional Mac OS alongside BSD on Mach, with all the benefits thereof? As much as I love open-source, UNIX-based OSes, this smacks of denial. Linux -- later, but better?
I'll get modded down to the core of the earth for ranting like this (if there actually are any vigilant moderators who read stories as old as this one), but Apple honestly deserves our accolades for at least attempting what they're doing with UNIX. They've gone a step beyond that...they've done a good job.
Or maybe I've gotten your points all wrong. Maybe you don't mind that Apple has handily achieved the Holy Grail of UNIX in the home. In that case, the beer's on me. (Sorry mate! Zealotry...that's where I'm a viking.)
< tofuhead >
How is Korean pictographic? I can read and write Korean, but other than hanja (Chinese characters), it is not pictographic.
Korean characters do not carry any intrinsic meaning, like hanja do. They simply represent syllables, like Japanese kana.
Either way, I agree, hangeul is a much more logical and easier to read phonetic system than Japanese kana systems (which are also easy for non-speakers to read and write). This is particularly so because the syllables are more descriptive and complete.
< tofuhead >
Hey, sorry to be off-topic, but if you are who I think you might be, I just wanted to let you know that it was cool meeting you @ Anime Expo '92. (I was a gopher there.) The game show that year was great!
Peace! And if I'm not making any sense, peace anyway. O_o
BTW, there will be a Mac-compatible USB version of the scanner soon. I snagged my PS/2 version a couple of days ago.
< tofuhead >
Why doesn't a company make scooby snacks?
Translation: "Dammit, where are my marijuana brownies?!?!" (^_-;
< tofuhead >
Anime in its native state is just a cut above.
True, true.
Carl Macek (of Streamline infamy) had it right when he announced at some convention I gophered as an early teen punk otaku that widescreen-ratio flicks should be shifted towards the top of the screen, so that the extra letterboxed area at the bottom of the screen could be dedicated entirely to subtitles. That way, purists would be satisfied on two grounds: Subtitles would no longer obstruct actual imagery, and those of us with wide screens could just get rid of the subs entirely.
This was at Anime Expo '92 or '93. Cheers rose up from the crowd, even for this man, butcher of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada...which were chopped up to form "Robotech." (I'm only guessing that they used Mospeada instead of Super Dimension Orguss because the motorcycle-armor thing is SO FUCKING COOL. Plus, the Orguss mecha looked too "organic.")
< tofuhead >
Tigersharks. Ugh. That was plainly Thundercats under water.
Puhahahaha...
"Tiger tiger by the tail!!!"
<echoing, trailing off>: "Hold on, Tiger tiger tiger tiger tiger tiger tiger..."
Oh, how sad my childhood was.
< tofuhead >
I agree that the ubiquity of FireWire on digital video cams is one feather that FireWire has in its cap. Personaly, I love FireWire. But at what point does "must-comply-with-the-standard" kick in? Isn't it a little too early to forego any possibility of competition between the two standards when it comes to the areas where they are able to compete?
Especially when it comes to issues of bandwidth -- today's fat pipe is just tomorrow's bottleneck -- we should be open to increased competition betwen evolving standards. In the end, we have to concede that market confusion and incompatibilities will sometimes be the price you pay for BETTER STUFF.
< tofuhead >
Hey wait, I never posted that! Someone must be trying to implicate me with a real-time ASCII filter!
Please guys, HELP ME FIGHT real-time disinformation!
< tofuhead >
Forgive me; I am unable to download it right now, but I am curious: Is it possible to enable close-behind windows, such as Mac OS Finder's command-OPTION-up/down arrow, as an option when multiple-window mode is the default in Nautilus?
(For anyone unfamiliar with the efficiency of the Finder when keyboard-driven, this is substantially more powerful and useful than it may sound.)
< tofuhead >
On the whole, I don't disagree with you, with the exception that Japan uses NTSC (not PAL), and that Digimon is anime. Yeah, so Saban is a chops up decade-old sentai shows; so what? I'm familiar with Saban's contributions, and they seem no different from other chop-shops like Harmony Gold and Streamline. Digimon is a Toei production. It has translation credits. If it has an American feel, it is because of these translators and their need to make the spoken dialog sound natural to American audiences as well as fit the lipsync...same as with any other show, which is why any self-respecting, non-Japanese-speaking anime fan prefers subtitles to dubbing, preferably fan-subbed by a good translation club who "gets it," like the old-school Ranma Project. Watching it on TV is pretty much out of the question, unless you're just a casual fan (which most of the /. anime community seems to be, unfortunately).
Perhaps I was careless in not pointing out the differences between anime styles intended for children and the many many other categories, but I thought I would leave that for all the other posts to come before mine which had stated as much. But it all starts with the kids, and as someone has already posted, the Pokemon generation (in America) will ensure that someday soon I'll be even more sick of anime than I have been for the past four years. (Mind you, before that, I used to be obsessed...to the point of going to all the friggin cons and pirating all the damn Japanese LDs I could find.)
Finally, a question posed to anyone reading: Why does everyone always talk about Urotsuki Doji as if it's some kind of merit badge of kewlness to have seen it? It's old, and it's boring!!! Humorous hentai and roman hentai were always much more entertaining to me than the tentacle kind, but overall I prefer real-life prawn, if any at all.
< tofuhead >
that, and it's great entertainment for us anti-pop-culture types too.
Hmm, it seems more and more to me that anyone who still thinks manga/anime isn't mainstream in America is living about eight years in the past. No offense intended, of course, but I just happen to be typing this with English-dubbed Saturday-morning Digimon annoying the hell out of me from the TV in the other room.
...Whoop, apparently Fox is going to show Escaflowne, if I just heard that commercial correctly. Muckingfarvelous. Unlike Gundam Wing, Escaflowne is pretty good. And of course it will be dubbed for its audience: American kids (read: mainstream).
Let's get over ourselves. It's not just the tech industry/lifestyle, or anyone else in particular. It's America in general that's just now picking up on anime. What worries me is that it's being treated like a trend, as opposed to something that's been around for longer than a lot of us have been alive.
< tofuhead >
Sure, it's neat-o and geekworthy that it could be done, but is it practical?
Neat-o. Geekworthy. Impractical. Sure sounds like Slashdot material to me.
< tofuhead >
Crap. A Blade Runner discussion on /. and I miss it. Oh well, I'm a latecomer, sue me.
The Blade Runner FAQ, initially authored previous to your '96 paper, poses the same argument, with many of the same supporting details. I recognized so much of it by reading your post that I wonder if you hadn't just used this FAQ as "inspiration" for your own paper.
Additionally, it's never been a secret that Ridley Scott and Harrison Ford themselves (as detailed in the FAQ) believed Deckard to be a Replicant. For true fans, there is no problem with believing either way, just as you state that you felt when watching the film yourself.
< tofuhead >
Hmm...commenting a little late, but it's here for anyone that cares.
Pioneer used to use this same technique with their Elite line of laserdisc players. It was called Legato Link. When tested by the A/V rags, it was found to produce effects that made any audio -- music, movie soundtracks -- sound unnatural. It's something that can be lived without.
It's really a shame too. I was prepared to buy a Pioneer Elite CLD-97 simply because it was one of the best auto-reverse LD players in existence at the time, but there was no way to turn off Legato Link.
< tofuhead >
Why not get the stoners on our side with GANJA? Cuz Ganja Ain't No JAva, mon.
< tofuhead >
I would venture a guess that it's a lot easier to set up a cell somewhere in the vicinity of a few neighboring villages than wire each and every house in all of the villages in the far-off provinces for telephone service.
Wireless phones make sense for the Philippines. Vanity plays no part in the whole decision of whether or not to own one there. Of course in the more heavily-populated cities, there is that possibility.
< dubuhead >
Kimchee is great. Try it on pizza, or on spaghetti with tomato sauce.
Kimchee, pepper paste, and SPAM in a bowl of Nongshim Shin Ramyun or Samyang Ibaekyang makes for good n'cheap five minute eats.
Kimchee on rice makes for good n'cheaper one minute eats.
Kimchee, a bunch of friends, and some good kalbee and dweijee bulgogi makes for good n'expensive three hour eats.
< dubuhead >
Don't go to Korea. They serve it with everything.
Yeah, and you don't have to eat it if you don't want to. =)
< dubuhead >
=P
There are at least two conflicting stories regarding the origin of the name "Godzilla" itself. Depending on whose story you believe, the correct pronunciation is either the common American English one with which we are all familiar, or "Gojira," which is the most-correct transliteration of the Japanese pronunciation of this name.
One suggests that it was the suggestion of an American boy, who lived in Japan and whose father was somehow affiliated with Japanese film producers at the time. In this case, the most correct pronunciation is the English one, "god.zil.la."
(BTW, this explanation was revealed to me on a websurfing excursion for Mac OS-related software several years ago, so this should be taken with at least three grains of salt. Since this was a while ago, unfortunately I no longer have the URL handy.)
The other explanation, which for some may be more credible, is explained here. In this case, the most correct pronunciation is the Japanese one, "go.ji.ra."
I had heard this latter explanation before the first, but somehow I was convinced after reading the "American" origin that it was the more likely of the two. Still, when speaking Japanese, I always say "gojira," just like I always say "youguruto" when referring to yogurt in Japanese.
But then, this is all irrelevant. The Mozilla folks are mostly Americans, so it would be American English, meaning "mo.zil.la." Of course, that will not prevent native Japanese-speakers from pronouncing it as "mo.ji.ra," which is perfectly fine too, for them. =)
< tofuhead >
Actually, I wish /. would gather lists of (somewhat) related Quickies together more often. Too many trivial topics are getting their own articles nowadays, and sometimes "normal" quickies are hard to spot and discuss, because searching for comments regarding them is dificult amidst the other discussions.
< tofuhead >
"Freeing yourself from Microsoft-based PCs on the desktop is difficult to do. It's not practical. Just try to find a non-Microsoft PC when you walk into a computer store today. It's not easy."
Funny, I just turn my head left when I walk into CompUSA, and there are all these funny-looking things called Macintoshes.
Granted, I would probably have to use Office on them for any real office work, since Corel no longer "officially" supports WordPerfect on Mac OS. I don't even know if there's been a new version since 3.5, released around 3-5 years ago.
< tofuhead >
...is a UNIX environment on Win32, not a Win32 environment for Linux, as the article states. Since the source for this tidbit is a Red Hat spokesman, and Red Hat now owns Cygnus, I would assume that the mistake was on the interviewer's part.
Cygwin homepage
< tofuhead >
"MP3" is not restricted to MPEG 1. MPEG 2 layer 3 audio is better suited for very-low-bitrate aplications than MPEG 1 layer 3, for example.
< tofuhead >
Eschew otakudom. So many recovering ex-otaku can only laugh nowadays when watching all the English-only new-schoolers play catch up after coming so late to the game, trying to watch as much "good stuff" as possible. It's funny, in a sad way, because such a feat is nearly impossible, due both to the fact that the politics of the translation houses/stateside distributors is often fucked up, and also because not many people are willing to learn Japanese like we did, go to the cons like we did, and do their own fan-subbing like we did. And that's how it should be, since after almost fifteen years of true fandom, what do I have to show for it? A lot of signed paraphernalia (Mikimoto-signed Macross VHS cassette shells and jackets...oohhh), boxes upon boxes of unwatched bootlegged subs, and a lot of money out the window. With that spent cash, I could have bought my own server farm, dammit. Luckily I've been anime-free for about three years, with no looking back.
The situation is completely different for casual fans. For them, I'd recommend all the standards listed by so many in this article, especially the Miyazaki films. Even the counter-culture punks that say they hate everything popular and mainstream usually end up moved by his work. I've even met (and been) one of those anti-dubbing elitists, who really _can_ stand to watch a dubbed version of Miyazaki's films. Despite the dubbing. Despite (in the case of Tonari no Totoro) Carl Macek's involvement. His works are so beautiful that they are enjoyable even after American chop-shoppers (like Macek/Streamline) have had their hands on them.
I also used to be a big Gainax fan. This studio is different from most others, because they are able to laugh at themselves -- something that most fanboys can't even do, because of their overzealousness. Watch Toppu o Nerae! Gunbuster and keep Gundam, Macross, and Top Gun in mind. You'll see why these guys are master satirists of the industry. And definitely watch their Otaku no Video. As soon as you think you recognize any of the people in that video, you'll know that you've stepped into some mighty shit.
< tofuhead >
Like I said above, I haven't noticed any quality loses with recording MP3s. Do they sound as good as if I had recorded from a CD? No, but this is the MP3 compressions fault, not ATRACs. Do not toss MD out the window just because it's compressed.
You can't blame either codec for the (relatively) poor quality of twice-compressed audio. They (MP3 and ATRAC) use different psychoacoustic models -- you know this -- which inherently will introduce more artifacts to the signal. If, hypothetically, MP3 were to be worse at pre-echo control and the ATRAC-flavor-du-jour were worse at reproducing high-end frequencies, it seems obvious that the two problems would both be evident in a file compressed with both codecs.
Even compressing MP3 to MP3 will produce poor results. The poster to whom you were replying has a valid concern with this practice, especially since Sony seems to be wanting people to do exactly this, with their line of Memory Stick ATRAC recorders that come with PC-based MP3 decoders. I personally would also be interested in an MD player that played MP3 files natively from cheap MDs.
< tofuhead >