That way, they can never say you don't have a contract, aren't a full-time employee, you're just another cog in the system -- just in case there's some reason to be.
But, when you leave, you'll have it on record that you signed a different contract, which, I imagine, is a lot more convincing than if there was no record at all.
I remember I had to sign an NDA. What I'm trying to remember now is whether it says they own any ideas I come up with outside of work, or only what I produce while working on a project.
But it does make sense that if you bring up an idea at the company, on company time, the company should own it. The reason this makes sense is that the alternative really sucks for companies -- where an employee who comes up with a particular idea can basically hold the whole company hostage. I seem to remember hearing of this happening before -- where a company's flagship product was largely the result of one guy, who then basically took the whole codebase and founded a competing company.
I have no problem with a noncompete/NDA that expires with the job. But yeah, beyond term of employment is a bit of a problem.
I'm not arguing whether apple news is boring or not.
I'm just wondering why you feel obligated to read those two a day (even to the comments page) and tag them? If they're really so fucking boring, you can do us both a favor and get the fuck out.
You actually blame the antitrust suit for Microsoft being that bad?
Did you actually use Windows 95? 98? It sucked. ME sucked more than Vista, by a lot. Back in a time when floppies were one of the more convenient ways to transfer small files, your entire computer would lag, horribly and visibly, during any floppy access.
If we hadn't given them a thorough slap with the antitrust case, not to mention some actual competition from Google, they wouldn't be doing as well as they are now. Judging by how well they're (not) doing now, that's saying a lot. But I do see Windows 2000 as a direct response to Linux -- which, no matter how you look at it, NT was intended to be a direct response to Unix.
As for evilness, is it really any better now, with Steve "The Chair" Ballmer?
I keep my current signature as a reminder, because I now work in an industry that has all kinds of DRM. I work with the knowledge that my code will very likely be restricted by copyright and DRM.
I keep it to remind me not to become complacent, to further a DRM-free world if I can.
But, consider: Would you take this to the extent of not buying any DVDs? After all, they contain DRM, even if it's been cracked wider than the Goatse Man's ass.
Would you avoid going to movies, or watching TV, because the same companies do DVD releases? Would you avoid, say, cable Internet in favor of DSL, just so the cable companies don't get a cut? (Realizing that if they do, it eventually ends up in the entertainment industry...)
I'd say, the root of the problem is the existence of huge corporations, little mini-states unto themselves. You've pretty much already lost the DRM issue. Pay attention in the 2008 election, get a candidate to say he'll revoke some parts of the DMCA if you can, but I don't think there's much else you can do, unless you're willing to completely boycott technology. (Hey, did you know that by visiting Slashdot, even if you Adblock the ads, you increase their user statistics, which means they can sell more ads, even to companies who support DRM? Some of them are Flash-based!)
Now, as for MS getting a cut, if my computer already has Windows on it, MS already got a cut.
On my desktop, my parents paid to send me to college, and the college subscribed to the MSDN Academic Alliance. So there was a "free" copy of Windows XP Professional for me to burn. Sure, it's not free, but I already paid for it by going to that college, so at that point, a boycott buys me nothing.
On my laptop, it's a work laptop, and I need a few pieces of Windows software in order to work. The cost of Windows and this software (including Visual Studio for the debugging) is nowhere near significant when you factor in the other costs in completely non-free hardware and software. Basically, if I want to work in the industry I'm working in, I already have to have a copy of Windows.
I still refuse Windows DRM, by the way. But we have a word for you: fundamentalist. The world doesn't have room for fundamentalists, be they Christian, Muslim, or GNU. (Or Microsoft, either.)
I'd love to be working on that! Really, no sarcasm here, I would love to be paid to work on a project that doesn't have to be profitable.
If your motivation is a paycheck, I feel sorry for you. A paycheck is what forces me to get a job in the first place, and not slack off 100% of my time. But it is not the motivation for picking one project over another. Any living wage, especially in this small town I live in, will get me rent, toys (new hardware), probably even a vacation.
If your motivation is that your project be profitable, again, I feel sorry for you. Windows is certainly profitable.
I'd much rather work on a project that interests me, that advances the technology, and that maybe, just maybe, will be popular enough to change the world. But all of these fit things like Linux. If I can make a profit, or my project is a real contribution to the company, fine, but these are nice bonuses.
In other words: I'd much rather work on R&D than work on a successful product.
Fortunately, I've got a job (not at Google) that lets me get paid to work on something that will be profitable, and very likely will be popular. I'm definitely doing things (within my niche) that no one else is. About the only thing I don't have that occasionally makes me wish I was at Google is 20% of my working hours to spend on anything I want -- I can still work on pretty much anything that'll help the project (which covers a lot), I can write a corporate blog, but I can't, say, spend work hours developing a new OS or something.
it sounds a little bit black top hat and twirling mustache to me.
And Ballmer isn't?
I work for a former Microsoft employee, and he does agree that Ballmer is one of the weirder things... definitely not good for morale to have that guy at the helm.
I just don't see a huge multinational corporation having institutionalized hatred of a competitor so strongly that they can't bear to have people talk about switching teams.
Not even a multinational corporation with Steve "I'm going to fucking kill Google" Ballmer running it?
Does that much change at the basic level? We're talking highschool here; physics is F=ma, not string theory.
True, and many high school math books have actual, original BASIC programs to illustrate a few principles.
There are also economics books, social studies books, etc, things that, while the principles are still going to be sound, are likely to be paid a lot more attention to if they seem relevant and current.
I could point to lots of examples -- the most recent is likely the Mac/PC ads, which I went out of my way to watch. Another would have to be the Chuck Norris / Mountain Dew ads.
Most ads are utterly forgettable, except for the conditioning they do -- or they're just really annoying, like "punch the monkey". Some ads, particularly Google text ads, can be helpful without being in the way.
But the best ads are the ones that are entertaining enough that you actively seek them out. (That, and complete grassroots -- NOT astroturf -- I drink Mountain Dew mostly because of The Whiteboard.
I don't know how much advertising (that I don't watch, thanks to my DVR) subsidizes my TV watching, but I do know that I wouldn't pay that much more than I currently pay for TV.
Most TV shows are available on DVD. These generally come with no commercials. I've been watching Heroes on HD-DVD.
Maybe they wouldn't exist if not for the advertising, but I somehow doubt that. After all, where do summer blockbuster movies get their money? Generally not advertising, at least, not much.
I'm a fairly secure nerd, and I do have legitimate reasons for wanting an alternative to the iPhone. And I have legitimate reasons for running Linux.
But I don't go around to the Windows articles and tag them "iuselinux" or "windowsnewsisboring". The "vistasucks" tag would at least be legitimate as a comment. But "applenewsisboring", comment or tag, is retarded.
how much government money is blown (directly or indirectly) on the textbook rackets for K-12 schools? If you make THAT process more cost effective (how about selecting standard material and sticking with it, rather than updating every few years?)
Updating every few years is not a bad thing.
Printing the books is, however. And probably most of the money goes to paying for copies of them.
My humble suggestion: Make them all public domain. Spend government money on creating and updating the content, but after that, let the students get em for free online (for those who have laptops), or as cheap as they can from whatever publishing house is willing. Require any district handing out laptops to students (they're getting cheaper and cheaper) to make that available -- hell, maybe even require the kids to pay if they want a hard copy.
Does this mean the flying car will actually be released?
Because we said this about Half-Life 2, and it was released. We said it about Windows Longhorn (now Vista), and it was released. We said this about Team Fortress 2, and...
I'm getting a bit sick of seeing that tag on every "Apple" story.
Look, up there at the top -- see the Slashdot logo? Look immediately below that. The leftmost link should be your name (or you need to get an account, you Coward). And just right of that, "Preferences".
Inside Preferences, click on "Homepage", and scroll to "Customize stories on the homepage".
And in there, click the leftmost radio button next to "Apple". Scroll down again, and save your changes.
You can now shut the fuck up and stop trolling the Apple stories, because you won't even see them.
It wouldn't be a total loss, as some people would just grab both. But Joe User is going for the cheap one.
As for technical issues, I think that's going to become rapidly apparent. The most visible difference: HD-DVD menu animations don't suck giant donkey balls.
Less visible differences -- sorry, I'm under an NDA. Should be apparent at CES, though.
There are many, many good reasons to avoid Blu-Ray, and to boycott sony. Video quality is not one of them.
They both use exactly the same fucking video codecs -- but Blu-Ray has higher capacity discs and higher disk bandwidth. Which means that, if the difference was in any way noticeable, Blu-Ray wins that one.
If you really care about this, stop trolling and get some facts. Like I said, there are plenty of reasons to prefer HD-DVD.
If Blu-Ray goes tits-up, you've got a console that pretty much no one wants. How many people do you know with Xbox 360s? Or Wiis? How many with PS3s?
And how long will Sony keep producing games for it, if the format dies? Can they afford to keep a factory running to churn out only games on Blu-Ray?
I guess you can always put Linux on it and turn it into a Seti/Folding@Home node.
Now, if HD-DVD goes tits-up, that standalone player is as "worthless" as the PS3 in that not much new is coming out for it, but it only cost you $150 -- or $99, if you got it in time. And the A1, at least, already runs Linux.
I remember some big article about -- paramount, was it? Net result was, I went and read about it. For awhile, I still wasn't convinced.
Then I went to develop HD-DVDs. And I was thinking of starting to do Blu-Ray -- our company eventually would want to support any successful format -- but practically fell over laughing when I was told about the limitations of Blu-Ray.
HD-DVD players are cheaper than Blu-Ray players. Yet, look at any matrix comparing real features -- you'll find that while Blu-Ray theoretically supports everything HD-DVD does, more than half of those features are optional on Blu-Ray, but mandatory on HD-DVD. -- things like network connectivity, additional read/write storage (128 megs of flash required in every HD-DVD player, at least), and any scripting at all.
Or, try scripting an animated menu on HD-DVD -- it's easy, it'll animate pretty smoothly, and it can be big -- the whole screen, if you like, and translucent. Now, try it on Blu-Ray -- no, I won't spoil the joke for you. Just try it, on anything but the PS3.
An equally compelling interpretation is that that the format with more capacity and better library of titles wins.
How's Laserdisc doing?
VHS was also cheaper, including cheaper per byte of storage. Right now, I'd estimate HD-DVD wins that.
I've written enough posts tonight, and I'd rather not get modded -1 astroturfer, but I will say that there are reasons beyond price to like HD-DVD over Blu-Ray. At this point, I can see only three semi-legitimate reasons to prefer Blu-Ray:
You bought a PS3. If so, I feel sorry for you.
You want to cram as much as possible onto a single disc, even if it costs you more than two discs would.
You love Java and hate Javascript. Possible reasons for this:
You prefer static typing -- I find it retarded, but there are smarter people than me on both sides of that flamewar
You don't understand Javascript
For some perverse reason, you need performance in your program itself (HDi does animate faster than Blu-Ray's Java.)
By "semi-legitimate", I mean I can't argue with those reasons. There are completely illegitimate reasons, such as thinking HD-DVD wastes space supporting standard DVD (it doesn't; that's literally on the other side), actually wanting Blu-Ray's region coding and DRM to work (it doesn't), and being paid huge piles of money by Sony, which I count as a BS reason because Microsoft has bigger piles of money anyway.
I don't mean marketing hype, I mean that this is about where stuff was when DVD took over.
PS3s might decide it, but I doubt it. More likely, it's HD-DVD with the sub-$100 player, and the combo discs (flip it over and it's a standard DVD).
Picture quality really is amazing, if you have an HDTV -- and guess what? I'll bet most new TVs being sold are HD capable, particularly any meant to be put in front of a couch (not those little 15" things you put in the kitchen or whatever). So, if you're buying new hardware at all, it sort of becomes a "what the hell" decision.
And while Blu-ray doesn't guarantee it, boths allow real programming languages, and menus that appear while the video is playing. Watch an HD movie, but pick up the remote and play with the special features a bit, too -- 300, Heroes, any of those -- and you may start to get the point.
Whether "astronomical" prices would justify these gimmicks is a very good question. But again -- the A2 was on sale for $99 recently, and it's still only some $150. At that price, it's even worth it for standard DVDs -- your 30 dollar player will work, but it'll look like crap on an HDTV, compared to something with a decent upscaler -- but those are more like $500-$1k, and the A2 looks almost as good.
If you think Toshiba is making money on any players under $200 I have a bridge in Brookline.
I imagine they are, but I honestly don't know.
Game consoles, you can afford to sell below cost, because you make it back in game licenses. But what is Toshiba licensing? So far as I know, they may be licensing some patents on the players themselves -- but that hardly helps if no one's making money on the players.
Oh, and do you really have a bridge in Brookline? Is that a real place?
The real problem here is upconverted DVD looks pretty good and some (most?) people don't know how to properly set up a good HDTV installation or think it is too complex.
That's really bizarre. HDMI is dirt-simple to plug in, even if it's too sluggish to sync up for my tastes. And the A2 is a really good upconverter -- and even at $150, cheaper than anything close that only plays DVDs.
If you were stupid enough to buy a PS3, you've already got a Blu-Ray player.
The A2 is $150 now, and Wall-Mart was selling them for $99 last week. Most upscaling DVD players are more expensive, and I guarantee you spent more on your Mythbox.
"Compatibility nightmare"? Hmm... I plug this end of the HDMI cable in here, and this end in here, and hey, presto! It works! Same for ethernet. And while we do test everything on all the players we can get our hands on, if it works on the A1, it'll probably work on anything.
(That said, there have been some really embarrassing things lately. Some National Geographic video that didn't play on the Xbox, for instance. But hey, it's not like DVD is better anymore, with Sony (and others) deliberately breaking the spec in order to fool some players...)
As for ripping, why rip? Maybe it's just me, but I find I don't watch the same movie over and over except in very rare circumstances (in which case it'll just stay in my player). And it looks like Netflix has HD-DVDs now, so you can still get em in the mail. (And I suppose you _could_ rip them, if you _really_ wanted to -- there are keys all over the place, and mplayer will likely support the container format soon. It already supports h.264, and VC-1 is pretty much WMV9, right?)
Slashdot Mirror
How the fuck did we kill cnet, though?
I don't know whether to laugh or cry. I wanted to see TFA, for once...
But do cross out the parts you don't like.
That way, they can never say you don't have a contract, aren't a full-time employee, you're just another cog in the system -- just in case there's some reason to be.
But, when you leave, you'll have it on record that you signed a different contract, which, I imagine, is a lot more convincing than if there was no record at all.
I remember I had to sign an NDA. What I'm trying to remember now is whether it says they own any ideas I come up with outside of work, or only what I produce while working on a project.
But it does make sense that if you bring up an idea at the company, on company time, the company should own it. The reason this makes sense is that the alternative really sucks for companies -- where an employee who comes up with a particular idea can basically hold the whole company hostage. I seem to remember hearing of this happening before -- where a company's flagship product was largely the result of one guy, who then basically took the whole codebase and founded a competing company.
I have no problem with a noncompete/NDA that expires with the job. But yeah, beyond term of employment is a bit of a problem.
Is exchange that bad to use through the Web interface? Does it work on Safari?
If not, is there some other system you could be using? Our corporate email is done through Gmail, and we seem happy with it.
I'm not arguing whether apple news is boring or not.
I'm just wondering why you feel obligated to read those two a day (even to the comments page) and tag them? If they're really so fucking boring, you can do us both a favor and get the fuck out.
Didn't I just show you how?
You actually blame the antitrust suit for Microsoft being that bad?
Did you actually use Windows 95? 98? It sucked. ME sucked more than Vista, by a lot. Back in a time when floppies were one of the more convenient ways to transfer small files, your entire computer would lag, horribly and visibly, during any floppy access.
If we hadn't given them a thorough slap with the antitrust case, not to mention some actual competition from Google, they wouldn't be doing as well as they are now. Judging by how well they're (not) doing now, that's saying a lot. But I do see Windows 2000 as a direct response to Linux -- which, no matter how you look at it, NT was intended to be a direct response to Unix.
As for evilness, is it really any better now, with Steve "The Chair" Ballmer?
I keep my current signature as a reminder, because I now work in an industry that has all kinds of DRM. I work with the knowledge that my code will very likely be restricted by copyright and DRM.
I keep it to remind me not to become complacent, to further a DRM-free world if I can.
But, consider: Would you take this to the extent of not buying any DVDs? After all, they contain DRM, even if it's been cracked wider than the Goatse Man's ass.
Would you avoid going to movies, or watching TV, because the same companies do DVD releases? Would you avoid, say, cable Internet in favor of DSL, just so the cable companies don't get a cut? (Realizing that if they do, it eventually ends up in the entertainment industry...)
I'd say, the root of the problem is the existence of huge corporations, little mini-states unto themselves. You've pretty much already lost the DRM issue. Pay attention in the 2008 election, get a candidate to say he'll revoke some parts of the DMCA if you can, but I don't think there's much else you can do, unless you're willing to completely boycott technology. (Hey, did you know that by visiting Slashdot, even if you Adblock the ads, you increase their user statistics, which means they can sell more ads, even to companies who support DRM? Some of them are Flash-based!)
Now, as for MS getting a cut, if my computer already has Windows on it, MS already got a cut.
On my desktop, my parents paid to send me to college, and the college subscribed to the MSDN Academic Alliance. So there was a "free" copy of Windows XP Professional for me to burn. Sure, it's not free, but I already paid for it by going to that college, so at that point, a boycott buys me nothing.
On my laptop, it's a work laptop, and I need a few pieces of Windows software in order to work. The cost of Windows and this software (including Visual Studio for the debugging) is nowhere near significant when you factor in the other costs in completely non-free hardware and software. Basically, if I want to work in the industry I'm working in, I already have to have a copy of Windows.
I still refuse Windows DRM, by the way. But we have a word for you: fundamentalist. The world doesn't have room for fundamentalists, be they Christian, Muslim, or GNU. (Or Microsoft, either.)
I'd love to be working on that! Really, no sarcasm here, I would love to be paid to work on a project that doesn't have to be profitable.
If your motivation is a paycheck, I feel sorry for you. A paycheck is what forces me to get a job in the first place, and not slack off 100% of my time. But it is not the motivation for picking one project over another. Any living wage, especially in this small town I live in, will get me rent, toys (new hardware), probably even a vacation.
If your motivation is that your project be profitable, again, I feel sorry for you. Windows is certainly profitable.
I'd much rather work on a project that interests me, that advances the technology, and that maybe, just maybe, will be popular enough to change the world. But all of these fit things like Linux. If I can make a profit, or my project is a real contribution to the company, fine, but these are nice bonuses.
In other words: I'd much rather work on R&D than work on a successful product.
Fortunately, I've got a job (not at Google) that lets me get paid to work on something that will be profitable, and very likely will be popular. I'm definitely doing things (within my niche) that no one else is. About the only thing I don't have that occasionally makes me wish I was at Google is 20% of my working hours to spend on anything I want -- I can still work on pretty much anything that'll help the project (which covers a lot), I can write a corporate blog, but I can't, say, spend work hours developing a new OS or something.
it IS so bad!
And Ballmer isn't?
I work for a former Microsoft employee, and he does agree that Ballmer is one of the weirder things... definitely not good for morale to have that guy at the helm.
Not even a multinational corporation with Steve "I'm going to fucking kill Google" Ballmer running it?
True, and many high school math books have actual, original BASIC programs to illustrate a few principles.
There are also economics books, social studies books, etc, things that, while the principles are still going to be sound, are likely to be paid a lot more attention to if they seem relevant and current.
I could point to lots of examples -- the most recent is likely the Mac/PC ads, which I went out of my way to watch. Another would have to be the Chuck Norris / Mountain Dew ads.
Most ads are utterly forgettable, except for the conditioning they do -- or they're just really annoying, like "punch the monkey". Some ads, particularly Google text ads, can be helpful without being in the way.
But the best ads are the ones that are entertaining enough that you actively seek them out. (That, and complete grassroots -- NOT astroturf -- I drink Mountain Dew mostly because of The Whiteboard.
Most TV shows are available on DVD. These generally come with no commercials. I've been watching Heroes on HD-DVD.
Maybe they wouldn't exist if not for the advertising, but I somehow doubt that. After all, where do summer blockbuster movies get their money? Generally not advertising, at least, not much.
I'm a fairly secure nerd, and I do have legitimate reasons for wanting an alternative to the iPhone. And I have legitimate reasons for running Linux.
But I don't go around to the Windows articles and tag them "iuselinux" or "windowsnewsisboring". The "vistasucks" tag would at least be legitimate as a comment. But "applenewsisboring", comment or tag, is retarded.
Updating every few years is not a bad thing.
Printing the books is, however. And probably most of the money goes to paying for copies of them.
My humble suggestion: Make them all public domain. Spend government money on creating and updating the content, but after that, let the students get em for free online (for those who have laptops), or as cheap as they can from whatever publishing house is willing. Require any district handing out laptops to students (they're getting cheaper and cheaper) to make that available -- hell, maybe even require the kids to pay if they want a hard copy.
Does this mean the flying car will actually be released?
Because we said this about Half-Life 2, and it was released. We said it about Windows Longhorn (now Vista), and it was released. We said this about Team Fortress 2, and...
I'm getting a bit sick of seeing that tag on every "Apple" story.
Look, up there at the top -- see the Slashdot logo? Look immediately below that. The leftmost link should be your name (or you need to get an account, you Coward). And just right of that, "Preferences".
Inside Preferences, click on "Homepage", and scroll to "Customize stories on the homepage".
And in there, click the leftmost radio button next to "Apple". Scroll down again, and save your changes.
You can now shut the fuck up and stop trolling the Apple stories, because you won't even see them.
Blu-Ray player for $100... HD-DVD player for $50.
It wouldn't be a total loss, as some people would just grab both. But Joe User is going for the cheap one.
As for technical issues, I think that's going to become rapidly apparent. The most visible difference: HD-DVD menu animations don't suck giant donkey balls.
Less visible differences -- sorry, I'm under an NDA. Should be apparent at CES, though.
There are many, many good reasons to avoid Blu-Ray, and to boycott sony. Video quality is not one of them.
They both use exactly the same fucking video codecs -- but Blu-Ray has higher capacity discs and higher disk bandwidth. Which means that, if the difference was in any way noticeable, Blu-Ray wins that one.
If you really care about this, stop trolling and get some facts. Like I said, there are plenty of reasons to prefer HD-DVD.
If Blu-Ray goes tits-up, you've got a console that pretty much no one wants. How many people do you know with Xbox 360s? Or Wiis? How many with PS3s?
And how long will Sony keep producing games for it, if the format dies? Can they afford to keep a factory running to churn out only games on Blu-Ray?
I guess you can always put Linux on it and turn it into a Seti/Folding@Home node.
Now, if HD-DVD goes tits-up, that standalone player is as "worthless" as the PS3 in that not much new is coming out for it, but it only cost you $150 -- or $99, if you got it in time. And the A1, at least, already runs Linux.
One of those is true.
I remember some big article about -- paramount, was it? Net result was, I went and read about it. For awhile, I still wasn't convinced.
Then I went to develop HD-DVDs. And I was thinking of starting to do Blu-Ray -- our company eventually would want to support any successful format -- but practically fell over laughing when I was told about the limitations of Blu-Ray.
HD-DVD players are cheaper than Blu-Ray players. Yet, look at any matrix comparing real features -- you'll find that while Blu-Ray theoretically supports everything HD-DVD does, more than half of those features are optional on Blu-Ray, but mandatory on HD-DVD. -- things like network connectivity, additional read/write storage (128 megs of flash required in every HD-DVD player, at least), and any scripting at all.
Or, try scripting an animated menu on HD-DVD -- it's easy, it'll animate pretty smoothly, and it can be big -- the whole screen, if you like, and translucent. Now, try it on Blu-Ray -- no, I won't spoil the joke for you. Just try it, on anything but the PS3.
How's Laserdisc doing?
VHS was also cheaper, including cheaper per byte of storage. Right now, I'd estimate HD-DVD wins that.
I've written enough posts tonight, and I'd rather not get modded -1 astroturfer, but I will say that there are reasons beyond price to like HD-DVD over Blu-Ray. At this point, I can see only three semi-legitimate reasons to prefer Blu-Ray:
By "semi-legitimate", I mean I can't argue with those reasons. There are completely illegitimate reasons, such as thinking HD-DVD wastes space supporting standard DVD (it doesn't; that's literally on the other side), actually wanting Blu-Ray's region coding and DRM to work (it doesn't), and being paid huge piles of money by Sony, which I count as a BS reason because Microsoft has bigger piles of money anyway.
I don't mean marketing hype, I mean that this is about where stuff was when DVD took over.
PS3s might decide it, but I doubt it. More likely, it's HD-DVD with the sub-$100 player, and the combo discs (flip it over and it's a standard DVD).
Picture quality really is amazing, if you have an HDTV -- and guess what? I'll bet most new TVs being sold are HD capable, particularly any meant to be put in front of a couch (not those little 15" things you put in the kitchen or whatever). So, if you're buying new hardware at all, it sort of becomes a "what the hell" decision.
And while Blu-ray doesn't guarantee it, boths allow real programming languages, and menus that appear while the video is playing. Watch an HD movie, but pick up the remote and play with the special features a bit, too -- 300, Heroes, any of those -- and you may start to get the point.
Whether "astronomical" prices would justify these gimmicks is a very good question. But again -- the A2 was on sale for $99 recently, and it's still only some $150. At that price, it's even worth it for standard DVDs -- your 30 dollar player will work, but it'll look like crap on an HDTV, compared to something with a decent upscaler -- but those are more like $500-$1k, and the A2 looks almost as good.
Vee Eych Ess.
Dee Vee Dee.
Eych Dee Dee Vee Dee. Harder? No, really?
Bee Dee.
But, realistically, if HD-DVD wins, you know it's going to either be abbreviated to DVD or HD.
I imagine they are, but I honestly don't know.
Game consoles, you can afford to sell below cost, because you make it back in game licenses. But what is Toshiba licensing? So far as I know, they may be licensing some patents on the players themselves -- but that hardly helps if no one's making money on the players.
Oh, and do you really have a bridge in Brookline? Is that a real place?
That's really bizarre. HDMI is dirt-simple to plug in, even if it's too sluggish to sync up for my tastes. And the A2 is a really good upconverter -- and even at $150, cheaper than anything close that only plays DVDs.
If you were stupid enough to buy a PS3, you've already got a Blu-Ray player.
The A2 is $150 now, and Wall-Mart was selling them for $99 last week. Most upscaling DVD players are more expensive, and I guarantee you spent more on your Mythbox.
"Compatibility nightmare"? Hmm... I plug this end of the HDMI cable in here, and this end in here, and hey, presto! It works! Same for ethernet. And while we do test everything on all the players we can get our hands on, if it works on the A1, it'll probably work on anything.
(That said, there have been some really embarrassing things lately. Some National Geographic video that didn't play on the Xbox, for instance. But hey, it's not like DVD is better anymore, with Sony (and others) deliberately breaking the spec in order to fool some players...)
As for ripping, why rip? Maybe it's just me, but I find I don't watch the same movie over and over except in very rare circumstances (in which case it'll just stay in my player). And it looks like Netflix has HD-DVDs now, so you can still get em in the mail. (And I suppose you _could_ rip them, if you _really_ wanted to -- there are keys all over the place, and mplayer will likely support the container format soon. It already supports h.264, and VC-1 is pretty much WMV9, right?)