Interesting too that it's said like December 2010 is like a decade in the future rather than under three years. Like it's a no-interest period for a car loan.
I'm a bit more concerned that Microsoft may not want to continue to license HDeaDVD support from Toshiba and, with an update, render the platform incapable of playing HD DVDs.
As someone who is taking advantage of the current fire sale on discs, this concerns me.
I'm always surprised to see Apple listed as a Bluray backer... particularly considering I don't believe I've ever seen an Apple device with Bluray built in. As am I, considering that DVD Studio Pro supports HD DVD, not Blu-ray, and Apple's DVD Player software is the only player built into an operating system (Leopard) that supports an HD format, and that format is HD DVD (provided that it was mastered with DVD Studio Pro).
DRM-crap on DVDs sure is trying to make it hard to sabotage a paying customer's experience with ads/fbi_warning/regioning I've been watching Lost season 2 on DVD and have been surprised that while I can chapter-skip past the Buena Vista logo at the start, the warnings about copying and performance can't have anything done to them, not even pause, and the first one goes by far too fast to even read it! I'd have to use a still-store feature in my display to read what I'm not supposed to do with the disc.
Profile 2.0's only real feature is Internet connectivity, which is kinda neat... I remember when the complaint about DiVX was that it phoned home your viewing practices. I guess this has become more acceptable now that it uses the Internet instead of your phone.
Aren't blue lasers the best for accuracy/data density at the moment? They could have gone with UV-ray had there not been that connection with skin cancer.
All my units go through switchboxes that don't like me using both S-Video and Composite at the same time, and after passing through the stereo system it goes into a digital video bridge to convert the signal to a DV stream over Firewire so I can edit it on my computer.
I'd rather it stay in the highest quality cable the bridge can handle.
Retribution
I am going to kill you because you killed my brother.
Anticipation
I am going to kill you because I killed your brother.
Diplomacy
I am going to kill my brother and then I'm going to kill you on the pretext that your brother did it.
HD DVD had pretty ineffective advertising for the format.
While Blu-ray has ads that put the format up front and show you multiple movies you can get for the format, HD DVD ads are mostly ads for a single movie, available on DVD and HD DVD. The only ad you could say was an ad for the HD DVD format itself focused far too much on characters of Shrek, and the characters were actually complaining about the superior quality of the picture, either for Donkey's dragon girlfriend looking too big and scaly or Gingie finding himself looking too delicious and taking bites out of himself, ([crunch] "Ow. Yummy!"). Rather than promoting the format, it felt like it was promoting the Shrek franchise.
I find it interesting too that though Apple backs Blu-ray, DVD Studio Pro supports HD DVD instead. Apple's DVD Player software included with Leopard only plays HD DVDs mastered by DVD Studio Pro, but still is the first OS to ship with native support for an HD media format, and it was HD DVD. Still, the mastering time is ridiculous: 1 week to encode 22 minutes of 1920x1080i video to H.264 on a 4-core Mac Pro with Compressor running 24/7.
I'm still considering picking up a second HD DVD drive for the XBOX 360 for use on my computers so I don't have to move the one I have around and risk damaging it. I've already invested in many HD DVD releases, most of them exclusively released to HD DVD, and am now reaping the benefits of 50% sales on more titles. A discounted drive that I can use on a computer, AACS keys disclosed, another five HD DVDs free... I'm even reconsidering purchasing HD titles I already have on DVD.
Meanwhile there are still studios with exclusive HD DVD contracts with titles I want sooner than later.
(You can't find a VHS player with S-Video out anymore at a reasonable price. Those dual VHS-DVD decks don't support S-Video for the VHS side. S-VHS decks sell for more than twice what HD DVD decks are. A JVC deck I've been watching is now $414.99.)
If Presidential aides break the law, should they be immune from investigation as long as the President invokes executive privilege? The real issue is that the Justice Department has said they won't investigate and bring charges, meaning it wouldn't go to court in the first place -- seems a bit of an odd choice if the court wouldn't do something about it. Going after his aides won't get the aides. The President will still Pardon or Commute sentences for them like he did for Libby. But he won't want Pardon them until he leaves office at the end of his term. To Pardon them now leaves them no recourse for refusing to testify. Claim privilege and he can keep them silent (or amnesiac) until his departure and avoid investigation, impeachment, and removal from office. Then he can resign at the very end, swear in Cheney, and have Cheney Pardon him (as Ford did Nixon).
That he can leverage Pardons and Commutations of his co-conspirators to get them all off scot free becomes the basis of the executive privilege he's asserting.
The one chink in the armor is the investigatory arm of a civil suit against the cooperating telecoms. Unless he can convince Justice that his power to Pardon can block a civil suit. It would be difficult argument to win without a better stacking of SCOTUS, which is why he'd rather get Congress to do it for him.
We need these friendly worms to patch these systems. How else than with lots of rapidly spreading, good intentioned automata are we to pave the very long road to Hell on time and under budget?
I couldn't get to this story's comments from the Firehose proper by clicking the "Read More" link or story title. I had to either click the message count in the collapsed story or go to idle.slashdot.org (which then changed my filtering in my original Firehose tab).
there's no feeling quite as electric as getting bit by 20,000 volts on the end of your finger whenever you step out of the car... Yeah, it's amazing they don't shut down gas stations in winter what with the irrational fear of people using a cell phone there igniting gas fumes.
How about when the work itself would naturally die? I find it ludicrous that a tray liner in a fast food restaurant should enjoy unknown-author's lifetime plus 70 years of copyright protection in the US.
You've just condemned all good musicians to be one hit wonders No, the good ones will be made to continue producing under penalty of death. The one-hit-wonders though who can't produce anything else, they will be put to death.
It definitely needs to be less than the artist's lifetime. Significantly less so that they have incentive to produce more works to continue to make money rather than rest on their old catalog and have their talent disintegrate.
Make copyright last the duration of retirement. Produce your last best works when you're 64, retiring on the royalties when aged 65 up to 115 (50 years) is already quite generous. Not that retirement at 65 is even necessary (Tina Turner, Paul McCartney, soon Mick Jagger).
Bob Roberts: This device is producing light and energy without heat. Michael 'Mike' Harlan: How is that possible? Bob Roberts: It's not possible. At least, not on this planet. Vince Latello: Woah, what other planets are we talking about?
The trouble is, the techniques that help you disentangle a bundle of cables not attached to any equipment are not applicable when some of the cables are plugged in and need to stay plugged in, as usually in real life.
If they must stay plugged in, then there will be situations where the cables cannot be untangled, especially if connected at both ends to equipment you can't move.
They need a variant of the sport where there are thirty cables, some plugged into various patch panels at both ends, some at one end only, and some free; your task is to extract the loose and dangling cables and leave the working ones.
Don't forget to require that they all look identical except that some may have mismatched ends. And some may have lost their tabs already so that a slight tug will pull them out.
If you're untangling them loose, you might as well just yank them all, cut new wire, and untangle the original nest later. First of course confirming what was connected to what. Of course, for some situations where you don't have an n-port continuity tester (n much much greater than 2), it helps to have a rat(*) that you clip on one end of the cable that runs down the physical wire to the other end, picking and pushing its way through any obstacles and tangles.
(*) rat == robotic attachment traverser. What else would you use to go through a "rat's nest" of tangled cables?
Slashdot Mirror
I like how they're the "Fource" because there's seven of them.
Interesting too that it's said like December 2010 is like a decade in the future rather than under three years. Like it's a no-interest period for a car loan.
And then it will be revealed that IT is just a two-wheeled standing scooter.
I'm a bit more concerned that Microsoft may not want to continue to license HDeaDVD support from Toshiba and, with an update, render the platform incapable of playing HD DVDs.
As someone who is taking advantage of the current fire sale on discs, this concerns me.
It was also intended that SCSI be pronounced "sexy".
All my units go through switchboxes that don't like me using both S-Video and Composite at the same time, and after passing through the stereo system it goes into a digital video bridge to convert the signal to a DV stream over Firewire so I can edit it on my computer.
I'd rather it stay in the highest quality cable the bridge can handle.
Retribution I am going to kill you because you killed my brother. Anticipation I am going to kill you because I killed your brother. Diplomacy I am going to kill my brother and then I'm going to kill you on the pretext that your brother did it.
HD DVD had pretty ineffective advertising for the format.
While Blu-ray has ads that put the format up front and show you multiple movies you can get for the format, HD DVD ads are mostly ads for a single movie, available on DVD and HD DVD. The only ad you could say was an ad for the HD DVD format itself focused far too much on characters of Shrek, and the characters were actually complaining about the superior quality of the picture, either for Donkey's dragon girlfriend looking too big and scaly or Gingie finding himself looking too delicious and taking bites out of himself, ([crunch] "Ow. Yummy!"). Rather than promoting the format, it felt like it was promoting the Shrek franchise.
I find it interesting too that though Apple backs Blu-ray, DVD Studio Pro supports HD DVD instead. Apple's DVD Player software included with Leopard only plays HD DVDs mastered by DVD Studio Pro, but still is the first OS to ship with native support for an HD media format, and it was HD DVD. Still, the mastering time is ridiculous: 1 week to encode 22 minutes of 1920x1080i video to H.264 on a 4-core Mac Pro with Compressor running 24/7.
I'm still considering picking up a second HD DVD drive for the XBOX 360 for use on my computers so I don't have to move the one I have around and risk damaging it. I've already invested in many HD DVD releases, most of them exclusively released to HD DVD, and am now reaping the benefits of 50% sales on more titles. A discounted drive that I can use on a computer, AACS keys disclosed, another five HD DVDs free... I'm even reconsidering purchasing HD titles I already have on DVD.
Meanwhile there are still studios with exclusive HD DVD contracts with titles I want sooner than later.
(You can't find a VHS player with S-Video out anymore at a reasonable price. Those dual VHS-DVD decks don't support S-Video for the VHS side. S-VHS decks sell for more than twice what HD DVD decks are. A JVC deck I've been watching is now $414.99.)
That he can leverage Pardons and Commutations of his co-conspirators to get them all off scot free becomes the basis of the executive privilege he's asserting.
The one chink in the armor is the investigatory arm of a civil suit against the cooperating telecoms. Unless he can convince Justice that his power to Pardon can block a civil suit. It would be difficult argument to win without a better stacking of SCOTUS, which is why he'd rather get Congress to do it for him.
We need these friendly worms to patch these systems. How else than with lots of rapidly spreading, good intentioned automata are we to pave the very long road to Hell on time and under budget?
I couldn't get to this story's comments from the Firehose proper by clicking the "Read More" link or story title. I had to either click the message count in the collapsed story or go to idle.slashdot.org (which then changed my filtering in my original Firehose tab).
How about when the work itself would naturally die? I find it ludicrous that a tray liner in a fast food restaurant should enjoy unknown-author's lifetime plus 70 years of copyright protection in the US.
At the rate copyright is extended, Britney Spears will continue receiving royalties in the year 5.5/apple/26 for her traditional ballad "Toxic".
You've just condemned all good musicians to be one hit wonders No, the good ones will be made to continue producing under penalty of death. The one-hit-wonders though who can't produce anything else, they will be put to death.
It definitely needs to be less than the artist's lifetime. Significantly less so that they have incentive to produce more works to continue to make money rather than rest on their old catalog and have their talent disintegrate.
Make copyright last the duration of retirement. Produce your last best works when you're 64, retiring on the royalties when aged 65 up to 115 (50 years) is already quite generous. Not that retirement at 65 is even necessary (Tina Turner, Paul McCartney, soon Mick Jagger).
Bob Roberts: This device is producing light and energy without heat.
Michael 'Mike' Harlan: How is that possible?
Bob Roberts: It's not possible. At least, not on this planet.
Vince Latello: Woah, what other planets are we talking about?
If they must stay plugged in, then there will be situations where the cables cannot be untangled, especially if connected at both ends to equipment you can't move.
Don't forget to require that they all look identical except that some may have mismatched ends. And some may have lost their tabs already so that a slight tug will pull them out.
If you're untangling them loose, you might as well just yank them all, cut new wire, and untangle the original nest later. First of course confirming what was connected to what. Of course, for some situations where you don't have an n-port continuity tester (n much much greater than 2), it helps to have a rat(*) that you clip on one end of the cable that runs down the physical wire to the other end, picking and pushing its way through any obstacles and tangles.
(*) rat == robotic attachment traverser. What else would you use to go through a "rat's nest" of tangled cables?